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Presumably Apple began working on and set the ship date without any regard to this particular development.

It was about the previous problems. This is just more of the same.

They would have switched anyway.

Apple is all about controlling all parts of their phone and software.

Now they have a well working ARM chip they have all the control over which is good enough for at least the non developer models of their laptops so it was just a question of time until they switch.

I mean why _long term_ maintain two OS'ses and two CPU archs when you can just focus one one. (And yes I'm convinced Apple will turn macOS into iOS+some desktop features in the long run).

Is there a legit case for doing it as an exercise for the experience (shaking out bugs, making discoveries by having 2 discrete development platforms), or as a strategic card, so they “have options”? I don’t know how the costs scale - whether it’s <2, ~2, or >2, and at what cost any (potential) benefits are simply cost prohibitive. Anybody have insight into this business, esp with something approaching a major player like Apple?

There's a pretty in-depth video analyzing the motivations and perceived strategic benefits here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wgEKDGNjqsk

I'm not sure he's entirely right, but I found it pretty compelling, overall.

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