Panther Analysis Getting Underway

Durin_Deathless writes "Think Secret has posted their first article analyzing the changes from Mac OS X 10.2 to 10.3. In this first installment, they look at the changes to the Installation, System Requirements, the Finder, and some other things. They have some nice images available too."

Comments

Well, that alieviates my main worry

[squiggleslash]

While the format of a Places sidebar won't appeal to everyone, just as column view doesn't appeal to everyone, Apple is providing users with a number of ways to customize the look and function of windows. A user who simply wants a plain window with no toolbar or sidebar, with basic folder icons that open up new windows when clicked, like in Mac OS 9, can still do that.

That's a real relief. It's not that Panther's new system isn't better (I don't know if it is or not), but when one's been using a particular, familiar, system since the Commodore Amiga, it's good to know that system is still available if I turn out not to like Panther's new way of doing things.

That really was the only worry I had. I don't have strong views on Brushed Metal, I like the lower-key stripes I've seen, so I'll almost certainly upgrade.

This looks like a strong release

[cuijian]

I'm really excited about Panther. The finder screen shots make it look like they have really gotten file navigation right. Previous iterations were too geeky, exposing the average user to /Library, /System, and /Users when most people just want to get to their documents and applications.

Expose is a great example of the combination of Apple's design sense and what you can do with the Quartz compositing engine. Windows scale down so you can see all of your open windows, or all of the documents in an application. I don't think its even technically possible to do that on windows because they lack an alpha channel.

I've used iChat AV and it is soooo much better than windows messenger. Unlike messenger, which forces me to a single postage-stamp sized video window, I can scale my video to any size and even go full screen. Audio conferencing seems to be pretty clear and will be great for when I'm on dial-up or talking to someone w/o a camera.

I can't wait to see more.

Expose!

[OmniVector]

I've been using the Panther preview for about a week now. and I have to say that Expose is one of the coolest ideas in the past few years I've seen come out of apple.

It basically eliminates the need for multiple desktops. I'm sure you're probably saying: "Well why not just use multiple desktops in the first place." The best answer to that is, apple likes to make simple/easy to use software. Multiple desktops are too much of a poweruser feature, and are confusing to use for the first time for many -- and that first time is KEY to adoption (afterall, the first impression you get about something is most likely to be the most important). Much like apple's aversion to tabbed interfaces, though tabbed browsing is one of those exceptions apple can't get past because it's too entrenched in browsers today.

I can give you more info but you're best looking at apple's preview.

Some interesting questions

[Dark Paladin]

1. Since the filesystem is journaled by default, can you turn it off later for a speed increase, or is this part of Panther's necessary tweaks?

2. The searching system - does it maintain some sort of small database in the background to keep things fast, or just start off with a "find" style command?

3. Right now, you can't seem to drag documents onto the Application Icons on the left side to have them open automatically - any chance of that changing?

Otherwise, the OS is looking pretty good. I still spend most of my time in either a development tool or the command line, so I'm not that big into Finder and the like. (A good old ~/do[TAB]/pro[TAB] gets me to my ~/Documents/Projects folder quite fast enough).

But I do like the idea of when you select an icon, the entire square around it highlights. I've had too many times I've selected image files, and since OS X makes little thumbnail images of the picture the icon symbol, sometimes it's hard to tell if you've selected it or not (especially if the picture is already composed of dark shades).

And labels - I never used OS 9 before (I'm a Linux2OSX convert), so I never got the big deal. But if they're bright and noticable like that, I can see using them to color code my personal/work/Gameforms.com stuff for quick picking.

The one thing I'm curious to look into is the Xcode development program - from the preview, it looks pretty quick and useful. Think Secret doesn't cover that here, and probably won't, but the Xcode is the #1 thing I'd like to play with.

I'd also like to see the "auto-encrypt your Home directory" talked about. From a security standpoint, I'd like to know just how that works, how much processor power it takes up in the background (hm - explains why we may need a G5, ne?). I have a group of guys at the place I work at who are into Penetration Testing, and they're thinking about going OS X - and this Encrypted Home Directory system might be useful to them. (Especially if you can tell the OS what other directories other than /User/username to encrypt.)

OK, so you've got a new Finder...

[hrbrmstr]

As the rest of the song goes "that don't impress me much".

I'm a recent "switchbacker" (used Mac from Plus to early PowerMac's and just got a dual G4). Since it's a ".#" release, I wasn't expecting a ton of major changes (since that should be a "#." release). However, this is the second review I've seen that spends the majority of it's time on the Finder. Wow. A new Finder.

I know things are different in Mac land (one reason I switched back), but not being an insider or able to attend the conference (hence, no preview copy), I'd really love to start seeing more authoritative articles on what kinds of 64-bit goodness is there for the G5's or a thorough coverage of what cool parts of FreeBSD 5 made it into Darwin/X.

Granted, it's a different perspective (I'm perfectly happy cd'ing and ls'ing from a terminal). Perhaps most Mac folks will be cheering a decent upgrade to their main view of the system.

I can't help thinking, tho, that alot of Mac /.'ers will want the inside skinny as opposed to hearing that the Finder can't be skinned (tho that's a fun complaint since I'd rather not stare at brushed metal all the time either).

This is the kind of feature that we want to see...

[WIAKywbfatw]

I've not seen it in action, but Expose strikes me as being the kind of feature that we want to see in our operating systems and applications - like most real software innovations, it's quick, simple and does something useful.

Features like tabbed browsing, mouse gestures, show desktop, context-sensitive help, tooltips, etc don't add to what you can acheive with your software but they do add to the richness of your user-experience by making software more flexible and user-friendly.

Very few computing tasks are truly intuitive - if you want proof of this, try putting a novice in front of a PC and watch them struggle with even the most basic concepts - but adding nice touches like this really do help users feel more at ease with their computers and more productive in the long run.

It's not earth-shattering stuff but it's stuff like this that's made today's software so much more accessible to the masses than it was 20 or even 10 years ago.

Open/save dialog boxes vs Finder?

[Arslan ibn Da'ud]

The new Finder layout is also present in open/save dialog boxes, providing a consistent interface throughout the system.

I *really* want to see a screenshot of this! (would y'all please stop /.ing the article? :) One pet peeve I've had with Macs is the disparity between the Finder and the open/save dialogs you get from regular software. Course this problem exists on Windows and Linux too, but the Mac finder is much nicer, and so the disparity is more pungent on a Mac.

I've just had too many stints where a newbie saves a file (using a save dialog) and then can't find it. Because the finder looks different. Heck, I've used these things for 20 years and I sometimes lose files myself (must be getting senile).

I REALLY want better integration with open/save dialogs so my mother can find any file she happens to save!

Piles?

[rleyton]

What happened to the "piles" document management system that was mentioned previously?

Anybody know? I was looking forward to hearing more about this, but fear it's fallen by the wayside...

Brushed metal and laptops

[mccalli]

I'm a fairly recent Powerbook owner (~1 month), and one thing I've noticed since using Safari is that brushed metal can be quite unreadable on a laptop screen.

Specifically, unless your screen is fairly far forward, you can't read the metal tab title names in Safari. Those titles are just the system font on top of the metal look, so this hassle is not limited to Safari.

Given that, I think this brushed metal is an odd direction to be moving in for a company proclaiming this their year of the laptop.

Cheers,
Ian

My Panther Notes

[themexican]

Overall the enhancements make Panther a must have upgrade. I'm especially keen on the Finder's live sorting and the overall speed (even when dealing with huge folders).

Exposé is so good that after only a day or two of using panther, I now find myself reaching for it when I am back on jaguar (or on windows/linux machines).

As always I have a few notes.

The Finder

1. The metallic interface should be optional.

2. Column view still lacks sorting by anything other than 'name' in column view. I would suggest adding sorting options via a contextual menu.

3. Fonts, HTML, EPS and any file handled by quicktime should be previewable right in the finder.

4. Contextual menus need to be smarter. For example if I click on a font or a saver file I should be able to send it to it's proper folder.

5. Lack of customizability is still a major complaint. There is still no way to change the font, to set the style of the desktop font, or to control grid spacing. Also we are limited to 10 point minimum font size.

6. Finder windows still take up too much screen real estate. If apple used small scrollbars it would save a significant # of pixels per window.

7. The finder still does not respect drag and drop locations when something is dropped on the desktop. This is a major sin in my book.

8. Minimization of fields in list view is still one of my pet peeves.

Why minimize 'Date Modified' to 'Dat..fied" when it could be "Date"
Why minimize 'Size' to "..." instead of 'Size' or 'kb'
Why does 48KB go from "4..b" to "..b" to "..." instead of "48k", "48", "48"... and so on. The kind field is especially dumb.

Also why doesn't the text get more condensed as it did in OS 9 when the field gets narrow.

9. Labels for items that one does not have permission to label should be handled more gracefully. Right now if you try to label something out of your permission range the labels are simply not selectable. This will be confusing to many users who don't understand permissions.

10. The way labels are indicated in column view is extremely confusing. Especailly if your highlight color is similar to a label, labeled items appear to have been selected.

11. The admin should be able to control what kind of finder window a user sees and they should be able to control which drives/folders are available within the finder window.

12. A new (better) folder design would be appreciated.

13. There should be an option to turn disk images into folders (this is what users normally want to do with downloaded images).

The Dock

The current dock is great for computer newbies and casual users, but it quickly breaks down when power users are in production on a big project.

1. Exposé is fantastic, but it still does not solve the problem of minimized windows (it does not show windows minimized to the dock although it probably should). While minimized windows will be used less often when users get the hang of Exposé, there is still a need for some sort of windowshading that allows for speedy one or two click window swapping. I personally miss having windowshade from OS 9 and had a haxie installed to add this behavior. Even better is minimize-in-place hack from unsanity which recently became available. I have found shading invaluable in production. The standard OS X minimize/maximize simply takes too long to swap between windows and windows get lost in the dock. Also exposé, does not solve the problem of window clutter (many of our designers are clean desktop sort of people), while some sort of shading allows for clean desktops and efficient production. 3rd party hacks are great, but having it built in would be better.

2. Grouping would really help the power user. I currently have 80 items in the dock and can never find anything. I use all my apps frequently so I want easy access to them. If instead of having them all minimized, I had springlloaded tabs in the manner of O

Relax; it's only DRM

[yerricde]

Talk about bad interface -- [WMP9] didn't even include the ability to fast forward or rewind!

Relax; it's only digital restrictions management.

Rewind, and you view something several times that you paid to view only once, transforming a "public performance" of a copyrighted audiovisual work into a "public display". The streaming video provider may not have been licensed to offer public displays.

Fast-forward, and you skip the commercials that you are obligated to have displayed by the TOS you signed with the streaming video provider.

What about the little details?

[nystagman]

Is anyone else bothered by the loss of such basic interface clues such as grayed-out icons for open folders, or the highlighting that we used to see when clicking on the proxy icon (the mini in the title of a window) when preparing to drag it?

They don't sound like such a big deal, perhaps, but they truly convey a great deal of valuable information when implemented.

Also poorly done is the abysmal internal truncation ('...') of text in narrow fields when in list view. (Also applies to long file names in icon view.) I really miss the condensed type that 9 used in these cases.

"Get Info" functionality is limited, as it doesn't tell you how many items are in a folder, and I find it pretty useless that getting info on multiple items can not open multiple windows, to allow for easy comparisons.

And WHY do removable volumes NOT remember open windows when remounted? If I log out (or even restart!) with the drive connected, the windows are remembered. So why not when they are manually un/remounted? This is really inconvenient, since I routinely modify the contents of many directories during a normal working day, and would like those windows to remain open when I transfer my Firewire drive between computers.

I also hope the zoom-to-fit function is less broken than it currently is. Ditto for windows correctly remembering their settings. I am tired of that damned toolbar reappearing again and again in windows where I had turned it off.

And today I narrowly averted disaster, almost overwriting the wrong file, because its modification time will not update until I click on it. Ditto for adding files to a folder with a process other than the Finder. The window must be manually brought to the foreground (or actively selected if it is already there) before the files show up. Once again, this is a disaster waiting to happen.

So, rant aside, are ANY of these things addressed in Panther? I am resigned to not being able to turn off all the cycle-stealing eye candy (including the excessive use of translucency which is anathema to visual clarity), but since my next computer will be a G5, I suppose I'll just have to live with it... But I'd be greatly appreciative if more attention was paid to fixing the broken stuff than adding more new features to debug.