I have one of those laptops lacking a lot of accessory ports. In fact, I’m writing this on an Apple MacBook Pro, and all I got was four lousy USB-C ports. If I want to connect pretty much anything, I need some sort of adapter or some sort of hub. USB-C hubs are a great idea: not only do they usually offer a power supply pass-through, but they also allow you to plug in some USB devices, an ethernet cable, and maybe even a monitor. Some even have fancy stuff like an SD card reader or a secondary audio output! And all of that over a single USB-C connection, which makes everything super comfortable if you frequently carry your laptop around your home, but you also have a desk with fixed devices set up.
Unfortunately, since 2018, I’ve worked through three USB-C hubs, and they’re all kinda bad.
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It honestly feels like no matter what you buy, you get more or less the same hardware, and you’re most likely getting a heavily overpriced product just because some company printed their logo on it.
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The fact that most USB-C hubs tend to use the same RTL8153 networking stack is also very annoying, especially since this is known to break on macOS, and it looks like Realtek just doesn’t care. That’s not really great if you’re promoting your hub primarily to MacBook owners.
One of the things that I found most frustrating about USB-C hubs is how hard it is to find one that actually gives you multiple USB-C ports. I have several USB-C devices but most hubs just give you one USB-C port and a bunch of USB-A ports. At most it’s 2 USB-C ports but only with the hub that plugs into both USB-C ports on my MacBook Pro (so I’m never able to get more ports than I started with). The result is I end up having to keep swapping devices. For a connector that was supposed to be the “one universal port,” it’s weird that most hubs assume you only need one USB-C connection. Has anyone found a decent hub with multiple USB-C data outputs?
I’m using an Anker hub with a bunch of USB-A ports, and it’s one of the more reliable ones I’ve owned—certainly better than the Studio Display—but I do have the sense that it’s slowing things down compared with when I connect drives directly to my MacBook Pro. I’m also using an Anker Thunderbolt dock, which is pretty good but doesn’t have enough ports. I still wish for more built into the Mac itself. (Recent MacBook Pros are down from 4 ports to 3.)
i recently spent an absurd amount of money on a startech usb-c/a hub. it replaced an old monoprice one and an old Anker one. the former was just goofy, in form factor, features, and performance. the latter was functionally ok, but had no mounting options, and was coated in that shitty TPA rubber that eventually gets greasy/sticky, and this one had started to turn.
the startech has a metal mounting bracket (that came separately and was also absurdly expensive), the ports aren’t perfectly allocated to my tastes (it only has two usb-c ports), but done well enough. it mounts to the backer board on my wall behind my screens, and has been working flawlessly since.
Research firm LightShed partners says Apple should consider replacing Tim Cook as CEO, but the change is unlikely to occur any time soon.
In a note to clients seen by Bloomberg, analysts Walter Piecyk and Joe Galone say that "Apple now needs a product-focused CEO, not one centered on logistics."
Bloomberg notes that Apple shares have "badly lagged" behind rivals like Microsoft and Meta this year after losing ground in the race to deliver compelling artificial intelligence features. Apple shares have fallen 16% in 2025, compared with gains of 25% for Meta and 19% for Microsoft. The note added:
Missing on AI could fundamentally alter the company's long-term trajectory and ability to grow at all. AI will reshape industries across the global economy, and Apple risks becoming one of its casualties.
It is worth noting that this year's slump in Apple shares is a comparative blip in the company's long-term performance with Cook at the helm. Apple shares have gained over 1,400% since Cook started as CEO, compared to 430% for the S&P 500.
The comments come after Apple announced that Chief Operating Officer Jeff Williams will step down from his position this month. He will be replaced by Sabih Khan.
Williams was once thought to be Cook's most likely successor. Now, senior vice president of hardware engineering John Ternus is believed to be the frontrunner. LightShed says "Tim Cook was the right CEO at the time of his appointment and unquestionably has done a great job," but in the wake of Williams' departure, "it's time for more disruptive change, not less."
However, Cook is unlikely to step down anytime soon. In his latest "Power On" newsletter, Bloomberg's Mark Gurman said that "there's no immediate successor ready to take the helm. There also haven't been signs internally that Cook is getting ready to leave or begin the process of grooming a replacement."
More significantly, "the board doesn't feel the need to make a change. Apple's directors are Cook loyalists like Arthur Levinson, Susan Wagner and Ronald Sugar." Gurman says:
There's no question Cook bears responsibility for Apple's current struggles. That includes the company's AI missteps, an aging product lineup, the erosion of its design-focused culture, a decade-long drought of breakthrough mainstream hardware, and its growing tensions with developers and regulators. But there's also no question that the board still sees him as the only person capable of turning things around.
Put simply: No crisis is big enough to shake the board's faith in Cook.
In fact, Cook's influence at Apple may grow. Gurman believes he could become Apple's chairman, in addition to his role as CEO:
Levinson, Apple's longtime chairman, has already surpassed the company's recommended board retirement age. So it wouldn't be surprising to see Cook eventually step into that role himself, as Iger, Dimon, Microsoft Corp.'s Satya Nadella and Cisco Systems Inc.'s Chuck Robbins have done at their companies. That would give Cook an even tighter grip on the iPhone maker.
Nevertheless, Apple apparently recognizes the need for change at the company. Senior executives such as services chief Eddy Cue have warned that Apple risks becoming the next BlackBerry or Nokia if it doesn't adapt quickly.
i think saying apple is “missing out on ai” is a lot like saying “apple is failing to build a successful social network” in 2005.
perhaps not every company needs to reinvent itself in every vertical that shows up in technology. it may be better if Apple focuses on making their platform a streamlined and integrated user experience with AI. Which requires more than the vague notions of use cases that AI has today.
that doesn’t mean Apple needs to own the entire ecosystem.
that said, i’m all about the head of steam building around the idea of Tim being replaced with disruptive new blood.
Jeff Williams will transition his role as chief operating officer later this month to Sabih Khan, Apple’s senior vice president of Operations, as part of a long-planned succession. Williams will continue reporting to Apple CEO Tim Cook and overseeing Apple’s world-class design team and Apple Watch alongside the company’s Health initiatives. Apple’s design team will then transition to reporting directly to Cook after Williams retires late in the year.
I like how the press release says this succession is long planned, and yet they aren’t ready to say who is taking over Apple Watch and Health initiatives.
Also, Cook (himself set to retire in the foreseeable future) has so many direct reports now lol.
What’s intriguing about the announcement is the design part — a functional area where, especially on the software side, Apple’s current stature is subject to much debate. While Williams is staying on until “late in the year” to continue his other responsibilities — Watch, Health, and serving as the senior executive Apple’s design teams report to — Khan isn’t taking over those roles when Williams leaves. And so by the end of the year, Apple’s design teams will go from reporting to Williams to reporting directly to Tim Cook.
I’ve long found it curious, if not downright dubious, that Apple’s design leaders have reported to Williams ever since it was announced in 2019 (the very same day that Khan was promoted to SVP of operations) that Jony Ive would be stepping down as chief design officer and leaving Apple to found the (as-yet-unnamed) design firm LoveFrom. Williams had no background in design at all.
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I’m of the mind that, in hindsight, it was a mistake for Jony Ive to bring HI (software human interface design) under the same roof as ID (hardware industrial design). That arrangement made sense for Ive’s unique role in the company, and the unique period in the wake of Steve Jobs’s too-young demise. But it might have ultimately made Ive more difficult to replace than Steve Jobs.
I don’t think it ever made sense because it doesn’t seem like Ive really understood software design. And Alan Dye’s background is in advertising and web/print design.
We’ve come to accept the myth that there’s such a thing as “design” in the abstract, as if some one person were qualified to design anything and everything. That’s ridiculous and nothing but a product of Jony Ive’s hubris.
Apple didn’t announce what will happen to the Watch and Health teams but here’s the likely outcome: Apple never said this but Watch HW was already given to Ternus years ago. You can bet watchOS and health software will go to Federighi. Fitness+ will obviously go to Services.
Williams joined Apple in 1998 (from IBM), the year after Steve Jobs returned. The same year Cook joined (from Compaq, though he had also been at IBM for a dozen years before that).
Khan joined Apple in 1995, which was obviously before Jobs returned.
The only members of the leadership team that have been at Apple longer are: [Cue, O’Brien, and Joswiak]
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It’s certainly possible that Apple is going to try to spend these next five months finding that design executive. It’s also possible that they promote Dye to such a role – he did have one of the most prominent slots at the WWDC keynote this year thanks to “Liquid Glass” – though as Gruber notes, in hindsight, it may have been a mistake to have one person overseeing hardware and software design – something that only happened because Ive stepped in on the software side after Scott Forstall was forced out in 2012.
i grow less and less confident in Apple’s long term future as this year goes on…
i am still a big fan of the idea of Forstall coming back in a Jobs-like way, saving Apple from its sugar water leadership and re-establishing the opinionated foundational norms that helped drag Apple from the brink of death. I feel like something akin to that will need to happen to cushion the landing of the free fall i already see them in.
Milwaukee Tool has launched a new modular vacuum system called NEXUS.
Milwaukee Nexus was designed to deliver a customizable cleanup experience to suit many different pro vacuuming needs.
And yes, as shown above it is Packout-compatible, with a top plate that can fit your tool boxes, organizers, and most other Packout products.
Milwaukee Nexus Vacuum System Modularity
The Milwaukee Nexus vacuum system will allow users to choose from several cordless and AC-powered vacuum heads, optional add-ons such as a dust separator and filter cleaner, different sizes of debris collection containers, and mobile bases.
There is the potential for further expansion in the future. They break down the vertical stack as follows:
Power – vacuum motor head units
Add-ons for optional features
Capacity – debris collection containers
Mobility – wheeled bases
At launch, there will be 3 Nexus modular vacuum heads:
M18 Fuel 6-gallon vacuum with mobile base
M18 Fuel 6-gallon vacuum with mobile base and VacLink
M18 Fuel Dual Battery with VacLink
An existing AC vacuum head unit is already available. The new Nexus M18 Fuel vacuum heads are Packout-compatible, the AC head is not.
Most of Milwaukee’s example images show the vacuum being used with a 4-wheel base.
The vacuum can be also used without any mobile base, if that’s what you want.
The M18 Fuel and M18 Fuel dual battery vacuum motor heads both have Packout-compatible top plates.
The vacuums are capable of wet/dry pickup.
Earlier Milwaukee M18 Fuel Cordless Vacuum
While none of the product images show a drain port, Milwaukee is using the same collection drums as their earlier M18 Fuel cordless vacuums, which do have drain ports on the left side.
Milwaukee Nexus Compatibility
Looking deeper, Milwaukee has rebranded their earlier M18 Fuel 6-gallon cordless vacuum, bringing it into the Nexus line. This suggests backwards compatibility between the different head units, collection drums, and mobile bases.
Early Milwaukee Cordless Vacuum Interchangeability
Milwaukee’s earlier vacuum system featured multiple M18 and AC power units, collection drums, and mobile bases. The new Nexus system seems to be a reimagining while maintaining compatibility.
Milwaukee’s add-ons are said to be fully compatible with existing [Milwaukee] medium capacity wet/dry vacuums, models 0910, 0914, 0915, 0920, 0930.
We’re checking with Milwaukee about whether there are any exceptions or incompatibilities to be aware of.
Update: It looks like the entire system is backwards compatible with the interchangeable vacuum products Milwaukee launched in 2022.
Milwaukee Nexus Vacuum Add-on: Dust Separator
The dust separator add-on, described as the first of its kind, directs debris away from the vacuum filter, separating up to 99% of jobsite debris before it reaches the filter. This should result in less clogging and longer sustained airflow.
Both add-ons fit in between the vacuum motor unit and the collection container.
From cut-away diagrams, it looks like the dust separator is completely inline and makes use of the main collection container.
Milwaukee Nexus Vacuum Add-on: Filter Cleaner
The manual filter cleaner add-on also fits in between the vacuum head and collection container.
You have to choose one add-on or the other – or none – as multiple add-ons will not work together.
The filter cleaner is said to bridge the gap between wet/dry vacuums and dust extractors.
It comes with 2x HEPA filters and is said to allow for Table 1 OSHA compliance in light concrete applications.
The design allows for quick filter cleaning that helps to remove fine dust from the filter, improving airflow in certain applications.
Milwaukee VacLink
VacLink compatibility allows for remote activation via a hose-end remote or select tools. From Milwaukee’s product images, it seems more VacLink-compatible tools are on the way.
Milwaukee Nexus Vacuum Performance and Runtime
M18 Fuel Single Battery Vacuum
3.5 HP peak
Wet/dry pickup
63″ suction power
95 CFM
2 modes – max power, max runtime
Blower port
M18 Fuel Single Battery Runtime: up to 44 minutes of continuous cleaning time per M18 FORGE 12Ah battery, up to 31 minutes at max power.
M18 Fuel Dual Battery Vacuum
4.25 HP peak
Wet/dry pickup
80″ suction power
115 CFM
2 modes – max power, max runtime
Blower port
M18 Fuel Dual Battery Runtime: up to 49 minutes of continuous cleaning time per 2x M18 FORGE 12Ah batteries, up to 35 minutes at max power.
Milwaukee Nexus Vacuum Package Options
At this time there will be 2 starter packages – 6-gallon with and without a VacLink remote.
M18 FUEL NEXUS Dual Battery Wet/Dry Vacuum Motor Head w/ PACKOUT Compatibility & VACLINK (0926-20)
The M18 Fuel dual battery vacuum head does NOT come with a collection container or mobile base. It can be used with Milwaukee Nexus 6, 9, and 12 gallon wet/dry vacuum tanks, models 0912, 0922, 0932.
Milwaukee Nexus Vacuum Component Pricing
Milwaukee Nexus M18 Fuel 6-Gallon Vacuum w/ VacLink (0914-20, $299) – Buy it at Acme Tools Milwaukee Nexus M18 Fuel 6-Gallon Vacuum (0915-20, $249) – Buy it at Acme Tools Milwaukee Nexus M18 Dual Battery Vacuum Head (0926-20, $299) – Buy it at Acme Tools
The 2025 Worldwide Developers Conference is just a few days away, with the keynote event set to take place on Monday, June 9. Ahead of Apple’s big software debut, we’ve rounded up all of the rumors that we’ve heard so far about iOS 26, macOS 26, and Apple’s other updates.
Today, Apple announced the winners and finalists of this year’s Apple Design Awards, celebrating 12 standout apps and games that set a high bar in design.
New for WWDC25 — online group labs! Register now to join Apple engineers online to ask questions, get advice, and follow the discussion about the week’s biggest announcements in real time, Tuesday, June 10 through Friday, June 13!
So, a number of us decided to start this repository to host links to various WWDC events, news, and tutorials from around the community. That means this repo will contain links to events being organized around our community, plus content from SwiftUI Lab, Hacking with Swift, Donny Wals, Swift with Majid, and many more – and we would love to share your articles too.
It’s time for our 10th annual competition regarding what will happen at Apple’s WWDC keynote! What will be announced? Will there be a major redesign? What will the AI story be? We predict it all!
My big question for this year’s WWDC is: Will Apple apologize, or even acknowledge, the fact that it announced numerous AI features at this same event last year that are still not shipping? Even after having attended a couple of dozen WWDCs, I really don’t know which way Apple will go.
A WWDC that is rumored to promise major iPad UX updates, sweeping OS redesigns, and built-in LLMs I can build new features atop? Honestly, that could be a dream WWDC. It could spur me on to ship major new versions of all my apps with tons of new things.
It could go very wrong, too — we had to live with the consequences of the iOS 7 redesign for a long time before apps started to approach looking nice again.
The reason I titled this post “Thoughts and Prayers Heading into WWDC 2025” isn’t that I’m offering up good vibes for Apple as they try to work out of the messes they’ve mostly created for themselves. I’m actually hoping — most likely against hope — that Apple will finally clean up some of the annoyances they’ve neglected over several generations of iOS and macOS.
In so many years past, developers have entered WWDC disgruntled and generally left pretty enthusiastic and hopeful. I’m having a hard time picturing this happening in a couple weeks without some massive changes. (And even then, we’ll only be cautiously trusting.) I guess we’ll see.
Apple can give a fresh coat of paint to all their operating systems but unless you fix the buggy state of everything Apple… well, if you put lipstick on a pig, it’s still a pig.
I don’t know if the news media or even Apple engineers understand the existential dread that developers can feel about WWDC. The latter are excited to show what they’ve done, the former to report it, and we’re excited too, but also terrified.
For developers, WWDC is like an annual employee performance review, from which we could get a big raise (new features and platforms), or we could get fired (Sherlocked, deprecated), although none of that actually depends on on our past performance.
I’m not excited at all. It’s become more a “what are they going to screw up this time” vibe
The first 12 or so years that I was writing Mac OS X apps, it was always exciting to anticipate what new features or frameworks would be announced and how I could leverage them to improve my apps. The last 12 or so years, Apple has given speeches about how much they love developers and then gone on to make changes that felt like they were meant to kill my apps, make them harder to use and harder for customers to discover, and drown us all in rising sea of bugs.
I am right there with Max and Michael. what are they going to screw up while trying to demonstrate progress, how long with it take to return to a stable state, and will this be the year (it won’t) where they finally do more to acknowledge the developer community, and not the one making scammy games that seems to make up huge swaths of Apple’s revenue.
In the last five years, the App Store has protected users by preventing over $9 billion in fraudulent transactions, including over $2 billion in 2024 alone, according to Apple’s annual App Store fraud analysis. This reflects the App Store’s continued investment in fostering the most secure experience for users while providing developers with tools and resources, including a powerful commerce system that helps customers transact safely and securely in 175 regions around the globe.
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In 2024, Apple terminated more than 146,000 developer accounts over fraud concerns and rejected an additional 139,000 developer enrollments, preventing bad actors from submitting their apps to the App Store in the first place.
Apple also rejected over 711 million customer account creations and deactivated nearly 129 million customer accounts last year, blocking these risky and malicious accounts from carrying out nefarious activity. That includes spamming or manipulating ratings and reviews, charts, and search results that risk compromising the integrity of the App Store.
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Before any app makes its way onto the App Store, it is vetted by a member of Apple’s App Review team, all of whom are deeply familiar with the App Review Guidelines, and focused on ensuring apps meet Apple’s standards for quality and safety. On average, this team reviews nearly 150,000 app submissions each week, helping bring new apps and updates to the App Store.
I think some developers would beg to differ on the emphasized point.
Other common tactics used by fraudulent developers can include concealing hidden features and functionality in their code, which are only enabled after the app passes App Review. Apple monitors for such behavior, and in 2024, rejected over 43,000 app submissions for containing hidden or undocumented features.
Are they saying that there were 43K apps that, like Fortnite, tricked App Review and had to be blocked after the fact? I don’t see that as an endorsement of the current system vs. what sideloading and code signing would offer.
These bad actors can also attempt to deceive users by disguising potentially risky software as seemingly innocuous apps. Last year, App Review removed over 17,000 apps for bait-and-switch maneuvers such as these, as part of its ongoing efforts to routinely monitor and take action against problematic apps.
Again, it sounds like these all got through App Review.
This has become an annual tradition in trying to convince people — specifically, developers and regulators — of the wisdom of allowing native software to be distributed for iOS only through the App Store. Apple published similar stats in 2021, 2022, 2023, and 2024, reflecting the company’s efforts in each preceding year.
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There are plenty of numbers just like these in Apple’s press release. They all look impressive in large part because just about any statistic would be at Apple’s scale. Apple is also undeniably using the App Store to act as a fraud reduction filter, with mixed results. I do not expect a 100% success rate, but I still do not know how much can be gleaned from context-free numbers.
I’m totally fine if Apple wants to point such numbers out as a way to upsell their own services, such as the App Store itself, and their payments infrastructure. But I’m worried this is more about the continued justification for why they need to keep the App Store locked down.
The App Store processes about $100B/year, while Stripe does about $1T/year. So, roughly, Stripe’s business is 10x of Apple’s *
It also tells us that Apple’s fraud rate is 2% ($2B / $100B). Let’s assume that Stripe’s has a similar fraud rate: that means they prevented $20B last year, or $100B vs. Apple’s $9B.
Apple’s still thinking like they area the only ones on the Internet that can process money securely…
It’s possible, perhaps likely, that Apple executives BELIEVE that the crApp Store is not full of scams, in the same way they may believe that their operating systems are not full of bugs: they have “internal metrics” telling them what they want to hear. In both cases, Apple’s own QA is practically nonexistent due to overwork and understaffing, while their external issue reporting system is overly difficult and unresponsive, a black hole.
The execs only see problems when they come via the media.
What some App Store critics argue is that if any substantial amount of fraud, scams, or rip-offs occur through apps distributed through the App Store, that proves that there are no protective benefits of the App Store model. That’s nonsense. There are high-crime cities and low-crime cities, but there exist zero no-crime cities. The question is whether Apple is catching most — or even just “enough” — scammers. Scammy apps, pirated apps, fraudulent app reviewers. You name it.
Aside from the very small alternative marketplaces in the EU, Apple has made sure that there’s no competition for the App Store. So we can’t actually compare whether they’re doing a good job. All we know is that they block a lot but also that a lot gets through. The main point I would make here is that I don’t think Apple has presented much evidence that the current system is safer than something more like the Mac model with notarization. If the App Store is a magnet for scammers because the search and reviews are so easy to game, and if almost all the damage could be blocked post–App Review, then it’s hard to see how the protections around discovery and the review process are really load-bearing.
Defenders vastly underestimate the extent to which App Store is a scammer’s paradise that makes it much easier to find victims and take their money. Apple handles hosting, search, downloads, and payments for scammers. “Free with IAP” auto-renewing subscriptions are inherently scammy. And Apple tells users to trust the App Store, lowering their guard.
As the sole source of iOS apps, App Store is a single point of failure. Once you sneak in, you’re golden.
One very weird stat this year: apps using StoreKit & Apple Pay fell more than 50% since the ’23 report. This stat has been included in this report every year[…]
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