The new cat: LION (10.7)

[z-mac]

I'm using the developer release of OS X Lion (10.7) on one of my Macs. Here are my impressions...

THE GOOD
The "Applications" folder (and some others) now requires your password before changes can be made.
Resize a window from any border or corner! AT LAST. This should have been in OS X from the start.
Launchpad, which one uses to run programs instead of opening a Finder window, works well.
If you use Spaces, you will now see your Spaces in the Exposé window. This is an improvement.
The new desktop backgrounds are quite nice.

THE BAD
The App Store annoys me. I am not sure that I want to use it at all. Apple is using the App Store to distribute the developer builds of OS X and the experience is painful.
Renaming Exposé and Spaces to "Mission Control" makes no sense to me.

[Dan Millar]

I think the App Store is brilliant, but I wasn't too sure about Mission Control. After watching the WWDC keynote, I can assure you it's more than just a renaming of Expose and Spaces, it's a whole new way of moving apps and their doc windows from/to different virtual screens, and the full screen apps are part of this - the whole thing once again reminds me of the venerable "Switcher" - right down to the sliding apps. I guess Steve liked Switcher a lot more than he ever admitted. You can add the Newton to that short list of tech Steve publically poo-pooed but privately drove him to re-think the whole idea into what has now become the ipod/iphone/ipad/iOS ecosystem.

Lion looks like a real winner, and a sure hit against Windows 7 and 8, which were beginning to look an awful lot like "good enough to compete with OS X". Now Ballmer and his gang of monkeys will have a lot of work to do to come even close - be interesting to see what Redmond can pump out at $29.99 - the price point for Lion. Once again, Cupertino has leap-frogged all the other "cloud" providers - iCloud is a well-thought out, feature rich, easy-to-use and cheap service - free for most of us - that takes the bare-bone concept that Google and others are still trying to figure out and rips it a new, larger niche. And, once again, Apple has done all the heavy mental conceptualizing and lifting for the other wannabes to imitate. But imitation is no substitute for innovation, and Mr. Jobs has clearly shown that, even without his physical presence on campus, Apple can still out-innovate all comers.

'nuff said? More to come...

Happy Mac'ing!

Dan

[z-mac]

Here's a list of all the new features:

http://www.apple.com/ca/macosx/whats-new/features.html

Note that 10.7 will *only* be available as a download from the App Store.

Built-in file versioning is another good thing for users.

Lion looks like a real winner, and a sure hit against Windows 7 and 8, which were beginning to look an awful lot like "good enough to compete with OS X".

The last time I looked, Windows was doing rather well "competing" with every other OS in the world.

[Dan Millar]

I should clarify that flame-bait - I meant compete in terms of features, not sales figures. Please don't take the bait, I wasn't fishing, merely stating the fact that, finally, after all these years of imitation, Windows was finally closing the gap. But, again, it's imitation, what we saw at WWDC was a ton of innovation - Steve must be pushing hard or the team is über-inspired.

Happy Mac'ing!

Dan

[z-mac]

I wasn't too sure about Mission Control. After watching the WWDC keynote, I can assure you it's more than just a renaming of Expose and Spaces, it's a whole new way of moving apps and their doc windows from/to different virtual screens, and the full screen apps are part of this - the whole thing once again reminds me of the venerable "Switcher"

X-Windows has done this for a long time and in the last five years, the addition of compositing in Linux makes both Windows and OS X look dull. OS X 10.7 improves the functionality, but the innovation has all been in the UNIX/Linux world. MS Windows has nothing to compare.

be interesting to see what Redmond can pump out at $29.99

Agreed. Redmond Inc. needs to keep its shareholders happy. Ballmer would be fired if he announced an unconfusing Windows release (i.e. only one version) for 29.99.

Once again, Cupertino has leap-frogged all the other "cloud" providers - iCloud is a well-thought out, feature rich, easy-to-use and cheap service - free for most of us - that takes the bare-bone concept that Google and others are still trying to figure out and rips it a new, larger niche. And, once again, Apple has done all the heavy mental conceptualizing and lifting for the other wannabes to imitate. But imitation is no substitute for innovation, and Mr. Jobs has clearly shown that, even without his physical presence on campus, Apple can still out-innovate all comers.

Er, I see you are enthusiastic, but Google released Google Docs in 2006 (five years ago), has done a very good job innovating the features, and anyone can be using it for free.

Apple's iCloud won't even be available until Autumn 2011. At this point, your frog has donned a black turtleneck sweater and jeans and croaked in a keynote presentation, but it has yet to leap over anything except the prostrate bodies of swooning enthusiasts.

I enjoy using a thoughtfully-designed product as much as anyone, but you may be mixing a little too much Kool-Aid in your rum, Dan. (o:

[Dan Millar]

X-Windows? Yeah, there's a huge installed base. Of course it comes from UNIX, and virtual desktops have been with us on the Mac since the late 80's - so it's nothing new from Apple, but check out the functionality. I see nothing on Linux that approaches the functionality of Mission Control (in fact, I see nothing on Linux that even whispers "functionality"). Please, for the love of Mike, give up on Linux as a consumer desktop - that Koolaid's been spiked for years - and it's not even Koolaid - it's cheap, wannabe Freshie!

Google Docs? No, iCloud is a lot more than some lousy "apps in the cloud". And, it is also free. Did you even watch the keynote? Please, folks, if you haven't seen the keynote - do watch it so you understand what iCloud is - it is NOTHING like Google Docs. Seamless synchronization of all your mail, calendars, contacts, apps and files on all your devices, without you having to do a thing.

WWDC isn't just a "keynote presentation" that Steve whipped up the night before. This stuff is well into Alpha testing. There is some groundwork to be done, iOS 5 and Lion first, then iCloud. See how it works when there's a plan?

At least we agree on the $29.99 price point.

Happy Mac'ing!

Dan

[Dan Millar]

Oh, and one more thing...

Compositing windows? Mac OS X had compositing years before X-Windows/Linux. From Wikipedia:

On March 24, 2001, Mac OS X v10.0 became the first mainstream operating system to feature software-based 3D compositing and effects, provided by its Quartz component. With the release of Mac OS X v10.2 and Quartz Extreme, the job of compositing could be moved to dedicated graphics hardware.
vs.
Compositing under the X Window System required some redesign, which took place incrementally.[14] Metacity 2.8.4 was released in August 2004.[15] However, the first widely-publicized compositing window manager for X was Xfwm, released in January 2005.[16] On 2005-01-26, Compiz was released, introducing fully-accelerated 3D compositing to the Linux platform.[17] KDE's KWin also supports compositing.

I'm not surprised, considering you got the virtual desktop history wrong as well. (look up "virtual desktops" on Wiki)

Please, do your homework and try to keep up... ;-) ...and...

Happy Mac'ing

Dan

p.s. this is a Mac community - you gotta expect to take the odd broadside when you come on here spouting Linux propaganda. You have used a Mac, I take it?

[z-mac]

p.s. this is a Mac community - you gotta expect to take the odd broadside when you come on here spouting Linux propaganda.

I truly am sorry I mentioned any other OS. Will you have me wear some sort of badge so others can shun me?

X-Windows had virtual desktops before OS X did. Mac OS is distant history. It was a poor OS with some interesting features. Some of them were innovative. The fact remains that X-Windows had virtual desktops before OS X did. How far do you want to go back in history to find prior art for innovation? Xerox PARC? (Ooooops.)

In any case, MS Windows also had virtual desktops before OS X did. But, of course, Redmond made a mess of it and the utility caused instability in the OS.

Thanks for informing me about the appearance of compositing in OS X. I confess I forgot. OS X may have had compositing first, but what the open-source community has done with compositing in Linux makes both Windows and OS X look dull. I thought I hadn't asserted anything further.

But then you frothed onto your QWERTY about Linux being a failure as a desktop OS. Well, I have no illusions. Red Hat seems to be doing better than Sun (i.e. RH is still alive), Canonical is doing significant work in the FOSS community, and the brilliant package management on Linux makes it clear that package management on OS X is an ailing, wretched creature that many people have failed to fix. But given that Linux is free, quite good, and used widely (although *dominant* only on servers, supercomputers, portable devices, and embedded devices), I would like to know what your criteria for OS failure are. OS X only has 7% of the estimated desktop market at this time. After 10 years of effort (not counting the decades of the failed Mac OS for claims of prior innovative genius, I regret), I am not sure that OS X is doing well. I await your guidance from the high temple, Reverend Broadside.

Google has eaten Apple's lunch in the portable device market (using the despised Linux, no less). Jobs' strategy of leveraging the popularity of iOS devices to increase the market share of OS X (now "demoted") makes sense.

Ah, but you are not done heaping scorn upon me:

Google Docs? No, iCloud is a lot more than some lousy "apps in the cloud". And, it is also free.

This stuff is well into Alpha testing.

Ha ha! "Well into alpha testing", is it? If you are going to applaud code in alpha testing, you'll quickly be mistaken for a Redmond vapourware fetishist. I hope iCloud turns out to be a great product -- better than Apple's previous alpha code, otherwise known as Mobile Me. 

[Dan Millar]

Well, you're missing the point, aren't you? Max OS X is a functional consumer desktop OS that is gaining market share (5-10%), while Linux is what most statisticians would call a rounding error, i.e <1%. Maybe you forgot to mention that? Apple continues to blaze trail so midgets like Google and Microsoft can try to stand on their shoulders.

Sure, Linux is a viable server, but a terrible desktop, and that is what we are talking about. But then again, what do you want for nothing? That's the one sure thing about Linux - you get what you paid for - kind of like free advice. The only ones who seems to think Linux is a threat is the Ballmer bunch, not good company these days.

Your computer history could really use some brushing up - Mac OS in the nineties was extremely productive, the Finder in OS X is the legacy of that OS, and what every other OS builder has been trying, and failing, to emulate ever since. Even NeXt failed - but only until Apple married the Finder's interface to NeXt's underpinnings - and OS X was born.

If success was all about bums in seats, then I guess Win XP is the most successful desktop OS, followed closely now and soon to be surpassed by Win 7 - Microsoft's sincerest form of flattery so far. Behind Windows users come Mac users, with about a 10:1 ratio - the same ratio of Mac-to-Linux desktops. So how else can you measure OS success? Revenue? Apple's the clear winner there, Microsoft a close second, and there the comparison must end as Linux generates nothing that is measurable for desktop OSes. The only revenue being generated for Google (from Android - not Linux) is about a billion dollars per year in ad revenue. Apple makes ten times that per quarter from their iOS clients. So maybe revenue isn't such a good measure for you either. Apple is eating Google's lunch - for breakfast - my friend - check your numbers.

My statements concerning Mac OS X being the most successful of the OSes is based on usability. I note you did not take the "functionality" bait - why is that? Because, objectively, Linux and Windows do not come near the functionality of Mac OS X. Stop kidding yourself - any functionality in either of those two OSes are the direct result of imitating Apple. As someone who worked in IT all through the eighties and nineties, I can quite well remember the relative functionality of Windows and Mac OS, not to mention Novell and SCO and many others who have fallen by the wayside.

Anyone who works in IT must eventually realize that "the average user" does not want to learn how to fsck when his disk goes sideways, or DNS or TCP/IP so they can troubleshoot their network problems. People who know how to maintain a UNIX or Windows server are called system administrators - not users, and let's face it, most people just want to be users - not the ubergeek who can fix their computer when it breaks. So a) we need to make computers that don't break, and b) we need to keep all that admin stuff out of their faces. This has been Apple's goal from day one, and OS X is the closest anyone has come to meeting both those objectives. And this is what all MSCEs and Linux admins truly fear - users who do not need them, and why they fear Apple - whose stated intention right from the get-go was to reduce the computer to an appliance. Yes, when you get right down to it - this is a turf war, and if it had been left up to MS and UNIX admins, we'd all still be using DOS - with a joystick.

I have great faith in Apple's announcements, and good reason for it - white iPhones aside, Apple has always delivered what they promised. By the way, have you finished "alpha-testing" the "vapourware" you mentioned - I think you said you were using a developer preview of Lion - is that some kind of fetish you have or are you a legitimate developer?

And yes, this is a Mac community. We like Macs, and we don't apologise for it. If we liked Linux, we'd be spending more time at Distrowatch and Sourceforge, and less time trying to flame other OS users with lame arguments backed up by dubious figures and foggy recollections of the past. You've branded yourself "z-mac" - maybe some kind of warning would be germane, or maybe change your user name?

So long as you keep firing salvos at our mothership, you will continue to see my broadside, sir.

Oh yes,

Happy Mac'ing!

Dan