Stephen Jendraszak (stevehj_at_mac.com) wrote:
> I think OS X resolves many issues. It offers far more robust networking,
> and compatibility with "foreign" networking systems.
We have PC Mac LAN installed on our PCs, which works great. If the OS
offers support for foreign file and networking systems, that's certainly
nice, but it's in no way ground-breaking.
> It finally does away with the Chooser, replacing it with the Connect to
Server...
Big deal.
> ... and the Print Center.
I don't see the big improvement, and I still miss desktop printers, a
very useful feature if you have many printers on your network. (On my
iBook, I also have an always disabled dummy desktop printer that I print
to when I'm not connected to any network. When I am, I just drag the
print jobs to a printer on the network.)
> Column view is an excellent navigation system
Give me back the spatial Finder and I would happily give up column view
-- and not that I even needed to give it up; after all, there are several
browser-type utilities for the classic Mac OS that offer column view.
> and the Dock is great for me to keep my most used files at immediate ready.
Never heard about DragThing? Dock-type applications have been around for
years under the classic Mac OS, and virtually everyone of those was
superior to Apple's Dock (OK, none of these had a La Ola effect). I'm
thankful that DragThing is available under Mac OS X as well, so I don't
have to use the Dock for everything.
> The control strip was a UI aberration...
It was? When it was introduced on the PowerBooks, many years ago, users
of desktop Macs clamoured to get it as well, as its usefulness was quite
obvious. This was a very, very popular feature of the classic Mac OS.
> it has been replaced with more UI-consistent elements.
After users made it clear that some replacement of the control strip was
sorely needed, Apple began to experiment first with extensions to the
dock (docklings, soon to be discarded) and finally to the menu bar --
none of these were consistent with anything else and it was plainly
obvious that they had no idea how useful the old control strip had been
and how they could retro-fit its functionality under Mac OS X. It's like
these people never ever used a Mac.
And there's still no easily extensible replacement for the control strip.
> The Control Panels were consolidated and organized.
Big deal. Previously I could just open the control panel I needed (it was
just a program anyway), now I have to open a container app and then
select the control panel I really wished to open, both of which takes time.
> Extensions were finally done away with.
Old-style extensions, yes, which has its pros and cons. It's harder to
crash Mac OS X by adding extensions, but it's also harder to address its
deficiencies with extensions.
> Sheets (to replace Open/Save dialogs) stay with the window they belong to.
Nice, but relatively non-essential. Open/Save dialogs, whether as sheets
or as independent windows, still suck, like they always did. This is
actually an area where the Mac OS could have done with a radical re-
design, preferably by getting rid of Open/Save dialogs completely. Sheets
don't cut it.
> The OS adds depth of perception with shadows and transparencies.
<shrug> I don't see how this is essential for anything, and if it slows
down screen redraws, I would happily do without. I want a consistent GUI,
not gimmicks.
> And don't
> underestimate protected memory... I love it when an my beta chat program
> goes down and I don't loose my Word Processing document. Preemptive
> multitasking, too, is often underestimated. I hate using OS 9 now,
> because I can only do one real task at a time, as opposed to OS X.
Sure, protected memory is great and preemptive multitasking, even though
its implementation in Mac OS X creates problems of its own, is great,
too, but those are the minimal features any modern OS would have to have.
This is something we should take for granted, rather than praising Apple
for its inclusion in Mac OS X. Any modern OS has these features, so it's
no reason to prefer Mac OS X over any of its contenders.
> What OS 9, features is it lacking, aside from spring-loaded folders,
> which are coming in 10.2?
Certainly not spring-loaded folders -- I hate spring-loaded folders and
have disabled this feature on all Macs I own or use ... What I'm missing
is the spatial Finder -- a great concept that was given up for no good
reason --; better support for type and creator codes (and generally a
more sensible way of dealing with file meta data); no hiding of
extensions, ever; no reliance on extensions (while _support_ of
extensions is fine); Finder windows that consistently remember their
position, size, and style; zoom and minimize buttons at the right-hand
side of a windows's title bar (yes, they used to be there for a reason);
"File" and "Edit" menus that don't jump when I'm switching applications
-- the menus in front of these should have a constant width --; multiple
info windows for every Finder object I want info on -- in many cases, I
use the Finder's "Information" command to compare two files, folders, or
whatever, which is impossible to do under Mac OS X; a system folder that
I can simply copy to another disk for backup purposes; the ability to
create a Mac OS X boot disk; control over my disk, not half of the OS
hidden away and next to impossible to get rid off once you need to re-
install the OS, short of erasing the whole partition (along with all user
folders); more economical use of screen real estate -- right now I have
to upgrade to a bigger display display just to have the same amount of
info on screen that I used to have under Mac OS 9; better support for
multiple partitions -- right now, Mac OS X mostly takes it for granted
that everything, including apps and documents, resides on the boot
partition (I know you can move the user folders to another partition or
disk with shell commands, but the OS should offer this option as
standard); the ability to switch between many global environments (no,
creating multiple users is not a solution); ... There's a lot more, but I
don't have more time right now.
- Michael
Michael J. Hussmann
E-mail: michael_at_michael-hussmann.de
WWW: http://michael-hussmann.de
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