A discovery in some public WebKit code referencing MULTITASKING_MODE has some people breathlessly anticipating what they consider the obvious and long-overdue solution to multitasking on the iPad: arbitrary windowing:

And as it stands, the Magic Keyboard is more of a convenient desktop accessory than a productivity tool, but giving it a new interface would make it far more useful. A desktop or pro mode would instantly change that.

Google does something similar with its Chrome tablets, but Apple could do it better with a hybrid macOS-iPadOS environment that seamlessly switches between tablet and desktop mode while unlocking the benefits of a touchpad with an intuitive, powerful interface.

Macworld

We’ve all been burned many times by hoping a new iPadOS update will bring significant improvements for power users, but this does seem to be pretty solid evidence suggesting iPadOS 16 could be the year this finally changes.

9to5Mac

More recently, Mark Gurman wrote for Bloomberg:

The iPad’s next major software update, iPadOS 16, will have a redesigned multitasking interface that makes it easier to see what apps are open and switch between tasks, said the people, who asked not to be identified because the changes aren’t yet public. It also will let users resize app windows and offer new ways for users to handle multiple apps at once.

Admittedly, multitasking on the iPad has always been far from perfect. iOS 15 went a long way, I think, to solving some of its issues, but it’s still clunky and confusing.

But the solution is not and will not be “arbitrary windowing”: the ability to resize apps to any size and layer them on top of each other indefinitely.

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