Should Apple allow websites to access the new Touchbar on the MacBook Pros?

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Recently came across this funny image. Then it struck me if they allowed touchbar acess to websites, you could have play/pause on YouTube, ticket related options on Jira etc. This could be done via browser extensions, scripts or however they choose to allow.

What do you feel? Why this might not be a good idea?

The bar only exist on one device, and nobody else is Planning to support it. Why add another API that needs to be supported forever for an item that may be removed in a few years.....

It makes sense, if apps take over the touchbar. But websites, not really, and what about accidental clicks on adverts on touchbar. And I don't thing Apple will give any control to the user. Moreover, I wish the touchbar was an optional distraction.

I voted yes but reading the comments my decision changed a little. It would be nice that you could access the fingerprint reader in some kind of way.... thinking about it more deeply it would not be a good idea for webs to keep your fingerprint data and crack but perhaps an app that you could use to "remember" your passwords or to make the interpretation in numbers and figures of your fingerprint and display it as a complex password. That would definitely be cool to have, no more typing your passwords just using an outside app that holds all your password information and the only way to access or view those passwords would be with your fingerprint

I answered no, but that's my knee-jerk reaction. I would say yes, but only if it's permission based.

Envision ads on your keyboard too!

Imagine free apps having dedicated In-App-Purchase buttons present all the time at the top of your keyboard! Truly magical

I get the point here but nothing would stop a MacOS app from putting the ad there. Trial desktop apps absolutely can display ads until you pay for them

Not just trial apps, it would be magical if all apps could display animated dedicated In-App-Purchases buttons on the keyboard at all time. The future is here

No! lol Even though this would be a neat experience on the new Mac it would ultimately mean a step backwards into vendor coding. Being that the top bar is brand new (and thus its success is not yet certain) I think time could/should be spent elsewhere. For example, more controls/gesture events for full touch screens. :)

CSS and HTML has been and are notorious for vendor specific coding for as long as I can remember - really, is this any different?

It is at least another vendor stupidity, @mgiambanco, so I hope it won't happen

@mgiambanco "others are already doing it so is this any different"? No, it's not any different and that's precisely why it shouldn't be done. We are trying to get rid of vendor-specific code so that engineers have to rewrite feature code as little as possible to suit each vendor platform. (See HTML5, CSS3, Responsive Design) This might be feasible for Browsers like Safari to support, e.g., by placing a copy of the <nav /> in the Touchbar. But I don't see any real benefit of creating an entire, vendor Web API just to support this hardware feature that is likely transitory anyway.

To a certain point, it does (or will) already via Apple Pay and Safari.

But, while I answered yes, I'm on the fence. So far as I've read, the bar should provide shortcuts or make it easier to use any specific feature the developer feels is appropriate for that space. So while a back button, close current tab, print, etc... might be useful - how useful might it be to put a login or register button, or next article button, or up-vote button, or etc... Too many interfaces might be equally confusing as they might be useful.

You're also trusting web developers to produce good, easy to read / touch graphics and the web just isn't like that. There are websites with great UI / UX and then there are really crappy ones.

The more I think about it - it might not be a bad idea - would be cool if (for example) espn showed sports scores on it or an investment site showed stock ticker prices or news.

It'll be worthless (as Apple Pay is) if only Safari supported it and Chrome or Firefox didn't.

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Should Apple allow websites to access the new Touchbar on the MacBook Pros?

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