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Apple Climbs Into Third Place In U.S. PC Market
Tibor the Hun writes "According to Gartner and IDC, Apple now has between 7.8 and 8.5% of market share. While those numbers are not astonishing, they are not insignificant, and their growth does not seem to be slowing down. Will the pearly gates of acceptance open up for them once they reach the magic 10%, and will that have a positive effect on desktop Linux adoption? Hard to tell, but it's good to see that normal people (not just us geeks) are choosing to go with a different OS, rather than staying with the headache-inducing Windows."
Try using Darwine (http://darwine.sourceforge.net/), or if you wish for commercial support, use CrossOver Office for Macintosh.
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That would be GNUstep http://gnustep.org/
It's got a long way to go, but eventually, they intend to make .apps from OSX run natively. Remember mac OSX is really NeXTstep 5 (or something).
That's a pretty bad example. Congratulations, you just learned the UI widget for adding something.
Now, in most every single Mac native application (and the good ports), you know when you are "adding X", there will always be a button with a + symbol at the bottom corner.
Let's take Microsoft Office 2008 for Mac as an example of "you can write FORTRAN in every language". Say you want to set the default format to the old binary one instead of OpenXML.
Word: Hit preferences. It's a System-Preferences like presentation of a matrix of icons. Hit compatibility. Nothing there. Hit "Save". Ah, "Save Word files as ... (dropdown to .doc)"
Excel: Hit preferences. Again, a System-Preferences matrix of icons. Hit "Save". Nothing there. Hit "Compatibility" - ah, a different layout of dropdown box.
Powerpoint: Hit preferences. It's a tabbed interface. Go to the "Save" tab and hit "Save powerpoint files as ... (dropdown to .ppt)"
So, there are 2 layouts of preferences (tabbed versus icon matrix) and two places where this dropdown is hidden (save versus compatibility), and two different styles for the dropdown. No two apps are the same.
But yes, you do get buttons with labels. Just not a consistent GUI...
Okay. I can get windows to run. Really, I can. That doesn't mean it isn't a fucking pain in the ass, a terrible user experience, and a waste of resources. Sorry, I have plenty of reasons to get headaches from windows. Not being geeky enough to handle it isn't one them.
/etc/hosts requires jumping through tons of hoops on the mac just because it's designed to be "easier".)
I've been a Mac user for 2 years now, although I owned a PC for around 14. I've had more headaches using Mac OSX than I've ever had using Windows.
It's always some stupid little things, but it's something stupid in the OS. Like finder will remember the view settings for each individual folder. I can't tell it to use one default view for every folder, someone on a Mac IRC channel suggested I write a shell script that goes through and changes some file in every folder (some file stores the folders view settings.) There should be an easy way to do that
When I purchased my new MacBook Pro I saw it came with a cool little utility that will copy everything over from my old computer. So I hooked up both computers to my gigabit ethernet switch ready to copy, and then it told me it doesn't support network transfers (!!!) I have to hook up the computers to each other using a firewire cable. I don't happen to have spare firewire cables lying around, although I do have tons and tons of ethernet cables (plus the laptops have built in wireless, it can communicate with the other laptop straight out of the box with nothing extra required.) Same thing with Aperture, I can't backup to network storage only an external drive hooked up via USB or Firewire. I can't imagine why anyone would want to rely on an external drive for a backup mechanism.
The single mouse button is often brought up and people are told "You don't need a second mouse button" although every mac program I've ever used has some right click menu, the standard methods of accessing the method with a single button are holding Ctrl then clicking or holding down the mouse button. The problem is, sometimes that doesn't work (like when finder is dying and you need to restart it, which you can only do through the right click menu) so I have to go find a USB mouse, plug it in, hope it works, and then use that to right click.
In contrast I've never found a problem like the ones listed above in Windows that I can't solve. Even if it requires diving into the registry at least there exists a method. Doing anything sufficiently advanced on a Mac seems impossible (even with the unix backend, a simple task like editing
Pardon me, but I'd like to know what version of windows you're using. It usually takes me at least 1.5 hours after installing to get all the drivers installed and not conflicting. The only things that "just work" out of the box are the GUI and my 10-year-old 3-button Microsoft optical mouse.
Its = possessive. It's = "it is"
Like finder will remember the view settings for each individual folder. I can't tell it to use one default view for every folder
Yes you can. Open a finder window, set it to the view type you want to set as default. I use List View (Cmd+2). Press Cmd+J to show the View Options pane. Notice how this pane changes as you cycle through the different view modes (Cmd+1-4). Once you adjust the settings to your liking, simply click "Use as Defaults" on the bottom of the View Options pane.
the standard methods of accessing the method with a single button are holding Ctrl then clicking or holding down the mouse button.
I assume you're using a laptop since you said you have to go get a usb mouse in order to right click. In the Keyboard & Mouse section of System Preferences, under "Trackpad" you can check an option labeled "Tap trackpad using two fingers for secondary click." I use it all the time.
Its = possessive. It's = "it is"
The reason is that Mac software works completely differently. The POSIX syscalls are the same, but almost everything in between is completely different. Not like Toyota-Ferrari, different, we're talking Schwinn-Ferrari different.
The Win32 API that Wine implements is a C API, so a clean version can be written from scratch by anyone who knows C and takes the time to do it. Lots of potential users there.
The Cocoa APIs of Mac OS X are written in Objective-C, a language which few people know. They are more expansive than the Win32 API, and since they are object-oriented the specification is quite a bit more complex.
There is a Free sort-of-implementation called GNUStep, which actually conforms to the earlier OPENSTEP specification, plus their own add-ons. The GNUStep people now make tracking changes to Cocoa a priority, so there is source compatibility, and there is something called Renaissance which allows users to create use a single file for user interface design.
However, I don't think GNUStep is binary compatible, even if it's built on top of Darwin and running on identical hardware. But if it's binary compatibility you want, the GNUStep codebase is the best place to start (just watch out for lawyers).
An interesting note, even though the two are binary compatible, because NeXT/OPEN/GNUStep/Cocoa applications are actually directories of multiple files, it's theoretically possible to have one single build that could handle either API, on a variety of architectures.
Yes, but lots of different text files. Windows only has two files for everything.
Unless I misunderstood you, you're confusing Linux with Windows or they've changed the install process considerably since XP. With Windows you must put the CD in, wait in front of the computer of five minutes, enter a very long string of alphanumeric characters including 1s and ls and Os and 0s and Bs and 13s, if you aren't on the internet you really get the "hitting yourself with a hammer" part as you authenticate, talking to a computer on your cell phone and entering another long string of alphanumerics.
Then you have to sit in front of the computer for another hour or two (or even longer) and tell it that it's OK to reboot itself several times.
When you finally get the OS installed you have to go into Control Panel to configure it like you want it (standard Windows or new kindergarten Crayon style, should the start menu pop up or cover part of the screen, etc.)
Then you have to install all your applications.
With Linux (with Suse or Mandriva, ymmv on other distros) you insert the first CD, choose how you want it to act in a single screen (LILO or GRUB, KDE or Gnome, etc) and what apps you want installed, and since it's all your apps as well as teh OS you have to change CDs when prompted. You don't have to sit there like with Windows, you don't have to install any apps (it's part of the installation process), you only have one reboot at the very end of the process, and your computer is able to do pretty much anything you would want a computer to do (except, of course, play Windows games).
IME Suse or Mandriva take less than an hour, while Windows takes all afternoon. It's easy and intuitive.
I'm not sure about Apple, but IINM you just buy one and plug it in.
Anybody who thinks Linux is hard hasn't tried Linux this century. Now I'll probably get downmodded by Linux geeks who want to keep their 133t cr3dz and don't want everyone to know that Linux installation is a piece of cake that your grandma could probably do.
mcgrew's razor: Never attribute to stupidity that which can be explained by greedy self-interest
I agree about the hockey puck but have you ever used the new ultraslim keyboards? This is the best keyboard I've used since the AEK II, which I have always missed since they stopped putting serial ports on Macs... the recent keyboards before the flat ones were abominations, I was always pushing the control key by accident because of the way I hold my hands while typing. These flat keyboards are great though, terrific form factor and just the right amount of clickety click when you type. The wireless one is a little too small -- good for a entertainment center situation but not for a desktop. But the wired one is terrific, and not too pricey either.
As for the earbuds, you're right, but it doesn't matter. There's no point in them including Grados since well over 90% of their market won't appreciate or care about the difference (they're playing mp3s anyway!), and those of us who do care already plan to spend $100+ on something better. Personally I wouldn't want to be locked into an audiophile solution chosen by Apple -- I'd rather throw out the crappy ones they include and use my Shures rather than have to pay a large premium for good earbuds that I probably wouldn't use anyway.
huh, how is prior comment informative?? No details, nada...
My issues with el Mighty Mouse:
1. The stupid trackball gets clogged very easily and is very hard to clean.
2. The stupid trackball is too small for fine control. Great for whizzing the cursor along vast expanses of screen, bad for little adjustements.
3. If I don't have the mouse perfectly aligned, I can't get the "right mouse" button - I get the "side button" which defaults to Expose, which is useful, but isn't the right mouse button. It's just over designed and not overly well executed. They could have just put a blasted button in there instead of getting all fancy.
4. The whole thing is hard take apart and clean. I'm sorry, mice and keyboards need to be periodically cleaned or tossed and the MM is a little pricey to toss routinely.
5. The ergonomics aren't very good, I much prefer the Logitech mice. Easier to use for extended periods of time.
Of course, it's all quite subjective. I'm just glad that there are good third party options.
Faster! Faster! Faster would be better!