So one of Apple’s highly-touted features, which debuted on Apple Watch, is Force Touch. Basically, it brings up more contextual options when you tap and press the display. The 3D Touch version on the latest iPhones, except for the iPhone SE, is souped up by establishing two intensities, hard and harder, to bring up different choices.

Are you with me so far?

Now tapping and holding is easy enough. It’s takes a little work to get used to managing two intensities. I know I’ve tried it at the Apple Store, and I also used an Apple Magic Trackpad 2, which features Force Touch, for several weeks. It was on loan from Apple and I finally stopped using it altogether before I had to send it back. It wasn’t my cup of tea. I prefer to stick with my original Magic Mouse.

To put things in perspective, I dare say most of the people I’ve encountered aren’t even accustomed to a control-click or a right-click on a Mac. Either way, you bring up a contextual menu of commands related to the app or document in which you’re working. Indeed, some still believe you can only do that on a Windows PC, even though you could invoke its Mac counterpart since the late 1990s and Mac OS 8.

I suppose, in the scheme of things, pressing your finger a tad harder to bring up additional options might seem a tad simpler, although learning two levels of intensity takes some practice. It’s one of those neat-sounding features that seems more than it is, though it makes sense on a touchscreen as opposed to an interface based on a mouse or trackpad. Apple also touts its value for drawing, where the intensity with which the display is pressed can be used to deliver different line thicknesses and shapes.

Now in the quest to flesh out usability features, Apple could do worse. If you become accustomed to it, Force Touch or 3D Touch might be useful. Certainly having Force Touch is important on an Apple Watch, where the tiny display limits what you can do and how you can do it.

In the real world, I suspect those who use Force Touch or 3D Touch are in the minority. They are tools for power users, particularly those are are interested in doing productive things.

The long and short of it is that it’s clear Apple is running out of basic features to add to its gear, so they have to explore the extremes. So the implications of pressing harder are being explored, and I wouldn’t be surprised if Apple will consider multiple intensities going forward, rather than just two. To me, however, that would be extreme, something you might expect from Samsung, a company that adds features for the gee-whiz value rather than any practical use.

So consider Tilt to Scroll or the ability to scroll based on how you tilt your head. Both features have appeared on Samsung Galaxy smartphones. I suppose if they actually worked, they’d have some value, but they didn’t. At least not for me, and I gave them their due during the seven months in which I relied on Samsung handsets exclusively.

As I write this, all or most of the final features for the next versions of the OS for Macs and mobile gear have probably been set in stone. Some might not survive the final release, but the ones that will are no doubt being tested ahead of June’s WWDC. So the question arises: Is Apple going to return to the 200-plus feature addition or enhancement scheme, or concentrate more on fleshing out what’s there already? I suspect the former — or fear the former — since it often takes a few maintenance updates to get things to work efficiently.

In yesterday’s column on whether Apple will begin to call the Mac operating system macOS, something that has already been predicted in several places, I suggested that it would be nice to focus on fixing known ragged edges. Naming is all about marketing. I cited Mail as a blatant example of an app that has long-standing glitches. Sure, it’s also nice to have a few tentpole features that seem impressive in public demonstrations and help create demand for a product.

But Apple doesn’t charge for OS upgrades — not even for Macs anymore. Sure, Google is regularly adding new stuff to Android. But the adoption rate on Google’s platform tends to be slow and halting. The actual list of compelling new features in Windows 10 isn’t that large. A lot of it was about undoing the silliness of Windows 8/8.1 and making the OS closer in concept to Windows 7 with some frills of questionable value. All right, it supposedly auto-configures for a PC with a regular display or a touch display, and that is a good thing if you’re into convertible notebooks.

Apple stands alone in pushing out a raft of features, and as the operating systems mature, the list of what more they can do has to be diminishing rapidly. Sure there are ways to rethink how computer operating systems function. A greater level of voice control might make sense if your ideal computer is the one on the Starship Enterprise. There’s even talk that Siri will debut on the Mac this year.

So I reman optimistic for useful enhancements. By that I mean features I might actually use, and features most users will want to discover as well.

So there was an article in a certain blog claiming that we are nearing the end of OS X as we know it. If true, that raises all sorts of fascinating possibilities about what Apple might do, and how Mac users might be impacted. Indeed, when I first saw the article, I expected to read speculation on future generations of the operating system.

Imagine how I felt when I discovered, instead, it was all about a name, about branding.

The logic is pretty basic. The operating system for the iPhone, iPad and the iPod touch is iOS. The operating system for the Apple Watch is watchOS and the operating system for the fourth generation Apple TV is tvOS. Indeed, when Apple was in danger of being forced by the courts to create an operating system that would allow the authorities to unlock an iPhone, they referred to it as govOS.

The upshot is that this article was all about rebranding OS X as macOS to keep with the prevailing style for other Apple gear. That’s all!

I could not help but feel disappointed. If anything, the new name would be the least of it. Rational, yes, but it wouldn’t change how it works, or the feature set. Instead, I had hoped to read suggestions on how Apple might flesh out the features of macOS and perhaps improve the ones that are already there.

That’s where there’s plenty of meat and potatoes (or whatever solid food you prefer). I can start with Mail, which remains foolishly ignorant of handling even ordinary account settings. So, yes, it’ll figure out the server configuration for such services as iCloud, Gmail, Outlook and some others. But it can’t begin to guess the proper setup for other email systems, even ones with “autodiscover” and “autoconfig” directives that should allow for automatic configuration.

Worse, Mail usually fails to automatically map local folders to server folders when you set up IMAP email. What this means is that the mail you send would ordinarily be placed in the corresponding mailbox on the email server and so forth and so on. It’s quite elementary, but Mail usually forces you to do it manually using the Use This Mailbox As command in the Mailbox menu for such options as Drafts, Sent, Junk and Trash. If you don’t follow this simple step, you may find that messages aren’t correctly synced, which is especially important if you check your email on different devices.

Despite the fact that I am not enamored of Microsoft Outlook for Mac, it usually manages to correctly map local to server mailboxes without manual intervention when you set up an account.

Another problem with Mail: If you want to change some settings, such as the incoming mail server, it has to be done in the Internet Accounts preference pane. The setting is grayed out in Mail’s preferences  Alas Internet Accounts only lets you adjust a few account settings, so you have to go back and forth between the two when you reconfigure an account. Does this make any sense?

Yes, it’s nice to be able to annotate an email, and to send attachments of up to 5GB regardless of the limits of an email system. But more attention needs to be made to existing functions that remain incomplete or buggy.

I could go on and on about Mail. It is usually fast and fairly reliable, but little feature glitches such as the ones I’ve mentioned prevent it from being the best of the breed. So whether future operating system versions are branded as OS X, Mac OS, Mac OS X, macOS or whipped mashed potatoes, Mail still needs work.

How Apple handles the next version of OS X becomes more important because the lid will be off in a little more than two months, when the 2016 WWDC is held. As per custom, you’ll no doubt learn all about the new OS for Macs, i-gear, and perhaps Apple Watch and Apple TV. Developers will get early access to betas — which will later go public — so they can bring their apps and other products in line to exploit the new features.

Whatever name Apple chooses, the real question is how OS X will change. Will the looks be further refined, will it take on more iOS features. Indeed, will it be another major feature refresh, or will more efforts be made to shore up reliability. Clearly El Capitan hasn’t received a lot of love from Mac users even though it was supposed to be the refinement release that would only have a small number of new features and enhancements.

Just sitting back and going feature by feature to see what’s missing and what can be improved, without doing a lot that’s altogether new, would make for a compelling OS upgrade. Indeed, iOS could use some fixing as well. Mail for iOS may be a tad smarter than Mail for Mac, but not to a large degree. It needs work too.

So an article focusing strictly on naming conventions was hardly worth reading.

Some people are making a huge deal of Apple’s 40th anniversary. I suppose if you’ve followed every little thing the company has done since the original Apple I arrived, you might feel pleased the company has not only survived but prospered over the years despite the obstacles. That’s no mean achievement for any business.

But in 1976, I really wasn’t thinking about some fledgling personal computer company in the Silicon Valley. Not that I didn’t work on computers. I was actually using a typesetting computer at work in the heart of New York City, plying my trade as I attempted to reinvent myself after disengaging from a bad business deal. That year, I also met and married Barbara, and we’re still together.

My first exposure to anything with the Apple logo on it came a few years later, when I was working at a prepress studio in mid-Manhattan, just off Fifth Avenue. One of the members of the sales staff set up an Apple II in his tiny office, and used it to store contact information about clients and pending commissions. Ever curious about gadgets, I’d drop in there occasionally, as he happily demonstrated what his little gadget could do.

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Apple can never do anything right. Not sure what I mean? Well, don’t you remember that silly little gadget known as iPod? When Apple first announced that you could put 1,000 songs in your pocket for a mere $399 in 2001, they weren’t taken seriously. But it didn’t take long for digital music players to be referred to as iPods, and for the product to embrace Windows, and for Apple to overwhelm the market.

I will not bother to remind you about iPhone and iPad skepticism, not to mention the Apple Watch. In each case, Apple gear became the standard for an industry. Microsoft has tried hard to make the Surface gain traction, but sales are, at best, in the low millions to this day.

Over the years, having an Apple product also meant superior security. Sure, in the days of the original Mac OS, there were some notable Mac malware outbreaks, and using security software wasn’t a bad idea. But it never became near as bad as Windows.

With the arrival of Mac OS X — the word “Mac” was removed later — there were no malware threats. The theory went that, as the Mac platform grew, they’d come in volume. A few did, but the damage was minimal. It’s not even certain there’s a need to install security software, although that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t be careful about the sites you visit, or clicking links in an email, even if it appears to come from someone you know.

With iOS, again there’s no need for security software. There have been potential exploits, but it’s not as if they are exploited, and they are generally fixed before long. Contrast that to Android, where security problems are almost never fixed, because the chances of getting an OS update with that fix, if available, are slim to none.

Now the issue of security came up again in the recent FBI dustup with Apple. They claimed in a court filing that the only way to unlock an iPhone 5c used by a deceased terrorist was for Apple to do it. How? Well, evidently by creating a so-called govOS that would defeat brute force protections. So in iOS 8 or iOS 9, you have 10 shots at entering the correct passcode, after which the data is deleted. The special OS would, in theory, no longer contain that limitation.

On the day before a court hearing on the matter, the FBI said that they had been in touch with an unnamed third party that had a solution. A week later, and it was disclosed that not only were they able to unlock that iPhone, but it was accomplished in 26 minutes. Or at least that’s what one published report claims.

The method used was not disclosed, but it has been reported that the same method may be employed to unlock other iPhones used by alleged criminals. So while the authorities generally would disclose security flaws that are discovered, it doesn’t appear there’s any incentive to do so this time.

So how was it done?

Several published reports claim that the FBI contracted with an Israeli firm, Cellebrite, which performs forensic analysis on mobile devices to retrieve data. So was this the result of a previously undisclosed security flaw in iOS, or some sort of gadget that otherwise tricks a mobile device into revealing its secrets.

Some suggest the scheme involves something known as NAND mirroring, which puts the contents of the flash memory in memory. So up to ten passcode attempts can be made, after which the RAM disk, or whatever it is, is reloaded. The attempts continue until success is achieved.

Supposedly the FBI has contracted with Cellebrite over the years to help recover mobile data. As part of it offerings, Cellebrite sells a device, the UFED Touch, to perform such an analysis in the field.

According to the information on Cellebrite’s site, “UFED Touch is a comprehensive, standalone mobile forensic extraction device that combines outstanding mobile device support with unrivaled data extraction technology. With its intuitive GUI and easy-to-use touch screen, the UFED Touch enables physical, file system, and logical extractions of all data and passwords, included deleted data, from the widest range of mobile devices.”

Sounds pretty impressive.

But does it mean there’s a security flaw that Apple must address to ensure the security of iOS users, is this a one-off exploited by a machine that few people outside of security firms or law enforcement authorities would use, just a fluke? What?

Some fear-mongering articles imply that all iOS users must now be fearful that their gear no longer has almost bulletproof security, and that Apple needs to act pronto! Apple’s marketing message has been shown to be false, they say, and they are fated to suffer as a result. At least until you compare Apple’s hardware encryption to the method used in Android, which is to engage encryption strictly in software.

Now maybe the UFED Touch, if that’s the device used, accomplished this task on a black box basis, without a way to retrieve the method. You can actually buy from a security dealer for around $10,000 or so I gather. It’s not that it’s restricted to law enforcement agencies.

Regardless, if the FBI has worked with Cellebrite before, and their methods have succeeded in the past, why was it necessary to raise a public brouhaha with Apple in the first place? I can be charitable and suggest Cellebrite’s gear failed to recover the data on the iPhone, but that they devised a way to do so and thus reached out to the FBI with a solution. Perhaps it involved some sort of software update, or maybe this device wasn’t used after all.

Perhaps the FBI doesn’t want to reveal its use of off-the-shelf hardware, and how it was used, in order to prevent criminals from employing the same schemes to recover data from stolen smartphones.

Regardless, the world is not ending for Apple users. It is still hard to unlock iPhones, but it’s apparently a whole lot simpler to recover data from Android phones. Maybe that’s why the FBI hasn’t had a need to go after Google.