Lightroom for mobile for iOS 2.1 brings iPad Pro support and Point Curve

To give you a practical example...
I can use an Android PHONE or Tablet and a OTG USB Adapter to actually make backups from SD Cards onto a large Flash drive (or even SOME harddrives (power consumption often exceeds some OTG USB connections... you can work around that though, but still))....
Easy: Plug the adapter in, plug a small USB, plug card reader in, plug Flash Drive in... open you favourite File-explorer app and Copy the files... just as you would on your mac or windows computer...

But iOS will NOT let you do any of that easily.
(Ok you can get the Kingston MobileLite - I have one)...
This enables you to Copy and transfer files between stuff... but it's again closed into it's own "storage" - meaning if I want to open a file, say in Lighroom mobile I will have to COPY (transfer) the image from the kingston (or attached external, SD, etc.) into Lightroom's App-Storage (on the iPad)... then when I'm done editing, I have to export it back to the Mobilite.

Also the kingston (and other similar solutions) can't display RAW files, not even previews of RAW files (embedded JPEG previews)... making it really hard to see what is what...
Also tranferring stuff onto the ipad's storage to Edit & view things will eat up those GB pretty quickly...
then it's time to DELETE again from the iPad...

Why not allow "Lightroom" (or any other App) real access, directly to an USB attached drive...
it would make the thing SO much more versatile.
But I guess it's, as mentioned a marketing move by Apple to protect sales on the lower grade Macbook / Macbook air hardware.

For example, in my home Office Setting, browsing the web, writing e-mails, etc.. basic work, an iPad, iPad Pro would be perfectly sufficient ... but the inability to work properly with storage - well, it breaks that potential.

I agree with your assessment of what the issues are with iOS devices (not) being up to the task, but I don't think it is Apple protecting sales on Mac products. Given the lack of price differential between an iPad Pro and MacBook (Air), I think Apple doesn't care where the money is being made.
I think the problem with the lack of professional level software support and walled garden and isolated apps approach comes from being a phone based OS in concept and design. iOS can never compete with MacOS for professional level tools because the file system is designed not to be transparent and plugins and files are not easily accessible to different apps, regardless of whether you add kb/mouse support.
I am going to move to Surface Book once it gets stable and ditch my MacBooks and iPads. Apple has no use or support for 'Protographers,' as evidenced by the brain dead launch of Photos.app and death of iPhoto/Aperture.

Tony
I partially agree with you here.
Yes iOS WAS primarily a Phone-OS but has evolved to different devices... and the iPad Pro claims "Desktop Grade" Computing Power (whatever that's exactly supposed to mean, I leave that to apple's marketing).

I don't think that a Tablet like any iPad SHOULD be a desktop / macbook replacement for EVERYTHING - but for basic tasks such as office work, Internet Browsing and maybe light photo editing it could be excellent, if it wouldn't be limited by the OS.
KB/Mouse, USB Device Support & File System Access...
All of which are 100% Software based aspects.
But what I see is that many could be tempted by an iPad Air - when that would work ... chepaer than any macbook.

Without those features, I find all Apple's Demos of "Creative Professionals" using the iPad Pro a bit moot, a tad long in the tooth. because unless your workflow is entirely CLOUD Focused (which is nonsensical if you work with large files and / or not in teams) - the ipad is just not ready

Surface Book - agreed, strong contender and on my list of interest too.

Apple themselves have some support for Photographers and as I have never used iPhoto or Aperture I was not too heart broken over the introduction of photos.app.
I've given "Photos" a try... it's "OK" but VERY limited and cumbersome for anything more complex...
Aperture was much more powerful, I agree...
I used to be a LR user and later switched to C1Pro.
Both run on Mac & Win...

What I believe though is that the Macbook Pro as a Notebook is an excellent device (well I have one ;), so yes, I'm utterly biased)....
hardware is nice & solid... performance is steady...
Screen is quite good too.
it's my main workstation - at the office hooked to a bigger screen though...

And I personally prefer OS X over Windows 10.
I have one Windows 10 machine - and it's good... no argues here.
but I just prefer the way I interact with OS X - but it's not a big thing.
If the surface book proves to be great, well ;)

I have played with the Surface Book hardware and it is superior in many ways to a MacBook. Windows 10 is a bit of a mess however.
I am getting tired of being hemmed in and herded by Apple's walled garden approach. Although they do have some hardware that is the best in many categories (5k iMac with 10-bit screen for ex), the software has left me hanging.
I have lots of Apple hardware, and I was able to sync my Dad's iPhoto collection, present it through his television on AppleTV and do any sophisticated edits through Aperture, all on a single library.
I could import my photos from my Aperture library and merge it into his iPhoto library.
So now that iPhoto and Aperture are EOL I thought I could just keep using them...until AppleTV software update took away the ability to browse photo libraries directly, I am forced to use their web based iCloud Photos to stream things, a brain dead mechanism that is limiting and *not* what I want to do...