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Tiger's 200 New Features
An anonymous reader writes "If this hasn't already been posted, Apple set up a page listing,
by software section, all of the new features for OS X.4, or Tiger.
Given that every upgrade touts over a hundred features, it is interesting to see all of the enhancements to this upgrade to see what adopters get out of the box.
There are a lot which are tweaks, some new non-Spotlight oriented features and a few that are interesting, mostly security related features.
2 words: stealth mode.
"
It seems to run a bit quicker with every release, unlike my poor SP2 machine. Go OSX.
of Longhorn another 6 months.
Coincidence?
I think not!
Creative Commons music that doesn't suck: emptydrum.com
There looks like there will be some great new features in Tiger, but I think they are stretching it with things like "Import contacts into Address Book in a variety of formats, including tab-delimited and comma-separated text." and "Print a handy pocket address book to take with you anywhere."
By including this type of thing in the list it threatens to swallow all of the real new features like Dashboard and Spotlight.
It's essential for any respectable firewall, and both e.g. Kerio and ZA even for Windows should have this, and both are available in free versions.
And firewall log?? Hmm, excuse me, but is the news Tiger just got a standard quality firewall or what? That's be more reason to blush than be overjoyed IMHO.
Beware: In C++, your friends can see your privates!
iptables -A INPUT -m state --state NEW -i ! eth0 -j ACCEPT
/bin/echo "1" > /proc/sys/net/ipv4/icmp_echo_ignore_all
iptables -P INPUT DROP
Hack your mind out of its sandbox.
I think a lot of network admins will breath a sigh of partial relief when they see the Password Helper. There will always be the "[kids_name]123" password people, but there are a decent number of users who want something secure but easy to remember, and to know roughly how secure a particular password is.
Please help metamoderate.
Apple uses a different version numbering system. Just because it is called 10.4 doesn't really mean anything - it could just be as simply called Mac OS X 2005 or v4.0 or Mac OS Tiger for all it matters.
10.3.6
Comparing to Windows Service Packs, there has been two for XP. Apple has released 9 "service packs" for Mac OS X Panther.
10.3.1
10.3.2
10.3.3
10.3.4
10.3.5
10.3.7
10.3.8
and now 10.3.9.
These have added new features, tweaks and improved security also.
I am sick of people whinging about apple charging for "point updates;" it's is an old and worn out argument and it comes down to the simple point of if you don't want it, don't buy it.
Your comment just lost a couple of cool points in my book.
Cats rock!
I was just sitting at my freelance gig, reading some online encyclopedia (win supersite, I believe) and the scientist there said that there are only 2 features: spotlight and something else. He stated that all other ones are pretty much nothing.
He also said, and I'll have to agree with him on this one, that SP 2 is a much better update than Tiger, and it's FREE!
I don't even know what you MAC people are cheering about, you're not even getting a firewall OR pop-up blocker, not to mention malicious software detector with you're upgrade your paying $$ 4! LOL!
If you don't know what AltaVista is (was), get off my lawn.
Why is a barn door not stable?
From the list:
Use command line file commands on HFS+ items with proper results -- utilities such as cp, mv, tar, rsync now use the same standard APIs as Spotlight and access control lists to handle resource forks.
Being both a Mac User and a Command LIne Junky. This makes me happy.
To E-mail me, replace the first period in my domain with an @
I think the most interesting new features of Tiger are under the hood. Those four new frameworks add an incredible amount of functionality into the base OS, which can be easily used by future applications. For examle, CoreImage adds tons of image processing features a la Photoshop, is extensible, and uses the GPU.
First of all, it was not really a correction of its spelling. More of a rework of its structure. My previous post, you see, was a simple joke about slashdot posting so many dupes. I know, I know, those jokes are getting old these days but I just got out of bed, am on a hangover, have not yet drank any coffee, and found it quite funny anyway.
... the angel chokes up, sheds some tears, and laments, "I may not
even live to see it."
So now, In an attempt to calm down the moderators, I'll post another joke (ripped from a newsgroup):
Linus Torvalds, Steve Jobs, and Bill Gates are gathered one night, when an angel miraculously appears. The angel grants them each one question.
Linus goes first, asking, "Tell me how long it will be before Linux is completely secure and the last bug is squashed." The angel looks into the future, and then answers, "It will be 10 years before Linux is completely secure and the last bug is squashed." Linus chokes up, sheds some tears, and laments, "I may not even live to see it."
Then Jobs steps forward and asks, "Tell me how long it will be before the MacOS is completely secure and the last bug is squashed." The angel looks into the future, and then answers, "It will be 20 years before Mac OS is completely secure and the last bug is squashed." Jobs chokes up, sheds some tears, and laments, "I may not even live to see it."
After a while, the two turn to Gates, who is shuffling around and staring at the ground mumbling. "Well, Bill, aren't you going to pose your question?" they ask him. "Oh, all right," he says with annoyance, "How long will it be before Windows is completely secure and the last bug is squashed?" The angel looks into the future, then looks further, then
I'd rather be sailing...
...at $129 yet again, but I've got the family pack on pre-order, so amortize the $150 after the Amazon rebate across 4 Macs and it's quite the bargain. They should really provide upgrade pricing, but the $129 list is still wayyyyy cheaper than XP Pro, but twice as expensive as my SUSE 9.2 boxed set.
Hmm, I wonder if font book is scriptable.
Also, Playing DVDs in the dock is by far the only reason I am getting Tiger.
Because a high wind blew through a stable and knocked it's door off, so they had to put in a barn door, and now the barn is left without a door.
(This is an issue because, if the cows get out of the yard they might end up inside the barn and make a hell of a mess.)
If you don't know what AltaVista is (was), get off my lawn.
Spotlight, Dashboard, Quicktime 7, H.264, CoreImage, CoreData, X Code 2, ... are hardly "tweaks." The list goes on and on.
Free Manning, jail Obama.
You're right, that didn't need a GUI at all.
I just wanted to point out that I have been on slashdot for a while now, and I have *never* seen a thread with so many posts moderated as "troll", "flamebait" or "offtopic". Many of the posts are valid points, and if they were discussing microsoft, they would be modded +5 funny, or +5 informative. It seems to me someone is taking things a little too defensively.
For the record, I hate microsoft, and I am a unix guy at heart. That doesn't mean that everyting apple feeds to me I have to love. A little healthy criticism does everyone good, including apple.
You're looking for a file containing the word "supercalifragilisticexpialidocious" (sic?)
In any case, in spot light you type "superca" and the list refines itself enough that you see it and start working with it.
If it waited for you to hit enter, how far would you type? Would "superca" be enough? Maybe you would type "supercalifra" to be safe. Maybe, if you were like most users, you would think you needed to type the whole word out... then you spell it wrong (like i probably did above) and it doesn't find anything.
Live search minimizes your typing. It's the same reason for type-ahead find in firefox. It just works better.
One of the new features is that Mail.app supports Exchange servers - but I have a feeling this is just imap support and won't handle meeting invites, etc.
So, I'm stuck using Entourage. Does anyone know if Spotlight will be indexing Entourage emails, etc? I sure hope so! My corporation has ignorantly banned Google Desktop search on the windows machines, so I no longer have a way of finding emails I need in a snap. Entourage + Spotlight puts me back in the game on that front.
Seeing as how all Apple computers come with some version of Mac OS - wouldn't you say that this IS upgrade pricing?
Conserve Oil, Recycle, Boycott Walmart
Our intelligent designer has never created an animal that we couldn't improve by strapping a bomb to it.
I'm surprised that they have Access Control Lists as one of the features.
/. community isn't all over that feature.
I mean, that is something I've been wanting standard on Linux for a long time (I haven't used Linux in a while now so let me know if it is standard now).
I'm also surprised that the
I would have expected apple to bang the drum a lot more on that feature. But I guess that apples target group aren't that enamored with technical points.
The Internet is full. Go Away!!!
If you use computers, you should care. Apple has consistently 'led the market' in computing, meaning if you watch Apple now, you will have an idea of what will be a big deal in a few years in general.
It's not necessarily the case that Apple can get 'credit', so much as Apple was first to 'get it right'. If not Apple, then someone else would have, it was just the fact that Apple was first that it matters. Examples include:
Windows, mice, folders, desktop metaphor in 1983 with the Lisa and 1984 with the Macintosh -> Windows 1.0 in 1985
Networking, introduced in 1990 with AppleTalk and AppleShare in System 7 -> Windows for Workgroups and Windows 3.11 in 1992
Quicktime, also introduced in 1990 with System 7 -> Video for Windows/AVI in Windows 3.1/3.11 in 1992
Color support, which allowed for Photoshop and other image programs, in 1988 with System 6 (Photoshop came out in 1990) -> Windows 3.0 in 1990 (And Photoshop in 1992)
Desktop publishing, Word, and WYSIWYG came out for Mac in 1985 -> Windows version in 1989
See a trend yet?
So what features does Tiger have that will probably be common in a few years?
'Quartz' 3d accelerated OS
'Spotlight' integrated OS wide database driven search
'Core Image/Video' hardware accelerated image and video libraries
'iSync' computer to computer 'synchronization' (bookmarks, preferences, etc)
'Apple Remote Desktop' built into the OS
'Target Disk Mode', which transforms your system into a 'plain' Firewire hard disk when it is booted.
'Xgrid' transparent, p2p distributed computing built into the OS
Who knows, maybe only half of these things are big deals, but I suspect most of them will become 'standard' by the time Longhorn ships.
GPL Deconstructed
With Quicksilver, one can spare oneself a lot of poking about and futzing with the mouse
With Bash, one can spare oneself ALL use of the mouse.
Being both a Mac User and a Command LIne Junky. This makes me happy.
Ditto here!
(ducks, runs for cover)
Please help metamoderate.
..as advertised. This is what graphic artists have been waiting for, a font manager that's STABLE with thousands of fonts. Suitcase is, but the interface is pitiful. FontAgent is easy to browse, but unstable with lots of fonts and if you turn on WYSIWYG in some views. There's been a big hole in the font management area for a long time now. http://www.apple.com/macosx/features/fontbook/
Oh, I can just see telling my 80 year old mother to type that in!
FTFA - How is this a feature?
Buy Printing Supplies
Easily purchase supplies for your printer right from Mac OS X Tiger.
I (and I think many others) don't want their operating system selling them crap.
Apple also posted a more readable comparison table with Panther and Jaguar at http://www.apple.com/macosx/upgrade/compare.html .
Windows 2K = Win 5.0
Windows XP = Win 5.1
Windows Server 2003 = Win 5.2
Calm down man... Longhorn will be here in... hmmm... sometime. ;)
Some fine people ported BlackBox to Windows. bb4win.org. It comes with your default 4 virtual desktops, and you can configure bbkeys to Alt+{1,2,3,4,n+1} between them. And it is lightning fast; much faster than Microsoft's.
It looks like BlackBox runs instead of the default Explorer process, so the OS ends up feeling overall more responsive. So you might want to check it out. You can easily uninstall it by using a sinple batch script.
One thing sorely missing from Panther was the ability to AppleScript power management features. It would come in handy for putting your Mac to sleep after a long task, or to wake it up upon certain conditions.
In order to do that, IIRC, you had to buy a third party extension/dictionary/API. A workaround was also to script at the UI level and simulate clicks in the menus - very inelegant, prone to failure and useless for waking up the machine.
The new features list in TFA doesn't cite this addition. Does it mean users will still have to resort to third-party software for this basic ability? Automator might help, but still it's not the same as a full-fledged AppleScript dictionary...
The fact that the site is called winsupersite.com should give you some hint of bias from its owner. Of course, it's not iluvwindozecuzitskool.com but it's getting there. I wouldn't call Thurrot an "experienced reviewer". The first paragraphs about how he claims to be a Mac fan because he had at some time an Apple IIgs are particularly laughable.
The fields that Thurrot covered in his review concern generally the GUI. And, apart from Spotlight, there is little revolution in this area from Panther to Tiger, merely refinements. Most of the people that will upgrade won't notice a big difference in their habits.
There are two points where Thurrot isn't particularly convincing. One is his endless comparision between Mac OS X and what Microsoft offers, that ranges from "It's some kind of imitation of Windows" to "They're the first to implement it but MS had certainly already thought about this feature before and their version will be better". The other point is the new set of APIs brought by Tiger, much welcomed by developers and overlooked by Thurrot.
In the end, many people will be ready to spend $129, not only because they're "Apple fans" or because they expect a revolution but because they feel that 10.4 will be an improvement in many fields (especially speed) and that future exciting apps for Mac OS X will require this release.
For instance, I'll pay for the new version and I see the relative lack of major redesign in Tiger as a sign that major architecture choices for Mac OS X have turned out to be valid. Apple is currently expanding what their OS can do instead of spending time to correct a big flaw. Which is a rather new notion for Apple users. And Apple users love to pay for something new.
Also includes ground-breaking new usability features, a couple of which weren't borrowed from Mac OS X Tiger (we got them from KDE and Gnome)! New security failure features as well!!
Yeah, right. The Slashdot editors and community is known to fall all over themselves on everything Apple does. Not. Shall I count the number of Mac-related articles that include the obligatory smart-ass line indicating the authors disdain for everything Mac? C'mon. Apple has done really well reaching out to the nerd set over the last few years. What acceptance they've gotten here is well-deserved.
You want to see slashdot get really stupid? See how everything having to do wth Linux is unquestioningly regarded as The Best Thing Ever.
You like your Macintosh better than me, don't you Dave? Dave? Can you hear me Dave?
That's not quite the point - burnable folders are persistent and can appear anywhere in your filing system. You create a burnable folder, 'copy' your home directory to it (which actually just leaves a marker to tell it to copy your home dir) and then burn it. Two weeks later you come back to do another backup and the contents of the burnable folder have changed to reflect the contents of your home directory - so you just press burn.
I notice quite a lot of the usual complaining about Apple charging for a point release of an operating system where Microsoft would give it for free.
While those people are right in that they are likely to get modded down by Mac fans, the complaints seldom offer much insight into what is a point release, what is a service pack and what is a full version number. To be fair, the OS vendors, both Apple and Microsoft, don't make it easy on the consumer either.
Apple generally gives out their version of point releases (10.x.x) for free, but those point releases usually don't offer much or any new functionality. (Currently I'm on OSX 10.3.9) which includes a new version of the Safari browser (1.3) but that is unusual. Apple also usually gives out point releases of the various software accompanying the OS for free (iTunes, QuickTime, iSight, iPod, Bluetooth etc) and they provide specific security patches as new exploits become available.(although there are currently about two hanging security issues that Apple really needs to fix)
Apple usually includes quite a lot of new extra functionality in the version upgrades (10.x). In the 10.3 Panther upgrade it was Expose, Fast User Switching, iChatAV and XCode and under the hood new APIs (Cocoa Bindings etc). in 10.4, it's Dashboard, Spotlight, XCode 2, Safari 2, Mail 2, Automator and a lot of new APIs (Core Data, Core Image etc.)
Microsoft is a little less consistent with its OS upgrades, pathces and service packs, but also follows a certain strategy. Generally, Microsoft offers API changes and some minor functionality changes in service packs, but rarely major new features. For example, WinNT went from sp1 to sp6 and actually gained a lot of the functionality that was in the Win98 and Win2k userspace, and NT users got those for free. Active Desktop for example (one can argue about how useful that was). Moving from NTSP6 to Win2k would not have entailed major changes for the common user, but, obviously, there was a lot that changed under the hood. Better security model, more stable, some minor UI changes, better networking etc. Obviously, for a user, it was worth paying for.
All the while, Microsoft also offered generally free upgrades to its bundled applications, such as IE, Outlook and WMP, although there was an outcry about the mp3 quality and MS' charging for better quality.
But can the same be said for the Win98SE to WinME upgrade? WinMe had a terrible reputation and was seen by many as an excuse by Microsoft to generate revenue.
And the Win2k to WinXP move, while also having some big under the hood changes (firewall, signed drivers etc), mostly had big UI changes (themes) and Fast User Switching, Automatic Updates (also in 2kSp3 onwards) etc. For the user, and the developer, it was probably worth the price. Since then Microsoft has offered two service packs, both free. SP1 had no visible change but fixed some glaring security and stability issues. During this time Microsoft has released literally hundreds of security patches, thankfully, free.
Now comes the part to argue over. XPSP2 offers a new security center and a firewall on by default. It also upgrades IE. SP2 is free. BUT, the security enhancements for SP2, including the IE upgrade, are not available for Win2k. Microsoft was getting a terrible rap with WinXP up to SP1. It was almost impossible to install a new machine on the net (activation) without getting hit by some of the rabid attacks going on within a few minutes. Microsoft HAD to do something, and, if they had charged for SP2, there would have been an even bigger outcry by an extremely digruntled public.
My personal opinion about Microsoft is that Microsoft, in a way that only Microsoft does well, decided to use the opportunity to both garner some lost respect by including the new security features, but also enforce upgrades amongst its userbase by excluding Win2k. This, I think, is something that Microsoft specialises at, prodding its userbase with new features, but including a catch somew
I know it's a real hardship to actually read your own links, but perhaps if you had taken this unprecidented step you would see that they list Pagemaker as coming out in "the mid-1980s," not 1980. Further, if you had actually read the article linked from that page, you would have found this: "1985 - Aldus develops PageMaker for the Mac, the first "desktop publishing" application."
If you have any further difficulties with basic reading comprehension, please let us know.
Lawrence Person (lawrencepersonh@gmailh.com (remove all "h"s to mail)
http://www.lawrenceperson.com/
This won't change anything! There is still no software available for Macs! They still can't run:
1) Netsky-P
2) Zafi-B
3) Sasser
4) Netsky-B
5) Netsky-D
6) Netsky-Z
7) MyDoom-A
8) Sober-I
9) Netsky-C
10) Bagle-AA
What good are they?
Cool art gallery, if you're into that sort of thing.
I hope I'm not blasting my NDA saying this, but we've been using seed builds for a while and the one thing that I think many people will be pleasantly surprised with is the sense of responsiveness/speed. I'm using a spanking new G4 laptop and using Tiger on it makes it feel like I have an ever faster machine (which is what I said about 10.3!). Everything is more responsive; screen redraws, directory listings, quicktime videos, etc. It's on-par with my AMD64 box with XP in terms of GUI resposiveness now!
-_-
I even SAID that Apple doesn't necessarily deserve credit:
BeOS had their database functionality first, but they died. Xerox had their WiMP interface first, but they never released (licensed only to Apple of course!)
Networking wasn't new, but it was experimental and Apple made it both easy and integrated.
CGA counts as color, but Apple introduced 24 bit color to a consumer level device.
3d acceleration was done first by SGI, in $10k devices, then by VooDoo Graphics in $600 video cards, but no 'common' or 'commodity' OS has implemented until Apple did in 2001.
Perhaps you're bitter, but you have to also understand Apple HAS done things, just like Microsoft has, and SGI, and Linux, and all the other companies out there.
The biggest thing people seem to have issue with is Apple's iPod.
The iPod did three things that no other mp3 player did before:
Density. 5gb in your pocket. Predecessors include Creative, with 20gb in a Mac mini sized device and the Rio with 64mb in a lighter sized device. Apple's was 5gb in a cigarette pack sized device.
Usability. Apple's device could be used by one hand. Creative, with 13 buttons (maybe it was 11) could not. The use of iTunes and a database meant, also, you could access thousands of songs with only a thumb and a forefinger. Finally the adoption of Firewire, over USB1, meant you could fill the thing up in 5 minutes, instead of 5 hours.
Style. Apple cared enough to make it look good. People don't like wearing ugly clothes, driving ugly cars, or wearing ugly watches, so why would they want an 'ugly' mp3 player?
GPL Deconstructed
Panther could do this too; after all, it uses ipfw. But Tiger just adds it to the graphical interface for the firewall.
English is easier said than done.
I actually expect this release to be a milestone in GUI operating systems. Not only is inter-programm communication fully developed, it also gets a easy to use point-and-click interface to access these functions (Automator).
What would really rock is if someday Apple had the guts to actually drop the desktop metaphor and introduce some non-overlaping full screen realestate using workspace and application management. Something like blender has - only more accessable of course.
How long have knowledgable users of Windows, Linux and Mac OS dreamed of easy cross-program automation via visual graphical pipes. Once again it's OS X that's years ahead of anything else.
We suffer more in our imagination than in reality. - Seneca
Then 'justsomebody' tried to correct the examples.
Xerox Alto 1972
They didn't get it 'right'--at least not right enough to bring to market. The Mac made the GUI useable.
ARPANET 1969
The GP was referring to desktops and LANS, not workstations and big iron. Etc. with the rest of your response. Maybe you're being obtuse on purpose?
Damn those pesky terrorists
Spotlight = Copernic/Google Toolbar/MSN Toolbar
No, it really isn't. I'm unsurprised by your ignorance about this. I guess we've just done a lousy job of explaining it.
Spotlight is a full-fledged system service, not just a user interface. Application developers can very easily add Spotlight to their own applications. For example, look at Mail. The additions to Mail to support Spotlight searching were trivial. In fact, the total code size of an early Spotlight build of Mail was significantly smaller, because we off-loaded all of the indexing and searching to the Spotlight service, removing it from Mail.
Comparing Mail to a third-party bolt-on search product is, well, dumb.
Safari RSS = Why the name change?
There has been no name change. The name of the browser is Safari. The version is 2.0. "Safari RSS" is just a marketing name for Safari's RSS support.
Dashboard = Avedesk/Samaurise
Um. No. Dashboard widgets are little Web Views. They're essentially Web applications running in little floating windows. I'd suggest you check it out before just arbitrarily declaring it to be the same as something else.
"AIM Profiles in iChat AV" isn't exactly a huge innovation
No, it's not. But we got 17,438 requests for that feature from users. It doesn't have to be big to be important to our customers.
it's quite easy to obtain as many free fonts as you please
We're not including free fonts. We're including professionally designed and licensed fonts --fully Unicode-savvy, of course -- that would cost hundreds of dollars if bought after the fact.
"Improved RAID Support" is what we call a "fix" not a new feature
You don't understand the feature. This doesn't really surprise me at this point, because it's clear that your goal here is just to post criticisms without a whole lot of concern about truth.
We already had striping support, which is sometimes erroneous called "RAID 0." We already had mirroring support. Now we've added concatenation. See? New feature.
I have absolutely no problem with people who want to be critical. Critical is where we live. But is it really too much to ask that the people who levy criticisms have the tiniest idea what they're talking about first? It would save so much time.
Um, you're missing something.
/home directory.
/swap directory
/swap are all encrypted.
/. some weeks ago that FV was a moot point because the swap was raw data. That is not an issue with Tiger.
1/ FV Encrypts the user's
2/ Secure VM encrypts the
So, the activities of the FV'd user (and others, and system process) that have been committed to
There -was- a flap on
--- See you at the Tannhäuser Gate.
Okay, I'm on a disinformation-squashing crusade today.
Google indexes content. This is important. Hugely, massively important. But we've had content indexing for a long time now. It only takes us so far.
What's more important than content indexing is metadata indexing.
Metadata literally means "data about data." It's information about your files that isn't actually stored in your files. For example, let's say you take a photograph and store it in your Pictures folder. Spotlight can automatically extract some metadata from the picture all by itself. It can tell that the picture is 2048 pixels across and that it's in Nikon RAW format and that you took it on December 24, 2003. The computer knows this stuff already.
Other metadata was inserted automatically when the picture taken. For example, the camera inserted metadata identifying it as being taken with a Nikon D1 using a 1/250 exposure and a 2.8 f-stop.
Spotlight indexes all that stuff.
But there's a third type of metadata. In addition to intrinsic metadata and automatically inserted metadata, there's descriptive metadata. Your computer knows that the picture is 2048 pixels across and that it was taken with a Nikon D1, but it can't know that it's a picture of your niece Katie. That's where iPhoto comes in. You use iPhoto to write a descriptive caption -- "Lawrence's daughter Katie on Christmas Eve" -- and that caption gets stored in the photo as metadata. Spotlight indexes it.
So if you come along later and search for "Christmas pictures," Spotlight will find that photo. Because it knows it's a picture, and because you described it as being related to Christmas.
Now, that's today. (Well, in two weeks.) What's next? We're going to find new ways of attaching automatic metadata. Here's one we've been talking about a lot: Your laptop has a GPS receiver in it. Tiny thing, about the size of a pencil eraser. At all times, your laptop knows where it is on the face of the Earth, accurate to about thirty feet.
Every file you create is tagged with three new, additional pieces of metadata: latitude, longitude and altitude. That's on top of the date and time data we already attach to every file.
Say you go on a business trip to Seattle. A year later, you can search your laptop for that e-mail you sent to your coworker Tom while you were in Seattle.
More: Using a very simple user interface, you can define locations. Sitting at your desk, you tell your laptop to refer to that location as "work." Any file created within a 100-yard radius of that location will be returned in a search for "work." On your couch you define a location called "home." Sitting at the coffee shop you define a location called "Starbucks." And so on.
Now your computer knows not only when you modified that file, it knows where you were when you did it. That's all metadata you can use for searching.
This is pretty advanced stuff. It's going to be a while before we start shipping GPS-enabled Powerbooks. But it's on the drawing board.
Spotlight opens up a whole new way of storing information. It's not a new idea; we've been trying to make it work for ten years now. But the actual working implementation of it is simply revolutionary. It's a quantum leap beyond anything that anybody has to offer right now.
ditto is a command on OS X and some BSD systems that's used to copy files. On OS X it has the flag -rsrc that ensures it copies the resource forks of various documents and applications. Currently on 10.3, 'cp' will ignore the resource forks, breaking some applications that use them.
Best. Webhost. Ever. Dreamhost.
I've been on Slashdot since '99, and I noticed initially there was quite a bit of resistence to most things Apple. The groupthink about Apple seemed to be, "Yeah, they make shiny widgets that graphic artists like, but they're toys unsuitable for people who know anything about computers."
The release of early builds of OS X started the ball rolling in the right direction. Apple's foray into Open Source with Darwin at first was greated with enormous skepticism, but after a while people started to realize that Apple wasn't just pulling a publicity stunt. The evolution of Apple hardware got more people interested in Apple, and the titanium PowerBooks in particular made quite a few Slashdotters to realize that OS X on a PowerBook was essentially a very capable UNIX machine with a great form factor and nifty features.
Subsequent events (the launch of the iPod, the foray into online music, the G5 boxes, and the continuing improvements to OS X) have changed a lot of minds. I seriously doubt that Slashdot has become infested with Apple fanboys who drool at the opportunity to mod up comments that make Apple look good. My take on it is that Apple has changed for the better, and they're coming out with hardware and software that many Slashdotters like.
Read the EFF's Fair Use FAQ
If you're willing to type out descriptions on all your files, the point being. When Jobs demonstrated Spotlight he had a load of images from Corbis which had all been nicely tagged and described by the good people that work there. People who don't have the luxury of being revered as gods inside Cupertino would have to actually type these lengthy descriptions themselves.
You've managed to effectively argue for the point you wished to oppose. You initially claimed only music files have meta-data, and then you go on to mention Corbis images - which are carefully tagged with extensive meta-data.
The meta-data from Corbis is put to good use by a lot of people who buy their images (publishers for example). Currently only people running a program like iView can search on that data. With spotlight anyone can - I know that this will make my life easier personally, and I'm more likely to purchase images with said data pre-entered (note that they do this now, on all images, not just for Steve Jobs as you imply).
Where there is financial value for adding meta-data (and in many cases in business there definitely is) it *will* be added, and extensively used. Programs like Word already add author specific data to files, I imagine once it is a system-wide service this sort of facility will be pervasive, as it will allow sophisticated searches and sorting of documents which previously had to be done by hand. Initially inside organisations and between trusted partners, but it will happen. Perhaps it will never spread to the internet, but if we're talking about Spotlight that is irrelevent.
Meta-data on the internet is a joke because of trust issues. You have extrapolated from that narrow case to all others. Please don't do that.
We're talking about highly advanced stuff here. It exists only in labs. So it's way too early to talk about specifics.
I don't want to blow anything out of proportion, but think of Spotlight as being kind of like the first bitmapped graphics. What we're doing with it right now is cool. But what's really important is what it enables us to do in the future.
GPS-based locational metadata is just one example. Automatic speech-to-text transcription for audio recordings is another. (You wouldn't believe what vector processing can do for speech-to-text. I saw a demo where a high-quality, noiseless audio recording of an unaccented speaker was transcribed at 20x real-time on a single 2.0 GHz G5.)
Example: You're doing a multi-party teleconference. A recording is made of that teleconference (each angle), and separate audio tracks are recorded for each participant. In real time, your computer transcribes each voice track and stores it as ancillary content on the recording, content that Spotlight indexes for you. At any time, you can type "meeting in San Jose" into Spotlight, and it'll take you right to the angle and track on which your co-worker Laurent talked about next week's meeting in San Jose.
Think about more detailed logging. Right now your computer logs only the most rudimentary events, stuff that is of no interest to human beings. What if it could log everything? Right now you can say "Show me that file I worked on yesterday at two o'clock." But what if you could turn that around and say, "When and for how long did I work on this file?" That's vitally important to anybody who does billable work. Imagine if, through metadata and logging, your computer could automatically produce your time sheet for you?
Another type of automatically generated metadata we're experimenting with is relational metadata. Let's say you've got a picture of your dog on your computer. You e-mail it to your sister Jan. Your computer notes this as metadata on the photo so later you can ask your computer to show you what pictures you've sent to Jan.
Address Book is one area where relational metadata is pretty important. In Address Book, you put Jan and your brother Harry into a group called "Family." Both Jan and Harry, in their contact records, get metadata describing them as being members of the "Family" group. So later you can ask your computer to show you what pictures you've e-mailed to members of your family. Or received from members of your family. Or what pictures you've e-mailed to SOME members of your family but not ALL.
Let's say you take that picture of your dog and drop it in a Pages document, then export the document as a PDF and mail it to your sister Jan. The computer records, as metadata, the fact that that picture of your dog is related to Jan. It knows that put associated the picture with that Pages document, that the Pages document was associated with the PDF file, and that the PDF file was associated with an e-mail to Jan.
Now combine it with a gestural interface. Take two files, any two files. Say it's a PDF representing an invoice and a Photoshop file representing a poster you designed. You drag the invoice over the Photoshop file and a marking menu appears, giving you the option of establishing a relationship between the two files. If you want you can annotate the relationship. If you don't, you don't have to. The computer will simply note that a relationship exists.
Now extend that idea. Instead of it being two files, it can be two ANYTHING. Drag a contact from Address Book to a Pages document; up pops a marking menu asking you if you want to establish a relationship. Or an song from iTunes to a picture of your girlfriend. Or your daughter's birth certificate to her birthday in iCal.
The possibilities that Spotlight opens up are pretty inspiring. It's not just a desktop search tool. Yes, it makes that possible, but bleah. That's 20th-century thinking. That's you working in the way the computer wants. What's more important about Spotlight is the fact that it's an enabling technology that lets the computer work in the way you want.
There's some pretty exciting stuff coming in the next few years.