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It couldn't be any worse than the current version: ugly and buggy.

I'd give my right ankle for a port of Adium to Windows, or any other platform than OS X for that matter. It's the only multi-protocol IM client that doesn't suck. (Well, it still sucks for file transfers... but it doesn't suck nearly as much as the others.)

I'm talking about *polish*, not eye-candy.

Things like, "if I copy some spreadsheet cells from OpenOffice Calc into an application with no concept of spreadsheet cells, like GIMP, will I see a picture of the cells or nothing at all?"

In OS X and Windows, you see the cells represented in the way the receiving application can cope with them, in this case as an image. In Linux, you generally see... nothing.

Getting details like that right is what I mean by "polish." I don't give a crap how it looks, as long as it's not offensively ugly.

Could be worse. Better dead than drawn by Rob Leifeld: http://schend.net/images/funny/rob_leifeld.jpg

First, let me apologize for something. I really should get out of the habit of replying to a post without reading the grandparent, and explicitly stating where I don't agree. For one thing, I am NOT claiming that a CLI is in any way a replacement for a GUI. In fact, if you read carefully, you'll note that I say ALL forms of UI have their place.

Fair enough.

But these are running a whole CLI in a GUI. For all intents and purposes, everything inside that little window is just as if I was back on vt1.

"But" nothing. The answer "double-click Terminal.app" was at least as useful as your previous answer "type in GIMP".

I avoid Word macros and AppleScript with a passion, and I haven't tried Automator (and probably won't), so you may be right here.

So you're qualified to speak to the merits of AppleScript without having tried it. AppleScript and Automator may not be perfect, but the point is that you *can* get the kind of scriptability/programmability you want without ever leaving the GUI. (And it's not like UNIX is perfect, either. It could improve in a dozen ways if UNIX users like you weren't so habitual.)

I'm not sure whether to insult you directly, viciously, or stealthily and sarcastically. The obvious thing is to make some joke about how for all your smugness about the Internet, you obviously can't use Google.

There's a difference between "knowing how to use Google" and "caring enough about the topic to Google it." You're the one who brought up those mysterious acronyms, not me.

You're on. Let's grab two normal people who have never used computers at all, ever, and you try to teach them a GUI web browser, and I'll teach them lynx. I'll have them exploring Google by the time you've taught them the difference between "right-clicking" and "left-clicking".

Why would I teach them about right-click at all? In the continuum of computer users, "right-click" is a power-tool. The vast majority of computer users never use it.

If a large corporation can save thousands of dollars by moving everyone from paper files to some ungodly VAX klugde where you have to manually type PostScript commands, they'll go with the VAX every time.

The VAX kludge would probably be superior to paper files. Of course, for a tenth the cost the same company could move to Windows Small Business Server or something similar *and* be more productive than the VAX solution. So your argument sums to "any computer is faster than doing things on paper," which while I'm sure most people would agree, has nothing to do with this particular debate.

Certainly not better, not really worse, and utterly pointless when Gaim works so well.

This GAIM?
http://schend.net/images/screenshots/gaim_2_is_ugl y.png
http://schend.net/images/screenshots/gaim_2_is_bug gy.png

That GAIM? Oh yeah, it works so well it puts an un-movable un-resizable window on my screen, or on half my screen. That truly is the hallmark of well-working software. If you want to see decent multi-IM software, try Adium on OS X, but GAIM is a piece of crap.

First, let me apologize for something. I really should get out of the habit of replying to a post without reading the grandparent, and explicitly stating where I don't agree. For one thing, I am NOT claiming that a CLI is in any way a replacement for a GUI. In fact, if you read carefully, you'll note that I say ALL forms of UI have their place.

Fair enough.

But these are running a whole CLI in a GUI. For all intents and purposes, everything inside that little window is just as if I was back on vt1.

"But" nothing. The answer "double-click Terminal.app" was at least as useful as your previous answer "type in GIMP".

I avoid Word macros and AppleScript with a passion, and I haven't tried Automator (and probably won't), so you may be right here.

So you're qualified to speak to the merits of AppleScript without having tried it. AppleScript and Automator may not be perfect, but the point is that you *can* get the kind of scriptability/programmability you want without ever leaving the GUI. (And it's not like UNIX is perfect, either. It could improve in a dozen ways if UNIX users like you weren't so habitual.)

I'm not sure whether to insult you directly, viciously, or stealthily and sarcastically. The obvious thing is to make some joke about how for all your smugness about the Internet, you obviously can't use Google.

There's a difference between "knowing how to use Google" and "caring enough about the topic to Google it." You're the one who brought up those mysterious acronyms, not me.

You're on. Let's grab two normal people who have never used computers at all, ever, and you try to teach them a GUI web browser, and I'll teach them lynx. I'll have them exploring Google by the time you've taught them the difference between "right-clicking" and "left-clicking".

Why would I teach them about right-click at all? In the continuum of computer users, "right-click" is a power-tool. The vast majority of computer users never use it.

If a large corporation can save thousands of dollars by moving everyone from paper files to some ungodly VAX klugde where you have to manually type PostScript commands, they'll go with the VAX every time.

The VAX kludge would probably be superior to paper files. Of course, for a tenth the cost the same company could move to Windows Small Business Server or something similar *and* be more productive than the VAX solution. So your argument sums to "any computer is faster than doing things on paper," which while I'm sure most people would agree, has nothing to do with this particular debate.

Certainly not better, not really worse, and utterly pointless when Gaim works so well.

This GAIM?
http://schend.net/images/screenshots/gaim_2_is_ugl y.png
http://schend.net/images/screenshots/gaim_2_is_bug gy.png

That GAIM? Oh yeah, it works so well it puts an un-movable un-resizable window on my screen, or on half my screen. That truly is the hallmark of well-working software. If you want to see decent multi-IM software, try Adium on OS X, but GAIM is a piece of crap.

A picture's worth a thousand words:

http://schend.net/images/screenshots/alphabetical_ disorder.png

This is the "Import" dialog in the OS X port of Inkscape. Notice how, when sorting by name, apparently "Zzyzx.jpg" comes *before* "albinopeacock.jpg". When I reported this bug to the Inkscape developers, they told me that it's a Gnome bug and so there's nothing they could do about it.

And of course I'm ignoring the millions of other things wrong with that open dialog when running in Mac OS X. They didn't even slightly spend any effort getting it to look and work like a Macintosh open dialog. But I can even forgive that.

Not being able to alphabetize a list of files, that's unforgivable. The most basic level of usability QA would have caught this bug in Gnome five years ago... it's obvious that nobody involved with the Gnome project gives a flying crap about usability, despite all the tough talk.

From the Read Me attached to that download:

nf FAQ for Mac:

Q. I set NSRT location to "Frontend Directory", but where is it?
A. nf.app/Contents/MacOS. Put nsrt into this folder.

Q. I set Start location to "Frontend Directory", but it doesn't work.
A. Qt rejects to show the contents of the nf.app when starting. Use other locations instead.

Q. Where is the preference file?
A. In nf.app/Contents/MacOS.

Q. Where should I put the lang folder?
A. In the same place as nf.app.

Q. What is the blank rectangle above "HTML" radio button?
A. Qt's bug.

All executable files are made as "universal binary".

File type detection is supported as '-noext' option on all NSRT platforms.
So, if your ROM image is compressed without extension, don't forget to add -noext option.

- zones

You're telling me that THIS was QAed?

Let's look at a screenshot of the first thing the user sees:

http://schend.net/images/screenshots/nsrt33.png

This is the best you can do cross-platform? "[Parent Directory]" on MAC OS X?! Whoever made this GUI obviously is not a Mac user, and there's no way this could possibly pass as a Mac OS-native application. Hell, "About" is in the Help menu! (Oh wait, About is both in Help and in the Application menu. Even worse.) The Preferences dialog is actually pretty good.

I'm not going to waste my friday doing a detailed review of some ported app which, frankly, I don't even really know what it does. But you haven't changed my mind whatsoever. Even the most basic QA process would have fixed that ugly blank rectangle which is basically the very first thing the user sees.

FYI, here are some screenshots of KeyCaps in action:

Normal: http://www.schend.net/images/screenshots/keycaps_n ormal.png
With Option down: http://www.schend.net/images/screenshots/keycaps_o ption.png
With Option and Shift down: http://www.schend.net/images/screenshots/keycaps_o ption_shift.png

You can type a lot of crap without having to resort to a keymap application. Heck, like I said, I can't even figure out how to type commonly-used accents in Windows.

FYI, here are some screenshots of KeyCaps in action:

Normal: http://www.schend.net/images/screenshots/keycaps_n ormal.png
With Option down: http://www.schend.net/images/screenshots/keycaps_o ption.png
With Option and Shift down: http://www.schend.net/images/screenshots/keycaps_o ption_shift.png

You can type a lot of crap without having to resort to a keymap application. Heck, like I said, I can't even figure out how to type commonly-used accents in Windows.

FYI, here are some screenshots of KeyCaps in action:

Normal: http://www.schend.net/images/screenshots/keycaps_n ormal.png
With Option down: http://www.schend.net/images/screenshots/keycaps_o ption.png
With Option and Shift down: http://www.schend.net/images/screenshots/keycaps_o ption_shift.png

You can type a lot of crap without having to resort to a keymap application. Heck, like I said, I can't even figure out how to type commonly-used accents in Windows.

ad 2) cut&paste works fine, even with images and spreadsheets. Did you try OpenOffice or Koffice ? Probably not. If your Gnome has problems with it, that does not mean that *all* X-based UIs have problems with it. I guess that it works right even inside Gnome (although I do not use it myself), the standards for drag&drop are in place for very long time already. Interoperability between different applications could be better, but that holds for Windows and Mac as well. If you paste something from Excell into Photoshop, you are going to get less-than-stellar result too, because the application just does not expect that kind of data.

I just tried this (even though I can't think of any reason for anyone to possibly need this feature) on my copy of Excel 98 and Photoshop 5.5 for MacOS 9. Now, remember these pieces of software are both *old*, both purchased in 1999 I believe. Here's the result It does exactly what anyone would expect it to do! Since Excel data can't be formatted into data Photoshop can edit, it pastes it as a bitmapped image into the Photoshop image. If I paste the exact same cells into Word 98, it'll use the editable version and format it as a table.

Note that Excel and Photoshop aren't made by the same company... this is all governed by the OS and I'd get the exact same results if I pasted into, say, Corel Painter or Aldus Superpaint 3.0 (released 1991.) (In fact, out of curiousity I did try Aldus Superpaint 3.0 and, indeed, it works exactly as expected again.)

This is how copy and paste should work. When Linux can do this, I might consider it.

Uh. Slashdot needs a moderation -1 Wrong.

Safari can view msnbc.com just fine. It's not the most beautiful render in the world, but everything is functional including the Javascript menus and the Week in Pictures feature you mention. Here are some screen shots of it on my iBook, using the most recent Safari and OS X versions:

Main Page

Week in Photos

Any problems you're having have nothing to do with either MSNBC or Apple in general... it's your comp, bud.

Uh. Slashdot needs a moderation -1 Wrong.

Safari can view msnbc.com just fine. It's not the most beautiful render in the world, but everything is functional including the Javascript menus and the Week in Pictures feature you mention. Here are some screen shots of it on my iBook, using the most recent Safari and OS X versions:

Main Page

Week in Photos

Any problems you're having have nothing to do with either MSNBC or Apple in general... it's your comp, bud.

(Sorry, at a lab computer, can't recieve login password.)

GO to your Startup Disk control panel and make sure that the internal HD is selected. I've seen a lot of people a few places I've been freelancing complain how long it takes their B/W G3s to boot up. Turned out the HD wasn't selected in the Startup Disk. I did that, and Voild! Boots up just fine. I blame their IT dept. They were upgrading all the video drivers and didn't know about that bug.

Not a bug, a feature. Simply tells the computer whether to boot from a single drive ALL the time, or whether to search for the "best" bootable drive currently plugged in. (I may be wrong... but as I recall, the ROM searches for the newest version of MacOS from the mounted drives...)

And if it helps, my PC boots a lot quicker if I tell the BIOS to ignore checking the floppy drive on boot. Same "feature", different platform.

James Schend

(Not a coward... also not on my home computer to recieve email password.There's nothing wrong with having several choices of color at all. I just wish one of the colors was a dark sinister Vader-helmet black! Of all the colors, they left out the coolest. Oooh yeah. To some people, you just can't get any more aesthetically pleasing than obsidian. Black is beautiful, baby! MMMMmmmmmmmmm....

You know, there's no rule stating you can't paint a computer black. I painted both my beige PowerMac 4400/200 and my AMD K6-II 400 a nice shiny black with a common household can of spray paint. Just be careful of the disk covers, etc. James Schend.