#MacOSX

I'm evaluating Mac for my needs first time after the first clamshell iBooks. I'm sorry if this text offends someone. I've followed and used Apple closely as long I can remember, but felt that this probably isn't true match for me.

Anyway I decided to test this as closely as I can and talk about it. I decided to try to survive next three weeks with Mac Os X. Luckily I have Kubuntu installed to this MBP so I can get to familiar waters if needed:)

Some rants:

It seems that nowadays Mac Os X UI is too simplified and clumsy for real multitasking. It doesn't offer enough from out of the box. For example managing ten browser windows is a challenge and needs more mental processing to handle than in Windows or Linux. It doesn't matter whether I have only one or more browsers programs open. Mac task switching would probably work better if every program had only one window. Tabs aren't answer for everything and Exposé isn't really answer.

Windowing system of Mac Os X is too simplified and the much waited "innovative" Spaces virtual desktops are just too limited. Even the windowing system of Windows XP is better than this without Exposé and Spaces.

I've spent a couple of days for just searching, downloading and installing little software bits to do what I need. The Mac way of installing software is nice when you're installing one software, but it gets annoying after five programs. And like in Windows, every software has it's own updater or you must download the version. I want apt-get for Mac Os X. I know about AppFresh and will probably use it, but that kind of functionality should be part of the OS.

Also Growl and AppCleaner should be integrated part of the OS. It feels that Apple has crippled the functionality of the OS just to get it simplified too much. And if there's a need for software like AppCleaner, Apple is doing something wrong.

Is there any way to get normal non-Mac keyboard layout? I can't stand the non-standard layout. It isn't really better, it's just different and isn't worth of learning.

Some kind of binary distribution of Unix-software would be nice. Now it's too fragmented with Fink, Macports and some standalone installers from the makers of one or two software.

It's weird that Finder doesn't have built-in support for SFTP. Have to install Macfuse and get it working.

Dock isn't great and I haven't seen anything better for Mac Os X. Managing more than one window per program is painful and not so obvious with some windows popping and not popping when clicking the dock icon, depending on the programs implementation.

Touchpads got worse when they introduced the two finger scroll. Also, would it be too much to implement a real second button to Macbooks? Tapping with more than one finger is as hard as pressing ctrl+click.

Windowing and file management are still (after eight years of development) clumsier than they were in Mac Os Classic. Something they fumbled and badly. After Beos none have gotten any closer the usability of Mac Os Classic.

It's hard to find a good mp3-player programs other than iTunes.

Some extra settings to Energy Saver would be nice. SmcFanControl is a must if you don't want to burn your legs with laptop. Some CPU speed scaling settings would be nice, too.

No built-in SMART software and no full defragmentation utility.

Some positive things I have noticed:

"ssh -X $hostname" works out of the box :)
Xcode seems to nice, Cocoa syntax is weird but learnable.
iPhone simulator
Most of the freeware utilities are great.
Native Lightroom
UI is beautiful but so is the UI of KDE 4
Preview seems nice and useful
the coverflow in Finder can be great aid
Suspend to ram just works
Snow Leopard brings good SMP queue system with Grand Central. When will software support it?
Spotlight works great

@trm Wow, that was a long text!

The iBook reveals a bit, however, as it used the old System. A lot has changed since then. And many things are not coming back...

I don't quite understand the multitasking thing. For me there is no problem to handle ten browser windows, depends on the browser also. But it is very easy to switch between windows inside one app. In the document-centric work each document needs a window, not a program. E.g. in Windows there is no clean and clear conceptual structure for apps, windows and documents.
It is essential that the system does the multitasking, not the human. One program (one task) - one window comes from MS Windows and it is, for me at least, one of the worst things ever. To note is that Linux UI developers have taken a lot from Windows (also from X11 systems sharing some features).

I can't but wonder, how the windowing system of Windows XP is better than of OS X without Exposé and Spaces. There are windows, I admit, but the whole system is a mess. Exposé and Spaces are relatively late in OS X, they could work better, but even without them I enjoy doing things on OS X. I use XP daily, it's not that fun.

All in all, it seems that you have some system image in mind, and try to enforce OS X to work like it. I do not say OS X is perfect, but I haven't found any better so far (and I've used all types of computers and systems since HP2000). There are hardly any objective measures, so if you like something else better, use it then. De gustibus non disputandum...

About the positive things you say, the syntax is really Objective-C, the language, Cocoa is the API. Syntax comes from adding Smalltalk ideas to C, basically.

If there are specific questions, I'm happy to discuss them...

The text above is a bit too general and long to go through. I understand, of course, that if you frustrated with something, you have to be able to express that somehow.

Exposé works great for me. why is it a problem?
I set up showing "All Windows" to top-left corner, so switching between windows is trivial. Snow Leopard also includes all minimised windows in Exposé.

p.s. Exposé is also activated by 4-finger swipe down on touchpad

@jwa Hehe. The rant was mostlyt some kind of counter reaction to endless Apple hype. You can rarely hear actual criticism about Apple products without hearing the "It's perfect because Apple designed to be perfect" -responses.

I wouldn't say I'm frustrated because of these things but they do annoy me every time I'm trying to find that and that window:) Just trying get some ideas for my own usage and hear how others feels about these things.

I was earlier somewhat OS geek so I've been testing and seeing everything I could get my hands on. Best desktop environment for me has been KDE for its modifiability for now, but sooner or later I have to get some new hardware so I'm evaluating Mac Os to learn something new and the best way to do it is to spend my vacation with MacbookPro:)

I've seen and tested briefly most of the Powerbook and iBook and MacBook designs since the original iBook. For some reason the original iBook is the coolest Apple laptop design for me after Duos. Oh and sometimes the temptation to buy a used Cube is big.

After that the original iBook they throwed all originality out of the window and started doing white/grey metal and plastic laptops, which didn't really introduce anything new to laptop computing. (Apple is getting more cautious all the time and they're careful not to do anything really new. Just adding touchpad gestures and keyboard illumination:)

The multitasking thing for UIs is difficult for all UIs, I believe, but somehow Apple managed to clunk it worse than usual. You have program tasking and then you have window tasking and they're not playing nicely. Apple has invented new kludges for the problem (like Exposé), but it doesn't solve the problem completely and was obviously forced to adopt virtual desktops to handle some of the burden.

Some programs you do want to run in same window (or in same imaginary space which includes all the windows of the program), like Photoshop, Xcode, but you don't want to that with browser windows. Mostly Windows programs nowadays aren't trying to do the MDI thing (thank god:) The function of the program and it's usage patterns defines the need for one window one program. Most of the IDEs are using tabs for document handling.

The actual problem here is that in Mac Os X it doesn't handle both of the situation so clearly. You can find Photoshop from the Dock easily but can you find the browser window below three or four other windows? If you command-tab or task switch via Dock, it's not guaranteed you will get that browser window (actually, you'll get the last one you used), but there's no clean way to get other browser windows without using Exposé or moving the windows to find the one window you're looking for.

And using Exposé is somewhat awkward. There should be a real button for it beside the touchpad. With some mouses you can bind it to some unneeded button or use hot zones in the corners of the desktop, but all the same, it tries to the same thing which Dock already fails to do so you have to task switching method which tries to do the same thing so differently that they don't support each other as they should.

At least in my own usage the Windows Taskbar is easier and snappier way to reach particular windows.

Oh and the dock doesn't help with windows if they aren't minimized and Exposé seems to be changing the order of the windows, so you can't even quickly use it because you have to read the whole Exposé screen to know what you're looking for.

Also you can do command-tabbing nowadays to go through opened programs but you can't do that with the same logic for program windows.

And because this mess, you have handle more of the multitasking mentally instead the UI would do it for you.

Yeah Windows XP is PITA otherwise, but task switching works better IMO. There might be some things which I haven't discovered about the Mac Os X way but it sure doesn't seem too encouraging. One of the Windows XPs biggest advantages is the possibility to divide the screen for just wanted programs via Taskbar (just click a couple of programs with shift and give order to cascade them.

Windowing system and it's feel is somehow hard to define. Some systems just feels clumsier to use. Maybe it's the lack of keyboard shortcuts (or not knowing them) or the big clumsy window decoration bars or just how the window can be moved. In this matter the old Mac Os Classic is my favorite. The windows didn't eat unnecessary screen space at all and they were swift and easy to move. So does the WinXP window feel compared to Mac Os X.

In Mac Os X there doesn't seem to be keyboard shortcut for maximize window command and you can't move windows without drag'n'dropping your window title. For some reason I have move windows a bit left and a bit right to get some other windows to fit the same screen.

Otherwise Mac Os X is nowadays pretty hassle-free and really stable. Thanks for correcting the ObjC-Cocoa -thing. I know the difference but I was a bit lazy at that point. After getting used to C-style languages, learning ObjC feels weird, but probably won't be harder than Python. Although some pyObjC -bindings are really weird looking :D

Did this get even longer? :-)

@trm Yes, it did get a bit longer!

To put the easy part first, ObjC syntax is not that hard, it's harder, though to learn all the libraries, classes, and conventions (like KVC, KVO &c).

A couple of things to try: while cmd-tab you can hit 'h' to hide the app (or 'q' to quit), and if you have a well-behaving program (most are, unlike on Windows), you can use cmd-opt-shift-´ to rotate app's windows (it is many keys down in the same time, but once I got used to it, it works really nice).

The current products, though they are similar to each other, are very clearly different from any other laptops. And I would say the unibody design is an innovation, among others. Making the touchpad as large works quite well for me, I find myself using two fingers on Windows laptop trying to move the content just to realize I'm on an antiquated system:)

BTW, there is no MDI in OS X. It is a Windows thing created to contain several document windows in one app window. In OS X you just have document windows. There are two kinds of apps, though, in that other apps close when the last document window is closed, normally they stay open (this confuses most Windows users). In Windows you create a task/thread for a document, in OS X you just open a window. This actually is conceptually one of the greatest problems in Windows, as the structure of the system is botched (think, for instance, how many ways there are to close a window, and how you never know the exact effect).

Finding the correct window is hard at times. The current Exposé with miniaturized windows while holding the mouse button on app dock icon should work fine. Even in Windows, if you want to find the correct window, you have to be able to identify it somehow. And if there are really many apps open with several documents in each, it is really, really, really hard to find one (the taskbar is useless, alt-tab is useless, there is no distinction between apps and documents).

Hmm, so that I remember to say, F9-F11 are by default bound to Exposé to show all windows, app windows, or desktop (that I don't use at all, except for background image, but some might).

About app hiding: one can hide the current app, or all other apps. This might prove useful sometimes.

I must admit that sometimes I'd like to move a window by grabbing any edge. But that happens once or twice a year, so it is not that big a problem:)

The biggest win in OS X for me is its consistency. One knows already quite many keyboard shortcuts even not having looked at the documentation, e.g. getting preferences by cmd-, is something that is sorely missing on other platforms.

With OS X it is, I guess, the same as with many other products, one has to make a balance between features and usability. Hence really any given system can not be perfect for all.

PS During the years my own observation has been that Apple users are the most critical of the company's products. Critical does not mean bashing. The deficiencies are seen better than in many other company's products.

@jwa it is not cmd-opt-shift-´
on my machine it is just cmd-~ (I use US and Russian keyboard layouts)

@indeyets Yes, e.g. in Finder menu it says 'cmd-`', but my Finnish keyboard makes me find workarounds (actually cmd-opt-shift-´ gives just that, checked with Keyboard Viewer)...

@indeyets Thanks for the tip. I'm using hot zones with Exposé but that gets annoying when the cursor moves accidentally or for the need to do something near the hot zone.

This MBP doesn't have gestures. It''s a bit older machine but it's specs are sufficient for me. Been using it with Kubuntu for some time now. It has its cons and pros.

@jwa Thanks for the tips. I didn't know all of them. Finnish keyboard layout sucks with Photoshop and Mac Os X. Some characters are too hard to get. For coding the basic US-keylayout is probably the best. I'm also lazy to reach F-keys every time I have to find a window.

I know there aren't MDI software in Mac Os X (but maybe in some Java and X11 there are?). I'm familiar with the window and program difference with Mac Os, but the built-in task switching utilities aren't good enough for that design pattern and the document centric design fails when there are tabs in those "document" windows such as browsers and IDEs or text editors. Tabs are probably the modernized version of MDI.

I found two precious 3rd party utilities to get Mac Os to ease my personal pain:
* Isolator
* And most importantly Witch

Isolator dims all the other windows and if wanted hides dock too, so the clutter can be hidden. Better and faster than minimizing all the stuff or trying to clean and find new virtual desktop for just one window.

Witch is the most important one utility. It gives you fast and clean way to switch between windows from keyboard. Something which Os X should offer out of the box. And it's shortcuts and functionality is beautifully customizable for your own taste. I have alt-(+shift)-tab selected for all of the windows and ctrl-(+shift)-tab selected for the windows of program focused. Gets easiar than cmd-opt-shift-´.

Usability isn't the same thing than crippled options, like Apple has in some parts. It just tells, they are denying some flaws they have created. KDE 4 is a great example for including all the options user could need without cluttering or forcing user to really walk through those if user isn't interested about the options.

Basic task switching in Mac Os is usable, if you have iPhoto, One Safari window and maybe iTunes running. Great and simple for my mother. After that it gets uglier without the Witch :)

Whew. Now it got a tad shorter.