All versions of Shake 4 were $4999 until just a few months ago when Apple made a *HUGE* price cut down to $499 for Mac. This is *very* recent. More than likely, they just didn't get to the formalities of the linux price cut, or don't see enough potential sales (or competition?) to justify it.
Personally, I don't have any problem at all letting microsoft install this little bugger in my PC. My girlfriend's little sister has a computer that was built for her by an unscrupulous individual who installed a pirated copy of Windows XP. Being the nearest geek, I now maintain the system. I install all M$ updates. I even have auto update set to automatically install everything, including WGA. I have taken no steps to prevent it "phoning home" and I even took the survey that it asks you to take (saying that I had no intention to license windows, which I wonder if they actually read...). The only interaction that I had with it beyond that was to tell it to stop popping up, which it has.
I trust microsoft completely.
Why? I allow them to provide me with an operating system that I am certain will fail regularly itself, without outside interference. I allow them to provide me with an operating system that will allow others to exploit my internet surfing. I allow them to provide me with an operating system that will allow others to exploit my computer and my files without any action on my part, or theirs. If they want to install a little something extra, how does it compare to what I already allow? It doesn't.
Obviously, this is only my girlfriend's sister's computer. I wouldn't put a microsoft product on my computer if you paid me, unless you were paying me enough to buy another computer...
I think you're confused about what a helpdesk does. In most situations, the helpdesk is staffed by people who a) don't know what to do, they just read a script or b) people who have other responsibilities and so want the fastest solution. If a user is having a problem with a mac version of a program that the helpdesk staffer knows/thinks works on windows, he/she will almost certainly tell the user to switch (i.e. reboot if Windoze is installed, or roll over to the Winblows machine on their desk). If the user gets told that enough, they will just stop using Mac OS X.
For the record, I know a little bit about it. I work at a helpdesk supporting ~20K machines. Actually, I work in the department that gets to field helpdesk requests, we are not actually a helpdesk and would prefer not to be. Because of the software we use, our Mac users already just get told to use their windows box. Personally, I try to fix the problem but the bureaucracy makes that difficult.
Rebooting *is* annoying, and if the "solution" to a not-working application is to reboot in windows, the user very likely will just stay there... which I think is the original posters point.:-(
I agree. I was on the Seed for this and I filed a bug report for every seed where this persisted without a preference. I have not yet installed the GM, but when I get around to it and find that there is still no preference, I will file one more bug.
Well, since I'm not quite stupid enough to keep the 'Open "Safe" files after downloading' box checked, then this only resulted in a zip file appearing on my desktop. Not to mention that in Safari on Tiger, it fricken' prompts you whenever you download anything that may contain a program, i.e. a zip file. This bug will only hit the idiots out there. Unfortunately, that includes anyone who doesn't know to turn off the *default* behavior of auto-open downloaded files.
Actually, one of the "features" of Tiger is CLI tools that know about and won't destroy resource forks. So, although you are right they started to distance themselves for a while (in the name of compatibility), they are definitely moving back.:-)
I've lost half of my preferences because of File Vault.
You are aware, are you not, that FileVault has nothing to do with preferences? Perhaps there's something going in inside the NSUserDefaults runtime environment. Ever considered that?
You are aware, are you not, that preferences are stored in files?
I lost my whole home folder to file vault. Even if I am too stupid to use, it it is UNACCEPTABLE that this would EVER happen with an option that is available to ANYONE on the computer. Think about it. If it *might* have negative side-effects, then it needs to give a BIG F*CKING WARNING before even telling you that you may or may not encrypt your home folder.
OSX is NeXTSTEP/OPENSTEP versions 5, 6, and 7 (for 10.0, 10.2, and 10.3 respectively). NeXTSTEP is based on code from BSD4.3, which is not completely public source, as I understand it. FreeBSD is the best maintained continuation of BSD4.3. That's why they chose to update OSX to FreeBSD instead of maintaining their own tree for BSD4.3.
Also, the file named 'mach_kernel' in the root of the disk (the kernel, duh) contains MOST OF THE FREEBSD KERNEL, which means that it is, more or less, the FreeBSD kernel.
Using x86 effects only two things outside of Apple. One, programmers, well some of them, the one who write assembly language or debug at the assembly level.
Ummm... So endianess won't affect anyone, right?
As for G5 being faster. Go look at the real SPEC scores for the models Apple used in it's comparison, not the one generated by Apple's proxy. There is a 20-30% hit by switching to gcc IIRC.
So then the G5 is really 20%-30% faster than they claim! Yes! I'm gunna go buy mine NOW!
One of the things that some people have done in their libraries is to make the lib check what version the linked app thinks it should be, and then provide the API from that version, either with current code or with included older code. Something like this in some widely used libraries would bloat a libraries disk space, but not how it performs in memory b/c it would only make available the code for the version that is being used. Does this make sense or am I speaking out of my rectum?
Wow, you have a "factory-configured 17" iMac with Panther"?!?! Where'd you get it and from what factory?! Last I heard, Panther was available only if you went to WWDC 2003 or were blessed by Steve himself (i.e. had a seed license thingie).;-)
I am much more simpathetic to your opinion than most of the other replies, but I must point out a small error. We are porting KDE to QT/Mac. This means that KDE *WILL* use the OSX Aqua GUI and all that xcomes with it. KWin and KDM and everything like that will NOT be ported, so the customization will not sky-rocket when KDE works. we'll still have just what OSX offers, just a new library to link against for GUI apps (QT/Mac).
On the other hand, OSX is highly customizable, it just takes a little more work than some other systems. OSX is designed to be a unified experience, and thus you have to be very careful and deliberate with what you tweak once you're off the beaten path. Many people aren't clever enough to do this properly, and others don't want to try, so they just complain about it.
And you compare it to windows?!? please please tell me that you just choose to shorten that sentence hoping that we would be clever enough to expand it to mean something like "...in terms of hackability"
and the version of OSX that runs on x86 is being sold where? and being developed where? and is running on whose computer?
Apple isn't stupid, they will never release a version of OSX that runs on x86. if you are talking about the old rhapsody builds then its not OSX, but rather OpenStep on steroids.
I'm not looking to start a flame war, i'm just wondering exactly what you're referring to.
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All versions of Shake 4 were $4999 until just a few months ago when Apple made a *HUGE* price cut down to $499 for Mac. This is *very* recent. More than likely, they just didn't get to the formalities of the linux price cut, or don't see enough potential sales (or competition?) to justify it.
JP
Personally, I don't have any problem at all letting microsoft install this little bugger in my PC. My girlfriend's little sister has a computer that was built for her by an unscrupulous individual who installed a pirated copy of Windows XP. Being the nearest geek, I now maintain the system. I install all M$ updates. I even have auto update set to automatically install everything, including WGA. I have taken no steps to prevent it "phoning home" and I even took the survey that it asks you to take (saying that I had no intention to license windows, which I wonder if they actually read...). The only interaction that I had with it beyond that was to tell it to stop popping up, which it has.
I trust microsoft completely.
Why? I allow them to provide me with an operating system that I am certain will fail regularly itself, without outside interference. I allow them to provide me with an operating system that will allow others to exploit my internet surfing. I allow them to provide me with an operating system that will allow others to exploit my computer and my files without any action on my part, or theirs. If they want to install a little something extra, how does it compare to what I already allow? It doesn't.
Obviously, this is only my girlfriend's sister's computer. I wouldn't put a microsoft product on my computer if you paid me, unless you were paying me enough to buy another computer...
JP
I think you're confused about what a helpdesk does. In most situations, the helpdesk is staffed by people who a) don't know what to do, they just read a script or b) people who have other responsibilities and so want the fastest solution. If a user is having a problem with a mac version of a program that the helpdesk staffer knows/thinks works on windows, he/she will almost certainly tell the user to switch (i.e. reboot if Windoze is installed, or roll over to the Winblows machine on their desk). If the user gets told that enough, they will just stop using Mac OS X.
For the record, I know a little bit about it. I work at a helpdesk supporting ~20K machines. Actually, I work in the department that gets to field helpdesk requests, we are not actually a helpdesk and would prefer not to be. Because of the software we use, our Mac users already just get told to use their windows box. Personally, I try to fix the problem but the bureaucracy makes that difficult.
Rebooting *is* annoying, and if the "solution" to a not-working application is to reboot in windows, the user very likely will just stay there... which I think is the original posters point. :-(
I agree. I was on the Seed for this and I filed a bug report for every seed where this persisted without a preference. I have not yet installed the GM, but when I get around to it and find that there is still no preference, I will file one more bug.
JP
Well, since I'm not quite stupid enough to keep the 'Open "Safe" files after downloading' box checked, then this only resulted in a zip file appearing on my desktop. Not to mention that in Safari on Tiger, it fricken' prompts you whenever you download anything that may contain a program, i.e. a zip file. This bug will only hit the idiots out there. Unfortunately, that includes anyone who doesn't know to turn off the *default* behavior of auto-open downloaded files.
Actually, one of the "features" of Tiger is CLI tools that know about and won't destroy resource forks. So, although you are right they started to distance themselves for a while (in the name of compatibility), they are definitely moving back. :-)
Something like HFS (and HFS+) data and resource forks? Like the mac has had for... 20 years?
Unless you use ALL default clients... i.e. M$ IE and OE with all their locks and limits... :-)
Ever heard of negative numbers?
I have the "latest version" of MacOSX (10.3.2) and you have to *explicitly* turn on the "Download important updates in the background" option.
You are aware, are you not, that preferences are stored in files?
I lost my whole home folder to file vault. Even if I am too stupid to use, it it is UNACCEPTABLE that this would EVER happen with an option that is available to ANYONE on the computer. Think about it. If it *might* have negative side-effects, then it needs to give a BIG F*CKING WARNING before even telling you that you may or may not encrypt your home folder.
OSX is NeXTSTEP/OPENSTEP versions 5, 6, and 7 (for 10.0, 10.2, and 10.3 respectively). NeXTSTEP is based on code from BSD4.3, which is not completely public source, as I understand it. FreeBSD is the best maintained continuation of BSD4.3. That's why they chose to update OSX to FreeBSD instead of maintaining their own tree for BSD4.3.
Also, the file named 'mach_kernel' in the root of the disk (the kernel, duh) contains MOST OF THE FREEBSD KERNEL, which means that it is, more or less, the FreeBSD kernel.
Ummm... So endianess won't affect anyone, right?
So then the G5 is really 20%-30% faster than they claim! Yes! I'm gunna go buy mine NOW!
Or maybe I run linux on my mac...
ummmm..... so how would you do it "manually"?
well as far as i know the predictive compiles in project builder don't run under linux... maybe i'm wrong... ;-)
JP
One of the things that some people have done in their libraries is to make the lib check what version the linked app thinks it should be, and then provide the API from that version, either with current code or with included older code. Something like this in some widely used libraries would bloat a libraries disk space, but not how it performs in memory b/c it would only make available the code for the version that is being used. Does this make sense or am I speaking out of my rectum?
JP
Wow, you have a "factory-configured 17" iMac with Panther"?!?! Where'd you get it and from what factory?! Last I heard, Panther was available only if you went to WWDC 2003 or were blessed by Steve himself (i.e. had a seed license thingie). ;-)
I am much more simpathetic to your opinion than most of the other replies, but I must point out a small error. We are porting KDE to QT/Mac. This means that KDE *WILL* use the OSX Aqua GUI and all that xcomes with it. KWin and KDM and everything like that will NOT be ported, so the customization will not sky-rocket when KDE works. we'll still have just what OSX offers, just a new library to link against for GUI apps (QT/Mac).
On the other hand, OSX is highly customizable, it just takes a little more work than some other systems. OSX is designed to be a unified experience, and thus you have to be very careful and deliberate with what you tweak once you're off the beaten path. Many people aren't clever enough to do this properly, and others don't want to try, so they just complain about it.
And you compare it to windows?!? please please tell me that you just choose to shorten that sentence hoping that we would be clever enough to expand it to mean something like "...in terms of hackability"
JP
That was a beautiful portrait of the Virgin Mary!
and the version of OSX that runs on x86 is being sold where? and being developed where? and is running on whose computer?
Apple isn't stupid, they will never release a version of OSX that runs on x86. if you are talking about the old rhapsody builds then its not OSX, but rather OpenStep on steroids.
I'm not looking to start a flame war, i'm just wondering exactly what you're referring to.