10.7 details

http://www.maclife.com/article/news/apple_unleashes_...

I don't know about anyone else but this isn't as good as I had hoped for:

Launchpad, 80's technology,
Full screen apps, okay but nothing outstanding,
New version of mail, yawn,
Airdrop, okay but dropcopy has been doing this for years,
Versions, hmm, this is handy but seems like it should have been done 10 years ago,
Resume, handy again but again should have been done ages ago,
Auto save, what? 90's technology,
New file vault, nothing to see here

Apple needs to press on, this isn't good enough, windows is catching up.

List the ground breaking features you would add?

Oh, no ideas huh?

Well nobody has any fresh ideas and there's a good reason why, we've reached pretty much the best we can do with non-touch screen computers with pointing devices and keyboards.

There's a lot to be done with touch, but the WIMP interface can't really be improved, it was perfectly fine years ago. All that OSes are doing now is mainly eye candy and slightly better ways of handing the information overload.

That post borders on the trolling.

So much that "should have been done [ages] ago"!

Such a pity that the lack of those features is killing Mac profitability.

Oh, wait ...

Indeed. Everyone knows that the desktop computer has peaked. Desktop sales are down, laptops are what people buy now. Tablets may do most of the things we do on the desktops, once the technology improves of course.

What features are you really missing on the desktop? if anything operating systems are too complex. Designed before the Web and the Internet were popular.

It is the same thinking as those who said the iPad did nothing new.

That isn't, and never has been, the point.

There's a lot more to an Operating System than just the interface. I think there's a fair amount of room for improvement in all current OSs.

I don't agree that the day of the desktop is past, but that's another matter. It's a mistake to consider only individual ownership and ignore the corporate world. There is still a lot of room for innovation there to reduce the TCO of computers.

In reply to a post by stniuk:

Versions, hmm, this is handy but seems like it should have been done 10 years ago,

Apple needs to press on, this isn't good enough, windows is catching up.

Yes, if I remember correctly DECs VAX VMS OS did this some 20 years or more ago.

But could it play mp3s?

In reply to a post by TheHorseman:

In reply to a post by stniuk:

Versions, hmm, this is handy but seems like it should have been done 10 years ago,

Apple needs to press on, this isn't good enough, windows is catching up.

Yes, if I remember correctly DECs VAX VMS OS did this some 20 years or more ago.

Could you put one in a shoulder bag?

In reply to a post by AEP:

There's a lot more to an Operating System than just the interface. I think there's a fair amount of room for improvement in all current OSs.

The interface is what matters, not what is under the hood. iOS proved that. Symbian and Windows Mobile were more powerful, more complete and in the case of Symbian more efficient (hence Nokia phones have slower CPUs). But WInMo and Symbian have god awful interfaces.

Computing power has peaked in many senses. There's all that power yet the software isn't written to take advantage of it. Multi-core programming isn't easy.

I don't agree that the day of the desktop is past, but that's another matter. It's a mistake to consider only individual ownership and ignore the corporate world. There is still a lot of room for innovation there to reduce the TCO of computers.

It is past in many ways, big desktop computers that sit on a desk are selling less and less all the time. A laptop can't be carried around and operated while standing. There are many jobs where a computer on a desk limits the efficiency of that job.

Full blown computers are best at creative things, there are plenty of people who just consume and aren't creating.

Anybody who's seen my posts know I'm not a troll. I love macs, I have at least 5 and been buying since the early 90's. I'm just concerned that Apple has gained a good lead in usability and reliability and is not being creative enough. Maybe there is not much that can be added but if anyone could think of new features to add Apple can. One feature I would like would be a full os switcher, just like user account switcher. Parallels et al are good but for games you need to reboot into windows. I'm sure Apple could find a way of running both systems in tandem so there's no need for a reboot.

You know there's nothing wrong in saying Apple or whoever got it wrong on some things. Apple has made many mistakes like most tech companies. It's when the companies don't listen the problem arises. Criticism can be helpful.

Edited by stniuk (Thu 24-Feb-11 23:22:52)

So the one thing you want from the OS is the ability not to use the OS. Apple already offers 2 ways to do that - via BC or virtualisation. M'kay. I'm sure they'll will get right on a third way, rather than encourage, say, Steam and all the game companies developing on iOs to come over to Mac.

Oh, hang on. Angry Birds: started on iPhone, now on Mac.

I don't think Apple is especially interested in playing on last year's pitch, nor on getting into another feature checklist war.

Notice how, on iOS devices it never emphasises ram or clock speed? Because that's last year's pitch. That's the thinking that is coming to Lion and whatever comes after.

Notice how it is letting gaming develop quite happily on iOS? This year's pitch.

"The desktop wars are over. We lost". (S Jobs).

Or as Gruber put it: "So: new developer preview of Lion, new FaceTime app for Mac, and an all-new lineup of MacBook Pros — and none of these things warranted a spot in next week’s event."

No way are you being a Troll by raising the question of whether an OS (any OS) could be improved. That leads to a far more interesting discussion than uncritical praise does.

I'd agree that Apple is moving away from the desktop. As Steve said, they lost that war. But that don't mean the desktop is history - far from it - it's just that Apple realise they can make better profits elsewhere.

The problem is that "the desktop is history" is a meme you made up. strawmanus aepus.

The problem is that "the desktop is history" is a meme you made up.

No it is not. It is a term that you often see bandied about, either in that form, or as "the desktop has peaked", "the days of the desktop are numbered", "the desktop is dead" or similar phrases. If you think that I am mistaken then just Google "The Desktop is Dead"; I cannot claim responsibility for the multitude of articles that you will find.

strawmanus aepus

As ever you feel the need to reduce discussion to personal attack when you are unable to raise objective points. It may be that there is indeed a Troll in this thread, but it's certainly not the OP who raised an interesting topic for discussion.

I'm not sure that I would agree completely with that analysis. In my experience desktop computers have a huge corporate use where simple tasks such as data-entry or word-processing are involved. A laptop doesn't make a lot of sense in such a scenario as they are more expensive and have poorer input and output functionality. Also it is far easier for a corporate IT department to keep control of fixed machines.

It is true that there has been a decline in desktop sales, but this is not entirely unexpected in a time of economic uncertainty. Most desktop computers are easily good enough for the job and so don't need replacement immediately.

But, in any case, an argument between desktops and laptops is peripheral to the issue of OS design. They both use the same OS; it would only be meaningful if you were considering the difference between computers and handheld devices.

Much of the innovation in Operating System design just at the moment is to be found in network operating systems, which the man in the street see little of. This is a market that Apple has now essentially abandoned (not that they ever made any serious inroads anyway). OS X Server still exists, but I can't see there being much of a market for server software that only runs on consumer hardware. IT departments need to be able to rely upon highly redundant hardware to serve internal and external markets.

As ever you feel the need to reduce discussion to personal attack

Pointing out a logical fallacy is not a personal attack. As ever, you seem to find the warmth of the kitchen not to your liking.

And, BTW, any reading of sensible data shows that "the desktop has peaked" is clearly true (as well, of course, as meaning something completely different to "dead" or "history" - that would be the fallacy of equivocation, should you wish to avoid it in future). Business is concerned with where the growth is. MS's big error of the past decade was to rely too heavily on mature markets that do no more than service their own licence base, while failing to exploiy new areas (even Xbox has barely paid for itself) - which is why its share performance has been as it has.

And speaking of personal attacks: read again. I described the post as bordering on trolling (since it made a series of idiotic and false comparisons and statements, that could have been designed to inflame - pretty much a textbook definition). So give it a rest, Mr Pot.

Edited by ian_c (Fri 25-Feb-11 12:42:23)

In reply to a post by ian_c:

As ever you feel the need to reduce discussion to personal attack

Pointing out a logical fallacy is not a personal attack. As ever, you seem to find the warmth of the kitchen not to your liking.

And, BTW, any reading of sensible data shows that "the desktop has peaked" is clearly true (as well, of course, as meaning something completely different to "dead" or "history" - that would be the fallacy of equivocation, should you wish to avoid it in future). Business is concerned with where the growth is. MS's big error of the past decade was to rely too heavily on mature markets that do no more than service their own licence base, while failing to exploiy new areas (even Xbox has barely paid for itself) - which is why its share performance has been as it has.

And speaking of personal attacks: read again. I described the post as bordering on trolling (since it made a series of idiotic and false comparisons and statements, that could have been designed to inflame - pretty much a textbook definition). So give it a rest, Mr Pot.

Some statements you might find idiotic, thats your opinion. But none where false.

I meant a decline in desktop sales but an increase in laptop sales. Desktops are 10% of computer sales. Laptops a lot more.

I used to use a desktop, I now use a laptop. I have a big powerful Mac Pro upstairs for music composition, but it's not a normal every day task for the masses.

OS synergy won't ever exist, there are too many patents to infringe.

I hate to say it but if Apple wants to supplant the Wintel box they need to lower their prices a lot.

Apple know that the desktop isn't worth trying to win, mobiles and consumer electronics are where it's at.

Winning the desktop requires lots of dull stuffy business apps.

Same here (except it's a big powerful PC - my Mac is a rather weedy Mini). But I'm thinking of computers in offices. Certainly laptops are used there also, but there is - and alway will be - a huge market for machines with proper keyboards and screens.

I couldn't agree more. That's why I expect, and see, more innovations in the OSs used in that market than in OS X. Apple are very sensible to avoid that particular fight.

In reply to a post by AEP:

I couldn't agree more. That's why I expect, and see, more innovations in the OSs used in that market than in OS X. Apple are very sensible to avoid that particular fight.

Don't forget that corporates want lowest price for IT equipment, and bulk ordering. Apple aren't interested in bulk supply (especially in the UK) they want to be the Rolls Royce instead of the Fiesta of computing

In reply to a post by jchamier:

they want to be the Rolls Royce instead of the Fiesta of computing

The trouble with that is... look what happened to Rolls Royce

Could of all been compressed into a 10.6.7 release

In reply to a post by krazykizza:

Could of all been compressed into a 10.6.7 release

I've never been able to work out what constitutes a first or second decimal point release... except that first point releases usually kill my screensaver

Me neither, but knowing Apple it will involve a long diligent process... and possibly a couple FoxConn suicides.

...and that first point update costs you real money.

First decimal would be a totally new OS or a massive overhaul.

Microsoft likes to make it appear as if each new version of Windows is a major new thing but the last huge change was XP. XP was a consumer-ised Windows 2000.

OSX has been gradually changing and so hasn't warranted a new major release number. Besides, OSXI just isn't as catchy.

Apple are an american company. In the UK we're very good at ruining businesses or selling them to foreign companies and letting them ruin them for us.

The American aren't too bad at doing that either. Whatever happened to Indian motorcyles, or - closer to home - DEC?

In reply to a post by gilesjuk:

Microsoft likes to make it appear as if each new version of Windows is a major new thing but the last huge change was XP. XP was a consumer-ised Windows 2000.

2000 was the huge change over NT4.0, and XP was a minor tweak to 2000 to improve perceived performance and include gaming APIs from Windows 98/ME.

Vista was a huge change over XP and Win7 is a performance tweak and new GUI on Vista.

The low level kernel engineering changes are NT4, NT5 (XP), NT6 (Vista); and the public acceptance releases are XP (5.1) and 7 (kernel 6.1)

Apple's vista era rewrite is essentially iOS ??

Yes, but XP was the first consumer OS to use the NT code stream. Massive change since before then Microsoft had a business OS (NT, 2000) and a consumer line (95, 98, ME).

While there's been a lot of changes there's not been a huge change in terms of the architecture. Just some chair shuffling and security mods.

In reply to a post by gilesjuk:

Yes, but XP was the first consumer OS to use the NT code stream. Massive change since before then Microsoft had a business OS (NT, 2000) and a consumer line (95, 98, ME).

Well the bulk of the change was in 2000....

While there's been a lot of changes there's not been a huge change in terms of the architecture. Just some chair shuffling and security mods.

From what I read there was a lot in Vista, such as rewriting the entire graphics subsystem, a new idea replacing what had been in Windows since 1.0, which is just one reason to give a new full version no?

Rather more interesting is the stuff that didn't make it, but which MS announced - a trap Apple goes to great length to avoid falling into.

In reply to a post by gilesjuk:

First decimal would be a totally new OS or a massive overhaul.

A misunderstanding here... in, for example, OS X 10.6.2 the "first decimal" to me is the "6". The "10" is the major version number.

Besides, OSXI just isn't as catchy.

The "X" in OS X stands for "Unix based", it's a coincidence that it's Roman for the major version number. The next one, assuming it's still Unix-based, will be OS X 11.p.q.

I believe that you are wrong. Else why isn't it pronounced "OS ex" rather than "OS ten"? I suspect that the "X" also owes a little to "NeXTSTEP".

That's incorrect - the X stands for 10 (following OS9), although the echo of Unix is most likely intentional.

I think it is unlikely there will be an OS11 (and debatable wither there will be a X.8) and that eventually they will merge into the iOS branding (once gestures are the principal metaphor on both Mac and 'i' platforms).

In reply to a post by AEP:

I believe that you are wrong. Else why isn't it pronounced "OS ex" rather than "OS ten"?

So I'm running OS ten ten point six point six... yeah, right.

I still think the next one will be OS X 11. Time will tell.

In reply to a post by ian_c:

I think it is unlikely there will be an OS11

You may well be right there.

Personally I think the dropping of PPC support was a sufficient change to warrant an increment in the major version number, but maybe Apple couldn't decide what to do with the "X" either

No, you are running OSX.6.x

Sometimes presented as 10.6.6

In reply to a post by ian_c:

No, you are running OSX.6.x

System Profiler says:

System Version: Mac OS X 10.6.6

Apple => About says

Mac OS X
Version 10.6.6

Edited by billford (Sun 27-Feb-11 12:52:45)

Apparently Apple is unperturbed by any confusion, but is clear about the X:

http://support.apple.com/kb/TA22541

Yes, I've seen that- AEP linked to it.

The first three sentences in the second major paragraph are not internally consistent.

Edited by billford (Sun 27-Feb-11 13:03:09)

It's perfectly consistent - it's just that you don't think it's sensible. It would be inconsistent if it read "Major releases of Mac OS X include versions 10.0, 10.3, and 4.".

There is nothing wrong in calling it OS X 10.6.4 and the X still deriving from "10". It was changed to X, rather than 10, to emphasize the fact that it was completely different from the previous OS.

If you're not prepared to accept Apple's own explanation of the X ....

In reply to a post by AEP:

It was changed to X, rather than 10, to emphasize the fact that it was completely different from the previous OS.

Agreed- because it was based on Unix, which has long been indicated by including an "X" in the name.

If you're not prepared to accept Apple's own explanation of the X ....

I gave up believing the marketing pronouncements of manufacturers long ago.

Personally I think the dropping of PPC support was a sufficient change

On a different tack, Rosetta support is apparently not in the Lion dev previews. So that is the real e-o-l of PPC.

That'll be a pain. My favoured version of Solitaire is a PPC app, and I think I've got a few others around somewhere

The "X" in OS X stands for "Unix based", it's a coincidence that it's Roman for the major version number.

No, it's not a coincidence. It's certainly a happy coincidence that it also has an association with UNIX (and with NeXTSTEP) but, as Apple quite clearly state, it's "ten" not "ex". The coincidence is in the opposite direction to your assertion

I don't believe that page that I linked to is a marketing pronouncement. It's a document on their support site.

It's all very well sticking to your guns when all the evidence is against you, but sometimes it can give the impression that you are merely stubbornly unwilling to accept an error.

In reply to a post by AEP:

It's all very well sticking to your guns when all the evidence is against you

"All the evidence"... one link

Every diagnostic I can find on this 'ere lump of silicon says I'm running an operating system called "(Mac) OS X", version 10.6.6.

Not OS X.6.6, or OS 10.6.6, but OS X 10.6.6.

You believe who you like, I'll believe the programmers.

Edited by billford (Sun 27-Feb-11 14:27:26)

Apple has a pretty brutal end of life policy, and always has (java is also no longer bundled and, like Rosetta, was marked deprecated in the first dev preview). Perhaps they are finally confident that Adobe is getting on board with Cocoa.

Front Row seems to have been scrapped too.

Never used Front Row so not bothered either way, but I won't be too upset to see the back of Java.

"Deprecated" rather implies it can still be used if you really insist... and Rosetta wasn't included by default in Snow Leopard, only as an option.

Any idea if similar considerations apply to Lion?

Apple was clear that "deprecated" means it may be removed from later version.

(Specifically it was Apple's own java engine that was deprecated - a good decision, since java on Mac was always trailing others - and java can still be got from Oracle.)

Deprecated means "don't rely on it continuing to function as expected". Same as with HTML tags - can still be used, but do not rely on this continuing.

More or less what I thought, but you've somewhat clarified what can only ever be a slightly uncertain area... thanks for that.

"All the evidence"... one link

Would you like to present some other evidence? That's all the evidence there is.

You are indeed running (Mac) OS X, version 10.6.6 - so you can believe the programmers (as do I). Now where does it say that "X" refers to UNIX?

Linux confuses things by having an X but by not being Unix.

X in Unix land surely refers to the X Windows server anyway?

In reply to a post by jchamier:

Well the bulk of the change was in 2000....

Yes, but that was a tidied up NT4.0.

I'm ignoring the whole business OS thing in this discussion.

XP was a huge change, it killed off all manner of things, 16-bit threads etc. It required new drivers. In business land people buy hardware they know works, they replace it if it doesn't any more.

At home people wanted everything they had working in Win 98/ME to work in XP.

Edited by deleted (Sun 27-Feb-11 16:51:57)

And Solaris and BSD confuse it further by not having an X in the title. As there are UNIXes that don't run X Window I'm not sure that it is true to say that the X in UNIX comes from there (although the converse may well be true).

My understanding of the origin of the word UNIX is that it is a pun on MULTICS, from which it was derived. I think that Brian Kerighan said that it was "one of whatever Multics was many of".