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The Roadmap to Leopard?
Alexandros Roussos writes with a link to the site MacScoop, which claims to have obtained a roadmap for the months leading up to Leopard's release. It's a straightforward article, stating how much access individuals outside the company will have access to the product prior to October. "Major build on early August - In a little more than a month, Apple's development team targets a feature-full build. The build that was provided to developers during the World Wide Developers Conference earlier this month is actually not totally feature frozen. Some minor features are currently being finished for the system. These features will arrive in the August build along with user-interface improvements, sources told MacScoop. If you expect major 'wow' features or interface changes, you will be disappointed. What we may expect is additional settings and [some] user interface polish[ing]. Among the most criticized parts of the new user interface [are] the new menu bar and Dock."
OK, I watched the WWDC07 demos of Leopard and I thought the new Dock and menu bar looked good. What's the beef? I've not read any "reviews" yet. No matter what happens - come October this MacPro will be running Leopard.
Is it just me, or is the "timeline" the article talks about not just something you could reasonably deduce, knowing where Leopard is at right now and when they plan to release it?
Didn't seem like there was any real new info here, but maybe it's just me.
Perl - $Just @when->$you ${thought} s/yn/tax/ &couldn\'t %get $worse;
...seems to be the main complaint among the bits I've read. And after having used it now myself, I'd have to agree.
Personally, I like the new look of the dock. The menu bar, however, is something I really hope they make an option. For the same reason that I (and many others) don't want or use semi-transparent windows, I don't want a semi-transparent menu bar. It's like they threw readability and usability out the window, all in the name of looking "cool".
Perl - $Just @when->$you ${thought} s/yn/tax/ &couldn\'t %get $worse;
You should consider providing feedback to . It sounds like the behavior of the stacks could be improved with a little effort, rather than ditching the concept altogether.
If you mod me down, I shall become more powerful than you could possibly imagine.
I,too, am interested in stacks. And Spaces. I always made use of multiple virtual desktops on my Linux boxes. Oh and since I am bad about doing backups any more regularly than twice a year, I'll probably use Time Machine as well.
Core Animation is sweet. As is 64 bit from top to bottom.
Oh and what's the deal with the blazin' speed of Steve's demo machine that was at WWDC07? I've got quad-core 2.66GHz MacPro that just doesn't have the snappiness of the MacPro Steve demo'ed. Is there that much of a difference between mine and a 3.0GHz (quad or 8 core) in running regular apps? I just don't see it....
How long are you thinking it will take to press a disc, stick it in a box, and ship it to the store?
Given that FC is in Sept., and FC is the first *intended* final version, a month+ of going through fine-tuning, and a week or two of manufacturing, seems more than adequate.
. Unless I'm mistaken, stacks are HORRIBLE!!!
You are mistaken. Both views have a "Show In Finder" option, and the grid view most certainly does contain text. The screenshots on Apple's site, as well as the keynote demo both show this, which casts some doubt on everything else you've said.
Don't become a regular here -- you will become retarded.
The new Dock is awesome, though. It is not 3D eye candy, it actually is 3D.
No, sorry. It's 2D that looks 3D. You don't need 3D to create the reflection effect, or to have objects appear to be behind other objects. Also, Stacks don't work quite how you seem to think. They're just a different view for Dock folders. You can't create a "second row" of apps, for instance.
Don't become a regular here -- you will become retarded.
I just pray that Leopard's Finder doesn't flip out if a network share suddenly goes missing, as Tiger's does. It's enough of a pain that I need to fully quit out of Azureus and iTunes which I have configured to do all of their storage on a network drive, and it's entirely my fault. But when my computer flips shit and locks up for fifteen minutes because I unplugged the network cable before unmounting all the shares... you get the idea. An auto-mount option, preferably with location-based configuration (sort of how I use MarcoPolo.app right now, with its scripting tools) would be great, but I'd be content if it simply gracefully disconnected from network shares that have become unavailable.
How are sites slashdotted when nobody reads TFAs?
Personally, I think Apple has finally lost it after several years of producing innovations that have changed much of the world. The fact that they are touting a transparent menubar as a major feature suggests their idea pool for MacOS X development is starting to collapse in the same way Copeland did in the mid 90's. They've become too focused on presentation and eye candy, rather than improving what goes on under the hood.
Of course, that isn't to say MacOS X hasn't been a mess in terms of the Human Interface Guidelines (on which the Mac OS was based) since the earliest public releases, but making the one visual concept that has remained consistent and immediately recognizeable in all versions of the Mac OS almost completely invisible has to be the single worst offense to date. The menubar was supposed to be a fixed (and always visible) reference point for the user to rely on while the rest of the desktop evironment continually changes during each session of use. It's the one part of the OS that keeps everything else organized and easily understood.
Aside from Leopard, we'll soon have the iPhone to contend with, which is sure to be a nightmare once the early adopters get past the hype and Steve Jobs' Reality Distortion Field and start to realize just how confining the device really is due to all the red tape that comes with it. It will probably sell as expected, but in the end, it may go down in history as on of the worst products in Apple's history, next to the Lisa, as a result of all the artificial limitations imposed upon it that kept it from being the killer product everyone really wanted it to be.
By the time this all plays out, Steve Jobs may get ousted for both 10.5 and the iPhone, much like Gil Amelio was due to Copeland and mac cloning.
8==8 Bones 8==8
Everybody has their undies in a bunch about the 10 things the Jobs showed in the recent keynote. Those things were carefully chosen by Jobs, likely with a great deal of input from other executives and managers at Apple, probably more such input than any keynote ever before. Why? Because Apple was trying to motivate the 5000 developers at WWDC to be more innovative with their use of some of the Mac OS X technologies. Apple focused that keynote on things like creative use of CoverFlow in several places, and other uses of CoreAnimation, to get developers to think more creatively.
Leopard has a bunch of interesting OS level features (some described here: Leopard and here: Leopard Server
Your complaints about the menu bar are valid, but can be easily solved by adding a user preference setting to the Dock for transparency level, and making the default be "very nearly opaque".
I think you're missing the point about the iPhone.
If you mod me down, I shall become more powerful than you could possibly imagine.