Spreadsheet "breaks" Apple Vision Pro eye-tracking
kguttag.com
kguttag.com
Happy to report that in the last few years since 2007, GIMP did fix their default colorspace, I can scale the Dalai Lama down even with the Linear filter and it doesn't turn grey.
https://erikmcclure.com/blog/everyone-does-srgb-wrong-becaus...
linear-gradient(in srgb-linear, ...)
Works in Safari/Chrome but not yet on Firefox
Not sure if it’s still up to date, so please check out the list of resources mentioned in the footer too.
One day excel gang will no doubt be using this type of VR setup. It makes for a very poor early adopter crowd though - Excel users need keyboards not current finger gesture setup. They're very reliant on muscle memory, shortcuts and predictable low latency interactions with literally a single piece of software.
Unless you want to pay your accountant twice as much and get 1/10 of the output...they're probably going to be late adopters by virtue of bad fit
The whole point of Vision Pro like devices is you wear your computer on your face always with you and the only peripherals you need are your eyes and hands also always on you.
Highdpi would be 4K on a 24" screen a foot or two away. The vision pro spreads those pixels out over a much bigger angle.
It's got enough pixels to equal a few 1080p monitors though.
[0] - https://www.ifixit.com/News/90409/vision-pro-teardown-part-2...
See also this post which has more numbers: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39323574
That’s what some people are dreaming at night.
And have you ever upgraded your monitor to a larger one so you could fit more on the screen at once? That helps productivity too.
Imagine being able to make as many monitors and in as many sizes as you want. And imagine being able to take them with you as a replacement for your laptop monitor.
I have and I haven't been delivering code/tasks 50% faster when my monitor count increased by 50% from 2 to 3. Then went back to one monitor with virtual workspaces as that made me more productive than having to constantly move my neck eyes across a sprawl of windows. Plus having to manage windows around and tile them "just right" across several monitors always interrupted my flow, and worse, was costing me even more time when those windows were moving around and they weren't in the place where I remember I left them last time.
>Imagine [...]
But I'm not asking what you imagine it might do. I'm asking if it actually measurably improves your productivity, not if you imagine it could, because those are two very different things.
I also imagined that having as many monitors as an operator from The Matrix would make me more productive but it hasn't. My coding and task delivery speed has stayed the same or even gone down inversely proportional to the number of monitors.
2 to 3 is a bit of a jump because now you can keep slack or teams or email on the third monitor (rotating is great for this).
But my other two monitors after that really don't give me that much more.
Depends, for some people switching windows/workspaces is less intrusive than moving their head to the sides all the time. Personally I had all kinds of multi monitor setups and the best one for my neck and eyes is a single one that fits in the center of my field of view. Even when I have more monitors, I usually end up using one in the center 90% of the time and the second one on the side is mostly a waste.
In my personal experience, having Teams or Outlook visible whilst I'm trying to work is a negative impact on my productivity. Most messages/emails do not require my immediate attention, having them open is an unhelpful distraction.
"I like it more" is a good-enough reason to do it!
Consider another example--I sleep alone on a king-size bed. If I swapped it for a queen bed, I bet it wouldn't even show up in any sort "measurably improved" metric: Time to fall asleep, total time slept, time to wake up, maybe trying to measure physical fitness numbers, etc.
But I still prefer the king bed. Maybe some people wouldn't care, and would rather save the space/money, and that's totally fine too.
I love falling asleep alone on our king size bed. I put my head on the female side where it smells like my wife does (hormones etc). My legs then half sideways. But I also think the weight is better there given matras is 8 years old. Caveat is a queen size is easier to turn around than a king size (weird cringe terms TBH). And you need to do that every other week to preserve the matras.
I don’t have a Vision Pro, so I can only imagine how much nicer a virtual 27” 4K monitor would be compared to my tiny laptop monitor. I think the benefit should be obvious to anybody with an open mind about the idea, though.
I am frustrated with all the GUI SQL clients like pgadmin4, DBeaver, etc.
There are so many things brain damaged about those things, for instance the way they are always harassing you to every precious SQL query you wrote but aren't really oriented to saving your files together with your code in version control with discipline as well as having scratch files that don't punish you for using scratch files.
The worst problem is that the harder queries involve looking at several tables at once so I really want something that lets me look at all the table definitions that are relevant to a query I am writing at once and that does the same thing at the instance level as well as the schema level, that is, if I am looking at a particular record I want to see the graph of related records around it following key relationships, whether those are coded in the schema or not.
> Sometimes when I code on a 13" screen, I feel like I am more naturally inclined to write better, easily maintainable code
I'm not sure what to call this - an unnecessary superstition? Self flagellation? I've never needed a constraint like this to write better, easily maintainable code. YMMV, I guess?
I'll set up as many monitors as I can fit on my desk. I've had up to 9 before which was equivalent to approximately an 83" curved screen. Currently I have three 32" 4k monitors in portrait which are equivalent to one big 55" 6k screen (6480 x 3840). It does help with my productivity, a lot.
Having only one screen means switching between many windows constantly, it's inefficient and a real pain when I need 8 or more windows open for different things - front end code, back end code, front end debug window, back end debug window, several different browser applications for testing, dozens of Google results and API document pages, terminal(s), and more. Nothing beats having all the important stuff visible at the same time.
I have a laptop. It has 2 screens. I'd add a third screen but it would get in the way of the TV when I'm on the couch in the evenings.
But those aren't visible at the same time since you can't fit your whole 9 monitors in your field of view and focus on them at the same time. You can only focus and work only on a monitor at a time, and so you need to constantly switch monitors, meaning the monitors you aren't looking at each moment are basically a redundant waste.
I don't judge, whatever floats your boat. But I managed to replace multi monitor setups with virtual desktops and shortcuts. Way cheaper and more space efficient, and more ergonomic since I don't need to keep my neck at an angle all the time to the monitors on the side, but always to the one and only in the middle.
Or turn your head and track faster than you can jump back and forth between several overlapping windows?
That’s also bit like saying you don’t need a monitor bigger than your fovea, because you can only read in your fovea.
Eye movement, head movement, and internal tracking a good part of a sphere of awareness around ourselves are what our visual system - physical and mental - were designed to be extremely fast at.
Just because we can see movement on the outer ends of our field of view to see predators, doesn't mean I can also comfortably stare at code via the side of my eyes. Filed of focus != field of view. Yeah, I can see nearly 180 degrees, but I can only comfortably focus for work on what's in the center of my FoV.
This is not what I suggested. I never suggested coding in your peripheral vision, and to suggest it is just trolling.
I have long-running tasks in windows open around and I need to know when they update. Peripheral vision works extremely well for this, but having the window submerged under the code I'm working on behind dozens of other windows, I would never see it. then I'm forced to have my code at half the width of a tiny screen so I can see the long-running task progress in another half of a tiny screen? No Thank You. I'll take multiple screens all day long for the complex development work I do.
But sure, go ahead and invent whatever you want out of what I said to win a pointless internet argument, I don't care. I just won't be replying anymore.
My three 32" 4k screens are equivalent to 6 pretty big 24" screens, essentially one big 55" screen and sitting with my head against my chair's headrest I my eyes can see every corner of all of it without having to move my neck one millimeter, my eyes effortlessly move around and I can see all the data. Maybe you have some kind of problem with your eyes that prevents that, but it's absolutely easy to find the data I need with zero additional effort.
It's way more efficient than having 1 screen and locating the data required constantly. The difference in friction is very noticeable and painful when I'm only on one screen because it does slow me down, and there's no way around that for anyone, one screen always means more cognitive load and higher latency to getting the data in front of your eyes. Shortcuts and virtual desktops don't change that. And, often things happen that I catch in my peripheral vision, like console logs I'm expecting to happen, that I wouldn't be able to catch if the window isn't visible.
Sorry but you'll never convince me that 1 monitor is in any way superior to multiple monitors, it just does not compute.
NEITHER DO I. I don't know how much clearer I can make that, yet you still refuse to understand.
><super + ]> and the screen for the web browser appears in front of my eyes. To be fair, on my keyboard super + ] is right thumb + right index finger. I have shortcuts for every program that I use, and every program that I use has its virtual desktop binded to some key combination on what is a very weird keyboard.
None of this is relevant to me in the least. I don't have to do any of it, because all the info I need is already in view of my eyeballs >>without moving my head at all<<, as if that's even some kind of manufactured inconvenience.
>And I maintain that a small screen is perfect for redacting code (and I had a similar setup of yours in the past).
Sure, if all you do is interact with one single text editor, and not any of the many other screens that modern development requires.
Having this conversation with you is pointless, enjoy your mediocre computing experience.
And I can see more going on at the same time. It's absolutely more efficient than a single screen for my complex development needs.
There's just so many workflows that are so much better with multiple displays, but you really just can't see it? I'm sorry, but you have a mediocre computing experience, and I know it, because I have a laptop and I know what using one screen is like vs. efficiently being able to see more data at the same time. I know all the tricks, I've been computing for 40+ years. I also know that hardware is cheap, and my time is not cheap, and more information being displayed definitely does increase my efficiency.
I was just developing a 3d model using OpenJSCAD with code in one window, and a view of the 3D model in 2 perspectives in 2 other windows. I write code, hit save, and see the 3d model update, and it's a very visual oriented thing, switching windows so I can see the result would remove my ability to see the updates happen, which informs me that the model is updated correctly. I also have a debugger window open and other windows that I always need to see all the time. You just can't do this with a single screen, it's not possible without cutting the screen up into tiny sections or constantly flipping between them which is DX friction. It's simply an excruciatingly cramped experience to get what I have within a single screen, and no mental gymnastics you could do would change that.
>"98% of users preferred a dual monitor configurator to a single monitor."
https://www.ie-uk.com/blog/how-multiple-monitors-affects-pro...
>"FAIRLY INEXPENSIVE PRODUCTIVITY BOOSTER Purchasing another display is a fairly low investment when looking at technology. Monitors range in price based on size and specification but typically a suitable one can be purchased from £200. And with a 42% average productivity boost, it can provide a great ROI. Even an ultrawide monitor with a built in dock to reduce desk clutter only costs around £600."
https://itfoundations.com/are-two-monitors-really-more-produ...
>"A study in 2017 by Fujitsu Siemens Computers analyzed whether multiple monitors boosted productivity. The company found that two monitors increased productivity by 25 percent compared to single-monitor setups. Workspaces equipped with three displays can increase productivity by 35.5% >This study was further backed up by scientists from the University of Utah have shown with their studies on the subject."
https://www.graphicdesigneire.ie/graphic-design-blog/multipl...
>"Over 15 years, Jon Peddie Research conducted three separate studies on the effectiveness of a two-monitor setup compared to using just one monitor. >It found that the overall average productivity boost was 42% when users added that second monitor. >The firm also found that between 2002 and 2017, there’s been a significant rise in the use of two monitors, with a compound annual growth rate of 10%. The company’s namesake put it simply saying, “The more you can see, the more you can do.”"
https://www.cloudavize.com/dual-monitor-setup-productivity/
> 1. Increase Productivity
> 2. It’s More Enjoyable!
> 3. Excellent for Meetings
> 4. Make Fewer Errors
> 5. Reduces Switchtasking Time
> 6. Cutting & Pasting
> 7. Better for Team Work
> 8. Helps Maintain Focus
> 9. Sharing Data
https://www.cloudavize.com/dual-monitor-setup-productivity/
But sure, you're right and everyone else is wrong.
I wonder if you consider an "ultrawide" to be one monitor?
My dream actually is to have one monitor. A single 65" curved 8k screen, sectioned off into about 8 different virtual screens. It's not really about how many screens you have, it's about how many pixels and viewable surface area (screen real estate). I stopped counting my setup in "screens" years ago and count it in megapixels for a long time now. Right now I have 24 million pixels across a 55" area. It's pretty fantastic. I think big, and do big things. I don't know what you do, but you're doing it - according to research - 42% slower than you could be.
Enjoy your trolling elsewhere, this conversation is over. I've supplied very relevant information proving you are wrong, and you've provided nothing but your feels. Enjoy your sub-optimal computing experience. Goodbye.
Only in your trolling mind. You lost this pointless internet argument but you simply cannot accept it.
>My message are perfectly meaningful
Only to you. Your messages are anecdotal and I provided studies that prove most people want multiple monitors exactly because it makes their jobs provably easier than whatever virtual desktop nonsense you have to deal with.
> I exposed why I think my setup is more productive and efficient than yours, and that 9 monitors are not necessary by any mean.
That doesn't mean you aren't completely wrong, because you are completely wrong.
Enjoy your sub-optimal computing experience. Goodbye.
Okay, but ... how big of a monitor? Consider that a 50" 4K monitor is a bit like four 25" 2K monitors. Except that space is undivided.
I agree that it's better to whip around virtual desktops with a hot key than to twist your neck between two monitors. But we have to agree on the monitor size first.
Is it better to have a 24" 2K monitor with a 4x4 virtual desktop, or a 50" monitor with no virtual desktop?
There is one special application that benefits from multiple monitor: when you have to monitor numerous real-time events and respond to them.
If an alarm starts blinking on an object on one of your screens, you notice, even if that screen is in your peripheral vision.
For things that your attention is riveted on, switching virtual desktops is fine.
I have 3 32" screens in portrait, which is the equivalent to one 55" screen. I'm not sure where this "twist your neck" nonsense comes from. I can assure you I never, ever have to "twist my neck" to any degree to see the entirety of my 3 screens. My eyeballs might have to move half a centimeter in either direction, if that much, but no, my neck never has to move at all.
>Is it better to have a 24" 2K monitor with a 4x4 virtual desktop, or a 50" monitor with no virtual desktop?
Why not have a 50" monitor with virtual desktops. I do it all the time, and it's an amazing thing, far better than a single small monitor with a fraction of the pixels/real-estate.
>For things that your attention is riveted on, switching virtual desktops is fine.
Multiple screens is even better.
How far from your face, and how many degrees will you turn your head?
I have a comfortable chair with a headrest, my head sits against the headrest and my eyeballs do all of the moving, my neck doesn't need to move a millimeter to view the entire area of the screen(s).
Neck strain is simply not a thing with multiple monitors unless you have so many monitors that some sit behind you - but that is not what we are talking about. We're talking about 2 or 3 screens or an ultrawide or a large 55" or 65" curved screen sitting in front of you on a desk. None of these scenarios requires turning your neck at all, unless your eyeballs are permanently fixed dead ahead and you cannot move your eyeballs at all due to some serious neurological problem, and then you should go see a doctor.
There’s no better way to handle all of this than to have multiple large monitors from my experience.
I made a challenge of setting up as many as my computer could handle. Ended up with 5 monitors.
I found I could only use two actively (I guess that would be one now that I have an ultrawide), and a third passively (music player, maybe CI status).
I have to agree to the sentiment many here have: a big monitor is nice, but other than that there's much more to gain by being efficient at using virtual desktops (can recommend virtual desktop autohotkey script)
One of my favorite setups had a small dedicated screen for email and IM. Being able to look away and have all my existing work in the same place was mentally easier to deal with than swapping one of the screens briefly.
Might have something to do with the doorway effect: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doorway_effect
It doesn't help productivity for everyone. At least, it doesn't for me, anyway.
I thought in 2024 you could just ask an AI and still go to Ibiza.
Then the argument becomes that maybe I'm actually not in any measurable way more productive in practice, but I feel better doing the work there, while having that fancy gear that I want and like. Which I guess is why many tech companies spoil their workers with all kinds of perks even if they know those perks won't make workers more productive but it convinces them to work and stay there instand of working somewhere else where they get the needless things they want but don't need.
Reminds me of that article on HN where the CEO/CFO of a small start-up asked to see the arguments of what improvements and ROI would bring if they all upgraded their M1 and M2 Macs to M3s as some of their employees wanted. And there's a good point to this.
It's not being stingy, it's just taking a second to think if you're spending your money where the ROI is, or are you being wasteful always buying the new shiny every year even if you don't need it just to keep some spoiled man children happy or to advertise it on the job ads that your company's so loaded with cash it can afford to give everyone the latest shiny, when I'd rather have more vacation days.
My parents used to do the same to young me when I wanted a new PC or upgrade parts. They expected an argumentation of the ROI or academic performance improvements those purchases would bring beyond "my games will run better" lol.
You can prove to your boss or bean counter that having faster CPUs will reduce compile times and deliver results faster, but you can't really prove having even more monitors or AVPs, will also achieve similar workforce productivity increases across the board.
It's probably the future, and I'll probably hate it.
Can't do it with today's Vision Pro (I believe) but massive spreadsheet windows is coming and IMO the Excel gang is going to love it.
So being able to bring us the same setup anywhere is a huge win.
I think the future of Vision Pro will centre around two use cases: (a) content consumption like an iPad and (b) virtual monitors with a keyboard/mouse like a Mac.
So like ... a laptop? Plus maybe an extra portable USB-C display or your iPad as an external monitor?
For your statement to be correct, it means that someone would have to be using the APV as their daily driver default setup for work in order to take it with them wherever they go, and not just use it as a secondary travel setup in parrales to their mains etup.
Curious how many people will actually daily drive the AVP for 8 hour workday as their default work setup long term, versus the ones who will give up on it as soon as the hype/honeymoon period is over and then only use it sporadically.
But could you use the AVP for months at a time for work? That's the main question everyone's avoiding to answer.
So far, everyone just plays with it for a couple of hours to post on social media "wow that's so cool, it's the future", but so far I haven't seen anyone saying they actually use it for work 8h/day 5 days/week long therm.
All those who have AVPs still default to using their computers with monitors for their daily work. So then how can you say AVP is gonna replace your setup for months on end?
So I'll repeat my question. Will you and most AVP customer be able to actually put in as many hours of daily/weekly/monthly work in their AVPs as they usually do on their computer setup, or is that just a fantasy people tell themselves to justify the thing? Because so far, no AVP users have come forward with such claims.
I had to go to the double strap to distribute the weight evenly.
You also rethink where you want to be. My desk is still great, but a tilted back chair with a keyboard/pad on my lap is better for longer hours. That is where I am now!
You'd probably only use it for focused work, i.e. when you actually need more than one screen.
You didn't have to take that literally. Obviously I didn't eman wearing it 8h per day with no breaks.
So I'll repeat my question to make it clearer. Will most AVP customer be able to actually put in as many hours of daily/weekly/monthly work in their AVPs as they usually do on their computer setup, or is that just a fantasy people tell themselves?
Now, you should probably ask yourself why you care so much about what other people do with their money. I won't get one, but I see why people would. If you are also not considering buying it, why do you even care ?
Mate, you're like a LLM that looses the topic and starts to hallucinate after the discussion thread gets too deep/long.
If you read the discussion from my root comment, you'll see that I don't care what people do with their money or how long they use it per day, I'm only countering the original root argument above someone made about "people using the AVP to replace their main work setup", to which I asked which AVP user did that in practice and the answer is nobody apparently, people are just fantasizing hypothetical but unlikely scenarios.
Using 1h per day in the AVP is a long way from the "the AVP replaced my PC setup" statement, as the workday is typically longer than 1h for most people. You can use it zero hours per day for all I care, I don't care what you do with the stuff you buy, just don't claim it's gonna replace your PC work setup when you/customers are barely using it(for work).
The improved ergonomics include greater physical flexibility and comfort, as well as the visual benefits.
Physically, I am now moving as I feel inspired, between my desk, a couch, bed, and an egg shaped chair with a foot rest. I only need a keyboard/trackpad on my lap, and my MacBook nearby.
The visual benefits turning your whole mental visual space (your fovea, peripheral vision, and head turning field of view) into a visual desk of any number of items is fantastic.
Being able to make my main screen as large as a wall is nice. Seems like for some work, a smaller screen feels better, for other work a very large or wide screen helps.
Downsides:
1. Needing the Mac at all. Would love it if Apple shipped Xcode and Terminal for the Vision. For now I move around and would travel with both.
2. That first one would solve this. But for now only one Mac screen
3. The Vision screens respond to both keyboard/track pad and look/pinch, the Mac screen only responds to the former. You get used to doing both.
Is this wireless or via USB cable?
Also, isn't sidecar the exact same tech that they are using to show your mac monitor on the vision pro anyways?
I think I'll stick to living in juridictions that prevent this to happen.
And providing a use case that enable more abuse is not a pro imho.
Apple marketing is focusing on using hands, sure, but that they were so quick to make it compatible with keyboards/trackpads is revealing.
Mice are still not supported.
Clearly not, as the Magic Keyboard and Trackpad are well integrated (as is just using your laptop trackpad and keyboard). It's akin to using a keyboard folio with an iPad. It's a fully usable product without it and tons go without, but the keyboard folio definitely unlocks additional potential.
The Ibiza-appeal would be that you can have a small backpack of stuff that lets you reach full productivity on the beach. I can't carry monitors the size I'm able to pop in on the AVP. To answer your question downwind, is it the same as like, an ergonomic desk set up? Nah. But it's pretty cool and surprisingly usable in many cases (this tricky spreadsheet is notable for not).
But will you also bring a mouse and keyboard with you to the beach with your AVP for work on the soun lounger? I'd love to see that. Hell I'd actually pay good money to see that.
"Ladies and gentleman, come to see our latest attraction, today for your eyes only, feast your eyes on the 'techbro at the beach'. Please, no flash photography and no knocking on the glass."
I think it's pretty clear that "the beach" here means your hotel room/airbnb. You wouldn't usually travel with your monitors, so you'd be stuck with your 14" screen. That's the use case this is addressing.
Does it? In my mother tongue "to the beach" means the place with sand and water, not the accommodation.
But if you imagine it said in a fancy accent by someone holding a stack of bills totaling $4000USD does it change the meaning? “On the beach” has to be in very posh accent.
But also, I think it probably would work well for hammock beach working in Ibiza. The biggest issue seems like it would be tan lines, getting bullied for being a giant Nerd, and your spouse/wallet killing you for buying a $3-4k headset and an Ibiza vacation.
You'll also have a really interesting tan line...
Let’s not forget that this is version 1.0, and it was clearly not designed for people to walk around in it outside their home or office.
Inspecting data on a spreadsheet does not define any that special type of human, and it can be done in different software. Spreadsheet is a common way of storing data.
leads too easily to spaghetti columns but still
But the way you casually dropped the term "spaghetti columns" literally sent a shiver up my spine.
Tech culture is the absolute worst. Everyone wants to pretend they are splitting the atom even when they are just using excel.
The current algorithm is not terrible; it may be possible to improve the artifacting a bit but ultimately the rendering setup exists to cope with the resolution of the displays. The state of the art in cost-effective HMDs will need to advance a bit for this to really get “fixed”, as TFA notes.
It is telling that it took a very contrived test (a white grid of fine lines on black) for this to be obvious. Most things displayed by most users won’t run into this problem.
I agree that this thing is not yet monitor-replacement-level yet. I mostly just want it for watching movies in bed or on planes.
However I was wondering just how accurate this could get yesterday. Because of saccades the eye never really stops and just looks at one thing right? Which would mean we can never tell what someone is looking at, only the area of the eye is heavily focused around. Sort of a probability field.
Just how small can we make that field and have it still feel accurate? Or does this introduce something of the “thumb“ problem on touchscreens where you have to just do your best to interpret what the user probably wanted?
I would bet that the limits of eye accuracy are the math basis of window resizing with push/pull movement, so that the accuracy rate remains the same for farther-away virtual screens.
Also the number of objects in a fighter jet is going to be rather small so the radius for selection around each object can be large.
On the other hand on a site like HN there are a ton of very small targets right next to eachother.
Let me quote Paris Marx's excellent summary from his Apple Vision Pro preview https://disconnect.blog/apples-vision-pro-headset-deserves/
> Tech companies want us isolated and constantly staring at screens because it drives profit
and of course
> The Vision Pro lets users further separate themselves from their surroundings and even create “digital personas” for video calls so other people are talking to a digital, abstracted version of themselves instead of seeing the real person.
Even The Verge acknowledges:
> using the Vision Pro is such a lonely experience, regardless of the weird ghost eyes on the front.
Of course it's Apple so it'll catch on and what in 1969 was predicted to happen in 4545 will happen, well, quite a few years earlier
: In the year 4545
...
: Nobody's gonna look at you
And of course https://img.ifunny.co/images/3461f2f61d0ac8385d0c1985ac41554...
https://developer.apple.com/wwdc23/10095
There is also an article, “Rendering at Different Rasterization Rates”:
https://developer.apple.com/documentation/metal/render_passe...
> Foveated imaging is a digital image processing technique in which the image resolution, or amount of detail, varies across the image according to one or more "fixation points". A fixation point indicates the highest resolution region of the image and corresponds to the center of the eye's retina, the fovea. [^0]
It's an optimisation technique that is needed now because we don't have the resources to handle the full resolution. But this will change over the coming years.
For now maybe just increase the font size on the spreadsheet.