Of unswitching and cycles
I saw in my feeds earlier that Tim Bray is thinking about switching away from the Mac, and gives some fairly decent reasons for why he's personally thinking about it. Repeat after me: "If I wouldn't flame someone for deciding, for their own reasons, that the Mac is the platform they want to use, then I wouldn't flame them for choosing otherwise."
I think he actually gives a pretty good overview of where the pros and cons are in his personal decision making process. And it is his personal decision making process. What's interesting is I know he's not alone -- but not saying he's the majority (but what wouldn't the majority of the Mac base be not-OK with?).
There are quite a few people in the community -- people you've probably heard of -- who are much less 'enthusiastic' about being a Mac user than they were say, a year ago. It's not generally any one thing, more of a few things converging on a bad taste in ones mouth, compounded by other options starting to open up depending on where your interests lie.
I'll admit I can identify with where he's coming from, as I've also been finding myself contemplating it in a pretty serious way. I've avoided posting about it for a few reasons:
- It's really not any one thing -- more like 5 or 6 -- and as such deserves a much longer post than I have time for right now to really lay it all out. I could probably cobble them together from IM logs and emails, but they deserve better than that.
Yes, Apple's current corporate policies play a role, but so does not having an email client or calendaring app on the platform that doesn't suck, and so does an interface coming in 10.4 that just doesn't look like something I'd want to use, and so does building core functionality features into the OS and then charging a yearly fee. It's really not any one thing, but more on these for another time.
- I'm not going anywhere soon. If I do switch, it won't be an immediate, next few months thing, more like a 6 to 7 months thing where I just spend less time on the Mac. It also most certainly wouldn't be going to Windows full time, and it could even still be Mac hardware. I know I have to take into some account that I have readers now, many of them Mac users, and a line about whacking hornets nests unnecessarily comes to mind.
- I've spent my time with software and developers, and there is nothing more annoying than "Do this or I'll not use your app." or "I was going to buy a
x, but..." when it's not really a serious thing. You deal with that stuff enough, you stop saying things like that unless you're very, very serious and it's a real decision. There's no point in pouring gasoline on things unless you're ready to drop the match. Crazy North Korean leaders have pretty much ruined it for the rest of us.
I'll also admit the Mac has never quite been the slam dunk decision for me that it has for others -- it's not a given that I'll always use a Mac like it is for some who really do bleed six colors (that'll date me) -- and it doesn't look like Tim is one of those people either.
I do dabble in other platforms, but when I've run that algorithm in my head for what my primary computer will be (and the object of my obsessive focus), the Mac has come out ahead over and over each cycle. It doesn't mean I've been rah-rah happy about it, just that that's how the trade-offs worked out in my head.
It hasn't always been an easy decision, but the closest I've come to the trade-offs being this imbalanced against staying with the Mac was when Copland was dying, OS9 was the foreseeable future while Microsoft was pushing NT, and Mac hardware was just spinning its wheels in Performa-land.
What kept me then was the amount of money I had in my software for the Mac (sunk costs), my knowledge base being so Classic-OS-centric, and that it was less hassle to switch at the time than it was to make do for awhile. Basically, inertia, but inertia that was coming dangerously close to being overcome. Barring some catalyst, I was just a few quarters away.
Again, it wasn't an immediate thing, just like it's not now. When user-base rot starts to occur in a given cross-section on any platform, it's often less like a heart attack and more like tooth decay: it takes awhile, you start seeing signs if you're looking, and then it eventually just caves in while you're innocuously biting on a bagel.
Posted by drunkenbatmanMarch 30, 2005, at 05:57 AM
Comments (63)
Posted by: Dustin at March 30, 2005 06:33 AM
It does seem like Apple has kind of lost touch with their userbase. They're throwing consistency out the window by creating a new interface every revision.
Posted by: Carl at March 30, 2005 06:51 AM
Well, you're about to get some fun emails… (grin)
I see what you're saying about Mac annoyances. My recent gripes have been a some weird, un-kill-9-able hang in the last iPod update that I had to restart to get around, my Powerbook sometimes forgets to keep the font smoothing at flat screen level, which results in fonts looking like ass, and the Finder refuses to let me drag the Desktop out of the sidebar and have it stay out for good. All sort of little things that bug me. I'm pretty hyped about Tiger in terms of under the hood stuff, but I wonder how much disk space indexing will need, why they decided to give mail those ugly ass toolbar buttons, why Dashboard gets a dock icon and an F-key and it pushes the dock out of the way sometimes, and I wonder if they'll ever make Finder really multithreaded and give it a consistent UI.
So, I've got some beefs, it's true. But I'm not aware of any system that is better than OS X. And that's what it's really all about, when it comes down to it. Apple is just a company. We may love them, but they only love our wallets. It's sad but true. There's not really anything we can do, besides try to prod Apple into making good products and making our own products kickass enough to fill the gaps where Apple falls down. Sure it's not ideal, but that's life.
Posted by: ken at March 30, 2005 06:58 AM
I tend to agree with you on Mail.app, but I have my doubts that there's anything better out there on any platform. The only mail client I ever really liked was Eudora on Mac OS 9. It was extremely responsive, had better search than Mac OS X 10.3 Mail, used an effective filters system, and was tied up in spatial interface that hung together beautifully.
The saving grace for Mail is that it is highly customizable through applescripts and plugins. Applescripts can be bound to keyboard shortcuts or triggered through launchers.
Posted by: Adam Lawre at March 30, 2005 07:14 AM
Luke, [i]"At the end of the day, everybody has things they want to be different. How can any OS be everything to everyone? Instead of deserting ship, why not focus on making a difference."[/i]
I don't normally jump in, but I have been reading DB for awhile and do not understand your comment. I can't think of any [b]one[/b] individual who has made more of a difference in the Apple community over the nine months I have read him. I do not know how to categorize all of what he does, but I do not think anyone else is doing it. By my measure he has done remarkable things and changed what I expect from a [i]blog[/i]. Not to mention other sites. I have no ill will but the 'Mac pundits' pale now. When DB is at his worst he is above most of them, and at his best there is nothing else close. If he did decide to move away from the Mac platform to Linux (I am assuming since he said not Windows) I think he would make a big difference there. He would be a [i]God[/i] in the Amiga world. :^) Sometimes I am surprised he has not moved on to "bigger and better" things already. His interviews are of publishing quality.
[i]"Apple is just a company that makes things. OS X is just a TOOL to make your work a little less painful. A bit of insight goes a long way. Life != your laptop. Its important yes if you are a professional in this business. But don't expect everything all at once.[/i]
Can't speak for DB, we only had one email exchange (He was very nice,) however I think he would be first to agree OS X is a tool. For your other I disagree with how he sees things and do not have a bad taste in mouth over the platform (Even if iCal does 'suck'), but I did not have the impression he has a short term view. Windows I use at my day job and OS X at home. Could not imagine using Windows full time. Linux is not supposed to be there on the desktop or have OS X user experience but for a user of DB's level it may be workable? Or he may not care. He did say he would write more. If he does go from the Mac I would be first to donate towards at least an iBook to keep one of his feet in it.
Posted by: ssp at March 30, 2005 07:45 AM
OMG! I can't offer anything beside cynical comments on this topic:
1. The 'real' reason for people moving away from the Mac is probably that it's starting to be too popular... first there was Ellen Feiss and now there's the cheap Mac mini. So, to stay 'different' (and by that superior) people will have to look for something more special.
2. I share a lot of the discontent with Apple's business strategies ranging from .Mac to metal windows and I'm happy to voice it – to an extent that people start thinking I want them _not_ to use a Mac. But even apart from that, I cannot deny that the Mac user's position in terms of technology and compatibility has improved a lot in the past years. And it doesn't look like it's going to change.
3. Nobody gives a shit about what computer you or that other nameless tbray person are using. You have to pay for it, you have to use it. I can't see how it affects anybody else.
4. Yeah, I suppose the previous point was wrong and there are people who'd stop reading your site if they found out you write it in edlin. But that's their problem.
5. It's just a blog... so I think it'd be silly to let it affect your computer buying decisions. If your readers are really that important to you, you could just lie to them about that fact...
Posted by: MM at March 30, 2005 07:56 AM
So he works for Sun and wants to run their stuff. Why not? Linus runs Linux on a dual processor G5. Again, a smart move, and only natural for him to run his own OS - and at least he gets decent hardware.
But for most people "switching back" would mean going back to Windows and that really is a dumb move. No, not dumb - truly moronic. What are we up to now - 200 000 viruses on Windows, isn't it? (And don't even mention the spyware problem.) None on Mac or Linux (which hasn't stopped Symantec are spreading FUD!) Admin on Windows is, in effect, Root. The Center for Strategic and International Studies says:
"Microsoft software is so full of security holes and so poorly audited that it not only poses a risk to national security but also cannot be
fixed. It is an insecure system so complicated it cannot be made secure."
Yeah, great ... go back to Windows because one's got one's knickers in a twist over the Think Secret thing. I think not. And arguably, TS are in the wrong. You want immorality, look at the material that has come to court in cases against Microsoft in both the US and EU.
So, no, Tim Bray does not convince me. If he wants to go with Sun software himself, he should go ahead. But for the rest of us: some reasons to go with Apple:
Losers always whine. Winners ... :
http://www.radsoft.net/resources/rants/20041031,00.html
Broken Windows:
http://daringfireball.net/2004/06/broken_windows
Gonna Switch?:
http://rixstep.com/2/20041018,00.html
The PowerBook Sudden Motion Sensor:
http://www.kernelthread.com/software/ams/
Another first from Apple ... a unique fiber optic backlit keyboard with laser-etched keys:
http://www.savedbytechnology.com/main/powerbook2003.htm
... and I could go on.
But Tim Bray really lost me when he said he preferred Firefox and Thunderbird. Now I wonder if he knows what he's talking about. Camino and Gyazmail I could believe. But Firefly and Thunderpants aren't even Cocoa. What is he on?
I don't know why Safari is slow on his system. Perhaps he's taking the favicons, or something - I don't ... *that* certainly slows it. But use some dumb carbonized app. instead and you lose access to the Services Menu, the keychain, the Address Book, your F5 autocompletion ...
Posted by: ssp at March 30, 2005 08:07 AM
Ah, and I forgot...
6. Please stop writing lengthy notes about the things you'd like to write about but haven't gotten around to yet. If you never manage to write about them, it'll look like a broken promise and if you are actually writing about those topics, your time will be better spent doing it than advertising it.
Just my €0,02
Posted by: Troy at March 30, 2005 08:19 AM
I hope that Tiger is good enough to get you to stick around for awhile longer - not because I am bothered by unswitchers, but because I want Tiger to be a big improvement for myself too!
I also use Windows and Fedora Linux at work, so I know what the current state of play across the platforms is, and neither of them is "insanely great".
Of course, I would still read the blog if it was written on a C64 :)
Posted by: John at March 30, 2005 08:19 AM
Mac OS X is the worst operating system in the world, except for all the others.
Posted by: eggsnatcher at March 30, 2005 08:32 AM
"SSP", could you come across as bigger envious C-rate blogger if you tried? If your opinion was worth anything I'd know of your site... Jesus. For his posts, I like little "what I'm doing" posts & even if I didn't care what he thought I'd care about the users he represents that are like him. If it bothers you, why read? It is also so stupid to me to see someone come in and tell someone else what they should do when they have done nuttin.
I think moving to Linux isn't for me unless it gets iTunes and I can move my music there now. :-) But if DB is really thinking about it that is his choice no? Don't think he wants his mind changed, he's just saying.
It is funny, this comes after another article somewhere saying everyone he knows is going to OS X. Apple is doing fine, I'm not worried, but have there not been many articles saying this for years and Apple user base doesn't grow in number?
"DO YOU WANT TO BE INFORMED OR DO YOU WANT TO BE REASSURED"
If you are hit by a bus drunken I'll remember you for that line. :^)
Posted by: Marcus at March 30, 2005 08:49 AM
You're going to catch shit on this one sir.
Not looking forward to the follow ups to this. I won't claim to have read you long, but I recall you saying "many people had concerns over the future of Apple UI" and caught shit and every interviewer after has bashed it, so I assume you aren't blowing smoke on this one either and have something lined up.
Always interesting.
Posted by: Chris McElligott at March 30, 2005 08:53 AM
There I was thinking I was the only one, for the past few months I've contemplating jumping to Windows just because 'I want something new'. I've been a Mac user for 5 years now (make that a computer owner for 5 years) and I haven't yet experiened Windows on a day to day basis.
I know the average switcher will say ugh I couldn't go back to Windows, its just far too painful. Well yes maybe but there are plenty of users out there who run Windows are perfectly happy with them (many many people).
To me Windows is almost like a forbidden fruit, I've built myself a reputation on the internet as a mac user, even started up websites dedicated to them. (funmac.com) If I jumped across to windows I'd be endless taunted and ridiculed, really its only a computer.
Posted by: Rory at March 30, 2005 09:19 AM
I think anyone looking for computing nirvana will ultimately come up empty. Where the Mac is ahead of the crowd really is the quality of its applications. Yes a lot of Apple's stuff is becoming highly questionable quality-wise but there are some truly great bits of free and shareware software out there which just are not rivalled by what's on Linux and Windows.
Looking back at the history of the Mac and Apple in general they've always walked a tightrope between genius and insanity, sometimes swaying slightly one way or the other. We're just in a period right now where there are a few high-ups at Apple rubber-stamping everything indiscriminately based on the initial 'ooh ahh' factor. It will just be another footnote in Apple history in a year or two, just ride it out :)
Posted by: Cookie_Monster at March 30, 2005 09:26 AM
All DrunkenBatman talks about is tradeoffs, and that is his point. Functionality and convenience versus security (Yin and Yang), encoding speed and hardware requirements for playback versus compression (Deconstructing H.264), functionality for users and developers versus debugging nightmare for others (Red Shed Interview), short term versus long term gain (Gecko's Unsightly Ass, Funnel Performance) to name a few.
It all comes down to what you care about!
OS X is fantastic we all know that. But if games are more important to you than worrying your E-Mail client is up to date so you do not get hacked and there are not more things you want on the Mac it makes sense for you to use Windows.
If Final Cut is more important to you than games it will balance for you and make up for the lack of games on OS X and you will use a Mac. If using the iTunes Store is more important to you than having access to the source code of your entire OS, then you will use a Mac or Windows. Same if it is Photoshop.
If open source is very important to you you will use Linux or BSD. If using a good Unix-like OS that does hibernate mode well is important to you that is another pro of using OS X. If your needs are more complex then the decision is more complex but it is still the same tradeoffs.
In my day job I admin a mix of Fedora, Red Hat and Gentoo servers. OS X is not just like them! There are times when it would be easier if my home machine was also Linux for compatibility and other things. I would not then have iPhoto, iTunes, or the pretty interface. If I did not care about those (And Desktop Manager, Virtue and AdiumX did not exist) I would probably not run OS X. Don't use an iPod, don't care, etc... But they do so OS X wins for me! (right now) If I was running Linux anyways a Centrino or new AMD-64-portable could yes, tempt me from my Powerbook.
The blogger from Sun, he listed his trade-offs and said his decision isn't as clear as it was before. Drunkenbatman is just identifying with him, not telling the world to switch away. Neither seem to be trying to be inflammatory so why get upset? If what he says doesn't matter, why not just ignore it? Is he hitting too close to home?
Posted by: JohnO at March 30, 2005 10:56 AM
Sounds like a good decision to me. I'd trade zeo viruses, reduced security problems, stability and great hardware for 15000 or so viruses, innnumerable pieces of malware and an obsolete OS any day. makes perfect senses. On the interface side, I have observed that Windows users have an easier time with the filing system in OsX than former System7-8-9 users. Put it in Column view and it becomes pretty clear. Put your HD and home folder in the dock and it is much quicker than the Start menu. Please write me when drag and drop actually works in Windows.If expense is an issue, then save money, buy a used Yugo and put the money you save into a Mini-Mac. The only concession I'd make is that there are more games for Windows, buy a playstation.
Posted by: drunkenbatman at March 30, 2005 10:59 AM
*rubs temples*
Posted by: Jose L. Hales-Garcia at March 30, 2005 11:13 AM
drunkenbatman says:
"and gives some fairly decent reasons for why he's personally thinking about it"
Tim Bray claims that Apple is opaque compared to the new transparency eminating from Redmond. That's got to be a joke. On the software front Apple is as transparent as any corporate entity can get in a field short on good ideas and overstocked with hungry sharks. They provide beta versions of Apple software to developer members (who can join for free). And the Darwin layer is there to scrutinize and hack just as is Linux.
Tim Bray also rants about blogger's rights over corporate interests at any expense. I'm sorry but I don't agree that it's our fundamental right to break the law over mundane matters such as which technology a company is working on. After all, this information is not depriving anyone's rights except Dell's and Microsoft's to pry into Apple's R&D.
He sounds like his heart is really into Linux. I think it's therapeutic to come out of the closet so to speak. Everyone then knows who you really are. No one should sit on a fence, they should commit to one side or the other. Tim should commit to his true passion of complete transparency and use Linux. Once he's made that liberating decision then he can work in the Linux community to create all the things that its lacking instead of griping that Apple isn't giving it away for free.
I think he's just lazy.
Posted by: whm at March 30, 2005 11:16 AM
When user-base rot starts to occur in a given cross-section on any platform, it's often less like a heart attack and more like tooth decay: it takes awhile, you start seeing signs if you're looking, and then it eventually just caves in while you're innocuously biting on a bagel.
That also describes my last marraige. :-( That metaphor will follow me all day.
Posted by: Flynn at March 30, 2005 11:26 AM
"He sounds like his heart is really into Linux. I think it's therapeutic to come out of the closet so to speak. Everyone then knows who you really are. No one should sit on a fence, they should commit to one side or the other. Tim should commit to his true passion of complete transparency and use Linux. Once he's made that liberating decision then he can work in the Linux community to create all the things that its lacking instead of griping that Apple isn't giving it away for free."
Let me guess, you're from a red state?
Posted by: Jeff Kirk at March 30, 2005 11:45 AM
I read both Tim's article and yours with a bit of bemusement. I don't really understand the hoo-haw over the Apple suit against Think Secret. If you look at the detailed info about the suit, you'll find that neither Think Secret nor AppleInsider made any effort to engage in actual journalism (i.e.., explanation or commentary over a news item) in this case--they merely posted internal Apple documents that were clearly marked "Confidential" without any elaboration.
That Apple seeks to defend information it rightly regards as confidential shouldn't come as a surprise to anyone. Apple's not being a giant meanie by coming down on these bloggers; it's doing what any responsible corporation would do if its confidential internal documents were circulated to the public.
To be angry about that is to misunderstand the purpose of Apple's litigation. Don't shed any tears over the poor, poor bloggers. If they choose to disseminate leaked confidential information, especially if the only reason to disseminate it is to create a little titillation for Mac fanboys who just gotta know what Apple's up to next, they deserve what they get.
As for wanting to use Solaris rather than MacOS X, I can understand why someone who works on it might want to use it, but ewww. I used to run a data center with about a hundred Solaris machines in it, and ewww. I never liked it. I run a lot of Linux machines now, and Linux is a much happier place to be as a user. But MacOS X is da bomb, as they say. It's not perfect, but it's derned good.
I wonder why no one has suggested to Tim that he use Eudora? The current version is OS X friendly, has all the search features anyone could want, and is reasonably fast on current hardware. I don't like Mail.app under Panther either, but it looks pretty good on Tiger. Maybe good enough for me to switch from Eudora. :)
Oh yes, one more thing: anyone who does a "fink update all" and expects everything to "just work" is, ah, well, optimistic might be a good word for it. Wasn't this dude sharp enough to back up his /sw directory before he applied the backup? Man, that's just basic UNIX defensive computing! Why didn't he just
mkdir /sw-backup; cd /sw; tar cpf - . | ( cd ../sw-backup; tar xpvf -)
Sheesh.
Posted by: Ted Whetstone at March 30, 2005 12:08 PM
You can focus on the side effects of any illness. In Western medicine, we tend to focus on the symptoms, not the root cause. With the Windows/Mac debate it is the same. Wrestling with Windows OS to accomplish a task is, frankly, just HARDER and more obtuse than it is on a Mac. Down at the fundamentals, the "rest of us" (non-techies) just want to use our machines, not fight with them. Yes, Apple is like a benevolent dictator but sometimes innovation (change) is the price you pay for progress. Windows XP went a step backward for me from 95! I couldn't HATE it more. It sucks in my mind. So at the fundamental, root level, it's not even a contest. I prefer to flourish, enduring the eccentricities of the benevolent dictator, versus struggle to survive amid the core perversion of the haphazard tyrant.
Posted by: Peter da Silva at March 30, 2005 12:10 PM
I've switched so often and I've got so many systems under my belt I can't remember them all.
My main computers have been...
Honeywell mainframe, PDP-8, Ti-59a, PDP-11, Apple-II, PDP-11, Xerox 820, PDP-11, Atari 800, Amiga, Compaq, Mac, Clones, Powermac 7500, Mac mini. I've used OS/8, OS/1100, OS/9, DOS, CP/M, GCOS, UNIX... Version 6 and 7, System III and V and V.2 and V.3 and V.4, Microsoft Xenix, SCO Xenix, Novell Unixware, SCO Unixware, NeXTSTeP in several variant spellings, TOPS-20, NT 3.1, 3.51, 4.0, Windows 2000 and XP, RSX-11/M, RSTS, RT-11, RTE-IV, Lanetix, AMOS, CDOS, Cromix, TOS, GEM, AmigaDOS, AtariDOS, TRS-DOS, LDOS, ProDOS, AppleDOS, DOS 1.x, DOS 2.11, DOS 3, DOS 4, Windows 2.0, Windows 3.0 Windows for Workgroups, Windows 3.11, Windows 95, 98, 98SE... and I'm barely starting.
I think the Apple IIGS is the only common personal computer I haven't used or written code for.
Most of these operating systems have good points. They all have bad points. Some of them are very very bad indeed.
At this point, i can't conceive of anything that would lead me to use any operating system other than Mac OS X other than a sudden surge of massive debts, homelessness, and abject poverty that so reduced me that I couldn't afford to keep a single computer of my own. Not because it's perfect... because lord knows it isn't... but because there are no alternatives. Linux isn't... there's absolutely nothing I know of that you can do on Linux that you can't do on Mac OS X... and that goes for other UNIX variants as well. UNIX systems are fungible, and Mac OS X is a UNIX system. Windows sure as hell isn't even on the list. What else is there? I honestly can't conceive of an answer. It's like the first America's Cup, "There is no second place".
Posted by: wilbur at March 30, 2005 12:23 PM
Clear, concise post by Bray. Consumers should always evaluate their options. I still think Apple offers the best general consumer desktop experience. I didn't like the yearly subscription model although I can understand why Apple would try it. I don't dispute that the upgrades added value, but I'm still on 10.2.8 and I try to avoid relying on Apple applications that might depend on upgrades. In 10.2.8, there are still Firefox stability issues (mainly the need to periodically dump cache during a session to recover from stalls). Otherwise, I have no Firefox gripes. Extensions make it an incredibly efficient tool.
I think Apple is correct to defend their NDA's using the options allowed by law. I trust judges and the legal system to be able to determine the difference between "public interest" and an "interested public" in similar cases. Bray raises a good point about Apple's "transparency". An outdated approach? Or is Apple in less need of humanization? Is Microsoft's behavior a corporate value, or a public relations necessity?
There are times I wish speed and efficiency were the primary goals of OSX, but -- hypocritically -- I miss the look and feel of it when I use something else.
In general, I think things are in good shape as long as there's real competition between platforms (go Linux!) and Mac users' criticism gets heard. Criticism leads to improvement (hopefully), and that benefits everyone.
Posted by: Izzy at March 30, 2005 12:34 PM
*sits back eating popcorn*
This is good stuff here. Good stuff.
*sips mountain dew*
I think I've seen an episode like this somehwere before though...
Posted by: Eddie Ski at March 30, 2005 12:36 PM
I've used computers since the Apple ][e and Vic20. From SGI to NeXT cubes. Oranges (franklin) to Amigas. I must say, OS X as of late, has soured me. Far more maintenance than OS prior. More stable? Sure. But before you reply with AnitPC rhetoric...ask yourself this: Why no restore from previous version? Why no System Restore?
I loved the unix op with multiple windows and tasking. Networking fighter games long before there was a Playstation or Xbox. There was cshell and pine. And grep to get binaries into pron from newsgroups.
But now, the mac (and PC) are bloated-ware laden tools. Just WHOSE tools are they though?
Adobe bailed on Apple. Apple bailed on the designers. Designers had kept the mac platform alive.
Mac- Moron Accessible Computer.
Oh ess, ecks! (no, its OS Ten!) Not!
Posted by: Peter da Silva at March 30, 2005 12:38 PM
Why no restore from previous version? Why no System Restore?
Uh, IDGI. What are you trying to say?
Posted by: Nabil at March 30, 2005 01:14 PM
Hey, good luck to ya, man, whatever you decide. You're not the first, you won't be the last, and that's fine. That's the beauty of choice.
I dunno, personally, I'm pretty excited about the interface changes and new features in Tiger. I remember the uproar that happened when 10.0 came out, with an interface so different from Classic. After a few weeks, though, the complaints started to die down. It's just different, it's not necessarily bad, and screenshots or even videos simply WILL NOT do it justice.
Of course, it helps that as a student, I pay way less for my OS upgrades. Takes off a lot of the insult of having to pay for updates. That really just leaves .Mac leaving a sour taste in my mouth, partially because it's a pay service that's been built into the OS (hmm, didn't MS get slapped for less than that?), and partially because it used to be FREE.
Posted by: James at March 30, 2005 01:27 PM
I don't understand the virus comments - leave windows behind a NAT, don't use IE or Outlook (Express) and you'll never see a virus (well, I never have - for your clueless cousin, a mac is probably better). Admittedly the NAT (well, firewall really) part is harder for laptops, but not impossible.
I've considered a mac laptop, but the hardware doesn't really satisfy me (Hello, Apple? 72dpi screens should have died with the Classic), and the OS + apps aren't a big deal since 90% of my time is spent in mozilla or sshing to a real machine. OS X's n*x core doesn't appeal to me since I'm used to Debian's "everything's packaged" system, and so if I wanted something that's not compiled in to (say) OS X's perl or apache, I have to compile it up myself and install it alongside.
Of course, I haven't bought a pc laptop yet either because nothing satisfies my requirements, so maybe I'm just too finicky. And I would run Debian on it, the main reason I run windows on my desktop is for games and itunes.
Posted by: Peter da Silva at March 30, 2005 01:34 PM
I don't understand the virus comments - leave windows behind a NAT, don't use IE or Outlook (Express) and you'll never see a virus (well, I never have - for your clueless cousin, a mac is probably better).
While "don't use IE or Outlook" has been my mantra since 1997, and it's been effective at work, it's *not* good enough. Too many parts of the system use the HTML control, and you can't turn off all the low-level code. I've got my kids behind a proxy (not just NAT) and what finally got me buying a Mac for my daughter was having to reinstall Windows every six months because she broke it or filled it with malware.
100% agreement on the low res screens on the laptops. Maybe Steve needs to get RK so he can see how crummy they really are.
Posted by: Robert at March 30, 2005 01:45 PM
Thanks for the blog. I was thinking I was alone in moving from the Mac platform. And your analogy of it being a gradual realization is dead on.
I've been using a Mac since the original 128k machine and have loved every minute... right up to the time Steve puked OS X at us. Don't get me wrong. user permissions and a CLI are neat and all, but if I wanted that crap I'd have bought a Windows PC.
The funny thing is, I DID buy a PC to check the Web sites I build on both platforms. Hey! My iPod syncs up with the PC version of iTunes just as easily. Who would have thought. Then I started to discover some decent freeware/shareware that's not available to the Mac. After awhile I started to move my business apps like QuickBooks over to the PC. Then I suddenly realized I was spending more time on the PC than my Mac.
It IS a gradual move, but when my OS 9 Mac finally bites the dust, I'll be ready.
Posted by: darth at March 30, 2005 02:13 PM
good list..the irony is that i've just returned TO the mac after a long absence..and am surprised just how much simpler my computing life has become, at home at least (still use XP at work). i'd gotten so used to working around issues with windows, that initially the OS X stuff seemed too..simple. now i'm getting used to it, and it just seems more natural to me. everything just seems to work well.
of course..ymmv. :p
Posted by: "Crocodile" Leechman at March 30, 2005 02:14 PM
You're comparing grotty old OS 9 to Windows XP, and you aren't using OS X... mate, you haven't given the Mac a fair go.
Posted by: Gibbons Burke at March 30, 2005 02:25 PM
Tim Bray wrote about Safari.... "If I accidentally hit command-Q instead of command-W to close a tab (so easy), Safari silently checks out without asking me if I want to save or review my unsaved work."
I fixed this problem in Safari a long time ago by opening up the program's Menu .nib file using Interface Builder - one of the Developer tools. I removed the 'Command-Q' keyboard shortcut from the Quit menu item and now, if I acidentally hit Command-Q when I meant to hit Command-W or Command-Tab Safari benignly beeps at me.
I too have been frustrated at the random Safari beach ball spinning lockups and crashes. Re-installing Java after system updates has been therapeutic for this problem.
Posted by: Grant Hollingworth at March 30, 2005 02:28 PM
defaults write com.apple.Safari NSUserKeyEquivalents -dict-add "Quit Safari" "nil"
makes a big difference when using Safari with a lot of tabs.
I like Firefox, but I like OmniWeb even more for OS X. Firefox feels a little alien with its different graphics and lack of standard Cocoa keyboard shortcuts.
Posted by: Robert at March 30, 2005 02:39 PM
croc posted: "You're comparing grotty old OS 9 to Windows XP, and you aren't using OS X... mate, you haven't given the Mac a fair go."
I should have made that clearer. I do boot up in OS X occasionally. Mostly to download the latest security patch. Each time I do I get frustrated by trying to navigate around the finder. Then I have to give my Mac a password before installing even the simplest upgrade, like I have to get past a club bouncer before I'm allowed in my own club!
Warm fuzzies and ease of use have given way to POWER and SECURITY, baby! This is progress?
Hold on, I think Apple just released a new security patch today...
Posted by: solios at March 30, 2005 02:57 PM
Every so often, I serously consider buying a Wintendo. I like playing games to blow off steam and I'm sick of Steam (Halflife, CS, CSS, Halflife 2) not being available, among other things.
Then I load up the Win2k box on my desk and experience the end-user equivalent of ghonnorhea.
I miss the OS 9 Finder terribly. I hate the state of email on the platform. I hate the state of calendar apps on the platform (probably not as much as you do), and I really hate the fact that any application can steal RAM from Photoshop just because it wants to. :-|
As a graphics and video monkey, linux isn't even a consideration... and OS X, as much as it sucks, sucks less than the other choices out there. Maybe the Finder issues will get fixed by 10.8. :P
Posted by: David at March 30, 2005 03:08 PM
Each user should evaluate options and decide for him/herself which tools make the most sense.
Some day we'll have a true resolution independent display mechanism similar to the way printers work. Things on a 1200dpi printer aren't half the size of things on a 600dpi printer, but sadly that's the way our displays work.
Until then we'll have the "give us more screen real estate" crowd demanding higher dpi while the massive baby boomer generation complains that everything these days is in fine print. We tech aware people often forget that something as "simple" as increasing the font size on a web page is beyond the knowledge of probably half the web surfers in the world today.
Posted by: Peter da Silva at March 30, 2005 03:18 PM
I hear and appreciate the "Finder" woes. I think they made a mistake trying to merge the NeXT Browser with the OS 9 Finder. They should have just Carbonised the OS 9 Finder and Cocoaified the NeXT Browser and left them as separate programs.
That way OS 9 fogeys could stick with Finder, and those of us who find Browsers work better wouldn't have to put up with "spacial spam" all over the screen.
As for "warm fuzzies", OS 9 never gave me "warm fuzzies". It's simple, yes, but it's so fragile that I had to metaphorically tiptoe around it all the time. And while an application can steal RAM from Photoshop... if you were running Photoshop and any app that was demanding enough to want to steal RAM from it on OS 9, you'd be playing tag with the crash fairy.
Posted by: solios at March 30, 2005 03:46 PM
The crash fairy doesn't concern me- the easiest way to work around OS 9 "fragility" is to be smart about your memory paritioning, take it "easy" with the system, expect a few reboots a day anyway, and.... don't multitask. I've always had at least two machines available - one as the media/web console and one for Doing Actual Work- which at the very least has always given me something to do while The Other Machine reboots. Combine MacSSH with a linux box running irssi through screen and the internets never know what sort of hell is exploding on the backend.
You'd be surprised at just how well the practice has worked out with the transition to OS X - though these days it's turned into running a web browser to look for walkthroughs and cheat codes on one machine while I'm playing a video game on the other. :)
Posted by: at March 30, 2005 04:24 PM
Interesting thread, I stumbled on it from Macsurfer's Headline News.
As for myself, I tried to bypass the whole PeeCee "thing" altogether. I was using CP/M and TRS-DOS in the fall of 1981 when the original IBM PC was introduced. It was laughed at by all the "serious" computer users of the day, including myself. I haven't seen much since then to change my mind - the hardware spec is a hack of a hack of a hack that dates back to said TRS-80, and the software has elements that date back to DEC's TOPS-10 operating system of the 1960s!
If it weren't for the magic three initials "IBM", it would have faded into history as quickly as it appeared - having hardware that was combined the worst of a TRS-80 Model I and an Apple ][, and the best features of neither - as well as software that combined the worst of TRS-DOS (Also written by M$) and CP/M, and the best of neither.
I was able to cling to CP/M until the early 90's when it just wasn't meeting my needs any longer before I "finally" switched to a PeeCee. Needless to say, I wasn't particularly happy, but using JP Soft's 4DOS command shell actually made M$-DOS useable. In 1997 I was essentially forced into the GUI world of Windoze (95) at last. I wasn't particularly happy then either.
At the time, I tried REALLY hard to switch to the Mac - but no-one could tell me the differences between the "10,000" different Mac models of the day or why I cared. I also had a very severe issue with the Mac's lack of GUI configurability - Windows at least allowed (and still does allow) me to configure custom colors such that I could have GREEN on BLACK characters - the flickering CRTs gave me EXTREME headaches with the GUI insistance of BLACK on WHITE - Windows at least got that right. This is still pretty much the same situation today - it amazes me that Apple, as the "consumer friendly" company cannot do something about this (although I've recently become aware of 3rd party apps that allow this for OSX). However, the whole problem pretty much went away with the introduction of LCD monitors - no more flicker, no more headaches!
After putting up with Windows for 3 years or so, I switched to Linux - over all I was much happier, I hadn't had this much control over my computing environment since CP/M. Over the next several years I gradually grew weary of constant twiddling and hacking, and about that time Apple announced OSX.
OSX changed everything.
Here was a UNIX operating system, with my beloved command line (I never had grown totally comfortable in the GUI world) that was actually supported by someone else! Plus all the neat-O Apple stuff I'd been hearing about since 1984 or so.
I took a blind leap of faith and ordered a 1.25GHZ Dual G4 for work.
I've never been happier. And to my utter surprise, I suddenly find myself doing things the GUI way for the first time in my life - Apple's GUI just works and seems far more intuitive to an old hack like me.
Now I have an iMac G5 17" at home, and will be buying a Mac mini for my wife later this year.
I often hear the cries of the Mac faithful who bemoan the loss of their pre-OSX favorite feature(s), whatever those may be. But as a person who never really used/saw the "classic" environment, I cannot be happier with OSX!
As for the ethics of Apple as a company - yea, if they were in control of the computing world, they'd probably be worse than M$. They've always been xenophobic - I remember when Jobs forbade the sales of Apple ][s via mail order. However, Apple's stuff has one overriding advantage over anything else....
IT WORKS!!!!
No hassle, no problems, it just works. I can get used to that I think...
-Zorba
"The Veiled Male"
http://www.doubleveil.net
Posted by: Peter da Silva at March 30, 2005 04:27 PM
The crash fairy doesn't concern me- the easiest way to work around OS 9 "fragility" is to be smart about your memory paritioning, take it "easy" with the system, expect a few reboots a day anyway, and.... don't multitask.
That's just incomprehensible to me. I was being more abusive than that to my Amiga 1000 in 1986, and it didn't crash more than a couple of times a day... and IT had no memory protection, a single-threaded DOS in a multitasking OS, and it was doing it in 512K (not megabytes, kilobytes) of RAM.
Once I upgraded to the Amiga 3000, with a 16 MHz 68030 and 8M of RAM, it was rock solid... running Digital Music Construction Set, Sculpt-3D, the MIDI Workbench, the videogame I was working on, a compiler, and of COURSE a telnet session to my shell account so I could read Usenet!
To me, the prime responsibility of an operating system is to be my Bitch, to take all the abuse I can dish out and beg for more. I want it to metaphorically plead with me "Oh, Master, I have a few spare CPU cycles... can I do some SETI@Home for you? Please?".
If it can't do that, it's not an operating system, it's a jumped-up PDA.
Posted by: me_94501 at March 30, 2005 04:33 PM
Apple is not a perfect company. They don't make perfect products. They do things that irritate me to no end (the lawsuits come to mind). But Apple's products are better than anything out there right now for my money.
Posted by: NoPCZone at March 30, 2005 04:43 PM
Being a user of a cornucopia of OSes every day at work (blame the vendors, not yours truly), I love OS X more and more. It's not perfect, but it's getting there. It really is a young OS despite the NeXT/UNIX lineage and is evolving.
To the OS9 crybabies, the old Mac OS is dead and was ready for the museum long before Apple stopped selling it. Apple may have bought NeXT, but NeXT took over Apple and that's just the way it's going to be.
I'd be interested in your take on YDL on your Mac. Dual-boot for a while and give us what's on your mind. Linus is running LINUX on a G5 box, so it cannot be that bad.
Keep up the great blog.
Posted by: at March 30, 2005 04:47 PM
/hated drunkenbatman for being reasonable
Posted by: hermes at March 30, 2005 05:07 PM
Funny, you are one of the cool things I can point to about being a Mac user and I feel you are really just hitting your stride. :-( Linux has no one like you, neither does Windows, and I know if you threw your hat in their game you'd make waves and still do cool things there.
I do see where you are coming from and why you said this though. You probably saved the ongoing blogger from some arrows from the Mac faithful. And I haven't been as unhappy as you have, but I've considered it too because I do like games. Doom 3 almost made me buy a PC, just to play, but I am afraid if I am using two computers I will use one more than the other gradual and I do love the Mac.
Linux is not so bad anymore either if you have the technical skills. I would not ask my grandmother to use it on her own, but I can see the attractiveness to a user like yourself. And x86 now has the Pentium M and AMD-64 with some nice systems built around them. Stick it out though, these come back around.
Posted by: Gareth Potter at March 30, 2005 05:19 PM
Interesting post, as is Bray's. And, with apologies for the length...
Being a relative late-comer to the Mac scene (2002), the user interface things don't get to me in quite the same way. It is only through reading your gripes (and those of Mr Daring Fireball) that I appreciate that there are issues with the UI - click through, the Finder in metal, and so on. (Metal has its place, but...)
But coming from MS-DOS/Windows 3.1 (until 1997 - I am quite proud of that) through Windows 95 and every iteration until XP, with more than a little dabbling in Linux on the way, I can say with hand on heart that I've not found anything better than OS X yet. Basically, I'm still basking in the glow of UI love, tatty and forlorn though the HIG Bible may be.
These days, I still use Ubuntu Linux as a server, and crack out GNOME on it from time to time - and it is very nice. It's not as nice in many ways as OS X, but it's not bad at all.
But if I said it was all sweetness and roses, I'd be lying. Wireless is unbearably painful. I still cannot understand why Apple is the only company who has managed to make a good wireless implementation. And the system in general needs attention. That's the biggest thing for me, and probably the main reason that the Mac is so Insanely Great for me - it's UNIX when I want it to be, but at the end of the day, when I want to get work done, I can just stop fiddling around and get on with it.
I must say that I cannot entirely grok what is being said about the politics. To misrepresent Apple's stance against Think Secret as an attack on bloggers rights and freedom of speech is unhelpful at least and rather careless on Bray's part. But on the other hand, I do feel his pain vis. Safari - it's irritating me too at the moment, and I hope that Tiger is going to fix all that.
Funnily enough, I'd just been thinking this evening about how wonderful the Mac is, especially after your Rentsch (?) interview - it seemed reasonably optimistic (dare I ask if you had momentarily let your guard down? :P). Just been playing with BluePhoneElite and was mildly amused - it's relatively pointless but rather cool - stopping screensavers and starting iTunes based on proximity, etc. It struck me that the glue between applications is so much more refined on the Mac - I couldn't see it working on Linux or Windows. Oh, and drag-and-drop always makes me laugh on other platforms, etc.
I realise you're at the very high end of the competency scale when it comes to computers, but remember what you're giving up! When I think of the countless hours I have whiled away trying to get Linux 2.6 to work reliably with my wireless card...:P
Posted by: Mike Warren at March 30, 2005 05:56 PM
I'm surprised you didn't get any real flames. Perhaps people are tired of religious wars. I know I am and not just the OS variety. At Easter dinner my sister-in-common-law confessed she's ready to leave the Catholic Church (both our families are Catholic) and become Episcopalian. Although I empathized with her pain, I just yawned -- being atheist, I don't see any difference between the two, at least not enough to switch. Whatever gets you through the night.
re. Tiger: I'm still looking forward to playing with it. I'm not sure what to expect but I don't worry much about UI inconsitencies. Is that like worrying over which direction to carry the Host around the altar? Clockwise or counterclockwise?
Can you imagine the noise you'd be hearing if Apple wasn't into change for change's sake?
- Apple Computer is no longer the innovator it once was. How sad.
- Is Apple relevant?
- Apple hasn't updated the OS in two years, they're losing the advantage to [your OS here]
- SONY will take over Apple by the end of the year!
I just wish they'd find a way to spellcheck blog entries.
Posted by: David at March 30, 2005 06:34 PM
Look Apple is not perfect. I don't like everything they do. I wish they would open the iPod/ITMS platform to competition. I just think it is in their long-term interests. I also think they would come out with OSX for X86. I just think that would make them a real player again. But even with these gripes - I can't consider windows - it sucks. My friends on Windows struggle with the littlest things. And while I think Linux will be the cockroach that survives them all, it is not for me - too complicated. I want to some extent to have a reasonably good company out there ensuring that my tech works well, is easy and fun to use. That's Apple for the foreseeable future.
Also, I am not offended by Apple's going after the Thinksecret and the others to get the names of the employees who leaked. I mean if you look at the ThinkSecret site, note the anonymous tipline, it is asking for litigation to enforce NDA. If I were head of a company where employees were giving away secrets, whether trade secrets or confidential patient records, to the media I would go after them too. Also your example of Enron is bogus. There are of laws to protect whistle-blowers. Information about corporate malfeasance would not be considered trade secrets by any court.
The one argument I can see on the blogger's side is this. Sometimes companies violate confidentiality intentionally to get attention. I don't see how a blogger would ever be able to truly tell an intentional leak for one that would be litigated.
Posted by: C Pethig at March 30, 2005 08:40 PM
Reasonable men make reasonable arguments. The only line item in both this and Tim Bray's fit of pique that strikes me as misguided is the mention of how mad they are at Apple for being some kind of free-speech hating bully. I must say this once and clear: I feel that the press and the Mac community in particular have completely taken the wrong view of this situation, and they certainly have misaprehended the long-established legal perspective.
- First, NDA-violating leaks is not an isolated case for Apple, but an ongoing thorn in the side of Apple Computer, Inc. for at least 5 years. In point of fact, there is so much furvor and rumor-mongering around the Apple product line that the Mac rumor mills are their own cottage industry. Rumors breed eyeballs. Eyeballs sell advertising. The more historically accurate the site, the more eyeballs. This is a market need that was just begging to cross the line of legality.
- Next, to any who would doubt the raison d'etre of the "blog" in question, just look at the name: Think Secret. What statement about the site's purpose does that reflect, if not as a clearinghouse for Apple's proprietary information concerning their business plans -ie, trade secrets?
- To take an example that will hit close to home for Mr. Bray, what would Sun's response be if the source code for JES were leaked and distributed through a public web site with an identifiable editor (and yes, I realize their plans to open source JES reduces this example's shelf life)? Well, the law doesn't make a distinction between intellectual property and proprietary intelligence - discemination of either constitutes violation of an NDA and this is tantamount to espionage - ie, theft. Both are intangible "goods", and assigning value to either is a fairly straightforward excercise for a skilled attorney.
- Would it have been preferable for Apple to approach this the way most large firms do and simply name erstwhile Mssr. DePlume as party to a multi-million dollar civil suit? I think not - Apple made it clear that the target of their investigation was in the fact the leaking employee and did Think Secret a favor in merely seeking his source instead of his hide.
I'm a defender of the individual and all that, but as an avowed existentialist, part of that creed requires the assumption of personal responsibility. What Think Secret did, had been doing, was illegal, unethical, and the punk knew it - hence the nom de plume; ergo the secret sources. Getting pissed at Apple for finally swatting at gnats isn't just naive, its petulent. And its an incredibly asinine criteria for selection of a general computing platform.
I think the real reason that there seems to be so much shock and tooth gnashing over this is because its Apple. Face it, we're all guilty of patronizing companies who have cause and continue to cause *genuine* harm to our rights, to society, to other nations, to the environment - and we do so on a daily basis. To avoid this requires more diligence than can be afforded in the waking hours. The reason Apple acting like a corporation
galls us so much is because - despite its 6 billion in revenues - we never viewed Apple as a corporation until now. It was more like a persona - a friend, even. Time to grow up. Me included.
Posted by: C Pethig at March 30, 2005 08:41 PM
Reasonable men make reasonable arguments. The only line item in both this and Tim Bray's fit of pique that strikes me as misguided is the mention of how mad they are at Apple for being some kind of free-speech hating bully. I must say this once and clear: I feel that the press and the Mac community in particular have completely taken the wrong view of this situation, and they certainly have misaprehended the long-established legal perspective.
- First, NDA-violating leaks is not an isolated case for Apple, but an ongoing thorn in the side of Apple Computer, Inc. for at least 5 years. In point of fact, there is so much furvor and rumor-mongering around the Apple product line that the Mac rumor mills are their own cottage industry. Rumors breed eyeballs. Eyeballs sell advertising. The more historically accurate the site, the more eyeballs. This is a market need that was just begging to cross the line of legality.
- Next, to any who would doubt the raison d'etre of the "blog" in question, just look at the name: Think Secret. What statement about the site's purpose does that reflect, if not as a clearinghouse for Apple's proprietary information concerning their business plans -ie, trade secrets?
- To take an example that will hit close to home for Mr. Bray, what would Sun's response be if the source code for JES were leaked and distributed through a public web site with an identifiable editor (and yes, I realize their plans to open source JES reduces this example's shelf life)? Well, the law doesn't make a distinction between intellectual property and proprietary intelligence - discemination of either constitutes violation of an NDA and this is tantamount to espionage - ie, theft. Both are intangible "goods", and assigning value to either is a fairly straightforward excercise for a skilled attorney.
- Would it have been preferable for Apple to approach this the way most large firms do and simply name erstwhile Mssr. DePlume as party to a multi-million dollar civil suit? I think not - Apple made it clear that the target of their investigation was in the fact the leaking employee and did Think Secret a favor in merely seeking his source instead of his hide.
I'm a defender of the individual and all that, but as an avowed existentialist, part of that creed requires the assumption of personal responsibility. What Think Secret did, had been doing, was illegal, unethical, and the punk knew it - hence the nom de plume; ergo the secret sources. Getting pissed at Apple for finally swatting at gnats isn't just naive, its petulent. And its an incredibly asinine criteria for selection of a general computing platform.
I think the real reason that there seems to be so much shock and tooth gnashing over this is because its Apple. Face it, we're all guilty of patronizing companies who have cause and continue to cause *genuine* harm to our rights, to society, to other nations, to the environment - and we do so on a daily basis. To avoid this requires more diligence than can be afforded in the waking hours. The reason Apple acting like a corporation
galls us so much is because - despite its 6 billion in revenues - we never viewed Apple as a corporation until now. It was more like a persona - a friend, even. Time to grow up. Me included.
Posted by: mason dixie @ ga tech at March 30, 2005 08:43 PM
I'm surprised you haven't gotten flamed more too since this has been linked. Either you are an untouchable celebrity in the Mac world (doubtful), or there is something to what you're saying or something else entirely. It has been encouraging to see most of the comments not devolve to that level.
Posted by: Ac0rn at March 30, 2005 08:46 PM
Reasonable men make reasonable arguments. The only line item in both this and Tim Bray's fit of pique that strikes me as misguided is the mention of how mad they are at Apple for being some kind of free-speech hating bully.
drunkenbatman is the one who has posted the most about the Tiger leak lawsuits. If he was vague on the "policies" but I would not be surprised to learn Apple suing students is what he meant. Or both? drunkenbatman?
Posted by: Lachlan at March 30, 2005 09:06 PM
It perplexes me that people expect to just USE a computer - without any real training or expertise ... I say this not in relation to DB, but just as an observation. If more people took the time to read a manual on whatever operating system they were using, and truly UNDERSTAND it, they'd be in a much better position to offer a critique and maybe even some constructive feedback to the developers.
Posted by: DKG at March 30, 2005 09:50 PM
Don't worry DrunkenBatman. Opinions are like assholes: everyone has one, and the only one that matters is your own!
Posted by: Jedd at March 30, 2005 11:17 PM
db sez, re, suckage:
" so does an interface coming in 10.4 that just doesn't look like something I'd want to use, and so does building core functionality features into the OS and then charging a yearly fee."
WTF? Google didn't revela anything about a yearly Apple fee. Unless you're referring to charging full price for each 10.x upgrade?
Posted by: jhn at March 31, 2005 01:45 AM
I think it would be just great if Gnome learned from the example of OS X and made a system that doesn't only look good, but is easy to maintain. I think it would be great if the only PCs that didn't look like hell and sound like a helicopter taking off weren't more expensive than equivalent Macs (I'm talking Hush, etc). I wish it were not the case that only on the Mac platform is quality an issue--- usability, ease, aesthetics; the whole package. I wish that lots more companies made awesome and cheap boxes that ran an OS as good as OS X. But it isn't so.
To dissuade yourself from switching to Gnome (the only possible option other than OS X--- unless you think that KDE's imitation of everything Windows is a good thing), just try using it for a week.
The anti-Apple backlash may be about to begin among the techno-cognoscenti. But any problems you may have with Apple the company are dwarfed by those you ought to have with Microsoft the company, and if you see Linux desktops as an answer to anything other than the question of "how can I spend even more time dicking around on the computer without getting any real work done," you obviously haven't tried actually using one.
Posted by: "Crocodile" Leechman at March 31, 2005 07:36 AM
Oy, jhn: ya know how the word for fiddlin' with the knobs instead of gettin' ya work done is "Macdinking"? It's long past time fer an update, 'ow about "Tuxtweaking"?
Posted by: Henk Tukkers at April 1, 2005 06:50 PM
I think I understand your problem (if you have any). Computers cannot think for themselves, you have to give 'em orders. They are like a vacuumcleaner or a refrigerator: you have to push the buttons to make it work. My Mac is ok for me.
Posted by: acaeti at April 2, 2005 04:31 PM
jhn: you sir, in my anecdotal experiences, are most correct. I switched from win/linux to OS X, and since, have found my productivity increase dramatically because I spend virtually no time dealing with drivers, updates, patches to software, etc. It is truly easier and better on OS X.
Posted by: otter at April 3, 2005 11:31 AM
Hmmm.
Well, I can say that this is interesting, this whole unswitching thing. Me? I am forced to use Windows, various generations, at work. I hate it. Even without dealing with the whole malware issue and dinking about with drivers, etc, it's still an eye stabbing nightmare in my book.
I do have one point to make though, regarding the Safari comments. If someone here could point out to me a single browser that doesn't have the same problem, I'd be most grateful. I've used every browser available on both platforms, and I haven't found one yet that won't dump open pages without so much as a how do you do. Seems like somebody is cranky and is blaming Safari for what is an endemic problem with web browsers.
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" the Mac has come out ahead over and over each cycle."
At the end of the day, everybody has things they want to be different. How can any OS be everything to everyone? Instead of deserting ship, why not focus on making a difference.
Apple is just a company that makes things. OS X is just a TOOL to make your work a little less painful. A bit of insight goes a long way. Life != your laptop. Its important yes if you are a professional in this business. But don't expect everything all at once.