
Apple Sidecar on Unsupported iPads and Macs - tosh
https://github.com/ben-z/free-sidecar
======
mistersquid
Three weeks ago, I used this repo to activate Sidecar on my 2013 trashcan Mac
Pro and 9.7” iPad Pro.

When activating some features of Sidecar, my Mac crashed without so much as a
dialog box. After three such abrupt crashes, I reverted the framework file.

YMMV

~~~
benzhang
Dev here. That sounds like step 8 wasn't completed without errors:

``` sudo codesign -f -s -
/System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/SidecarCore.framework/Versions/A/SidecarCore
```

A properly signed SidecarCore modified with free-sidecar shouldn't cause
random crashes.

~~~
mistersquid
When I have the time I’ll try again, paying special attention to the
codesigning output.

I’ll report my results here, unless replies are closed, in which case I’ll
comment in the repo.

------
musicale
IIRC there also used to be a com.apple.sidecar.display setting.

I expect the reason certain Mac and iPad models are blacklisted from Sidecar
is that it was sluggish or glitchy running on them. Even on supported
hardware, Sidecar is sluggish over Wi-Fi (though it works great over a wired
USB-Lightning connection.)

------
notadoc
Sidecar would be a lot more interesting if you could use it without Catalina.

~~~
chrisseaton
New software would be more useful if you didn't need to use the new software?

------
bsaul
This is a blatant act of artificially making old hardware obsolete for no good
reason other than force people to purchase new one. I wonder if there isn’t a
law against that, at least in the EU.

~~~
diebeforei485
It's not making anything obsolete. Nobody is losing anything.

This is a new feature, which they have chosen to make available to recent
hardware only.

I suppose you could argue whether the performance features of new devices is
really necessary for this new feature to work well (and what does "work well"
even mean - is occasional choppiness OK? How low does latency have to be?) but
old devices are not losing anything because they never had this feature to
begin with.

~~~
bsaul
that's not how things work, apple products form an ecosystem, they work
together : i buy an ipad pro, now i'd like to use the feature with my 2013
mbp. Oh, but i can't, because it's too old ( or is it ?)

Same thing with apple watch. i "had to" buy an iphone 6 at the time because my
4gs couldn't have the apple watch software installed.

~~~
jsjohnst
> buy an iphone 6 at the time because my 4gs couldn't have the apple watch
> software installed

Apple Watch supported iPhone 5 and higher. It’s a limitation of the BLE stack
on the iPhone 4S (the 4S has BLE, but there were issues with it).

~~~
bsaul
I agree, it was just an example on how « adding something new » may cause
existing hardware obsolete, if you look at it from an ecosystem pov.

~~~
thebruce87m
They get accused of planned obsolescence either way.

Implement the feature on old hardware, but it’s slow or crippled? Planned
obsolescence. Don’t implement the feature... planned obsolescence.

~~~
bsaul
Well, the solution is easy : implement it everywhere the best you can, and
make it optional so that you can disable it on slow hardware.

It's basically the way software updates has worked for ever. Only since apple
( because it controls both the hardware and software) do we see features not
deployed on old hardware because it may eventually not give you the best
experience.

