I agree totally. Having a universal system that is cross platform and accessible from anywhere is certainly nice to have, but as a secondary route only, in much the same way as web email interfaces are nice but a native email client is better.
If I were Microsoft I'd be planning for a native release on every platform that was in popular use.
It was? I don't remember that. As far as OS X versions go, there was X, 2004, 2008 (first UB release) and 2011. It's been well covered in the life of OS X, certainly.
There was a discontinuation of the Office scripting in one of the versions, since it was based on code that (in the words of the MS developers themselves) was a "total nightmare of hacks and kludges and legacy stuff", so it was taken out of one release, but has been rewritten and is now back in 2011.
I've never had any problems sharing documents back and forth with windows friends, but then I never really used the scripting, so I wasn't affected by that. I know that some businesses have script-loaded office files as the lynchpin of their operation and could not live without it.
While iWork is very nice, and it replaces Powerpoint and Word very nicely, Numbers is still not quite there compared to Excel (which in turn, is not quite there compared to Matlab) for many uses.
I don't have an iPad, but I'm not going to be the only one who prefers Excel over Numbers for the basic things.
Still, your point stands - it's hardly an anchor weighing down iPad sales.
It's the square peg that makes you believe that every task is a square hole.
It is handy for visualising CSV lists before you move them into something like Matlab, and it's perfectly capable as a simple accounting sheet for a small business.
Not great for graphs unless you know you can manipulate your data for a straight line, and you don't have any points to exclude from the fit. Tends to choke on very large data sets too.
At some point you have to draw the line where the program stops and the interpreter begins. The OS is another example.
I think I'd cut it off at the point where everything becomes generic, so the interpreter is a general device that can be used for other programs, not just this game.
This is hilarious. I've been on this site for more than 10 years (joined up during first undergrad degree in 1999 or 2000) and you've listed me as one of the shill accounts?
I suspected this was total bullshit before, but that simply confirms it as far as I'm concerned.
What? You think Apple/MS/Sony etc have been paying me for a decade? I wish! Then my student loans would be more manageable.
For the record, this is my only account, no one else has access to it, I've had it since first registering it, no one has ever paid me (or otherwise instructed me) to post anything. Just so it's down in writing.
Well, he's listed me as one of those "shill accounts", so he clearly has absolutely zero proof (although I can't prove that to you, obviously).
I've been posting on slashdot since my first time around at university, so that would be 1999-2000 or something? Maybe 2001 - it might have been in my second year when I got a computer of my own rather than the ones in the lab. My UID is whatever was assigned to me when I made the account, and this is the only account I have.
In other words, I've been around here for a very long time (obviously not as long as some of the 4 digit UIDs), so either Apple/MS/Sony/Facebook whoever has been paying for my to post for over ten years, or they approached me recently and started offering cash (yeah, how very likely, that they'd trust some random guy living in the UK to shill for them. No risk at all that I'd tell anyone about it! no sir!).
In other words, the guy is full of shit, and if he'd been around on slashdot long enough he'd recognise that I've been posting here for a decade.
Still, let the kids have their grand conspiracy ranting and raving. I just wish it didn't reflect so poorly on a site I that I've been a member of for so long. How far it has fallen. Hard to have a proper discussion these days without being modded down or accused of shilling if you dare to say anything that isn't in lockstep with the groupthink.
There is no "tax", and the new system being introduced in 10.8 merely adds a layer of UAC-style authentication to apps not from the App Store or identified developers (and any developer can get a digital cert from Apple for free, with no vetting process). The large majority of developers who make Mac software but don;t sell via the App Store will see no functional change to their apps on 10.8 from the user perspective, since they'll all be signed already.
If a developer doesn't get a digital certificate then the OS merely asks the user whether they'd like to add the app to their whitelist the first time it is run, but then never again after that. Other than the first request, the OS won't block the app at all.
Or, you could just turn the whole thing off in the preferences and it will never query you about any app from any source.
So no, you haven't heard plans that "everything will have to go thru the app store" - you've heard that 10.8 has a new feature that adds an extra (optional) step when you launch non-signed apps for the first time.
Ah, a classic example of putting words into someone else's mouth and then bashing them for what they supposedly said.
He didn't make any such claim, just that it had a single window interface. Does he really need to add disclaimers that he knows that Apple did not invent the single window video player interface?
Well, only if they can somehow hide the number of iPhones in vendor channels across all of the countries where they are sold, and then hide all of the phones in consumer hands after they buy them, and hide the cellular carriers' reports on the number of devices on their network and the data they're using... then there's the iOS developers and the ability to collect the UDID of a handset, so you'd have to fake a ton of that data somehow (but you're trying to make it look like there are fewer iPhones than there really are, so what? you intercept and block some UDIDs? but then what if the developer notices that they aren't getting as many device IDs as indicated by the sales of their app, so now you have to fake the download and sales figures of third party apps and tell them that they've sold *less* than they really have, and you then have to use those figures in your official PR (the deliberately lower numbers)...
The level of complexity and conspiracy is just so far fetched. Not to mention the risk of a whistleblower somewhere in thy supply chain or within Apple itself. It's just not a feasible scenario with so much at stake given that the ultimate act in the conspiracy requires deliberately filling false accounts on a massive scale.
So it's either do all that... or maybe they're telling the truth about their profits from the App Store, and that it's designed as a value-add to sell hardware, which is where the profit comes from, as it always has historically with Apple.
And by "weakness" in phone sales you mean the record quarters they have posted.
The 4, then the 4S were selling by the truckload. The 4 and the 3GS are *still* selling by the truckload despite the 4S (which is much higher still) as cheaper alternatives to a 4S.
Perhaps they'd be looking to cover their losses in the phone arena... if it were even remotely necessary, which it isn't.
Not to mention the build quality (as in the design of the car, not a reflection of the labour force building it).
Ford was one of the first to realise that they couldn't just phone in the overall design any more when selling in European markets, so they put work into better transmission, suspension, engines, ride quality, the basic interior features etc and it really paid off for them - they have several class-leading, great value vehicles available in Europe and have for many years.
They also joined up with other manufacturers to collaborate on major developments (mainly in high efficiency, gasoline-a-like diesel engines).
So yes, there are going to be low-IQ morons like the OP who feel emasculated while driving a 4 cylinder vehicle with better performance, efficiency, emissions, weight and quality compared to the "patriotic American" 6 and 8 cylinder dinosaur lumps that make him feel like a real man - maybe that's why it took Ford so long to move their winning formula back to the USA after finding it worked so well in Europe, but it seems they're finally doing it.
Ford is doing well over here, and it't not because they're building designs right out of the 70s where more numbers of cylinders = better! manly! rar!
It wasn't even that bad of a design to begin with. Under all the conditions where an internal antenna would work acceptably (ie, when the phone was being held in any possible position) the 4's antenna also worked fine. It was only in marginal conditions where internal antennas, like the one in the 3GS, would not receive a signal in the first place that the detuning showed up.
The design should have figured both left and right handed use from the start, certainly, but it was nowhere near as bad as many were making it out to be.
That said, the bumper cures the issue in those edge cases.
Ask Apple - anyone who wanted could return it for a full refund, including being released from the cellular contract at no cost, if they felt it was not fit for purpose.
Of course, in reality, the antenna was only marginal in signal areas beyond that of the 3GS it replaced, so the majority of people never saw the issue. Antennas are susceptible to detuning; that's physics for you. The 4's antenna was just more susceptible than others (the internal ones) because it had a much better range to begin with, but in areas of very weak signal (where an internal antenna would get zero signal) it was possible to cause the external antenna to drop.
No doubt the design had a flaw, but the hype surrounding it was just ridiculous.
Yes, and it was expected - this isn't the first time people have visited the plant and checked, or the first time Apple has had a code of practice.
The outcome of the report was irrelevant though, since slashdot Apple bashers had made up their minds when Apple announced the FLA would be doing audits for them - if they find positive stuff, then its clearly just Foxxcon "hiding the abuse" while the FLA are visiting, or they release a pre-written report given to them by Apple and cash a fat cheque, and if they released a negative report then it's "validation all along about how evil Apple is".
The actual facts of the matter rarely play a part in Apple bashing. No Apple hater is going to believe this study was valid because it didn't fit their preconceptions of the "facts" that they know to be true, deep in their gut.
Slashdot Mirror
I agree totally. Having a universal system that is cross platform and accessible from anywhere is certainly nice to have, but as a secondary route only, in much the same way as web email interfaces are nice but a native email client is better.
If I were Microsoft I'd be planning for a native release on every platform that was in popular use.
It was? I don't remember that. As far as OS X versions go, there was X, 2004, 2008 (first UB release) and 2011. It's been well covered in the life of OS X, certainly.
There was a discontinuation of the Office scripting in one of the versions, since it was based on code that (in the words of the MS developers themselves) was a "total nightmare of hacks and kludges and legacy stuff", so it was taken out of one release, but has been rewritten and is now back in 2011.
I've never had any problems sharing documents back and forth with windows friends, but then I never really used the scripting, so I wasn't affected by that. I know that some businesses have script-loaded office files as the lynchpin of their operation and could not live without it.
While iWork is very nice, and it replaces Powerpoint and Word very nicely, Numbers is still not quite there compared to Excel (which in turn, is not quite there compared to Matlab) for many uses.
I don't have an iPad, but I'm not going to be the only one who prefers Excel over Numbers for the basic things.
Still, your point stands - it's hardly an anchor weighing down iPad sales.
It's the square peg that makes you believe that every task is a square hole.
It is handy for visualising CSV lists before you move them into something like Matlab, and it's perfectly capable as a simple accounting sheet for a small business.
Not great for graphs unless you know you can manipulate your data for a straight line, and you don't have any points to exclude from the fit. Tends to choke on very large data sets too.
Still, I like having it around - it is useful.
At some point you have to draw the line where the program stops and the interpreter begins. The OS is another example.
I think I'd cut it off at the point where everything becomes generic, so the interpreter is a general device that can be used for other programs, not just this game.
I'm a corporate plant? hahahahahahahahaha.
Oh wait, you were serious, let me laugh even harder!
You're clutching at straws and seeing enemies everywhere. It would be funny if it wasn't so tragic.
For the record: not a shill, never been paid or influenced to post on slashdot, registered my account 10 or 12 years ago, been around here ever since.
I also have no story submissions.
You are the most paranoid and mental person I have ever seen.
Do you yell at your own shadow for following you around?
Seriously, you'll have every slashdot account owned by one guy by the end of the week if you think anyone who disagrees with you is a sockpuppet.
Let me guess, you're also one of the elite group that owns wikipedia? Same sort of crazy paranoia and conspiracy nonsense.
Join the club - he's accusing you of being me, so I know it's all nonsense. This is getting out of hand.
You're accusing me of being one of those shills, so I know you're full of shit, but keep trying! Maybe someone will give you a gold star or something.
Seriously, now?
This is hilarious. I've been on this site for more than 10 years (joined up during first undergrad degree in 1999 or 2000) and you've listed me as one of the shill accounts?
I suspected this was total bullshit before, but that simply confirms it as far as I'm concerned.
What? You think Apple/MS/Sony etc have been paying me for a decade? I wish! Then my student loans would be more manageable.
For the record, this is my only account, no one else has access to it, I've had it since first registering it, no one has ever paid me (or otherwise instructed me) to post anything. Just so it's down in writing.
Well, he's listed me as one of those "shill accounts", so he clearly has absolutely zero proof (although I can't prove that to you, obviously).
I've been posting on slashdot since my first time around at university, so that would be 1999-2000 or something? Maybe 2001 - it might have been in my second year when I got a computer of my own rather than the ones in the lab. My UID is whatever was assigned to me when I made the account, and this is the only account I have.
In other words, I've been around here for a very long time (obviously not as long as some of the 4 digit UIDs), so either Apple/MS/Sony/Facebook whoever has been paying for my to post for over ten years, or they approached me recently and started offering cash (yeah, how very likely, that they'd trust some random guy living in the UK to shill for them. No risk at all that I'd tell anyone about it! no sir!).
In other words, the guy is full of shit, and if he'd been around on slashdot long enough he'd recognise that I've been posting here for a decade.
Still, let the kids have their grand conspiracy ranting and raving. I just wish it didn't reflect so poorly on a site I that I've been a member of for so long. How far it has fallen. Hard to have a proper discussion these days without being modded down or accused of shilling if you dare to say anything that isn't in lockstep with the groupthink.
There is no "tax", and the new system being introduced in 10.8 merely adds a layer of UAC-style authentication to apps not from the App Store or identified developers (and any developer can get a digital cert from Apple for free, with no vetting process). The large majority of developers who make Mac software but don;t sell via the App Store will see no functional change to their apps on 10.8 from the user perspective, since they'll all be signed already.
If a developer doesn't get a digital certificate then the OS merely asks the user whether they'd like to add the app to their whitelist the first time it is run, but then never again after that. Other than the first request, the OS won't block the app at all.
Or, you could just turn the whole thing off in the preferences and it will never query you about any app from any source.
So no, you haven't heard plans that "everything will have to go thru the app store" - you've heard that 10.8 has a new feature that adds an extra (optional) step when you launch non-signed apps for the first time.
Ah, a classic example of putting words into someone else's mouth and then bashing them for what they supposedly said.
He didn't make any such claim, just that it had a single window interface. Does he really need to add disclaimers that he knows that Apple did not invent the single window video player interface?
I need an answer - am I or am I not being paid by Apple (or some other third parry PR firm) to post on slashdot?
(pssst, you forgot to log in - how silly do you look?!)
Well, only if they can somehow hide the number of iPhones in vendor channels across all of the countries where they are sold, and then hide all of the phones in consumer hands after they buy them, and hide the cellular carriers' reports on the number of devices on their network and the data they're using... then there's the iOS developers and the ability to collect the UDID of a handset, so you'd have to fake a ton of that data somehow (but you're trying to make it look like there are fewer iPhones than there really are, so what? you intercept and block some UDIDs? but then what if the developer notices that they aren't getting as many device IDs as indicated by the sales of their app, so now you have to fake the download and sales figures of third party apps and tell them that they've sold *less* than they really have, and you then have to use those figures in your official PR (the deliberately lower numbers)...
The level of complexity and conspiracy is just so far fetched. Not to mention the risk of a whistleblower somewhere in thy supply chain or within Apple itself. It's just not a feasible scenario with so much at stake given that the ultimate act in the conspiracy requires deliberately filling false accounts on a massive scale.
So it's either do all that... or maybe they're telling the truth about their profits from the App Store, and that it's designed as a value-add to sell hardware, which is where the profit comes from, as it always has historically with Apple.
Can you find me "a man" to explain the grammar in your parentheses first?
And by "weakness" in phone sales you mean the record quarters they have posted.
The 4, then the 4S were selling by the truckload. The 4 and the 3GS are *still* selling by the truckload despite the 4S (which is much higher still) as cheaper alternatives to a 4S.
Perhaps they'd be looking to cover their losses in the phone arena... if it were even remotely necessary, which it isn't.
You're saying I'm paid for my posts, yes?
Just being clear on what I'm being accused of here.
You believe, because I hold a different opinion to you, that I'm being paid for it?
Haha, so I'm paid by Apple?
Is that what you're suggesting here (and that I have more than one account)?
You believe I am paid to post on slashdot? Just to be clear here.
Not to mention the build quality (as in the design of the car, not a reflection of the labour force building it).
Ford was one of the first to realise that they couldn't just phone in the overall design any more when selling in European markets, so they put work into better transmission, suspension, engines, ride quality, the basic interior features etc and it really paid off for them - they have several class-leading, great value vehicles available in Europe and have for many years.
They also joined up with other manufacturers to collaborate on major developments (mainly in high efficiency, gasoline-a-like diesel engines).
So yes, there are going to be low-IQ morons like the OP who feel emasculated while driving a 4 cylinder vehicle with better performance, efficiency, emissions, weight and quality compared to the "patriotic American" 6 and 8 cylinder dinosaur lumps that make him feel like a real man - maybe that's why it took Ford so long to move their winning formula back to the USA after finding it worked so well in Europe, but it seems they're finally doing it.
Ford is doing well over here, and it't not because they're building designs right out of the 70s where more numbers of cylinders = better! manly! rar!
Wow, I really thought people like you were merely a parody.
I really can't tell if you're trolling or genuinely really, really stupid, selfish, misinformed and obnoxious.
Well played sir.
Your mom told me that you don't play well with the other kids unless you have your special stress pillow. Did you forget it today?
It wasn't even that bad of a design to begin with. Under all the conditions where an internal antenna would work acceptably (ie, when the phone was being held in any possible position) the 4's antenna also worked fine. It was only in marginal conditions where internal antennas, like the one in the 3GS, would not receive a signal in the first place that the detuning showed up.
The design should have figured both left and right handed use from the start, certainly, but it was nowhere near as bad as many were making it out to be.
That said, the bumper cures the issue in those edge cases.
Ask Apple - anyone who wanted could return it for a full refund, including being released from the cellular contract at no cost, if they felt it was not fit for purpose.
Of course, in reality, the antenna was only marginal in signal areas beyond that of the 3GS it replaced, so the majority of people never saw the issue. Antennas are susceptible to detuning; that's physics for you. The 4's antenna was just more susceptible than others (the internal ones) because it had a much better range to begin with, but in areas of very weak signal (where an internal antenna would get zero signal) it was possible to cause the external antenna to drop.
No doubt the design had a flaw, but the hype surrounding it was just ridiculous.
Yes, and it was expected - this isn't the first time people have visited the plant and checked, or the first time Apple has had a code of practice.
The outcome of the report was irrelevant though, since slashdot Apple bashers had made up their minds when Apple announced the FLA would be doing audits for them - if they find positive stuff, then its clearly just Foxxcon "hiding the abuse" while the FLA are visiting, or they release a pre-written report given to them by Apple and cash a fat cheque, and if they released a negative report then it's "validation all along about how evil Apple is".
The actual facts of the matter rarely play a part in Apple bashing. No Apple hater is going to believe this study was valid because it didn't fit their preconceptions of the "facts" that they know to be true, deep in their gut.