Apple have made no updates to their X server in 4 years and it really shows.
They've released several updates, including this year. It probably wasn't mentioned here, but Infinite Loop on Ars Technica had an article or two on it.
Finally, System maintenance is the area where it needs the least help, although an automatic fsck -y would be a good idea for the average user, so long as there's an easy way to change it. Windows and OSX both need more help here than Linux does.
I'm curious, what is it you tihnk Linux does better than Mac OS X re: system maintenance? Mac OS X does an automatic fsck on startup if necessary, runs automated maintenance scripts at scheduled times and automatically defrags files when they're accessed.
I recently talked to a non-techie about her recent attempt to switch from Windows to Mac. She was having a hard time because it was so different. She cited things that she knew how to do in Windows weren't obvious in OS X. Simple things like copy/paste,
She seriously found the transition from CMD-C to CTRL-C hard? If someone can't manage that, I wouldn't want them anywhere near Linux.
the right-click menu,
What's harder about this in Mac OS X? You right-click and up comes a contextual menu... just like in Windows.
Atually a lot of differences you mention come down to using a key in a slightly different position, or window controls on the opposite side of the window. A lot of people manage to get by okay driving in cars with controls in slightly different places, or driving on a different side of the road when they go to another country. If people can manage that okay, what should be so hard about CMD vs. CTRL, window controls on the left instead of the right or menus on the topof the screen instead of the top of the window?
The 360 will have a hard time getting into my home, though, as it seems multiplayer requires
some sort of subscription. I can't just slap in a game and do co-op/host a small server with
some friends.
Depends on what kind of multiplayer you're after. You only have to pay for Xbox Live. Off-line multiplayer (LANs and single-console) is completely free.
Re: illuminous, I guess it could be a cultural thing; you don't see the word in the UK.
Re: aqua, I still see a fair bit of blue around the OS and when Aqua was first introduced, there was certainly plenty around. Today there's still highlights, scroll bars, apple menu, spotlight menu, dialogue box hightlights (and other controls in general) and the occassional desktop background. I'd say that blue is the dominant colour in OS X. When you start up, log in, log out connect/disconnect another monitor, there's a lot of blue on screen.
That would drive one of us nuts if we then had to use each other's computer, resulting in changing the setting, irritating the owner who has to change it back... Consistency is better in this case, IMHO. Of course, it is just opinion, rather than a provable fact.
Huh? So, you tell me a bunch of examples that happen only sometimes, then it's the normal behavior? How does that work?
If your requirement for normal behaviour is that it is what you always expect to happen, then your preference fails to meet the definition because clearly going full screen isn't always the desired behaviour. A more sensible definition of normal or expected behaviour is that it be what is most often required, hence me explaining that it is more common for me to want to see other windows than have the entire screen dominated by a single window. How would a less commonly desired usage of the zoom/maximise button be a more normal or expected behaviour than a less commonly desired usage?
Click a menu. Are there shortcuts for every item on that menu? The one next to it? The one next to that?
No. What's your point? Are you aware what full keyboard access is? It isn't having a shortcut for every menu item; it's being able to access any menu or control from the keyboard. Hit ctrl-F1 to turn it on, then ctrl-F2 to shift focus to the menubar. You can then use the cursor keys or start typing to select menu commands. A couple of seconds in the keyboard preferences makes this pretty clear, but that would require actually sitting down and using Mac Os X, rather than just making grand claims about non-existent failings.
Exactly my point...sometimes. If it's only sometimes, why is it the norm? Wouldn't it make more sense if the OS worked the way you did most times, and could account for the sometimes? Or, does it make more sense that it acts the way you need sometimes...all the time? I was asking for NORMAL occurances, not sometimes.
Wanting to see another window is considerably more common for me than wanting to give the entire screen to one program, so I find it to be perfectly appropriate behaviour. Having programs default to full screen would be a massive step backwards.
No, it doesn't. Some things can be done with the keyboard, even with Accessibility turned on. Again, some does not equal all.
Actually, most dialogue boxes can be manipulated by keyboard, they just don't have the relevant letters highlighted. Lots more elegant, but is understandably irritating for keyboard junkies. command-. is always cancel, command-[first letter] usually works for other buttons.
If you turn on keyboard navigation, then a blue highlight appears round the default button and you can use space to select it and tab to move between options. Turning on full keyboard navigation is a must if you're a keyboard junkie.
Explain to me the benefit of having a million windows open on a screen while you're trying to work on just one. You complain about "space-sucking toolbars", but if you're not maximizing the window anyway, aren't you wasting space?
Because sometimes you need information in another window for the task being performed in the current one. Sometimes it's nice to be able to keep an eye on something in another window, like IM or mail or TV. Sometimes you want to drag things from another window into your current one. I prepare my church announcement sheet each week in CorelDraw and I greatly dislike tabbing back and forth between it and Outlook to get the announcements people have emailed in. Unfortunately it doesn't seem to work too well when it's not full screen, so I have to live it. Actually CorelDraw just has a terrible interface anyway, especially when it comes to manipulating text. Breaks every convention I'm used to. Which other program selects text from the bottom third of the cursor?!
Apple, in their infinite wisdom, does not offer you the choice of using the keyboard for much more than simply typing.
That was fairly inaccurate in the classic Mac OS days, but M=OS X has had full keyboard access for years. You can control the cursor, jump between interface elements and even define custom keyboard shortcuts for any application. It's not turned on my default, but it only take a click to change that (or holding down a certain key combination).
Something you might find useful:
Holding down command while clicking on a background window often lets you manipulate it without activating the window.
E.g. in Safari, if I'm reading one window and want to check a detail in another while keeping my current one in front, I can drag the background scrollbar (or click on the arrows) while holding command and it will scroll without moving to the front.
If I'm reading in Safari and want to check my mail without switching to Mail, I can just command click on the 'Get Mail' button and it will check in the background, leaving my Safari window on top.
You can even drag windows about in the background using this method. One note though: if you command click on a link in a background window, it'll open in a new tab in the foreground window, though this can be advantageous at times, particularly if you use different windows for different categories of tabs.
Any one of Linux, Solaris, or FreeBSD would provide a much more solid foundation than Darwin. All of these are fundamentally similar enough that porting the GUI would be less effort than maintaining Darwin.
That's a big claim. Why should we believe you when Apple's engineers, who know the details of the code better, seem happy enough to work with Darwin?
About the only thing that needs considerable work are the various Mach interfaces, and it is arguable that those should go anyways.
I'm sure that wuldn't take long or brake compatibility with anything.
I may have speculated too much on this, but this is not the DRM I am referring to. MacOS already takes advantage of the TPM, to keep it running on Apple hardware, and I expect things will be worse with 10.5.
That's not exactly a problem if I'm in the market for Apple hardware.
Linux as a desktop OS is lacking, but it provides a very solid foundation. The "*nix stuff" isn't just a nice bonus, it is the foundation of MacOS X, and it is very brittle and shaky.
That's a rather trollish exaggeration. Not perfect in every way according to your criteria != very brittle and shaky. You make it sound like Mac OS 7.5.3, Now that was brittle and shaky. Type 11 errors. Yay!
Apple does not sell a system for less than $999.
That's rather diferent to saying 'currently every computer they sell is priced outside of >90% of the market.' Now where is the evidence that >90% of the market is for systems, rather than individual computers? Why would I want to buy a monitor when I already have a perfectly good one?
Furthermore, you have to spend an extra $200 just to get a rewrite-able DVD drive that is available on far cheaper PCs.
A lot of people will never get round to burning DVDs. I have a Superdrive and have used it maybe twice in the last year.
No, maybe they should do their stockholders a favor, and address the changing market. The $500 PC accounts for 38% of the market, and it is growing fast.
And what's the profit margin on those things? Not great, especially compared to the markets Apple is in. How much production capacity do they have available? Enough to manufacture sufficient quantities of a new, cheap model to offset the reduced profit margin? Would people bother to buy Apple in the el-cheapo commodity market? You haven't considered whether there is a demographic there for Apple to target and whether it's worth targeting them. Apple seem to b doing just fine with their current lineup.
Also, the $599 Mini does not use standard hardware
It's not exactly exotic. The worst you could say is that some components are laptop variants, but that's about it.
and is not upgradable, making it a very poor value compared to these cheaper machines.
How many people buying those machines upgrade anything more than the RAM and maybe hard drive? Not a lot. And you're placing no value on the small footprint, quiet operation, pleasing aesthetics, etc. that other people will place value on. Not every consumer has the same requirements and value systems as you. In fact given that you think OS X should be built on Linux, you're likely very different to the average consumer.
Anyways, there are a ton of people who have been waiting for the "xMac"; Apple could do a whole lot better.
Having complained about the high entry price point, you now want Apple to produce a more expensive machine than the Mini?
And I never hear aqua used (except for the occasional reference to the color) I hear 'water' a lot, and 'aquatic' which is obviously derived from aqua, but that's it. I can't think of anybody ever telling me, "man, i sure could go for a nice bottle of aqua!"
I've always assumed that Apple used it because of the colour it describes, rather than as a noun.
And when you read the word 'illuminous' didn't you immediately make the connection to light?
Sure, but my first thought was 'What a daft, pretentious word.' It's not snappy.
They're trying (if the new name is real) to portray the image of the new GUI being able to better the data and functions you need.
I'm not sure I understand. How does a GUI 'better the data and functions you need'? I'm guessing you dropped a word there - 'present' or 'display' perhaps?
I can't think of a word similar in meaning to 'illuminous' that would fit the bill better while maintaining a sort of chic. 'bright' just doesn't cut it as a cool name, and neither does 'revealing'
I don't think 'illuminous' does either. Doesn't have any chic as far as I'm concerned. 'Luminous' would be a better word. Maybe this all stems from my hatred of the non-word 'irregardless.'
Personally, I think "illuminous" is more common that "aqua". When I hear "aqua" I think of some crappy pretensious bottle water commercial.
You actually here people use the word? At least aqua makes you think of something. Illuminous draws a complete blank here. Where do you here it used? Maybe it's a US thing.
Though "illumination" would have been better as it's a noun, not an adjective.
I thought they went with aqua precisely because it can be used as an adjective. Naming the look and feel of the OS with an adjective surely makes plenty of sense?
In the case of Darwin, they should embrace a successful open source *nix instead of wasting their efforts.
Maybe there aren't any *nixes that doe exactly what they want? And there's a reasonable amount of FreeBSD and NeXT stuff flaoting around in there already.
However, I think they will stick with Darwin so that they have the opportunity to force DRM down our throats.
Whoever's fording DRM down your throat, it isn't Apple. I've a few songs I bought off iTunes, but I wasn't forced to and can use plenty of non-DRMed media on my Mac.
As a *nix, it is also half-baked, and severely lacking.
As a desktop OS, most *nixes are half-baked and severely lacking. As a desktop OS, there's nothing that meets my needs better than OS X and that's what it's trying to be, not just another *nix. *nix stuff is just a nice bonus.
If Apple does not embrace a more OSS friendly (read: community friendly) development model though, I feel that they will relegate themselves to irrelevance.
You'd think it was '96, not '06 from some of the comments you're making.
Similar things can be said about their hardware business--currently every computer they sell is priced outside of > 90% of the market.
Over 90% of the market for computers is under $599? News to me.
Not that they are not competitive on price; they simply ignore almost the entire market. This is not sustainable...
That must be why they're selling record number of computers and have a growing market share. Maybe they should just close down the company and return the money to the shockholders?
It's a bug; it's a feature. seriously. That's the way it's always worked with Mac OS. I understand why it would seem buggy to a Windows user (don't know default KDE/Gnome behaviour), but it was a design decision a long time ago on the Mac. Change it and you'd have a lot of users thinking that a bug has been introduced.
I dunno, I'd say Illuminous (or at least its relative illuminate) is in use probably as much as the word 'aqua'.
I didn't realise 'illuminous' existed as a word, let alone heard it used, unlike 'aqua' and not just in the area of computing. And regardless of how often 'illuminate' is used, 'illuninous' just plain sounds weird and made up.
Besides, if you think about it, it makes sense- 'aqua' is a relatively uncommon synonym for 'water', and 'illuminous' is a relatively uncommon synonym for 'bright'. Both 'bright' and 'water' are short, simple words we use on an everyday basis, but 'aqua' and 'illuminous' are more interesting, and produce better imagry.
'aqua' is considerably more common in usage, shorter, simpler and by virtue f being recognisable, arguable produces better imagery.
And honestly, how much does the average person use the word 'aperture' on a regular basis?
The average person? Not much. The average person in the market for the product, i.e. photographers? A lot. An awful lot.
Fair enough, but I disagree that there is no current reason for copyright. If musician's weren't paid for the use of their works, we'd see a lot less people producing a lot less music because it wouldn't be a viable profession.
You mean, the author who is given copyright has to do all this? No, not really. The publisher does all this and according to a contract the author gives permission to the publisher to do all this with his copyrighted work. The cost of publishing is advertising, distribution of physical medium, and COPYRIGHT fees to the author.
But without copyright, there's nothing to prevent someone coming in and redistributing what you (or your contracted artist) has produced, without having to spend money on recording and quite possibly benefiting from the money you spent on advertising. It drastically reduces the benefit of paying someone for music, which would discourage the production of music.
Making a profit is not a cost.
True but without profit, there's a lot less incentive to produce the music or pay for it. Without profit, you don't have a business. Sure, you'll get people producing music purely for the love of it, but you'll have eliminated a lot of talented people who would like to make money, but wont produce music if they can't make a profit and people will have less time available to dedicate to the production of music because they'll have to have a full time job as well. That or a rich patron who may well have no interest in distributing whatever gets played/recorded for them.
What I'm advocating is the exchange of copyright fees to a.) a percentage governed by a private contract if so wished, as a payment for creating the given work b.) one time flat fee. The publisher ends up better, the artist ends up doing a work for hire/craftsman's job and will continue to create just like us to make a living,
Why bother paying someone to create music when you can wait for someone else to pay them, then take the content for free? There goes the incentive to pay, which removes a lot of incentive to play./p>
and society ends up better because we have the right to make derivative works etc.
We already do. We just have to pay a fee or wait a certain amount of time. A more realistic and beneficial proposal would be to reduce the fees and/or reduce the time.
I didn't say they are not _doing_ anything.
And I didn't say you did. Didn't even use the word 'doing,' so I don't know why you emphasised it.
I didn't say they are not _doing_ anything. I said what they do is rather improving/changing/evolving something. Since copyright is about information, it's impossible for a work to not be a derivative work of multiple influences. This includes the best of art. If they feel insulted by acknowledging that they wouldn't be able to create art without society's thousands of years of history, then they are fools.
Since when are 'creating' and 'building on society's thousands of years of history' mutually exclusive things, which they would have to be for your argument to be valid? No artist could claim to be 100% original, but ti doesn't mean they aren't creating something.
Isn't that the point? Why couldn't I take ABBA's melody and create something new, different and maybe better from it? Currently Madonna could do that, because she paid a huge hunk of cash so that she is allowed to do that under copyright law. Why should ABBA be compensated for me creating a derivative work of their work and a thousand other? Their work is a derivative work itself of a huge cultural background, so how is mine different?
Well I guess that depends on how similar it is. It is a sticky issue and I freely admit there are plenty of grey areas where the degree of originality can be
Copyright is actually worse. It not only does not have a reason to exist, [...] worse since the 18th century in relation to the purpose it served.
Didn't you just contradict yourself massively? Surely a reason to exist and purpose are pretty close to the same thing? If you have one, you have the other. Just because you think the reason i a bad one, doesn't mean it isn't a reason. Plenty of people think it's a good reason.
In today's world there are no extraordinary costs to publish something.
Recording. Advertising. Distribution of a physical medium, which is what most music is distributed as. Stocking on shelves. Paying staff in the shop. Making a profit for the shop. Making a profit for those involved in transport. Making a profit for those involved in production. Making a profit for those involved in creating. Making a profit for those involved in managing. The list goes on.
Copyright rests on a false assumption, that you're creating something. You're not creating, you're improving on/evolving something,
You seem to have a very low view of the arts. I imagine a lot of artists (music or otherwise) would be rather insulted too hear that they're no creating anything. Isn't there a reason they're sometimes called content creators?
unless you want to reinvent the wheel all the time.
That's a daft analogy. There is incredibly variety in the music and lyrics produced by artists.
If we would draw a parallel to the world of mathematics
His whole existance on this Earth was to set an example as to how we should behave and to give our lives meaning.
Wouldn't it be more accurate to say that his life and death and resurrection demonstrated that we do not have the capacity to behave well enough and require his forgiveness, hence his repeated use of the phrase 'repent and believe'?
prostitution (what do you think Mary Magdalene was???)
Probably not a prostitute. Though Jesus did hang out with plenty of them. Doesn't mean he approved of what they did, however. In fact, he condemned sexual immorality, which would have included prostitution. The whole bit about lust in the sermon on the mount pretty much precludes it.
Did you know that if, today, you went and tried to translate the original Genesis story into English today it could have 4 or more meanings? The Bible you read is the most *probable* meaning but it is NOT the only meaning that Moses could have intended when writing it.
Quite a few people have translated it into English today. The English Standard Version, for instance, is less than a decade old. When translating it, they don't spell out whether or not creationism is right or not - that's a task for expositors, not translators.
As we learn more and more about the detail of the universe I think it shows us more and more about how awesome God is for putting it into place.
As for religion, it is based on blind faith, blind since I and "others" cannot percieve the same observations, these observations and associated theories fail the "real world" test because they cannot be demonstrated to "others" using their own perceptions.
As a Christian, I rather strongly disagree with that. Take the gospel of Luke as an example It begins with the claim that it is the collected testimony of many eye-witnesses. It claims to be historical, resting on the events of Jesus' death and resurrection. If there happened, Christianity is true; if they did not, Christianity is false. Christianity may not be scientific, but it is historical. You can only call the faith of the gospel writers (and those who believe them) blind if you also consider historians in general to be possessing of blind faith, by virtue of their profession.
That's pretty much my point - you're not going to have both Christians and Muslims in heaven because their routes to salvation are mutually exclusive. Well, Christianity certainly excludes Islam - if the teachings of Christ are true, the only Muslims in heaven will be those who have accepted that they can't earn God's grace and instead have received Jesus as Lord and asked for his forgiveness, making them Christians rather than Muslims.
I guess I'm not sufficiently qualified to say if the Islamic concept of heaven would exclude Christians.
First of all, I don't have "beliefs". I attempt to act based on the best knowledge I have at any given time. Believing in shit is stupid. Plain and simple.
Have you ever trusted anyone? Do you have confidence in anything? Do you mentally accepted anything to be true? Are you convinced that something is valid? If so, then welcome to the stupid club, because you have been engaging in the at of believing/believing in something. If not, you must lead a very unusual life.
Furthermore, your examples are particularly egregious. Stalin and Pol Pot were clearly Dictators, or Fascists, which is on the opposite end of the political spectrum from Communism and it's precepts, regardless of what they called their ruling parties at the time. That was a dumb straw man on every level.
That in no way hinders the point I was making as I was simply demonstrating the absurdity of your suggestion that teaching about religion should be linked to genocide.
My propaganda is not malignant.
I think this has very capably been addressed by another poster.
I'm encouraging thought and study.
I'm a little confused here. How is limiting teaching about religion to genocide 'encouraging thought and study'? Sounds more like you'd like to burn a lot of history books, religious/theological studies books and works of literature that mention religion in any other context. Incidentally, do you advocate banning the Bible as well?
Further, memorization is OFTEN a handicap
I thought you said it was at the opposite end of the spectrum. Are you retracting that view?
That is hardly a malignant message, and I think history will back me up on that claim, even if you want to skip logic altogether, which seems rather apparent when you're throwing around OTHER straw men like mathematics and axioms, which is silly in the extreme.
About as silly as throwing out dogmas for not apparent reason. What is your problem with having certain well established principles to help guide the framework of study?
to learning and study, rather than an asset. Nearly every various teaching method I've studied has proven that time and again.
Ok, off you go then and learn a language without memorising anything. Perhaps we should encourage surgeons to work out from first principles where bones, muscles, major blood vessels, internal organs, etc. are located, rather than remembering.
Those who spend time memorizing the multiplication table end up shitty at multiplication quite often, as one example.
One example does not an argument make. Just because memorisation is unhelpful in one area does not mean that it is fundamentally opposed to the process of learning and studying. It's roughly equivalent to saying that the reverse gear hinders driving because you can't more forward, than finding yourself in trouble when you actually need t reverse round a corner.
I could give you another 30 with regards to playing the violin, but unless you also study violin, they will most likely be in a completely foreign language.
I'm curious, do all the pieces you play fit onto one sheet of music, or do you get someone to turn the page for you?I imagine it would be frustrating otherwise, to have to put the violin down to turn the page for longer pages. After all, memorising the piece wouldn't be at all helpful when it comes to playing it, so you couldn't possibly be doing that, could you?
Slashdot Mirror
They've released several updates, including this year. It probably wasn't mentioned here, but Infinite Loop on Ars Technica had an article or two on it.
I'm curious, what is it you tihnk Linux does better than Mac OS X re: system maintenance? Mac OS X does an automatic fsck on startup if necessary, runs automated maintenance scripts at scheduled times and automatically defrags files when they're accessed.
She seriously found the transition from CMD-C to CTRL-C hard? If someone can't manage that, I wouldn't want them anywhere near Linux.
What's harder about this in Mac OS X? You right-click and up comes a contextual menu... just like in Windows.
Atually a lot of differences you mention come down to using a key in a slightly different position, or window controls on the opposite side of the window. A lot of people manage to get by okay driving in cars with controls in slightly different places, or driving on a different side of the road when they go to another country. If people can manage that okay, what should be so hard about CMD vs. CTRL, window controls on the left instead of the right or menus on the topof the screen instead of the top of the window?
Depends on what kind of multiplayer you're after. You only have to pay for Xbox Live. Off-line multiplayer (LANs and single-console) is completely free.
Re: illuminous, I guess it could be a cultural thing; you don't see the word in the UK.
Re: aqua, I still see a fair bit of blue around the OS and when Aqua was first introduced, there was certainly plenty around. Today there's still highlights, scroll bars, apple menu, spotlight menu, dialogue box hightlights (and other controls in general) and the occassional desktop background. I'd say that blue is the dominant colour in OS X. When you start up, log in, log out connect/disconnect another monitor, there's a lot of blue on screen.
That would drive one of us nuts if we then had to use each other's computer, resulting in changing the setting, irritating the owner who has to change it back... Consistency is better in this case, IMHO. Of course, it is just opinion, rather than a provable fact.
If your requirement for normal behaviour is that it is what you always expect to happen, then your preference fails to meet the definition because clearly going full screen isn't always the desired behaviour. A more sensible definition of normal or expected behaviour is that it be what is most often required, hence me explaining that it is more common for me to want to see other windows than have the entire screen dominated by a single window. How would a less commonly desired usage of the zoom/maximise button be a more normal or expected behaviour than a less commonly desired usage?
No. What's your point? Are you aware what full keyboard access is? It isn't having a shortcut for every menu item; it's being able to access any menu or control from the keyboard. Hit ctrl-F1 to turn it on, then ctrl-F2 to shift focus to the menubar. You can then use the cursor keys or start typing to select menu commands. A couple of seconds in the keyboard preferences makes this pretty clear, but that would require actually sitting down and using Mac Os X, rather than just making grand claims about non-existent failings.
Wanting to see another window is considerably more common for me than wanting to give the entire screen to one program, so I find it to be perfectly appropriate behaviour. Having programs default to full screen would be a massive step backwards.
What is it lacking that you need?
Actually, most dialogue boxes can be manipulated by keyboard, they just don't have the relevant letters highlighted. Lots more elegant, but is understandably irritating for keyboard junkies. command-. is always cancel, command-[first letter] usually works for other buttons.
If you turn on keyboard navigation, then a blue highlight appears round the default button and you can use space to select it and tab to move between options. Turning on full keyboard navigation is a must if you're a keyboard junkie.
For disk images, it even gives the path for the original disk image as well as the path of the file in the mounted image.
Because sometimes you need information in another window for the task being performed in the current one. Sometimes it's nice to be able to keep an eye on something in another window, like IM or mail or TV. Sometimes you want to drag things from another window into your current one. I prepare my church announcement sheet each week in CorelDraw and I greatly dislike tabbing back and forth between it and Outlook to get the announcements people have emailed in. Unfortunately it doesn't seem to work too well when it's not full screen, so I have to live it. Actually CorelDraw just has a terrible interface anyway, especially when it comes to manipulating text. Breaks every convention I'm used to. Which other program selects text from the bottom third of the cursor?!
That was fairly inaccurate in the classic Mac OS days, but M=OS X has had full keyboard access for years. You can control the cursor, jump between interface elements and even define custom keyboard shortcuts for any application. It's not turned on my default, but it only take a click to change that (or holding down a certain key combination).
Something you might find useful: Holding down command while clicking on a background window often lets you manipulate it without activating the window. E.g. in Safari, if I'm reading one window and want to check a detail in another while keeping my current one in front, I can drag the background scrollbar (or click on the arrows) while holding command and it will scroll without moving to the front. If I'm reading in Safari and want to check my mail without switching to Mail, I can just command click on the 'Get Mail' button and it will check in the background, leaving my Safari window on top. You can even drag windows about in the background using this method. One note though: if you command click on a link in a background window, it'll open in a new tab in the foreground window, though this can be advantageous at times, particularly if you use different windows for different categories of tabs.
That's a big claim. Why should we believe you when Apple's engineers, who know the details of the code better, seem happy enough to work with Darwin?
I'm sure that wuldn't take long or brake compatibility with anything.
That's not exactly a problem if I'm in the market for Apple hardware.
That's a rather trollish exaggeration. Not perfect in every way according to your criteria != very brittle and shaky. You make it sound like Mac OS 7.5.3, Now that was brittle and shaky. Type 11 errors. Yay!
That's rather diferent to saying 'currently every computer they sell is priced outside of >90% of the market.' Now where is the evidence that >90% of the market is for systems, rather than individual computers? Why would I want to buy a monitor when I already have a perfectly good one?
A lot of people will never get round to burning DVDs. I have a Superdrive and have used it maybe twice in the last year.
And what's the profit margin on those things? Not great, especially compared to the markets Apple is in. How much production capacity do they have available? Enough to manufacture sufficient quantities of a new, cheap model to offset the reduced profit margin? Would people bother to buy Apple in the el-cheapo commodity market? You haven't considered whether there is a demographic there for Apple to target and whether it's worth targeting them. Apple seem to b doing just fine with their current lineup.
It's not exactly exotic. The worst you could say is that some components are laptop variants, but that's about it.
How many people buying those machines upgrade anything more than the RAM and maybe hard drive? Not a lot. And you're placing no value on the small footprint, quiet operation, pleasing aesthetics, etc. that other people will place value on. Not every consumer has the same requirements and value systems as you. In fact given that you think OS X should be built on Linux, you're likely very different to the average consumer.
Having complained about the high entry price point, you now want Apple to produce a more expensive machine than the Mini?
I've always assumed that Apple used it because of the colour it describes, rather than as a noun.
Sure, but my first thought was 'What a daft, pretentious word.' It's not snappy.
I'm not sure I understand. How does a GUI 'better the data and functions you need'? I'm guessing you dropped a word there - 'present' or 'display' perhaps?
I don't think 'illuminous' does either. Doesn't have any chic as far as I'm concerned. 'Luminous' would be a better word. Maybe this all stems from my hatred of the non-word 'irregardless.'
You actually here people use the word? At least aqua makes you think of something. Illuminous draws a complete blank here. Where do you here it used? Maybe it's a US thing.
I thought they went with aqua precisely because it can be used as an adjective. Naming the look and feel of the OS with an adjective surely makes plenty of sense?
Maybe there aren't any *nixes that doe exactly what they want? And there's a reasonable amount of FreeBSD and NeXT stuff flaoting around in there already.
Whoever's fording DRM down your throat, it isn't Apple. I've a few songs I bought off iTunes, but I wasn't forced to and can use plenty of non-DRMed media on my Mac.
As a desktop OS, most *nixes are half-baked and severely lacking. As a desktop OS, there's nothing that meets my needs better than OS X and that's what it's trying to be, not just another *nix. *nix stuff is just a nice bonus.
You'd think it was '96, not '06 from some of the comments you're making.
Over 90% of the market for computers is under $599? News to me.
That must be why they're selling record number of computers and have a growing market share. Maybe they should just close down the company and return the money to the shockholders?
It's a bug; it's a feature. seriously. That's the way it's always worked with Mac OS. I understand why it would seem buggy to a Windows user (don't know default KDE/Gnome behaviour), but it was a design decision a long time ago on the Mac. Change it and you'd have a lot of users thinking that a bug has been introduced.
I didn't realise 'illuminous' existed as a word, let alone heard it used, unlike 'aqua' and not just in the area of computing. And regardless of how often 'illuminate' is used, 'illuninous' just plain sounds weird and made up.
'aqua' is considerably more common in usage, shorter, simpler and by virtue f being recognisable, arguable produces better imagery.
The average person? Not much. The average person in the market for the product, i.e. photographers? A lot. An awful lot.
Fair enough, but I disagree that there is no current reason for copyright. If musician's weren't paid for the use of their works, we'd see a lot less people producing a lot less music because it wouldn't be a viable profession.
But without copyright, there's nothing to prevent someone coming in and redistributing what you (or your contracted artist) has produced, without having to spend money on recording and quite possibly benefiting from the money you spent on advertising. It drastically reduces the benefit of paying someone for music, which would discourage the production of music.
True but without profit, there's a lot less incentive to produce the music or pay for it. Without profit, you don't have a business. Sure, you'll get people producing music purely for the love of it, but you'll have eliminated a lot of talented people who would like to make money, but wont produce music if they can't make a profit and people will have less time available to dedicate to the production of music because they'll have to have a full time job as well. That or a rich patron who may well have no interest in distributing whatever gets played/recorded for them.
Why bother paying someone to create music when you can wait for someone else to pay them, then take the content for free? There goes the incentive to pay, which removes a lot of incentive to play./p>
We already do. We just have to pay a fee or wait a certain amount of time. A more realistic and beneficial proposal would be to reduce the fees and/or reduce the time.
And I didn't say you did. Didn't even use the word 'doing,' so I don't know why you emphasised it.
Since when are 'creating' and 'building on society's thousands of years of history' mutually exclusive things, which they would have to be for your argument to be valid? No artist could claim to be 100% original, but ti doesn't mean they aren't creating something.
Well I guess that depends on how similar it is. It is a sticky issue and I freely admit there are plenty of grey areas where the degree of originality can be
Didn't you just contradict yourself massively? Surely a reason to exist and purpose are pretty close to the same thing? If you have one, you have the other. Just because you think the reason i a bad one, doesn't mean it isn't a reason. Plenty of people think it's a good reason.
Recording. Advertising. Distribution of a physical medium, which is what most music is distributed as. Stocking on shelves. Paying staff in the shop. Making a profit for the shop. Making a profit for those involved in transport. Making a profit for those involved in production. Making a profit for those involved in creating. Making a profit for those involved in managing. The list goes on.
You seem to have a very low view of the arts. I imagine a lot of artists (music or otherwise) would be rather insulted too hear that they're no creating anything. Isn't there a reason they're sometimes called content creators?
That's a daft analogy. There is incredibly variety in the music and lyrics produced by artists.
Then we'd be making a mistake.
Wouldn't it be more accurate to say that his life and death and resurrection demonstrated that we do not have the capacity to behave well enough and require his forgiveness, hence his repeated use of the phrase 'repent and believe'?
Probably not a prostitute. Though Jesus did hang out with plenty of them. Doesn't mean he approved of what they did, however. In fact, he condemned sexual immorality, which would have included prostitution. The whole bit about lust in the sermon on the mount pretty much precludes it.
Quite a few people have translated it into English today. The English Standard Version, for instance, is less than a decade old. When translating it, they don't spell out whether or not creationism is right or not - that's a task for expositors, not translators.
Amen to that!
As a Christian, I rather strongly disagree with that. Take the gospel of Luke as an example It begins with the claim that it is the collected testimony of many eye-witnesses. It claims to be historical, resting on the events of Jesus' death and resurrection. If there happened, Christianity is true; if they did not, Christianity is false. Christianity may not be scientific, but it is historical. You can only call the faith of the gospel writers (and those who believe them) blind if you also consider historians in general to be possessing of blind faith, by virtue of their profession.
That's pretty much my point - you're not going to have both Christians and Muslims in heaven because their routes to salvation are mutually exclusive. Well, Christianity certainly excludes Islam - if the teachings of Christ are true, the only Muslims in heaven will be those who have accepted that they can't earn God's grace and instead have received Jesus as Lord and asked for his forgiveness, making them Christians rather than Muslims.
I guess I'm not sufficiently qualified to say if the Islamic concept of heaven would exclude Christians.
What, exactly, does Bush have to do with whether or not you can say that the idea of believing/believing in something is stupid?
I assume you applaud the actions of the teacher then, who was simply concerned about thelives of the young people he was in contact with?
Arrogant? Perish the thought! That's exclusively a property of those religious types, just like rationality is exclusive to humanists.
Have you ever trusted anyone? Do you have confidence in anything? Do you mentally accepted anything to be true? Are you convinced that something is valid? If so, then welcome to the stupid club, because you have been engaging in the at of believing/believing in something. If not, you must lead a very unusual life.
That in no way hinders the point I was making as I was simply demonstrating the absurdity of your suggestion that teaching about religion should be linked to genocide.
I think this has very capably been addressed by another poster.
I'm a little confused here. How is limiting teaching about religion to genocide 'encouraging thought and study'? Sounds more like you'd like to burn a lot of history books, religious/theological studies books and works of literature that mention religion in any other context. Incidentally, do you advocate banning the Bible as well?
I thought you said it was at the opposite end of the spectrum. Are you retracting that view?
About as silly as throwing out dogmas for not apparent reason. What is your problem with having certain well established principles to help guide the framework of study?
Ok, off you go then and learn a language without memorising anything. Perhaps we should encourage surgeons to work out from first principles where bones, muscles, major blood vessels, internal organs, etc. are located, rather than remembering.
One example does not an argument make. Just because memorisation is unhelpful in one area does not mean that it is fundamentally opposed to the process of learning and studying. It's roughly equivalent to saying that the reverse gear hinders driving because you can't more forward, than finding yourself in trouble when you actually need t reverse round a corner.
I'm curious, do all the pieces you play fit onto one sheet of music, or do you get someone to turn the page for you?I imagine it would be frustrating otherwise, to have to put the violin down to turn the page for longer pages. After all, memorising the piece wouldn't be at all helpful when it comes to playing it, so you couldn't possibly be doing that, could you?