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Apple's Bonjour Available for Windows
inblosam writes "Apple's Bonjour ('also known as zero-configuration networking, enables automatic discovery of computers, devices, and services on IP networks') is now available for Windows! A Bonjour icon shows up in Internet Explorer to enable Bonjour browsing, along with the Bonjour Printer Wizard. Developers can download the Bonjour SDK. The benefits would appear to be for Apple customers (more Bonjouring with more networks) and to gain Apple switchers by enticing Windows customers."
I find it interesting that totally generic french words can be held as being relatively strong trademarks in the US.
Granted, the Rendezvous complain had a certain basis, but it's funny to me that anyone would call their technology "Good Day" (litteral translation of Bonjour) (or "Meeting" for that matter) and expect to have a strong mark.
What is it with French being hip? I though the statue of Liberty was destined for the scrapyard and that everything french was suspicious.
Does this mean that Xgrid may also hit the Windows side of the moon?
I don't have too much knowledge of the nuts and bolts of Xgrid, but ZeroConf networking seems to me the first step to porting it on Windows. After all, it is not too much different than distributed number crunching projects (e.g. SETI@Home), or is it?
Apple wont be doing that ,The clone macs caused apple alot of problems mostly related to the fact that it cut proffits by brobdignagian ammounts.
Quite simply , apple makes a hell of alot more off of hardware and support(not so sure about support though) than they do off of software so it would not be in their best intrests.
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I agree that all browsers available should be supported generally, but the issue here is: zero-configuration networking, enables automatic discovery of computers, devices, and services on IP networks. These things are Operating System issues, the only reason they call it Internet Explorer plugin is probably that it is the file-manager. Opera and Mozilla are not file managers, thus they do not need a plugin to browse available printers etc on the LAN, and they will not work unless the underlying operating system has configured the network etc. :-)
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..since all networked HP printers built in the last few years have Bonjour support built in to the JetDirect software.
There are many printers now that work with this technology. It's actually pretty good stuff. I am surprised that this was not already in Windows. Apple usually isn't the type to just release free software for a platform other than theirs, unless of course something is in it for them. Possibly wider ZeroConf adoption in devices? Possible another pc compatible device that apple wants to release, but requires this?
Just tried Bonjour on Windows, and it automatically detected our two network printers : one's an HP LaserJet 3030 (with a network box) and the other is a Lexmark C510N. I'm really glad I can at last uninstall all the crap that comes with the drivers to make them work... And I won't have to define network ports that crash or fail to detect network names again! Nobody will come ever again to tell me "the printer doesn't work"... I'll switch all our computers to Bonjour as soon as I can. Thanks Apple.
As near as I can tell, having considered this myself, there are essentially two major reasons not to make an x86 version of OSX (OSx86?).
First is that of hardware support. OSX supports a fairly narrow array of hardware--most of it designed for OSX specifically. Driver translation, although not impossible, would take some effort and money. This problem, although not a show stopper (since Apple could, if they wanted to, make it happen), is a significant hurdle. It isn't that there aren't lots of drivers for OSX, but that those drivers would need to be rewritten for a new OS on a new platform. Costly and annoying. Also confusing for those who are purchasing a new bit of hardware.
The second reason is more important, and probably is the show stopper. From what I can tell (and I'm sure others will chime in), Apple makes a good portion of their money from hardware sales--not software. Arguably (though not necessarily) selling OSx86 (I like the nomenclature) would reduce sales of their hardware beyond the point of increased revenue from selling the software (remember that there would be increased development costs). The question is two-fold: would there be a significant reduction in sales of hardware? and, how many peices of software need to be sold in order to make up for one lost sale of a new iMac? If you can answer those questions, then you know whether or not this is a show-stopper. I would guess that it is. The folks at Apple are not stupid (regardless of what some folks will tell you). I am sure that more than one bean counter has run the figures and KNOWS what the costs would be. What they don't know, and probably can't know, is how many people who would NEVER buy a Mac (hardware) would LOVE to have OSx86 (or OSx86-64). I suspect that it would offset sales, but they obviously don't agree.
There is a third reason--Steve Jobs may not want to position themselves to compete directly with MS. It isn't exactly the most healthy way to do business.
A fourth reason also has to do with Jobs--he may just not like the idea, and frankly, that would be enough.
I think that just about covers the argument. That said, I would buy OSx86-64, if only to confuse people!
"We don't know what we are doing, but we are doing it very carefully,..." Wherry, R.J. Personnel Psychology (1995)
I throw 20 people and their laptops into a room. With zeroconf they all automatically notice each other, sort out what IPs they're each going to use, offer their printers to each other (as defined by policy), and magically become a network of machines.
In dumb speak, it just works. DHCP is much better for an organised network, this is much better for an ad-hoc one.
jh
I really don't get how someone thinks this will get people to convert to apple. OK, so you port some really great app or function of the apple to windows. Why do I want to leave windows? The function is already on my native OS. It's only after I realize that something is so great isn't available for windows that I would want to switch. apple doesn't have enough market exposure to cause a serious exodus from windows.
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HELLO (Picasa share client)
I wonder if Apple's French language Bonjour download would be called Hello. I hope Google doesn't sue over this one.
Oh wait. Never mind. That might be perceived as evil.
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Because Apple, like MS, understands that 'folks' recognize and appreciate words for software products better than acronyms and abbreviations. Linux types pride themselves on naming software with cryptic more-clever-than-you acronyms. This needlessly turns off 'folks' from migrating to Linux. Windows: Media Player Apple: iTunes Linux: XMMS
"...and yet, I blame society" Duke - Repo Man
Seems to me Apple needs to update the Cocoa frameworks for operations on the modern NT variants (2000/XP).
Seems to me they may already me doing that, what with QT7 being a Cocoa app (and I wouldn't be surprised to find iTunes is not far behind).
Seems to me we may see Apple pushing back into the cross-platform application development arena very soon, as a hook to customers to move off Carbon on the OS X platform...
???
not so much that French is hip, but "something-you're-not" is
my brother tells me the story of when bicycling through belgium, he came across a guy customizing a hod-rod car. on the side were painted the words "sweet girl." when asked, the belgian responded that he wanted something that looked/sounded exotic. A U.S. equivalent might be "cherchez le femme" (or "churchy lafemme" for you Pogo fans...)
I think that it just has to be in a different language. it promotes the need for some one to ask you what it is. makes you feel smart (though possibly only relative to the person asking... (think bad lawyers and latin.)) I suppose it helps that in the U.S. certain languages/accents have come to be hung with certain stereotypes. BBC style British accent=intelligent, French accent=sexy (or stuck-up (or both, for that matter)), Italian=short tempered gangster/lothario. But in all of these cases the primary thing that the accent or the foreign word implies is simply the sense of the exotic.
In the rest of the world, French was/is frequently considered the international language. though with the advent of airtravel, and by necessity international air-traffic control, that has been moving to english for some time. (most computer languages also have their basis in english (keywords and syntax rules for instance.) I find it fairly interesting that ruby, (developed, as far as I know) primarily in Japan, still uses english for the major keywords.)
Finding a name that is not "sue-able" or offensive is a tricky thing. Exxon spent a lot of time and money looking for a new name when Esso was broken up and managed to find that the XX was uncommon or non-existent in all known languages. The fact that Exxon itself eventually became something of an epithet is unrelated, (but pleasantly ironic.)
Rendezvous, at least, had come into relatively common english parlance.
-- it's ridiculous how many people misspell ridiculous... (damn, damn, damn...)
The thing about Apple's UI that annoys me (well, apart from the whole chrome thing, which is just a bit nasty because it's inconsistent) is the way they bark at Windows developers like they're small children when they port their apps to Mac OS and don't conform to every Mac OS UI convention...but when Apple port their apps to Windows? Well, screw the standard UI furniture and behaviour! We're Apple!
Case in point: focus behaviour. Windows and Mac OS deal with focus switching differently. In Mac OS, you click on a window that does not have focus, it switches focus to it, and that's it. It doesn't matter where you click, a Mac window will eat the click. Whereas in Windows, all controls are 'live' even if the window does not have focus. So if you click on a button in a window that does not have focus, the button receives the click (as well as the window receiving focus).
Now, you can argue about which is best all you like, but the important thing is: Windows does it one way, Mac OS does it the other, and users on both platforms are used to that.
Until iTunes for Windows comes along, and it uses the Mac OS focus model. I've only started using iTunes again for a week recently, and I've already lost count of the number of times I've had to double/triple/quadruple click because the first click was eaten etc, and then my intentions were misunderstood by iTunes, and it's let me rename a track instead of playing it as I want to, etc.
It's either ignorance or sheer arrogance, and either way it's annoying. Don't screw with platform standards, just because you think you're so great that you can. iTunes is the only app I run on Windows that behaves like this. Great. Just great.
And don't get me started on why the fsck it uses Aqua scroll bars on Windows. What the hell were they thinking?
Answers like "it's branding" don't wash. To most people, that argument plays in their heads like this: "We don't give a fsck about the users."