58 MACWORLD AUGUST 2021
iOSCENTRAL i PAD’S INEVITABLE MAC-LIKE FUTUREavailable keyboard shortcuts—organized
in a quite familiar pattern that begins with
File and Edit. You don’t even need to use
keyboard shortcuts—tapping on any
command will execute it.
How are there hidden menus inside
iPad apps? The answer lies with Catalyst,
which enables iPad app developers to
bring their apps over to the Mac. Now
iPadOS 15 makes that extra work visible on
the iPad, too. (Catalyst apps can also open
multiple windows, and on the Mac they
appear as regular, floating independent
windows. Hmm.)
Would Apple ever offer a proper
Mac-style menu bar on the iPad? I think it
might, in the proper contexts—perhaps
only when a keyboard and pointing device
are attached, or only on an external
display that has to be entirely driven by
those input methods. But (as my fever
dream of a 5K iPad mock-up shows), it’s
not as if the iPad isn’t most of the way
there. The iPad’s status bar displays time,
date, and a bunch of icons already—they’d
be quite at home in a Mac-style menu bar.
Toss in icons for Control Center and
Notification Center if you want.NOT NOW, BUT SOON
All the pieces are there: a proper mouse-
driven pointer, multiple windows per app,
menu bar items, and apps that can adjust
to different sizes. It’s not hard to imagine,
almost entirely using existing iPad
interface elements, what a bunch of
different iPad apps floating on a 5K display
might look like. That’s what I did—and you
can see it at the top of this article.
Would I like to plug my M1 iPad Pro into
a 5K external display and see an interface
like the one illustrated above? Why, yes.
Yes, I would. As Apple has repeatedly
made clear, what sets the iPad apart from
other devices is that it’s supremely
adaptable. It can be a naked touch tablet,
but you can add an
Apple Pencil, a keyboard,
or a Magic Keyboard with
a trackpad.
Adding a big, bright
display and filling it with
app windows doesn’t
break the premise of the
iPad. It fulfills it. I hope
that Apple sees it that
way, too. ■