Apple Stage Manager - I need convincing…! | Mark Ellis Reviews 

Yes. Stage Manager has made work on an IPAD more productive. One example- Casting spreadsheets on an external monitor while typing a report on the IPAD. Another example is looking at your bank accpunt on an external monitor while recording your expenses on an App in the IPAD screen.

I'm using Amethyst, a tiling window manager, that automatically resizes and moves all windows so that they perfectly share ever bit of screen real-estate that my monitor has to offer. Then I just create multiple spaces (or desktops) for every specific task, one with two finder windows for file management, one with only Firefox/Safari, one for email and sometimes a finder window to drag and drop files, one with signal and telegram on it, etc. Basically I never have to resize any window manually and always just drag and drop them between desktop using the "mission control" overview (4 finger swipe up) or I'm using App Exposé (4 Finger swipe down) to choose between desktops/windows if I have multiple window of the same program open, like multiple Word files on different desktops. 4 finger left/right let's you easily switch between all desktop too, by the way. It's a usage strategy that I learned using the gnome desktop and a similar tiling manager, and so far it's unbeatable efficient for me. The bottom line is, there's nothing that apples stage manage can give me, it's just a worse implementation of the spaces (desktops) feature to me, that still features overlaping windows by default. Always hiding some of their content from the user, until they explicitly click on the window they want to see and then not even in full screen.

iSheep: "when apple introduces something, they always do it well and better" Me on my MacBook: What was apple even thinking?"

Hi Mark, I think I know what the confusion is about for you. When the update dropped, before I even turned it on, I went looking for the directions, trying to figure out the keyboard shortcuts and then use that to figure out how I can use it to make programming a bit faster, or see how else I could use it. And that's where I went all wrong. We tend to think of MacOS as being an already complete experience where things like this, especially features designed to be easily turned off in a hurry, are add-ons. We like to think of them as this whole new thing that you can use a particular way, kind of like how we tend to think of apps with features that we previously didn't have. In my opinion, Stage Manager is not this. It's not a new way of working with your Mac by having this fantastic tool to work with. Stage Manager is meant to be just another part of the ecosystem, just like when Apple added Launchpad, or Mission Control. It's not something to make sense of, it's something that just should have been there from the beginning but nobody thought of it. Think about how we typically manage windows. We have the desktops, we can expand our window into a whole desktop space, we can use Mission Control to bring apps from one desktop to the other, and we can even reorder the desktops so that we can run a workflow from left to right or however you would like. In the dock, we see a row of app icons. The app icons work like pinned shortcuts to launch the app that they pictographically represent, and if you launch one of those apps, the dock lets you know by displaying a little dot beneath the icon. If you don't have one of these apps pinned to the dock, you can launch one from the applications folder, or you can just use launchpad. And when you do, the dock adapts to show you what's going on by displaying an ephemeral instance of the icon, also with a dot beneath it. And that's more or less how it's been since I got my first MBP over 11 years ago. So this system's been around long enough that we got used to it. In fact, we are used to it to the point that we think of it as whole, or complete. Nothing new is needed, merely a design language update from time to time so that things look modern, but nothing like changing up the system altogether. But for all that, MacOS was missing a window manager. Let me exemplify: Say you have a safari window open. You open 3 tabs, and then you're the kinda person who likes having another window, or you need a private browser open. So now you have two safari windows open. But you don't like them stacked up. Now, you can mess around and try to display them both side by side by resizing them... But that's messy. So you open a new desktop and put the windows side by side by flipping back and forth and fiddling with Mission Control. But then you want to use the twitter app, and now you're constantly flipping between Desktops so you can scroll through tweets while you're waiting for RU-vid ads to finish (Google, I swear, I have never done this). And that's what Stage Manager is for. It's literally there now because it's more convenient (and pretty) than switching desktops, or worse, trying to find Finder window number 11 where you finally found where you stashed that PDF so long ago. So, my opinion, Stage Manager isn't there for you to figure out 'a' use for, it's there so you can access from a larger pile of apps that would otherwise be cluttered on a single desktop. Yes, using Desktops is a great way to work. So is this. iPad OS is a whole other story. Before Monday, there were no iPads that could display more than 2 apps at a time, with a third one that pops out of the side like an uninvited designated driver. It was clunky, and you could make it work, but it was not intuitive. So to me, stage manager feels like an attempt at making app management look closer to window management while letting you use 3 apps at the same time and keeping multiple instances in the forefront for quickly switching back and forth. In all, it released with bugs, and the betas actually helped reviewers be critical about it, but don't worry, not only will it mature, but people will get used to it (I think anyways).

But seriously, I try to use Stage Manager. I really like the idea of plugging my personal iPad Pro into my external LG display sitting next to my work MacBook Pro and letting universal control to slide my iPad’s mouse over to my MacBook Pro when I need to do something over there. Really slick - when it works. Stage Manager’s strip is SO inconsistent. And I need to count on TWO HANDS the number of times that my iPad has restarted when using stage manager and external display in the past 30 minutes. I’m not really pushing anything right now - Safari, Messages, Apple Music, simple stuff - and it crashes. One day maybe. - And OMG, RU-vid won’t continue playing when I don’t have the stage with Safari in it in the front?

Bc using MacOS on an tablet doesn’t work with touchscreen. It’s not designed for touchscreen interface It’ll never work as well as with a mouse

@@RunForPeace-hk1cu I would say multitasking on Surface is much better than iPad.

Great point on the snapping.

iPadOS already has snapping

Have you tried the Rectangle-app for MacOS? I love it and use it all the time. With it, you can (for instance) tap 'opt+cmd+right' to quickly snap a window to the right side of the screen.

Same. I use magnet and to have stage manager and magnet running would just cause issues. Stage manager should have windows snapping on the desktop. They kinda snap on the iPad with it but not the desktop which is just stupid

Yeah, I've since discovered that. Although, once again, it isn't exactly discoverable (ironically).

Did it in one take too, mate.

Glad you enjoyed it!

Ha - pure luck!

Unless you have a burning desire to, I'd give it a miss ;)

Thanks, Kim!

Glad I'm not the only 'close everything down' guy.

@@MarkEllisReviews I too have the same habit 🤓, btw I'm so so confused b/w ipad 10 and air 5 . Will the 10th gen be enough for me or I should opt for m1?

Thanks, Benjamin! And thanks for your input.

That’s why it’s optional. Some folks don’t run multiple apps simultaneously hence they don’t need state manager. It is designed for people who want to multitask on an iPad. Apple realizes that old gen of people might not accept the new paradigm, but your son and daughters will. Just like some OG programmers are still using emacs and vim, but the hahe moved on to visual studio code. 🤷🏻‍♂️

It needs some work, doesn't it...

Kanto YU2 (featured here: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-rlqNuNbEEo0.html).

Nope - cable only.

@@MarkEllisReviews thank you! No one ever talks about it. That’s so sad though :(

This does feel like a “remember that feature they released at WWDC a few years back? Now, what was it called…”

He talks about the suculento way the windows opened are displayed on a dock like behavior on the left

I suspect it has to do with the OS spinning up a new desktop when you do a Split View, just as the OS does when you expand a video full screen. You swipe left or right to go between desktops. There is a setting (I forget what it’s called) that restricts the entire OS to a single desktop. It also has the effect of putting a menu bar on only one monitor (default all monitors have a menu bar). Turn that on and perhaps Stage Manager will treat them all as the same desktop. I haven’t tested it, though.

Appreciate that - thanks!

@@techinrl9869 interesting! Curious to see how it works when it will be officially released

You didn’t spot a hint of sarcasm/tongue-in-cheek japery in this, then?

​@@MarkEllisReviews sorry, I don't get what you mean.

Nice!

For me?? Cool

I can see a use for Stage Manager on my Mac, I don't get on with Mission Control. I work with multiple Excel documents and desktops scattered with invoices, cheque images and other stuff pertaining to accounting. When Ventura is released I shall certainly give it a go. As for IOS - I have an iPad Air but don't really get tablets. They seem to make everything more difficult.

This is a great point.

5-day update: I still enjoy using Stage Manager however I ran into an inconvenience when trying to drag and drop a file from a window of an app to a window of another app. The extra steps needed to put 2 windows side by side is probably the biggest downside of Stage Manager for me, I feel like there are ways to easily address this; hopefully in a future iteration...

But what it solves - if you want one window setup you can use it on one virtual desktop and have each VD for each app. Virtual desktops in MacOS is what SM tries to be for iPads - an environment for designated apps or sets of apps

Great points.

Do you mean something like Gnome's "Activities Overview"?

It's definitely worth playing with to see if it can fit into your workflow/life...

now you have the dock to launch app, stage manager so switch between windows, and soon you will have an app manager on the right side of the screen :)

and you will have 2px by 2px to work :)

I'm not even convinced it's eye candy 😬

Kinda the narrative throughout this video ;)

Great, isn't it?

@@MarkEllisReviews superb

This is very very true. Window management on Windows is far better

If you didn't know this, there's multiple window management apps for Mac, both free and paid. The free ones are just as good; off the top of my head, there's rectangle, magnet etc. They bring you the windows like window management, and some are even better giving you much more power user features.