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Apple Reveals Mac OS X 10.2, 17" iMac, Windows iPod
The Address Book is now system-wide, accessible from many applications, and even has Bluetooth integration. Jobs dialed his cell phone via Address Book, and then when someone called him back on that phone, the computer popped up with the caller's name in Address Book. He had the option to pick up the phone or reply with a short text message.
iSync is a new system for synching your contacts and calendars with GPRS cell phones, Palms, and iPods; so Palms and cell phones are now a part of the digital hub. The iSync program shows you connected devices, and allows configuration of what to sync, and when. The demo showed a complete sync of an address book on the computer to the cell phone, again over Bluetooth. iSync will also allow integration with .mac to update your contacts and calendars between multiple computers, and will be available as a free download in September.
The Mail app now has much better searching and spam filtering, and inline QuickTime (no, that won't be abused ...).
Rendezvous will allow such things as automatic accessing of other's playlists in iTunes, accessing USB printers on the network, and more, with "zero configuration" (I hope there is some configuration, so I can opt in or out of such things). Epson, HP, and Lexmark will have Rendezvous-compatible printers. Jobs didn't mention any way to share USB printers between Mac OS and Mac OS X.
iChat, the new instant messaging program, and iCal, the new shared calendar program, can work with the $100-per-year .mac subscription, or with the free AOL IM account and any web server. iChat will use Rendezvous for finding local users, and shared calendars can be sent via iChat or mail. iCal will ship in September, as a free download.
Sherlock 3 has been completely rewritten, using Internet services (SOAP? XML-RPC?) instead of trying to parse HTML. The demo showed movie listings with embedded trailers, eBay searches with intelligently organized information and pictures, Google image searching, and a Yellow Pages search that knows your ZIP code and sorts by distance, and shows directions and maps.
iTunes 3 is out today, with new features such as rating songs, keeping track of how often songs are played, playing back all songs at the same volume, integration with audible.com, and "Smart Playlists" with rulesets so they are automatically populated (e.g., "25 most played songs", or "500 MB of songs where playcount is 0", to play songs you've never listened to). It is only available for Mac OS X, and requires registration with an email address.
For the iPod, Apple lowered prices on the 5GB and 10GB models ($299, $399), and introduced a 20GB model ($499). The 10GB and 20GB have a solid state scroll wheel, a door to protect the FireWire port, a remote control, and a case. The playlist counts, Smart Playlists, and audible.com integration sync between the iPod and iTunes. Sound volume check has also been added to the iPod. The new 10GB model is 7.692 percent thinner than the previous version.
Also added to the iPod, in addition to the contacts, is calendars, synched with iCal, so it can really act as a PDA for most people. Jobs also announced Windows versions of iPod, synching with musicmatch and including a FireWire 6-to-4 pin cable.
The new iMac has a 17" widescreen display at 1440x900, with an NVIDIA GeForce4 MX, G4/800, and 80GB hard drive.
Jobs also noted that there are 2.5 million Mac OS X users, that 77 percent of owners of new Macs keep Mac OS X as the primary OS, and that they estimate there will be 5 million Mac OS X users by the end of the year, representing 20% of all Mac users using the new OS in the first 24 months.
Apple showed some new ads in the "Switch" campaign, including a student who lost her paper on Windows, a student whose CDs get messed up in his bag (although they didn't point out that he can use iPod under Windows now), and a comedian who ended his commercial with, "My name is Will Ferrell ... and I'm a porn actor."
Twice. You buy X.0. Then you got X.1 for free and all the updates with it. You then buy X.2. Of course, if you buy a computer sometime in the last 2 years, you will only buy OSX once. Either once with having to upgrade to X.2 or once having to get X.2 for the first time.
This is not bug fixes.
This is an update.
You did READ what was posted is going to be in 10.2, didn't you?
If you had watched the keynote like I did (via quicktime), you'd know this is FAR more than a bug fix.
.
The wide-screen iMac specs page gives the native
resolution of the 17" iMac as 1440x900. This is a 16:10 display ratio, which is about as
close as any monitor I know of gets to the
Golden Ratio, (1 + sqrt(5)/2), or approximately 1.618.
Clearly Apple is trying to channel Pyramid Power
to sell more computers.
GollyGee Blocks -- 3D creativity software for kids.
"That's less than $1 for each major feature," he quipped."
Bah, I can get Windows XP for only $99 and get thousands of bugs^H^H^H^Hfeatures for my money!
------
Today's Top Deals
Doesn't a demonstration of such kickass tech (especially the Bluetooth stuff) realised today for the consumer show just how many streets ahead Apple are?
This is all stuff that should exist under Windows, but doesn't. Apple has, after so many years, arrived at the point of equality (and now usurption) to everything else in the market - they can only produce better and better products.
Yay.
Or I could be wrong - this is what they did last time for OS 10.1, and I'm not seeing anything like this for 10.2.
My apologies for shooting off my mouth and "assuming facts not in evidence".
52 Weeks, 52 Religions with John Hummel
Good:
.Mac - nice new features
.Mac pricing. There should be a scaled-back free edition, like the other services providers offer. I expounded on this in a comment on the initial .Mac thread earlier today.
- iPod upgrades and price cuts.
- iPod for Windows
- Jaguar before Labor Day
- All the new software tools
- Wide-screen iMac!
- Price cut on the old Superdrive iMac (though that's the original price pre-hike)
- iSync - way cool
-
Bad:
- The new iMac is still PC100/800 MHz
- No "upgrade edition" of Jaguar. A $49 or around that version of Jaguar that would only install over an existing MacOS X install would be good. I should get some bonus for being an early user.
-
- No support for either USB 2.0 or Firewire 2 yet. Introducing the new iMac with that would have been nice.
Indifferent:
- The iPod accessory kits (pretty much all available in the 3rd party market already)
- The pricing of the new iMac
- The lack of changes to the other price points (I was expecting across-the-board iMac price cuts, but no biggie)
-- Josh Turiel
"2. Do not eat iPod Shuffle."
iI ithink ithat ithey iare itaking ithis i'i' inaming ithing ito ifar.
Some firewire interfaces, notably Sony's iLink and most laptops, don't provide power to the ports. These normally take a four-pin cable rather than a six-pin cable. Six-pins carry the full power.
Basically, he's saying that it's easier to plug in your Sony DV gear now.
Cheers,
Ian
A lot of Wintel boxes (especially laptops) only have a 4-pin variant of the Firewire port, that doesn't provide power to the bus. All Macs use the full 6-pin version that powers the bus and recharges the iPod directly.
So an adapter's needed for the Windows version else they may not be able to connect.
-- Josh Turiel
"2. Do not eat iPod Shuffle."
The main reason they still included Mac OS 9 was simply that a lot of people buying macs also had a Mac in the past and those people want to be able to still run older programs, which haven't (yet) been ported to Mac OS X, on their new computer. Backward compatibility, you know.
Finally, yes, the current/previous versions of Mac OS X are/were quite a bit slower than Mac OS 9 (although not in all regards, e.g. disk performance is already a lot better than in 9; it's mainly the GUI responsiveness imho), but otoh Mac OS X keeps getting faster and faster (and I hope 10.2 will solve this, for me, final issue). I for one am glad they first worked on stability and only then on optimizations. The way they're doing it now, you can really use the computer under OS X (I've barely booted in Mac OS 9 anymore since even Mac OS X Public Beta); if they'd done it the other way round, you'd be bitching even more I think.
Jonas
Donate free food here
Alas, you are correct. It looks like they still have not fixed all the printing bugs.
Seriously, my USB-connected printer was hugely more functional under Mac OS 9. Rendezvous sounds wonderful, but it apparently won't do much for my current HP inkjet.
Yes, there are hacks to get USB printing working under the current OS, and I'll have to go with one of those, since spending $258 to upgrade the OS this year is...not going to happen very quickly. My most likely course of action now is to defer upgrading or purchasing any Apple stuff until 2003, which I fear is the opposite of what they were looking for here.
Babar
I think you might be - what I took from the keynote was that the $20 upgrade pricing is ONLY for people who buy new Mac hardware between today and 8/24. Anyone else will have to pay the $129.
Just one little interesting tidbit i noticed that is getting kind of lost in the noise: Did anyone else notice the little note on the Jaguar page? Apparently the 10.2 developer tools use GCC 3.1!
:)
I found this interesting, as i had heard that the bulk of the linux distributions had not yet managed to migrate to GCC 3. Neat to see Apple is staying on top of this whole UNIX-technology thing
Irritable, left-wing and possibly humorous bumper stickers and t-shirts
As a Mac user for nearly 18 years, I'm quite happy that Apple is now charging some modest fees for their value-added services.
.mac, they've got to fight similar interests at Microsoft.
This is something that Microsoft's hedgemony WON'T let other PC manufacturers do - at least not to the extent that Apple has shown here. If Gateway (Dell, whoever) wants to create a value-added portal like
Apple has no such conflict - they own the whole ball of wax, so the hardware and OS sides of the company can work together to produce a best-in-class (and don't pretend they aren't class-leading or at least very innovative and polished) set of services for Mac users - for free in many cases (iTunes, iPhoto) and for a modest yearly charge in other cases.
My ISP charges $20.00 a month for a 5MB mailox and 50MB of FTP space. Apple is providing more than that for $100.00 a year. That's half off for me - for more space.
Owning a mac has never looked better. Apple is again taking positive steps to increase revenue growth and reduce it's dependence on volatile hardware sales. Reasonable prices for services that generate recurring revenue...new product refreshes on a regular basis to win the fence sitters and an advertising program that _is_ winning over some converts (right here in my office) - rather unfunny Penny Arcade cartoons notwithstanding.
Good job, Apple.
It's $20.00 only if you purchase your iBook on or after July 17, 2002 (today). So people like me, who bought one two months ago, are screwed.
With that said, giving a $20 upgrade only from people ordering today is not enough time for an OS that ships in a month. Any software vendor that ships an upgrade gives upgrade pricing to everyone that bought within the last 3-4 months. Apple should at least follow that model.
As the first keynote I've watched, I have to say I was impressed with how well it came off. Jobs had a few glitches along the way with some of the new feature demos, but recovered nicely. There're a lot of people saying Apple's so bad for charging for "what was free" but the thing is, they're doing what had to be done. iTools cost them money, and a pretty substantial chunk I'm sure. And .Mac will actually do nothing but improve the iTools featureset. iCal, five times the storage space, and iSync could make .Mac quite useful to a lot of people. I'm not one of them yet, but I definitely respect the effort they've gone to. Yes, I'm a bit upset that they're taking away my email address - and wouldn't be too surprised if they turned around and let people keep the email addresses for nothing if people complain enough - but I won't get pissed off.
And $100 a year isn't a bad price, considering the integration you get. One service to offer all those features, rather than five services and a mishmash of programs to do it.
And even though $129 seems a bit of a shock for 10.2, it really isn't a point upgrade so much as it is a rewrite level. Compare 10.2 to 7.5, if you're familiar with Mac history. 10.2 gives you a whole new rendering layer for new Mac machines, a hell of a speed boost from the reports I've heard, and several new features like iCal, iSync and Rendevouz. I'll probably pay for it. I -would- like a $49 upgrade for 10.1 owners, but I think Apple's probably feeling enough of a financial pinch not to do that.
I think the part of it all that would be most respected by Slashdot readers is the fact that open standards were touted quite loudly. SyncML and Rendevouz (zeroconf) primarily. They might not be opening up as much as we want in some areas, but at least when they're moving in a new direction they look like they're trying to make the best of it.
And I've decided people who push for open sourcing -everything- in OS X, or porting to x86 are just idiots with no business sense. That would kill Apple's income. 'nuff said.
My own pointless vanity vintage computing page
The iPod news is great. Especially if it were to have happened a few months ago when I actually purchased the thing.
I appreciate the response to what the market wanted. But half of the indication that the market wanted a Windows version iPod was that some people (read: me) bought it and worked around the mac-only restriction. Are there not going to be any updates?
Interesting enough, my wheel has deteriated a bit, and when I wrote CS for Apple telling them about it, they said that what I was describing was "not a common problem" and that it didn't "inhibit use of the iPod" so it really wasn't a problem. I wonder why they released a touch-sensitive, non-moving wheel if it wasn't such a common problem.
The reason working with Apple is a hassle is because of releases like this. While I would shit my pants to be able to switch my iPod with one with a touch sensitive wheel... fine, that's understandable. Such is the progression of technology. But a carrying case? It's not exactly an "industry first", as Apple likes to say about most things they do. Why not throw it out there when I had purchased my 10 gig beforehand? When I had purchased my Nomad II MG before this mp3 player, it came with a case. Not a good case, mind you, but it still came with it. That was appreciated.
If you dont like the .mac fees, let apple know here This is a general discussion forum for the new .mac service.
If you don't want the new features, don't buy them. Stay with MacOS X 10.1.5 ...
The "paying for features I don't want" excuse is getting old. If what you have is working well for you, then you have no need to upgrade. I for one still have several Red Hat 6.2 boxes running here because Red Hat 7.2 has features I don't need. It's a free upgrade if I want it, but I don't.
Mac OS X is a great OS. Apple put a lot into those new features you don't want. $129 isn't bad for what you're getting. Hell, look at Windows. It doesn't include half the functionalty and it costs $200-$300 depending on your persuasion (Home/Pro).
I just got off the phone with Apple and they said "you'll have to buy two ipods if you want to use them on Windows and the Mac." Damn it, why can't Apple just for once make it easy.
I am putting off my order of the iPod until I find out if there is a workaround for the "feature". That really bytes too cause it looks like the Apple Store is also offering a free car power adapter with the purchase of the iPod.
Not only is the display 17", at 1440 x 900 with square pixels, it's wide aspect. This is far better for movie playback.
I'm seriously tempted to get one just for watching DVDs.
Says the RIAA: When you EQ, you're stealing bass!
Only if you just bought your mac in the last month or so. The rest of us are expected to bend over and grab our ankles then cough up the money if we want to be supported in the future.
Moon Macrosystems. Sun's biggest competitor.
I agree. Between 10.2. and .Mac, I'm beginning to wonder why Apple doesn't just hack into our credit cards and take the money out directly. H2K2 was not far away, after all...
10.2 looks compelling, but most of the new features don't seem immediately useful to me. I may just skip this upgrade until I get some Bluetooth toys to play with.
I also noticed this, snipped from macnn.com:
One last thing: Apple lowered the price of the SuperDrive iMac by $100 to $1,799 and introduces new 17" flat-panel iMac. It supports 1440x900--66% bigger than the 15" iMac, adds a Nvidia GeForce4. The 80GB/256MB/17"/SuperDrive/GeForce4 model is due in August for $1999.
That 17" iMac looks sweet, but I thought consumer-level computers were supposed to be getting cheaper lately. Even if this is the high end of Apple's consumer line, does Apple think that people will be willing to spend $2000 on an iMac? Or do they know something about the economy that we don't?
OS 10.1.5
PowerBook G4
Everything Configured correctly.
Still have the beachball.
Quietly, I weep.
I think I see a trend forming here. The 16:10 "Golden Ratio" iMac screen and the $100 per year "Golden Shower" .Mac services.
Check out their homepage. The slightly effete but expressive classic Apple Garamond font has been replaced by a plain, rather ugly version of Adobe Myriad Roman. Say it ain't so! But it is.
They started it with the eMac, but I assumed it was some education-only market differentiator. Apparently not. There's a little more at Mired.
Personally, I think it's a terrible change. And a stupid one. They'd built a huge amount of brand identity with Apple Garamond, to the point where anything written in it reminded you of Apple. The new font has no personality at all. Is that what they were going for?
P.S. The Myriad Roman link is a Google cache of a page that 404's now.
He who refuses to do arithmetic is doomed to talk nonsense.
Please point me to a webpage which states that you can use your coupons. The upgrade page makes no mention of them.
I hold it, that a little rebellion, now and then, is a good thing. -- Thomas Jefferson
The ipod warranty has been improved to one year, up from its much criticized 90 day warranty. The ipod service page doesn't reflect this new warranty yet... out-of-warranty repairs cost an amazing $256.
Yesterday I read an article in a major newspaper (NYT, WSJ, or washington post - sorry, couldn't find link) describing how many high tech things (including the ipod) didn't come with suitable warranties -- for example, dell just changed from a 3 year to 1 year warranty.
HIV Crosses Species Barrier... into Muppets
Unix from AT&T had a similar problem. they kept calling it "System N" and incrementing N. when they hit "System V" (the first to use a roman numeral, i think), they started pushing the tagline "consider it standard" to combat the fears of people noting that there was no official standard for Unix, unlike pretty much everything else the Bell System did. and, lo and behold, people sorta took AT&T's word for it!
the problem was, it worked so well they couldn't increment N any more, because "System V" was the standard (and thus whatever came next wouldn't be).
so the went to "System V Release 2" and got through about SVR4 before that got "stuck" as a "standard" with the various splits and unification efforts in the unix community. so they did "SVR4.1" and so on. then they started adding letters when that got stuck.
many commercial unixes will still tell you they run a "SVR4.3x" (i think) kernel. it wasn't until SCO (the then-owners of the original Unix strain) did UnixWare 7 (i think) that they incremented to SVR5.
just a bit of Unix history.
i speak for myself and those who like what i say.
Take a black felt-tip marker and carefully ink out the lower 90 pixels of you 17" iMac monitor. This will give you a 16:9 ratio, which matches HDTV!
The FAQ says it will start deactivating original iTools accounts that have not paid starting in Sept. There's also a blurb about what steps to take to save your email to disk and that you should notify people your address is no longer valid.
:(
To me that is == no more email for us
you make some very good points.
-braxton
I could be wrong, but I'm pretty sure I heard Steve say that the new features would be available to existing iPods. Since the new ones are not shipping yet anyway, I doubt that the new firmware is fully ready yet anyway.
They did this once already (iPod 1.1 added vCards, for instance)
--
The internet is the greatest source of biased information in the history of mankind.
Ya, buy XP is a HUGE upgrade from ME. Heck, it's almost a completely different product. When XP SP1 came out - with major updates, not just bug fixes - we didn't have to pay $20. I think I'd be frustrated as an OS X user. Personally, I think they should just price major versions accordingly so that all updates are free. As a developer, this would ensure that a larger population was upgrading to newer versions
There is no longer anything that can be done with computers that is nontrivial and clearly legal. -- Paul Phillips
The people that have already bought and paid for OS X are Apple's staunchest supporters. If anyone deserves to finally have a fast OS, it's them. Yet they are being asked to pay full tilt ($129) for the speed that should have been there in the very first release.
OS X as it currently sits can be slow even on fast Mac hardware, and annoyingly laggy on slower Macs. This is simply not acceptable. Mac OS X users deserve these fixes for free, and I suspect that most people will take them without paying if they have the opportunity.
I haven't looked for a complete list of what you get on a normal install, but you can safely assume a fairly vanilla BSD kit, including development tools: emacs, perl, gcc, etc. It's all free with MacOS X, as it should be. The supplied versions aren't always the most up-to-date, but that's what fink is for.
Also, the Mac OS development environment (which includes updates to NeXTStep's really-quite-impressive development environment, Interface Maker and Project Builder, full API docs etc) is a free download. I believe it's included on the harddrive (as an installable package) on new machines.
Your best bet is to check developer.apple.com. Signing up as a developer is free, although you have to pay $700+ to get stuff like advance betas of the OS, WWDC proceedings on DVD.
now i'm just pricing some G4s.
Do not buy a PowerMac until the new models come out -- either in mid August or early September.
...much as i wish it were. There was no mention at all of discounts for those of us with software coupons. It's full price for everyone except those who bought the computers today or later, presumably to stop people holding off on buying new hardware.
Things will change with Jaguar(10.2), so I've broken this up:
/usr/bin/ leaving you free to build a later Perl if you want. Perl 5.6.1 is buildable on 10.1 and can be installed to /usr/local/ without problems. Some config muckery is required to build 5.6.1, notes are available on various websites. Perl 5.8.0rc3 builds out of the box on 10.1.
10.1
----
- Perl 5.6.0 is included in the base install, with a fairly minimal library set. Perl is at
- Niether Python nor Tcl/Tk are included with 10.1 although both are available from community sites in both source and installer formats.
- GCC is not included in the 10.1 base install, but instead in the "Developer Tools" installation. If you buy a new machine you won't get the Dev Tools in the box, but you can register with Apple as a developer (for free, the basic developer membership) and download an ISO of the CD for free. The dev tools also include ProjectBuilder and InterfaceBuilder (showing their NeXT inheritance).
- Their "clumsy" Terminal emulator is the old NeXT terminal, and is about as xterm compatible as I need (and far better than many terminals I've tried over the years). I conclude that you haven't tried it and are simply guessing that you won't like it (if I'm wrong I apologize and I'd love to know what you think is missing from Terminal). That said, if you want it you can get xterm prebuilt (along with a full X install from source or binary) from the Fink project (http://fink.sourceforge.net). apt-get to your heart's content.
Jaguar (10.2)
-------------
- Perl 5.6.1 is included. Python is included (not sure about version). Ruby is included. Not sure if Tcl/Tk is included, but again its almost sure to be available from community sites.
- Terminal is reported improved even more. See http://www.apple.com/macosx/jaguar/unix.html
- All the free dev tools (including GCC3) will be available as a part of Jaguar, probably as a separate download again.
As for the rest of it... Well, the free dev tools are very good. I suspect coming from a Linux world they will meet your needs. Some folks prefer the CodeWarrior dev tools which still require separate purchase. Mostly these are folks from Mac backgrounds (including myself) who have used CW for years and like it.
To find out what's included in the Darwin (UNIX) layer of MacOS a poke around the Darwin site is likely in order http://developer.apple.com/darwin/. If you want you could even install on X86 and try it out (although obviously this won't be the same as the experience of MacOS X which includes both Darwin and the higher level items like ProjectBuilder).
More generally, the Apple developer site http://developer.apple.com/ is a good resource for developers. Third party developer sites such as http://www.stepwise.com/ are also invaluable.
Information on portability of common UNIX tools to OS X is usually dictated in part by the opensource community for that tool. So for example, you really should check the Perl porters list/site for details on Perl port.
For projects which are not porting to OS X on their own the Fink project(http://fink.sourceforge.net) is likely your best bet.
Hope this helps,
Bas
Just read Apple's knowledge base. If you turn off the Automatic iPod update in the iTunes control panel, you can COPY the music to the iPod from several Macs. You cannot copy the music back to the computer though without third party software.
The online petition to oppose the new .Mac charges is available at here.
My 2 cents: The email accounts should remain free. The rest can be value-add fee-based.
What's up with Job's quote:
'...Apple is now the biggest supplier of Unix-based operating systems in the world -- "bigger than Sun, bigger than Linux" -- Apple CEO Steve Jobs announced during his Macworld keynote speech on Wednesday...'
Anybody buy this?
https://www.accountkiller.com/removal-requested
I just called the Apple store at 1-800-my-apple, and the rep told me that the upgrade proof of purchase coupons you get when you buy a new machine will not apply to this upgrade, so it's $129 across the board, (unless you buy your machine starting today, and it doesn't already have Jaguar installed).
She told me Apple is taking comments from (potential) customers to gauge their reactions, and that it could possibly result in changes to the plan. (Remember that the upgrade isn't actually available until August 24...plenty of time for them to change the pricing policy).
In my case, I told them I was a "switcher" who has bought two new macs (an iMac and an iBook) in the last four months, and I was very unhappy that I'll need to pay $260 to upgrade them to 10.2. I suggested that they should at least honor the coupons and give a price break for them.
Call them and tell them what you think...maybe we can make a difference.
iWant to iGet iMyself iOne of iThose iNew 17" iMacs.
You're saying Microsoft doesn't charge a lot for a development package? Last time I checked, Visual Studio was $600.
Yes to all your tools questions. XFree86 runs on top of OS X, either in Rootless or Rooted mode (separate screen or local screen). If you've ever used Cygwin on Windows, you'll know what rootless X-Windows are like. Rooted is just like linux, with your window manager and everything. Speaking of Window Managers, Gnome, Enlightenment, fvwm, fvwm2, and quite a few more are available. I haven't seen a KDE port yet (probably because of QT), so that isn't available. If you're feeling extremely zealous, you can run a window manager on top of OS X and arrange your iconbars and stuff so it is usable.
It is also possible to run Gnome on top of OS X, with Gnome's title bar underneath the OS X menu bar. I had to move the mac icon bar to the right side, but I don't believe the latest versions of gnome require this.
Python comes as both a Fink module (essentially a debian package manager file, so probably a tarball as well) and a Framework, depending on how you aquire it. Jaguar is supposed to include Python. Perl is on all distrobutions. TCL/TK can be downloaded and installed.
just gnot like gnu or gnome and most certainly knot like kde kdesktop which is trying to konquery the world as well.
:) heck, i could still use my 486 if i wanted to, we just got suckered into this performance/spec/mhz war.
everything is drawn out in the pc world
if it isn't one thing it is another
I think it's interesting how people are calling Jaguar just a "bug fix release" or "service pack" even though there are a TON of new features and archetecural improvements running behind the scenes.
Apple is one of the few non-Unix companies that still cares about a semi-consistant versioning scheme:
v A.B.C
A=Major release number, new paradigms, etc...
B=Minor release number, incremental improvements
C=Bug fix release
In the past, Apple has bumped the minor release to x.5 when some sort of major incompatability occurred (ie, OS 8.5 was the first to require a PowerPC Mac). They didn't do that here, but I wonder people would be as bent out of shape about it if Apple *had* called this Mac OS X 10.5. Or maybe Mac OS X 2002? Compare the product on a feature-level, not a numeric level.
Apple usually isn't willing to inflate a version jump for marketing purposes:
- Mac OS 6 to 7 was a giant jump in terms of structure.
- Mac OS 7.1.1 to 7.5 wasn't quite as big, but did greatly expand the "experience" with new technologies (and doubled the distribution size).
- Mac OS 7.6.1 to 8.0 had a major UI overhaul, mutli-threaded Finder, and major architectural re-writes.
- Mac OS 8.5 began life as 8.2 until it hit beta and it was decided that it would be PowerPC only. (Even though it was 8.6 that deserved the monkier thanks to the new microkernel.)
- Mac OS 9 was Mac OS 8.7 until a beta as well, although that was probably to help maintain a clear separation between OS 9 (designed to work with X) and 8 (not).
- Even though OS X is in roman numerals, it's still numerically just OS 10.x.
Compare this to Microsoft (and, by following MS's example, a majority of the Windows software out there) which gets away with murder by renaming a bug patch according to the current year and can charge an arm and a leg for it. Even MS realized that Windows 98 was just Windows 4.1 (and Office 98 contains Word 7.0).
Could someone please tell me where the hell Windows Media Player 8 went though?
Hire a Linux system administrator, systems engineer,
You aren't forced to, now, pay Apple for 10.2; you can just, well, install FreeBSD. Or Darwin at least. Or Yellow Dog Linux. Or Debian. Or whatever. Why does exiting Apple mean going for cheaper and lower quality components? You can still run your iBook or 17" iMac with a conventional Linux or BSD based OS...
Now, as I see it, what you're trying to do is avoid becoming an addicted zealot.
That is understandable. I loathe myself for lusting after a 20gb iPod and a 17" iMac or a 23" Cinema HD Display.
But... it almost seems that you're overcompensating in your actions.
"Hm, I don't want to be prey to AppleLust and AppleZealotry, so I'll get rid of my Mac altogether."
Is this like losing weight through purging? Or controlling sexual desire through abstinence?
The weakness is in you, not in Apple. Getting rid of the Apple hardware doesn't remove the fact that you still have that weakness in the first place.
The difference (for me) is that I recognize I have the weakness (AppleLust), but as much as I *want*, I don't let it compel me to instant spot purchases or decisions.
GPL Deconstructed
Why would you have used all three? And on what?
My G4 came with OS 9.0.4. I was able to get 9.1 with a coupon, but not OS X.
So I bought OS X 10.0, and used one of the three coupons in that to get 10.1.
You can not go from 10.1.x to 10.2 for $19.95 unless you just bought a new Mac that came with 10.1 and has the coupons. I heard the words come from Steve Jobs' mouth myself. So the left over coupons are useless anyway.
But then Windows 95 to Windows 98 was a paid update, and it's still Windows 4...
-- if it was so, it might be; and if it were so, it would be; but as it isn't, it ain't. That's logic - Lewis Carrol