
The Future of Transmit iOS - Doubleguitars
https://panic.com/blog/the-future-of-transmit-ios/
======
smashingfiasco
I hate to admit it, but I have both Transmit and Coda for iOS and I never use
them. I've never really used them. I know a lot of care went into making these
applications, so I don't want to say it was a waste of money, but I just can't
make iOS any more of a productive platform... even with great software.

Honestly, this story/link should be considered maybe a both a blow to the
"post-pc" narrative (we're going on 8 years of "post-pc") AND to Apple itself.

MS didn't go about Win8 very gracefully, but honestly, I think A LOT of the
thinking behind Win8 was right-on and future-minded. These concepts just
needed a gentler, multi-staged introduction. I think Win10 is turning things
around.

Also: I wonder if this reality has anything to do with that "cross-platform"
UIKit/AppKit replacement PR drop we got a few weeks ago?

~~~
tptacek
Careful. People on HN aren't really a part of the "post-PC narrative". People
plugging keyboards into iPads and using them full-time to write papers at
school are.

I'm not really clear why I'd use Transmit on the Mac either, except that it's
a very pretty interface.

~~~
ghostcluster
> People plugging keyboards into iPads and using them full-time to write
> papers at school are.

How many people are doing that? A chromebook I can buy as a school computer.
An iPad... The idea of trying to select chunks of text and move them around in
a paper, or simply re-positioning the cursor sounds like a nightmare.

If I were a kid I'd beg my parents for a real laptop.

~~~
ggg9990
That’s because your idea of a “computer” has a command line, Python
interpreter, filesystem, etc.

Kids these days don’t get exposed to that so they don’t really desire it.
Their idea of computing comes from apps that are take-it-or-leave-it, interact
with other apps only in predefined and constrained ways, and use touch UI.
They may want a better text selection interface but I’m not sure they
concretely know that a “real laptop” has one.

~~~
addicted
But isn’t that a failure of their education system?

Compare the kids who grew up on their iPads against a kid in Eastern Europe
who grew up hacking on a Linux or even Windows machine using a real keyboard.
Wouldn’t the latter have all sorts of advantages in all sorts of jobs?

If nothing else, growing up using a real keyboard would mean they could type a
lot faster than the one who is used to a touch screen.

~~~
coldtea
> _Compare the kids who grew up on their iPads against a kid in Eastern Europe
> who grew up hacking on a Linux or even Windows machine using a real
> keyboard. Wouldn’t the latter have all sorts of advantages in all sorts of
> jobs?_

No, especially since the other kids grew up in a more dominant economy and
have way more opportunities (which matters more than learning to mess on a
cli).

Besides, the degree to which Eastern European kids learn to "hack on Linux" is
perhaps overrated. Most kinds in school couldn't even learn to power on the PC
on their own (but amazingly one would teach another all there is to start
playing some game).

------
comex
Transmit for iOS is $10, but I bought it because Panic is known for making
premium-quality software to match the price.

…So I was quite surprised to find out it doesn't support the SMB protocol
(i.e. Windows file sharing). That's one of the most common file transfer
protocols, not to mention the only one that current macOS can serve out of the
box. And the lack of support is not an OS limitation, since there are other
iOS apps that support it (e.g. Documents by Readdle). So what gives?

I suppose the lack of support is inherited from Transmit for Mac; macOS can
mount SMB network drives natively, so there's no need for a separate app.
(Although I might like to use one anyway - mounting network disks is always a
laggy affair, since most software doesn't expect the filesystem to be that
slow.) But iOS has no builtin SMB client, so it would be quite useful there -
is useful, with those other apps.

The list of cloud services supported by Transmit for iOS is also rather small
- S3 and DreamObjects, that's it - even (especially?) compared to Transmit for
Mac, which supports something like 10 other services![1] Why couldn't they
port that functionality over?

The app does have a quite nice UI, and unlike some, I place a high value on
that. But a premium UI is no use if I can't even connect to the servers I'm
trying to access. Maybe they'd have gotten more sales with an app that could.

[1] [https://panic.com/transmit/](https://panic.com/transmit/)

~~~
mschuster91
> I suppose the lack of support is inherited from Transmit for Mac

I'd add that CIFS/SMB is one beast of a protocol... a basic ftp client for
up/download can be done in a day, but CIFS/SMB? The spec alone clocks in at
healthy 441 pages. Either reimplement a huge subset of this (and test with the
countless versions of Windows + the even more countless deployed versions of
Samba) at considerable expense, or ship Samba with the app... there are IIRC
some Android apps doing exactly this, but I don't know if it's at all possible
to do so on iOS.

~~~
comex
Samba is GPL, but there are other options. I Googled 'smb client library' and
saw at three viable-looking libraries on the first page:

[https://github.com/naxos/SMBClient](https://github.com/naxos/SMBClient)

> SMBClient is a small dynamic library that allows iOS apps to access SMB/CIFS
> file servers.

[https://github.com/videolabs/libdsm](https://github.com/videolabs/libdsm)

> lib Defective SMb (libDSM) is a SMB protocol client implementation in pure
> old C, with a lot less features than Samba but with a much simpler, and a
> more permissive license

[…]

> The initial goal of this project is to have a library that can access most
> SMB shares to read files and that has a license compatible with the
> iOS/Android/WinRT appstores in order to integrate it into VLC for iOS and
> VLC for Android.

[https://jcifs.samba.org](https://jcifs.samba.org)

> JCIFS is an Open Source client library that implements the CIFS/SMB
> networking protocol in 100% Java. […] This client is used extensively in
> production on large Intranets.

(Java would be annoying to run on iOS, but probably doable, perhaps using
Google's Java-to-Objective-C translator.)

There's also Apple's own SMB implementation, which used to be included in
opensource.apple.com source drops, although it seems to be gone as of macOS
10.11; here's the latest version:

[https://opensource.apple.com/source/smb/smb-759.40.1/](https://opensource.apple.com/source/smb/smb-759.40.1/)

Or you could go to the BSD SMB implementation that it was based on. I'm not
sure how difficult it would be to port either of these to run as a standalone
library - it looks like parts are already a library, but smbfs itself is a
kernel module - but it's probably viable. In fact, 'fs-utils' from the
rumpkernel project, which is an existing effort to port filesystem modules
from the BSD kernel to userspace, seems to have a version of it:

[https://github.com/rumpkernel/fs-
utils/blob/master/lib/exter...](https://github.com/rumpkernel/fs-
utils/blob/master/lib/external/netsmb/smb_rq.h)

…Forgive me for the wall of links. I guess one example library would have been
enough, but I was curious what options were out there.

I don't know how these libraries compare to each other and to Samba in terms
of quality and compatibility. Most likely Samba is the best, but they all seem
widely used enough that I'd expect them to do the job in most cases.

------
joeblau
Every time I read stories like this, I feel like the value of iOS development
is slowly dwindling. App development has been a race to the bottom for small
teams/indie developers making it difficult to build a sustainable lifestyle
business. I'm not sure if there is anything that can turn the ecosystem
around, but I hope WWDC introduces some more sustainable plug and play
business models for developers.

~~~
overcast
I never understood the needs for the vast majority of apps. With everything
clearly moving towards the web over the last twenty years, why did we all of a
sudden focus on native applications? Money is the only one I can think of. I
sure as shit don't need a native application to view news / tweets / whatever
other nonsense there is these days. I've limited myself to the very first
"page" of my iPhone. No more.

~~~
pjmlp
Because the kludge of HTML 5, CSS 3 and JavaScript is no match for actuall
good UI/UX and platform integration, as proven by all WebApps platforms
introduced since the WebRuntime on Symbian OS.

WebAssembly will be the final nail, making the browser just yet another
general purpose VM, targeted by all major language eco-systems, using their UI
framworks on top of Canvas and WebGL.

~~~
oneeyedpigeon
Admittedly, I have barely used MS Word in at least a decade, but I find Google
Docs a far superior overall experience. Do you honestly have no positive web
app experience at all?

~~~
pjmlp
Google Docs is at the level of Word 2.0 for Windows for Workgroups. Aka an
improved typewriter version with some support for images.

No, I have yet to use any web app that could provide a better UI/UX than
native alternatives, specially in execution speed.

~~~
overcast
So you'd rather Hacker News was an app correct? I sure don't.

~~~
pjmlp
I use the Reddit app yes.

Better yet would be for HN and any other kind of discussions forum, to just be
NNTP hosted and then I could use any newsreader I like.

The Internet is about network protocols and distributed computing, not trying
to shoehorn everything into [http://](http://)

~~~
overcast
www would disagree.

~~~
pjmlp
Mobile native apps and the market failure of all browser based OSes would
disagree.

Even ChromeOS only had an impact in the US school system, forcing Google to
support Android native apps.

~~~
oneeyedpigeon
Just because browser based OSes haven't been spectacularly successful, doesn't
mean that webapps as a whole are failures. I am willing to bet that Google
docs has better usage on the desktop webapp than it does on the mobile native
app.

------
notadoc
> Transmit iOS made about $35k in revenue in the last year

Not good given the obvious development effort that went into it, but the
transparency is appreciated.

I suspect this is directly related to the extraordinarily difficult experience
that comes with trying to accomplish technical work on iOS. Perhaps that will
change as iOS matures. Personally I've tried to use even boring old ssh and
vim from an iPad a handful of times and it's beyond frustrating, you'll never
want a real keyboard and cursor more in your life.

~~~
nine_k
I'm afraid iOS never "matures", except maybe by important user-facing parts of
it being consumed by MacOS when it becomes viable on i-devices.

iOS was designed with entirely different use cases in mind, entirely different
workflows, and completely different users, those who prefer to never know
words like "vim" or "ssh", and honestly have no need in either.

It's a square peg in a round hole.

~~~
dangoor
iOS has matured some and continues to do so. The Files app and drag and drop
enhancements in iOS 11 are good examples of this. I don’t know if iOS will
ever meet all of the use cases of a desktop OS, but it has definitely become
capable of doing a lot more than it could a few years ago.

------
freetime2
The thing that actually surprises me most here is that Transmit for Mac _is_
apparently quite profitable. Free FTP clients have been around for so long,
and have worked so reliably, that the thought of paying for one never crossed
my mind. I personally have used Cyberduck for years, which is free (although
it does tastefully ask for donations) and has never given me a reason to look
for other options.

Can anyone explain what Transmit does that makes it worth $45? I am wondering
if I am missing out on something here.

~~~
smashingfiasco
Transmit/Mac when it's discounted is definitely worth it IMO. $45 is a little
steep, but Transmit performs really well, especially when you have a lot of
little files to move.

~~~
addicted
$45/yr is probably an hours worth of work in most of the US for software devs.
If you work minimum wage that’s probably 5 hours of work.

It literally needs to save you about an hour’s worth of time over its lifetime
to be worth it. And that isn’t even including all the other benefits you get
from using a more frictionless and pleasing to use software.

I find complaints about the steep cost of tools from professionals when they
don’t even cost triple digits quite short sighted, to be honest (an exception
could be made for professionals from countries where their pay is
significantly lower).

~~~
freetime2
I'm fine with paying for good software and I probably have about a half dozen
paid apps running right now on my desktop. I completely agree with your point
that $45 is probably not worth worrying about (or the difference between $45
and a $25 sale price) in the grand scheme of things if the software is useful
to you.

One thing I will say though is that there are other costs associated with non-
free software beyond just the license cost. You've got to manage license keys.
You've got to worry about upgrades. If your company is paying for it you've
either got to go through IT for procurement or you've got to submit an expense
report to be reimbursed. Sometimes there are obnoxious license servers that
you need to deal with (I'm looking at you, IntelliJ!). Installation of paid
apps is harder to automate than a simple homebrew or npm command.

Of course, all of this may still very well be worth it if the software is
useful.

------
starsinspace
Sad to hear this. Transmit for iOS is a fantastic app and a staple for my
usage of iOS. Since Apple still hasn't implemented any sane ways to easily
share files between iOS and PCs, Transmit is always there to allow a quick
safe upload to a trusted server (with no "cloud service" nonsense involved!).

Hope it will keep running for a long time even without updates!

------
danpalmer
I love Panic, and their software is great quality for what it does, but I'm
sad to say I just don't have a place in my life for those kids of development
tools anymore.

I find it unsurprising that there isn't a market for Transmit on iOS, but I do
find it surprising that there's still a large market for Transmit for Mac. I
bought it in 2011, and got a year or two of use, but now only use it once or
twice a year which doesn't justify an upgrade.

I'd love to see them focus on more modern development tools, but I'm not sure
their approach will work in that context.

~~~
acomjean
might be why they started making games. Firewatch (the tree icon on their home
page). It was fun and different, but failed to make me more productive...

~~~
danpalmer
As I understand it, Firewatch was not made by Panic, but the founders of Panic
had creative input into it. I don't think it's a company focus for them.

------
wjdp
Removing, from what I can see, a pretty good piece of software from sale
doesn't seem the correct option.

Then again I understand making it free / heavily discounted may irritate
people who have bought it already.

Is there a better option for apps such as this?

~~~
tonyedgecombe
I can see why they wouldn't make it free, they would have all the support
costs without any revenue.

In an ideal world someone would be willing to take it over but who would want
to take on a product that is a commercial failure?

~~~
natch
It's only a "failure" if the goal is to make money with it. If the goal is to
build good will and help their users who have bought their other products, and
help recruit new users for those other products, it doesn't have to be looked
at as a failure.

They could always offer it without support. Or open source it.

~~~
smashingfiasco
I bet they won't. I think there is a (or maybe a few) soecial and proprietary
Panic libraries that they include across their applications. Open sourcing
Transmit iOS would also mean open sourcing part of their other conmercial
applications.

------
ancarda
>Finally, the new Files app in iOS 10 overlaps a lot of file-management
functionality Transmit provides

I disagree completely. Every time I need to save a file to my phone, I can’t
use the files app because you can’t just save files the root, and I can’t make
a directory in the root either. You need to save into an App or an App’s
directories. So I need a “container”, unless I’ve completely missed the point
of the Files app.

EDIT: I should say, this is for the “On My iPhone” option, not iCloud Drive,
which I don’t use.

I always save files to the Transmit “folder”. In fact, before files it WAS the
files app on my phone, and it continues to be today.

I’m very sad to hear it’s being discontinued. I wish they’d open source it so
it could live on in some way. I’d be willing to pay money to help this app
live on (e.g. pay the Apple developer fees to host it myself).

Damnit. Are there any good replacements for Transmit?

------
cyberferret
I love Panic's tools, but I was one of those that got burnt when they pulled
their StatusBoard app off the App Store a couple of years back. I have a small
side project [0] that I created a specific integration with StatusBoard
because it suited our web service so neatly. Shortly after I launched my app,
they shut it down!

Haven't been able to find another app like it, and I believe a lot of our
customers (including myself) still use an older version of StatusBoard still,
so I've left the integration info on our web site for now.

But like others on here, I have most of their other tools on my iMac and my
iPad, and while I use the iMac ones semi regularly, I hardly ever use the iOS
versions (apart from StatusBoard).

[0] - [http://www.staffstatus.io](http://www.staffstatus.io)

------
nkristoffersen
As someone who really wants to use my iPad for everything, I really really
tried to use coda for development. But it crashes soooo much. It’s sad because
the potential is there. The iPad is so powerful but we need apps to utilize it
fully.

Also, relatively unrelated, I await Apple to release Bluetooth mouse support.
The touch screen ergonomics aren’t good for long perdiods of hackin:-)

------
revision17
Aw that stinks. Transmit was the first app I bought for my iPad Pro. I use it
every day.

I guess it'll keep on working for now.. hopefully someone else fills the gap
in the future.

------
rconti
I simply had no idea it existed. Bought just to support a great developer, but
also because I may find uses for it in the future.

I still can't get into tablets but I can absolutely see how this would make
tablet work feel more like "real" computer work.

~~~
Spooky23
Try FileExplorer. Not as pretty, but substantially similar at 50% of the
price.

------
johannsg
Bummer. Coincidentally, I just (about an hour ago) purchased a bunch of
license for Transmit 5 Mac -- fantastic product. I've also been a Prompt and
Transmit iOS user since release -- also great products.

------
LeoPanthera
That's a real shame. I'll keep using it, but at some point I guess I'll need
to find a new SFTP client. Any recommendations? Bonus points if it integrates
with the new Files app.

------
drmpeg
Also sad to see it go. I use it all the time to transfer videos from my Linux
workstation.

------
Cenk
Sad to see it go!

------
futurix
Crappity crap... Then again, it was very rarely updated - usual sign of
noncommittal developers.

~~~
alsetmusic
> Crappity crap... Then again, it was very rarely updated - usual sign of
> noncommittal developers.

I call bullshit.

Panic has been developing apps for the Mac for many years. Wikipedia lists
Transmit for Mac as first released in 1998. Transmit 5 was released several
months ago. Though they have been slowly ending development on their iOS apps,
this is a preferable outcome to burning money and closing up shop altogether.

Disclosure: I am a customer.

~~~
futurix
I was talking about Transmit for iOS specifically.

------
natch
Wow, I just saw the price. $10!

There seems to be a lot of entitlement amongst developers of successful apps.
I mean ten dollars... Have they ever considered that it could be a free app
that is a thank you to the community that has supported them over the years,
which could pay for itself by bringing new users into their customer base?

~~~
andymatuschak
> Or a free app that is just done as a thank you to the community that has
> supported them over the years? What would be wrong with this?

That would be a very expensive thank you for a tiny business! Given Panic's
level of polish and concomitant development timelines, I expect this app took
several months of a designer's time and at least six months of an engineer's
time—probably more like nine. Then QA, support, etc. I'd guess we're looking
at a >$150k price tag here, plus ongoing maintenance.

As to paying for itself via bringing new users into their customer base: given
the average sale price of their desktop software, this iOS app would have to
generate several thousand net-new sales. That doesn't seem _wildly_ outlandish
to me, but I'd guess one order of magnitude fewer is more likely.

~~~
natch
You haven't responded to the point that the cost is sunk.

I have made free apps and the indirect dividends have been huge. You yourself
make a free app (and I donate to it monthly, hurray for me) and yet you don't
see why anyone would want to make a free app?

