Laptops with touch screens are pretty much the norm these days, with a prominent exception: Macintosh notebooks.
Apple has stubbornly refrained from adding fingertip interaction to the displays on its MacBook-branded notebooks (while tryihg to accommode touch aficionados in other ways, like gargantuan trackpads and a controversial MacBook Pro Touch Bar.)
So what’s a touch-y Mac user to do?
A company called Astro HQ goes part of the way to solving this problem by converting one of Apple’s touch-screen iPad tablets into a second Mac display.
This happens courtesy of a cute little Luna Display dongle that plugs into a Mac and — via a wired or wireless connection — mirrors or extends the computer desktop onto an iPad to make the Mac interface touch-responsive.
As I note in a TidBITS review, this works pretty well.
But, as I also note, Mac users shouldn’t assume they now have a touch-screen Mac. Well, they kinda sorta do, but it won’t always be a pleasant experience since the macOS operating system isn’t designed for touch.
Macworld’s famously snarky Macalope has some fun with this.
Laptops with touch screens are pretty much the norm these days, with a prominent exception: Macintosh notebooks.
Apple has stubbornly refrained from adding fingertip interaction to the displays on its MacBook-branded notebooks (while tryihg to accommode touch aficionados in other ways, like gargantuan trackpads and a controversial MacBook Pro Touch Bar.)
So what’s a touch-y Mac user to do?
A company called Astro HQ goes part of the way to solving this problem by converting one of Apple’s touch-screen iPad tablets into a second Mac display.
This happens courtesy of a cute little Luna Display dongle that plugs into a Mac and — via a wired or wireless connection — mirrors or extends the computer desktop onto an iPad to make the Mac interface touch-responsive.
Today's Joy of Tech comic!
