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IBM Cloud Developer Console for Apple

121 points by robinhowlett 9y ago

michaericalribo 9y ago
Good marketing for struggling Watson, I wonder what Apple gets—ie, how useful it is to the developer. It's a shame Watson's been so disappointing (eg MD Anderson Cancer platform), maybe it can start a support group with Stephen Wolfram...
wpasc 9y ago
I wonder if Apple's choice of IBM for AI integration is motivated by the fact that IBM does not compete with them on any level? Outside of that, IBM/Watson seems like a comparatively bad choice of partners.
- patwolf 9y ago
  Apple and IBM have had a partnership as far back as 2014: https://www.apple.com/newsroom/2014/07/15Apple-and-IBM-Forge-Global-Partnership-to-Transform-Enterprise-Mobility/ https://www.apple.com/newsroom/2014/07/15Apple-and-IBM-Forge... I remember as part of that partnership IBM released a version of their MobileFirst tooling that was identical to a previous version except it had Android support removed.
- jaxondu 9y ago
  Tim Cook was with IBM for 12 years before Apple.
  - mrpippy 9y ago
    True, although it was from 1982-1994.
nik736 9y ago
I think it's probably the worst idea to partner with IBM.
- stevenwoo 9y ago
  Probably selective memory on my part but outside of a few research projects I cannot recall the last successful venture to come from IBM since the Space Shuttle onboard computers. (edit) also laptops when they made hardware but they sold off a lot of divisions it seems.
- david-cako 9y ago
  Seeking out possible moves to keep Apple on the leading edge of technology and user experience, a determined Tim Cook arrived at page 103 of his Strategic Decision Making in Information Technology textbook, and came across what some may call ancient wisdom -- such wisdom that seemed peculiarly familiar, as though it was encoded into his subconscious from birth. Left alone in center aligned bold text along the top of the page was scribed "NO ONE GETS FIRED FOR PARTNERING WITH IBM". Tim, being the savvy executive and decision maker he will always be, concluded that the only logical choice is to make the decision which will virtually nullify his chance of getting fired. "Your legacy shall not go to waste, Steve...", he said under his breath as he picked up the phone.
  - ghostbrainalpha 9y ago
    That's hilarious. Seriously. If you want to right a longer Tim Cook fan fiction, I'd be the first one to buy your e-book.
brokencode 9y ago
This makes me worried for Apple. IBM is not a company that comes to mind when I think of cutting edge cloud services, and Watson in particular has seemed to be a pretty mediocre product with heavy marketing and gimmicks (Jeopardy and H&R Block come to mind). Does Apple really think that it would be better to outsource cloud services to IBM than develop their own? To me, it looks like Apple lacks confidence in their own internal abilities, and that’s not a good look.
- zapita 9y ago
  Apple is not delegating cloud services to IBM. They are partnering with IBM for enterprise go-to-market, as they have done before. It just happens that cloud services is IBM's preferred method of selling enterprise software and services.
- IBM 9y ago
  How is this any different than Core ML supporting the other tools for creating NNs? https://developer.apple.com/documentation/coreml/converting_trained_models_to_core_ml https://developer.apple.com/documentation/coreml/converting_...
- jedberg 9y ago
  > Does Apple really think that it would be better to outsource cloud services to IBM than develop their own? To me, it looks like Apple lacks confidence in their own internal abilities, and that’s not a good look. I think it's a good move. At the very least, they can learn a bit from someone else on how to run a cloud service. Let me ask you this -- if you didn't already have the Apple hardware that was integrated with iCloud et al, would you pay money to use any of the Apple internet services? Like if they build Windows clients and you had Windows, would you pay to use any of their services? I can't think of a single Apple service I would pay for if I wasn't on Apple hardware. And even worse, despite the free services from Apple, I will pay to use competitors that offer a worse integration, just to not use the Apple services.
  - awakeasleep 9y ago
    The user experiences of Notes and Contacts are both perfect, and they're an enormous part of what I do with a computing device
tzahola 9y ago
Nobody ever got fired for choosing IBM, I guess... On a more serious note: why??
binarytide 9y ago
I'm curious what benefit this actually offers to devs.
gaius 9y ago
Remember this? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VtvjbmoDx-I https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VtvjbmoDx-I Can you imagine the company that made this getting into bed with IBM!?
- pktgen 9y ago
  > Can you imagine the company that made this getting into bed with IBM!? Remember PowerPC Macs?
- pavlov 9y ago
  That’s what people were saying in 1991 when Apple first partnered with IBM: https://www.nytimes.com/1991/07/04/business/ibm-and-apple-give-up-rivalry-to-preserve-grip-on-their-industry.html https://www.nytimes.com/1991/07/04/business/ibm-and-apple-gi... Since then, the Apple-IBM relationship seems to be the longest “on again, off again” in computing.
- jdboyd 9y ago
  Yes. I can imagine it because they've already done so repeatedly. The first case I can think of was Apple working with IBM on the Taligent operating system (designed to compete with what became NT and NeXTStep) circa 1988. Then the PowerPC chip at the center of Macs for years was co-developed with Apple, IBM, and Motorola, and in later years IBM supplied the actual chips. Also, the Apple Network Server machines (circa 1996) ran AIX.
edko 9y ago
There is no pricing information easily available. Is it free, or are people supposed to invest time into learning, and then find out what it costs to go live?
CodeSheikh 9y ago
Is that a printer jam example? If yes, then is Apple using a "printer jam" example to showcase it's ML chops in-collab with the Big Blue?
bwang29 9y ago
I don't understand why most of the comment here are negative. On the bright side, being able to train a model in any sort of cloud (doesn't matter if it is Azure, Google, AWS, or IBM) and then directly create CoreML models, and iterate from model feedback, is a pretty special and unique position. It's a hybrid edge + cloud approach to running A.I. for end applications, and I do see it to benefit developers who want to roll their own models and create new applications particularly to computer vision, photography, and videos.
- yvsong 9y ago
  Wish competing service providers appear soon. The need is real.
zhyan7109 9y ago
Just spent a few minutes playing with the Watson Custom Model for vision flow and let's just say I am totally disappointed is an understatement, few things I noticed: 1. You first need to register an account, and to my surprise there is no command line tool or REST APIs, the entire interface is written in HTML. Hmmm, are they expecting me to specify the network structure by pressing buttons 2. Okay next, after choosing the visual model, it leads you directly to a web page with a bunch of widgets where you can add classes and negatives. To a seasoned ML engineers, this whole interface is useless. The classification has to be done at a full image level, no way to define the layers, the loss function, or any knobs to play around with the network. To an amateur, this is also very confusing. What are they expecting us to drag in to the negatives, if it's a logistic classifier, I could understand but for classifying an image, what exactly do you expect us to put? 3. Btw, to upload images, they expect .zip format, and this is where i stopped. Do they seriously think I will now export this so-called "model" to CoreML and load it to my Xcode? If they came up with this 5 years ago I might play with it a little longer, but don't the IBM engineers keep up with what's going on at GOOGL, FB or AMZN. I can't possibly imagine anyone using this to develop iPhone apps for the purpose of image recognition, even if it's an offline flow.
- bwang29 9y ago
  I think there is definitely space for improvement for 2 and 3, but then you would need to collect your own data. Are you a developer? We should talk if you're considering CoreML as we (Polarr) have ready to use, battle tested CoreML models for various computer vision purposes (email in my profile.)
  - zhyan7109 9y ago
    I have used both CoreML and MPSCNN in the past, the pain point is typically how to translate a cloud-based model to run directly on the phone. Caffe2 to CoreML is good so far, but issue is CoreML is a black box and crashes are often not decipherable. I'm looking more in a universal flow that can port models trained in TensorFlow or PyTorch and at the same time some way to debug intermediate results. Or better yet, if there are existing mobile models that can be used is best. Just reached out!
brisance 9y ago
This FAQ list is actually more informative than the press release which is targeted towards marketing/media. https://www.ibm.com/cloud/apple-developer/faq https://www.ibm.com/cloud/apple-developer/faq Resources here. https://www.ibm.com/cloud/apple-developer/resources https://www.ibm.com/cloud/apple-developer/resources

121 points by robinhowlett 9y ago

Good marketing for struggling Watson, I wonder what Apple gets—ie, how useful it is to the developer. It's a shame Watson's been so disappointing (eg MD Anderson Cancer platform), maybe it can start a support group with Stephen Wolfram...

wpasc 9y ago

I wonder if Apple's choice of IBM for AI integration is motivated by the fact that IBM does not compete with them on any level? Outside of that, IBM/Watson seems like a comparatively bad choice of partners.

patwolf 9y ago
Apple and IBM have had a partnership as far back as 2014: https://www.apple.com/newsroom/2014/07/15Apple-and-IBM-Forge-Global-Partnership-to-Transform-Enterprise-Mobility/ https://www.apple.com/newsroom/2014/07/15Apple-and-IBM-Forge... I remember as part of that partnership IBM released a version of their MobileFirst tooling that was identical to a previous version except it had Android support removed.
jaxondu 9y ago
Tim Cook was with IBM for 12 years before Apple.
- mrpippy 9y ago
  True, although it was from 1982-1994.

nik736 9y ago

I think it's probably the worst idea to partner with IBM.

stevenwoo 9y ago
Probably selective memory on my part but outside of a few research projects I cannot recall the last successful venture to come from IBM since the Space Shuttle onboard computers. (edit) also laptops when they made hardware but they sold off a lot of divisions it seems.
david-cako 9y ago
Seeking out possible moves to keep Apple on the leading edge of technology and user experience, a determined Tim Cook arrived at page 103 of his Strategic Decision Making in Information Technology textbook, and came across what some may call ancient wisdom -- such wisdom that seemed peculiarly familiar, as though it was encoded into his subconscious from birth. Left alone in center aligned bold text along the top of the page was scribed "NO ONE GETS FIRED FOR PARTNERING WITH IBM". Tim, being the savvy executive and decision maker he will always be, concluded that the only logical choice is to make the decision which will virtually nullify his chance of getting fired. "Your legacy shall not go to waste, Steve...", he said under his breath as he picked up the phone.
- ghostbrainalpha 9y ago
  That's hilarious. Seriously. If you want to right a longer Tim Cook fan fiction, I'd be the first one to buy your e-book.

brokencode 9y ago

This makes me worried for Apple. IBM is not a company that comes to mind when I think of cutting edge cloud services, and Watson in particular has seemed to be a pretty mediocre product with heavy marketing and gimmicks (Jeopardy and H&R Block come to mind). Does Apple really think that it would be better to outsource cloud services to IBM than develop their own? To me, it looks like Apple lacks confidence in their own internal abilities, and that’s not a good look.

zapita 9y ago
Apple is not delegating cloud services to IBM. They are partnering with IBM for enterprise go-to-market, as they have done before. It just happens that cloud services is IBM's preferred method of selling enterprise software and services.
IBM 9y ago
How is this any different than Core ML supporting the other tools for creating NNs? https://developer.apple.com/documentation/coreml/converting_trained_models_to_core_ml https://developer.apple.com/documentation/coreml/converting_...
jedberg 9y ago
> Does Apple really think that it would be better to outsource cloud services to IBM than develop their own? To me, it looks like Apple lacks confidence in their own internal abilities, and that’s not a good look. I think it's a good move. At the very least, they can learn a bit from someone else on how to run a cloud service. Let me ask you this -- if you didn't already have the Apple hardware that was integrated with iCloud et al, would you pay money to use any of the Apple internet services? Like if they build Windows clients and you had Windows, would you pay to use any of their services? I can't think of a single Apple service I would pay for if I wasn't on Apple hardware. And even worse, despite the free services from Apple, I will pay to use competitors that offer a worse integration, just to not use the Apple services.
- awakeasleep 9y ago
  The user experiences of Notes and Contacts are both perfect, and they're an enormous part of what I do with a computing device

tzahola 9y ago

Nobody ever got fired for choosing IBM, I guess... On a more serious note: why??

binarytide 9y ago

I'm curious what benefit this actually offers to devs.

gaius 9y ago

Remember this? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VtvjbmoDx-I https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VtvjbmoDx-I Can you imagine the company that made this getting into bed with IBM!?

pktgen 9y ago
> Can you imagine the company that made this getting into bed with IBM!? Remember PowerPC Macs?
pavlov 9y ago
That’s what people were saying in 1991 when Apple first partnered with IBM: https://www.nytimes.com/1991/07/04/business/ibm-and-apple-give-up-rivalry-to-preserve-grip-on-their-industry.html https://www.nytimes.com/1991/07/04/business/ibm-and-apple-gi... Since then, the Apple-IBM relationship seems to be the longest “on again, off again” in computing.
jdboyd 9y ago
Yes. I can imagine it because they've already done so repeatedly. The first case I can think of was Apple working with IBM on the Taligent operating system (designed to compete with what became NT and NeXTStep) circa 1988. Then the PowerPC chip at the center of Macs for years was co-developed with Apple, IBM, and Motorola, and in later years IBM supplied the actual chips. Also, the Apple Network Server machines (circa 1996) ran AIX.

edko 9y ago

There is no pricing information easily available. Is it free, or are people supposed to invest time into learning, and then find out what it costs to go live?

CodeSheikh 9y ago

Is that a printer jam example? If yes, then is Apple using a "printer jam" example to showcase it's ML chops in-collab with the Big Blue?

bwang29 9y ago

I don't understand why most of the comment here are negative. On the bright side, being able to train a model in any sort of cloud (doesn't matter if it is Azure, Google, AWS, or IBM) and then directly create CoreML models, and iterate from model feedback, is a pretty special and unique position. It's a hybrid edge + cloud approach to running A.I. for end applications, and I do see it to benefit developers who want to roll their own models and create new applications particularly to computer vision, photography, and videos.

yvsong 9y ago
Wish competing service providers appear soon. The need is real.

zhyan7109 9y ago

Just spent a few minutes playing with the Watson Custom Model for vision flow and let's just say I am totally disappointed is an understatement, few things I noticed: 1. You first need to register an account, and to my surprise there is no command line tool or REST APIs, the entire interface is written in HTML. Hmmm, are they expecting me to specify the network structure by pressing buttons 2. Okay next, after choosing the visual model, it leads you directly to a web page with a bunch of widgets where you can add classes and negatives. To a seasoned ML engineers, this whole interface is useless. The classification has to be done at a full image level, no way to define the layers, the loss function, or any knobs to play around with the network. To an amateur, this is also very confusing. What are they expecting us to drag in to the negatives, if it's a logistic classifier, I could understand but for classifying an image, what exactly do you expect us to put? 3. Btw, to upload images, they expect .zip format, and this is where i stopped. Do they seriously think I will now export this so-called "model" to CoreML and load it to my Xcode? If they came up with this 5 years ago I might play with it a little longer, but don't the IBM engineers keep up with what's going on at GOOGL, FB or AMZN. I can't possibly imagine anyone using this to develop iPhone apps for the purpose of image recognition, even if it's an offline flow.

bwang29 9y ago
I think there is definitely space for improvement for 2 and 3, but then you would need to collect your own data. Are you a developer? We should talk if you're considering CoreML as we (Polarr) have ready to use, battle tested CoreML models for various computer vision purposes (email in my profile.)
- zhyan7109 9y ago
  I have used both CoreML and MPSCNN in the past, the pain point is typically how to translate a cloud-based model to run directly on the phone. Caffe2 to CoreML is good so far, but issue is CoreML is a black box and crashes are often not decipherable. I'm looking more in a universal flow that can port models trained in TensorFlow or PyTorch and at the same time some way to debug intermediate results. Or better yet, if there are existing mobile models that can be used is best. Just reached out!

brisance 9y ago

This FAQ list is actually more informative than the press release which is targeted towards marketing/media. https://www.ibm.com/cloud/apple-developer/faq https://www.ibm.com/cloud/apple-developer/faq Resources here. https://www.ibm.com/cloud/apple-developer/resources https://www.ibm.com/cloud/apple-developer/resources