Apple Computer’s announcement of new Macs based on processors from Intel raises an interesting question: Since both the Mac and Windows operating systems now run on Intel-based hardware, shouldn’t it be easy to run both on the same computer? That simple question deserves a simple answer. But there isn’t one – at least not right now. Reaching the nirvana of running the two most popular desktop operating systems on one machine is a lot harder than you might expect.
Mine won’t.
At least not in a dual-boot environment. QEMU, WINE, Darwine evne the ghastly Virtual PC should cater for whatever obscure Windows-needs I might stumble across (though I doubt I’ll ever try running Windows on my Macs other than just for trying it).
I’ll be dual-booting OSX and Slackware, once I save enough money to buy an Intel PowerMac (or whatever it’s called once it’s Intel-powered)
I don’t think this is one of Patrick’s main prioritise.
to port slackware to the new macs
Edited 2006-01-20 22:30
He isn’t involved with the Slamd64 or Slackintosh projects, either, yet both of those exist, and work quite nicely (Though I must admit, the software selection for Slackintosh is a bit limited at the moment). I’m sure someone will have created an unofficial port by the time I can afford a PowerMac.
Well, if that were possible, then why not just format your hard drive and install WindowsXP?
I mean seriously, that’s pretty much a no brainer.
Windows XP isn’t easily EFI compatible, and Vista doesn’t support OS X’s partitioning schemes. or is it Apple choose schemes which MSFt won’t support ever.
Even Linux needs a modified Grub to do it.
Itanium uses EFI. Windows boots on that just fine. I doubt it’d take much to make a future version of Windows for x86 boot.
It’s not likely to happen anytime soon, but if Microsoft were to find value in ditching the current PC bios in favor of something more modern, an available platform would give them extra leverage to initiate change.
Of course, that’s a big if.
Hm, maybe it’s not easy on the same partition, but let’s say you have an external HD on firewire or something. I suppose you could easily install linux on this, probably some version of windows too.
I don’t know what running Windows and Mac OS on the same machine is, but it isn’t “nirvana.”
For professional developers who make their money off of MS tools/platforms, yes it is. I would love to be able to boot into Mac for day to day non-work related stuff, and be able to boot into Windows to get some work done. The best of both worlds, on one PC…sounds like nirvana to me.
I’m completely satisfied with what Ubuntu Linux can offer me for home computing (I have to work in Windows, since there’s no Trados translation memory software for Linux). But even though I have Breezy installed, I don’t boot into it that often – Windows has everything I need, too! Firewall and AV software are mandatory there, running restricted accounts can give you some frustration on Windows, but I can live with it.
Therefore, if I were to buy a Mac, it would have to satisfy all of my needs, or else why spend so much money?
i’m not sure if I understand the point of your post?
If you’re “completely satisfied” with Ubuntu, then why search further?
Having to dual-boot is an inconvenience, ad therefore a disincentive, but with Ubuntu I’m at least not paying anything. But when you have to shell out a fair amount of money to get this inconvenience, then surely the disincentive gets bigger?
Edited 2006-01-20 23:08
“…it would have to satisfy all of my needs.”
Then again, the Mac may satisfy needs you never knew you had.
News.com surely doesn’t know which OS’es are the most popular, considering Linux on the desktop has a userbase around twice the size of Mac OS X
But it doesn’t change the interesting aspect of booting Mac OS X and a second mainstream OS, in this case Windows.
Mac OS X for work, and Windows to play games
News.com surely doesn’t know which OS’es are the most popular, considering Linux on the desktop has a userbase around twice the size of Mac OS X
Before any one else makes the obligatory response, I will:
sources, please.
At best, looking at stats from, say, w3schools, Linux and Mac are even. But I have my doubts as to how popular Linux truly is on the desktop. Other websites give much lower numbers.
Yeah, there’s actually a story about this …
Google’s Zeitgeist up until a certain year reported OS statistics along with everything else that they do now. Linux usage, as reported by Google based on the entire year’s, was miniscule. Some pro-Linux site complained (I guess the truth hurts?), and Google no longer provides OS statistics.
Wasn’t there a large amount of “Other” OS’s though? Presumably most of them were some type of Linux/Unix. And when they were added in OSX wasn’t far ahead or might have even been behind.
Perhaps I’m thinking of something else though.
I wouldn’t be surprised if more people use OSX than Linux, but I do think it’s probably close.
Apparently osViews is now a pro-Linux site.
Who else would complain about a negative truth about Linux?
You mean the negative truth about MacOS, right?
*Excellent* dodge.
Not.
osViews is run by a Mac proponent, and the concern over Google’s statistics stemmed from their use in determining the mythical “install base” of alternative operating systems like MacOS. Since you alternate between being a raving BSD, Windows, and MacOS fanatic, I found it especially entertaining that you suggested the decision was a result of a pro-Linux effort when it was actually the result of a pro-MacOS effort. This is just more of the fact-based decision making that you think you engage in.
If people really want to run windows apps they can dual boot into linux and use wine or something. Until wine is ported over to MacOS.
Edited 2006-01-20 23:05
or… fire up VMWare/vpc.
I agree that dual booting will be a pain in the butt, and you can’t really do any serious work when you have to shut down, restart, do work, shut down, restart, and so on. The productivity lost is so much that it would be more economical to get another computer to run windows!
Microsoft COULD make windows work.
First of all we know that EFI has compatibility mode so windows COULD run. Microsoft can modify Vista to be able to run on Macs, if Microsoft wants to do this of course.
My vote goes toward virtualization. You can freeze the guest OS, you can run it at almost full-speed which is good for most applications. You boot up the guest once, use it, freeze, and then use it again when you need it, without long bootup times. Even if the guest OS needs to restart – you are still productive on the MacOS X side while waiting for windows, linux, BeOS, whatever, to start
“My vote goes toward virtualization. You can freeze the guest OS, you can run it at almost full-speed which is good for most applications.”
I’d have to second this. There are only a few things that people do that truely suck running in virtualized environments, and chances are if you’re buying a Mac, you know it’s going to be doing the things you want it to do anyway, and certainly won’t be buying it just to run Windows.
There are always going to be exceptions, but when I get around to buying one of those MacBooks (perhaps in their second incarnation), I’m not going to be spending time or energy trying to get Windows, Linux, BSD or whatever else to run on it. I’ll be buying it to get a decent machine that’s easy to use, fairly stable and secure, with a Terminal.app security blanket for those times when the GUI just doesn’t suit the job at hand.
why buy an expensive imac when you can get a dell and run os X on it?
You, my friend, have a brain that actually works. Nice job.
good idea:
download image….
jump through some hoops… jump through more hoops
keep jumping till I get dizzy
push really really really hard
ah.. there, now I have OS X on my Dell/// it only took me for ever and a day and I will have to do this all over again to upgrade the OS next time.
Actually a dual core dell laptop costs about the same price as the macbook pro (2999 swiss francs here). The difference is that the dell has a huge 17 inch screen and slightly higher clock frequency. On the other hand it looks… ugly like a dell, bulky like a dell.
I’d rather have a mac as primary system and a pc virtual process just to run explorer to view how buggy the rendering engine is and adapt css code to work through it. Currently I use a remote user on a windows 2003 server, just to run explorer. Maybe if I could do it locally, that would be better (in a faster way than VirtualPC allows me to do now).
Apple has said that it will take steps to prevent this from happening. “We will not allow running Mac OS X on anything other than an Apple Mac,” Senior Vice President Phil Schiller said in a June interview. The company has not gone into specifics, but appears to be using a TPM (trusted protection module) chip as part of its authentication mechanism.
Ya know, it’s really too bad. If Apple would sell a full Intel version of OSX, even if they offered no support for it whatsoever, I’d probably still buy it. Especially if they sold it for $50. Hell, what have they got to lose? Actually being able to run OSX on my PC might for an extended period of time might actually convince me to go buy a Mac. But without it? No way in hell. The in-store demos (where the mouse movement is always about 5x slower than what it should be) really don’t do that much for me.
PS – Isn’t the TPM thing they got going on the same thing as people have been blackballing MS for? Hell, AFAIK, MS hasn’t even implemented it yet. Once again, Apple innovates
Edited 2006-01-21 00:17
what have they got to lose?
hmm…. their revenue stream.
The day Apple decides to sell S X for any old PC, is the day I jump ship.
If OS X requires most of the hardware to be Apple-hardware (motherboard, cpu, memory, psu etc.), it’s much easier to make a stable OS. If OS X could run on any home made budget motherboard + second hand cpu, you would see a lot of complaints.
It took a long time for Microsoft to make an OS that is stable on most hardware configurations. Apple doesn’t have that time, because everything has to work right now.
I have to ask why would you want to run Windoze when you could run OS X? Why would you want to infect a perfectly good Mac with Microshaft software? I would think people would be asking the opposite question… how can I get OSX to run on my piece of crap PC?
Simple answer: Apple makes some incredibly sexy hardware compared to their PC counterparts, and now they are selling said hardware for a pretty decent price. I wouldn’t want OSX running on my peice of crap PC, I’d want it on a Mac, along with a copy of Windows to have the best of both worlds.
Because not everyone agrees with you that OSX is superior!!
What is so hard to understand about that? You mac people, on top of being mainly gay and canadian, are so damn arrogant!
If someone *gave* me a mac I would either sell it or format and install linux asap! Why? Because I like Linux! More than OSX! Get it?
Do you really actually believe that people only run linux because that is all they can afford? Do you realy believe that people only run Windows because they are ignorant?
My OS preferences *in order*:
1. Linux
2. WindowsXP (that’s right)
3. Uh, I quit caring much below here
4. HURD (I’m reaching now)
5. BSD?
6. SkyOS
7. BeOS
8. OSX
9. Windows 3.1
I run linux because it is fun and because it is interesting and it is a community that has ethics that are meaningful to me. And because it is a pretty damn good environment. Better than XP? Mmm, probably not. Better than OSX? Yes.
Anyone who says that XP is buggy or bad interface or confusing or any of that crap hasn’t used XP much. My gnome desktop is 10x more buggy than XP. Easily 10X. And usability? XP is really not that bad. Even the security thing is overblown. There are many known backdoors for unpatched Linux boxes and Linux has about 1/1000 of the viruses targeted at it than XP. Linux is no less resistant to Trojan horses as any other OS and most viruses are exactly that, trojan horses. The main problem with XP’s security is the usage model where everyone always runs as local admin so trojan horses can wreak total havoc on a system. In linux you don’t do that so in Linux things are more safe. That is not about the superiority of Linux, that is about the superiority of the use model. Anyway, XP is attacked too much because of its bad past (3.1 and 98 really did suck balls, I agree. And I don’t mention ball just for your sake)
Why do I hate OSX? Because I am a nerd. And I somehow always find myself doing odd non standard stuff with my computer (no, not browsing bestiality web sites you sick bastards!). Like you know, one day I tried to help my gay canadian friend set up his wireless in an ad-hoc network. Yeah right! f–king Mac support couldn’t even help us after we tried for literally hours to get it working. Mac is only smoothe and integrated and just peachy if you are part of middle 50% of computer users who just have a stock netgear basestation and just use msn hotmail and have an ipod and drive a lime VW Beetle with a flower in the dash. Also the intense candy cane like interface just makes me sick after the first 10 minutes of looking at it. And their laptops which are otherwise very nice have only that single extra large idiot button where there should be three! You’ve got to be kidding me! That is fasion over function and simplicity for morons over even a minimum of usability for anyone else.
Look if you like OSX, I respect that (snicker) but my basic overall point is that not everyone else does so just quit with your “why would you want to” not run OSX crap.
Keep your OSX and shut your f–king mouth. For everyone else there is Linux and WindowsXP.
Perhaps you need to calm down. You seem irrational.
As for your statements, I have never had *fewer* problems with wireless connections than with my iBook.
The ‘Oh so hard’ steps to setup an ad-hoc session in OSX (With Internet sharing).
1. Start your Mac.
2. Click on the Airport Icon
3. Click ‘Create Network…’
4. Type a name where it says ‘Name:’
5. Click OK
Now for internet Sharing…
1. Click Apple
2. Click System Prefrences
3. Click Sharing
4. Click Internet
5. Select Ethernet to Airport
6. Click ‘Turn On’
Sorry dude, you luck out… no compiling kernels to get something done simply.
Now… Challange…. Tell me how you do it in linux/Windows.
If simplicity scares you, than OS X is not for you. But so far you have no point. If it took you ‘Hours and Hours’ with a ‘Mac Support’.
Your claims are rediculus and un-founded.
So in your easy 1-5 steps for joining an ad-hoc network, where is the part where you set your static IP, gateway, Network Name, and DNS servers?
That is what I thought. You have no idea what you are talking about.
Do you think I just invented that story? I’m telling you we completely failed, even with mac support on the line, to get it to work despite the fact that several linux and windows boxes and my ipaq were all connecting without any problem.
Anyway, both of these posts are totally missing my point. The specific case of the network was just one example.
Let me summarize:
1. Not everyone agrees that OSX is best
2. You are gay
Simple.
Setting static IPs? Dude, Internet sharing TURNS ON A DHCP SERVER.
And without internet sharing, your 169.254.x.x is perfectly useable.
I suppose you think Bojour (Rendezvous) is worthless also?
You have some serious emotional problems to be calling people gay.
Do I have to make a movie for you??!
Client on an ad-hoc network. client on an ad-hoc network. Please understand now. You are shaking my faith in mankind.
Since the only option you have is to Create an ad-hoc session or join one, maybe you need the steps to join one..
1. Airport menu
2. Select network.
By it’s very meaning, Ad Hoc is computer to computer networking without base station… what is so difficult about it?
“Not everyone agrees that OSX is best”
Certainly true, but I think it likely that most people agree that you’re a foul mouthed idiot.
“You are gay”
You throw that term around often enough that I am beginning to wonder if perhaps you’re looking for some action yourself.
While not all Canadians are gay, I’m sure we can magic up something long and pointy for you to sit on. Let’s call it an asshole’s throne, something I’m sure would be very fitting for you.
I conceed that not all Canadians are gay.
This conversation has become emotional and unreasonable. Perhaps everyone should calm down before the admins decide to eliminate all comments.
“You mac people, on top of being mainly gay and canadian,”
Is there something wrong with being Canadian? Because I’m a Candian and I wouldn’t have it any other way.
How does owning a Mac make people “gay and canadian”? Last time I checked profiling people based on the hardware they buy wasn’t a proven science.
It seems to me you implied that whole sentence with contempt, that whole “gay and canadian” part seems to hold obvious negative connotation to me.
Give me one good reason why I shouldn’t take offence to this and moderate you down.
Man are you defensive!
I never implied any such thing. I *observe* that most (if not all) people who use Macs are both Gay and Canadian or at least smell that way. Are there not homosexuals in Canada? Is it not possible that some of them have moved around the world and bough Macs?
I have zero problem with Canadians or gay people. What I don’t like are Mac zealots and/or poo smell.
So, if I have offended you Canada, I retract my statement on behalf of George W Bush, Dick Cheney, and all gay canadian-expatriot mac users!
Edited 2006-01-21 06:16
I will make one generalization though, verified by scientific study. Canadians do have the second smallest dicks of any nation on earth (Crawford Texas is the #1 *city* on earth, #1 country is England, #3 is Poland).
This is based on statistics easily verified by googling for the terms “canadians have small dicks”.
Someone ban him?
“Anyone who says that XP is buggy or bad interface or confusing or any of that crap hasn’t used XP much.
…
Like you know, one day I tried to help my gay canadian friend set up his wireless in an ad-hoc network. Yeah right! f–king Mac support couldn’t even help us after we tried for literally hours to get it working.”
you tried hours to get wireless in ad-hoc mode working, because you simply haven’t used MacOSX much. you proved that yourself in your comment. so funny. that means you are just a no-brainer or simply a stupid kid with much time to waste. go and do your homework first please.
Edited 2006-01-21 13:26
You can have a whole variety of differently formatted partitions on one hard drive. For instance I have a PC where I had BeOS, OS/2, Windows, and Linux all with different file systems each in their own partition on one hard drive. No big deal at all. So there is no issue with that in have multiple OSs on one computer. In this case it is the non EFI compatible OSs that stop them from being installed on intel Macs.
It’s not the partition I think but rather the partition scheme. If you open Disk Utility on a mac you can see you can chose between Apple Partition Table or IBM PC partitition table (or something like that).
It is very unlikely that Windows would run on a partition inside an Apple Partition table.
has anyone thought of running windows or kde/gnome with a one button mouse?
i dont know about the macbook pro, but “wall street” black g3 powerbooks had only one mouse button.
unless this thing has two buttons, any real mobile usability would require a hardware hack.
umm… you go into the preferences and set it to activate a right mouse click on a ctrl-click.
Holding down a key and pressing the left click button to right click seems rather unintuitive and inconvenient to me.
Personally I’d preffer it if Apple either had two buttons, or one button that was sensitive over which side was pressed. By default both sides could count as a left click unless the settings were changed by the user. That way it’s more convenient, and won’t upset anyone still attached to having just one mouse button. The one button which is sensitive over which side is pressed is such a simple and small solution, who would notice the difference unless they wanted to enable the right-click feature?
I can’t believe Apple would have such a hard time implementing something like this, and I can’t think of any excuses why it couldn’t or shouldn’t be done.
http://www.apple.com/mightymouse/
I knew about that, but the problem is it’s not built into their laptops. Apple could easily implement a two button mouse on their laptops the same way they implemented the two button functionality into the mighty mouse, by having it sensitive over which side was pressed. By default both sides could function like the left mouse button until the user changes the settings.
actually, on a laptop it is not that hard or awkward. you hands are already in position, and I find it more convenient since I do not mis-click, ever.
It comes down to a matter of preference, the way it is now works for you but I would find it inconvenient. If the option I suggested were available there would be an ideal solution for both of us don’t you think?
I suppose that should tell you something about the useability of the user-interfaces on other platforms.
If you cant do something because you do not have 2 mouse buttons, someone did not think the GUI out properly.
Your answer is totally incoherent. That is like saying if someone can’t design a bike with only one wheel that works as well as bikes with two wheels then they did not think the bike out properly.
The second mouse button is not a crutch dumbass. It is a feature and a powerful and convenient feature at that.
God! How classic for a mac guy to just assume that anything someone says is wrong with their environment is obviously just the inferiority of the system it is being compared against! Unbelievable. Next you’ll be telling me I think my cellphone is cool just because of the poorly design telegraph system!
Of course! What an idiot I am for thinking bikes with two wheels are superior to unicycles! Get the analogy? If you don’t mind the lack of performance and you like having something rammed hard up your ass then good for you! Ride a unicycle! But don’t be amazed that most people will continue to ride bikes! And don’t try and convince me that what I’m doing is stupid or crazy ok? Your the f–king pevert here. Let’s just keep that straight.
Really, why do I need two hands? Stupid god! Stupid evolution! Damn two hands! If only our human bodies were more like macs!
Edited 2006-01-21 05:26
I know it’s hard, but let me give you an example.
Just this morning, I booted my mac into Ubuntu linux, everything seems to work great… until I needed to eject the cd from the cdrom…
I noticed that there was no menu option for it, there was no settings for the keyboard to setup control-click of any sort. I am a tad bit smarter and used umount and eject in a terminal session, but how many computer users know this?
You mean in the day and age that almost no one but people you would call your friends know what the right click mouse button EVEN is, that the UI guidelines are not the problem it’s the one button mouse?
I know thinking makes your toes hurt, so you do not have to reply to this post.
“I suppose that should tell you something about the useability of the user-interfaces on other platforms.”
I dissagree, I’ll even go so far as to say that’s a typical knee-jerk reaction against having two mouse buttons and it’s foundation is purely subjective, hence your total lack of facts to back such an absurde statement.
Two mouse buttons may seem foreign or poorly designed to you if you’re not used to it, but to someone who is it’s a convenient feature. Right clicking gives me a convenient menu with quick access to related functions for the widget my mouse is over. I don’t know how Macs handle this because I haven’t had a chance to use one, but I’ve found right clicking to be very usefull and never poorly designed beyond the layout of the menu in some software.
I’m curious, do you have something like a right click menu on your mac, or do you have to move your mouse all the way up to the menus at the top of the screen in order to get the same functionality? If your software doesn’t have right click menus, getting to the functionality you want would probably involve learning hot-keys which is more work than right clicking, or moving your mouse all the way to the menus at the top of the screen which again is more work. I’d much rather have my right click menu.
Yes, there is… it’s Control Click, read my prev post. My issue is not two buttons. My issue is the developers lack of adding full functionality for single clicks.
In my example of ejecting a cdrom. The option is most certanly there, but ONLY available for right clicking. Most people do not know what the right button even does.
There is nothing wrong with 2 or 12 button mice, but the developers need to think about user interface guidelines put in place for someone that might not be as smart as self.
OSX was designed to be used with a two-button mouse. There’s right clicking pretty much everywhere there is on Windows. In that respect, my Apple Pro mouse is actually very inconvenient. $30 down the drain on that one, eh?
Nice way to distort the truth, there. The reason that Google took down the OS statistics is that – by their own admission – they were unreliable. They did not take into account user agents, persistent IPs (more prevalent among Linux users) and other elements. Rather than present a flawed statistic, they chose to remain silent on the matter.
Perhaps you should consider doing the same…
when i click on a reply link it just takes me back to the first page of comments… it used to work before… what changed? i’m still using konqueror 3.5…
also, in reply to jamesrdorn about setting up an ad-hoc wireless connection, here’s how you do it in freebsd (linux is probably similar):
1. # ifconfig <interface> inet <ip> netmask <netmask> up ssid <name> mediaopt adhoc wepmode on weptxkey 1 wepkey 1:<key>
I think I had the same problem once. My browser didn’t send a “referrer”-header, and OSNews requires that for some reason.
Turn on the referrer-header in your options menu, and it should solve the problem.
If it will be an Intel machine and it can run Windows, what is the reason for buying a Mac anymore?
The reason for buying a Mac will be that it can run OS X without people having to circumvent the ball and chain Apple intends to use to keep it from running on non-Mac hardware. Correct me of I’m wrong, but in the US circumventing Apple’s features like that counts as a violation of the DMCA.
Then there’s the people who couldn’t care less about OS X and just want the alluminum box and it’s innards.
Oh, no! My next computer is the Intel-equivalent PowerMac running Windows (they’ll find a way). Apple hardware is absolutely top-of-the-line in every respect. The case design alone is worth it, not to mention the cooling system inside.
“Oh, no! My next computer is the Intel-equivalent PowerMac running Windows (they’ll find a way). Apple hardware is absolutely top-of-the-line in every respect. The case design alone is worth it, not to mention the cooling system inside”
Oh my God I can’t tell who’s serious and who’s sarcastic anymore
“If you cant do something because you do not have 2 mouse buttons, someone did not think the GUI out properly.”
I guess that’s pretty much true. Loading everything in a right click menu isn’t always the hottest way to do things (the gimp is a popular example). That doesn’t make the other part of your post correct though.
“I suppose that should tell you something about the useability of the user-interfaces on other platforms.”
Fortunately, in most Linux and Windows programs functions in the right click menu can be reached through toolbar buttons or the menubar as well (ie: right click->paste == edit menu->paste) Most of the time there aren’t things you can only do with a right click menu. Having a right click menu != user must use right click menu.
I’d say the complete lack of one is worse than the existence of one, especially when each of its functions can be reached another way. Just because one could argue that a right click menu shouldn’t be mandatory doesn’t mean it isn’t incredibly useful.
Mac fans commonly point to Fitts Law as an example of the superiority of the Macintosh interface (menus along the top of the screen for example).
In that vein: name the five easiest to click on spots on the screen.
.
.
Four of them are of course the corners. The fifth, and easiest spot to click is wherever your pointer happens to be.
Not having a right click menu means failing to take advantage of this easiest to click on spot on the screen. The right click menu is a way to easily bring up commonly used actions, without needing to maneuver the pointer to a button or menu. (Of course keyboard shortcuts obviate the need for any of that, but that is hardly in the spirit of the Mac )
Having a one button mouse (and ignoring kludges like holding the ctrl key while left clicking) means having to move the mouse farther to get to commonly used actions. Hardly a plus, as Apple itself seems to have finally conceded, or hadn’t you noticed the Mighty Mouse?
Wow! Reason, logic, insight, intelligence.
Who are you? Is that you President Bush??
That’s a good post, but it just proves my point even more.
My issue is not the fact of having/not having right button on mouse. My issue is not even about having/not having a right click menu.
My issue is the developers who do not write code for the norm.
My example of Gnome ejecting a cdrom, how would anyone new to linux eject a cdrom without knowing the CLI commands?
One of the smartest implamentations for right click I have ever seen started on the mac with OS X, and works flawlessly with FireFox for OS X.
Simply hold your click for more than one second, there is the right click menu.
What is funny is how this mouse stuff relates to another thread on OSNews, where people are objecting to the waste and duplication of effort involved in OSS projects.
The lesson, though its one that Apple will never learn, is that human interface guidelines are totally out of date. They were an 80s concept. Now that the market has matured, uses of computers have proliferated, and users are much more heterogenous lot than they were, it is surely obvious that one size does not fit all?
When the mac users talk about one button being all you need because it is all they personally need, this is what Linus called UI Fascism, or something like that. It is not that you need more than one button because the interface or app is designed wrong. You need more than one button because you feel like having more than one.
What’s wrong with that? If enough people feel that way, one button is wrong. For most people. This is what has happened. The right solution for a provider is to offer both. For a couple of percent of the market to tell the rest that what they like is wrong is ridiculous. The other 95% are probably working differently, that’s all.
Apple’s problem is that it is stuck in a time warp on this.
Um, Apple offers a damn three-button 360-degree scrolling mouse now. It’s standard on the iMac. Get over the one button thing already.
4 years ago I joined an ISP as a sales/marketing manager. Except for one Windows PC it was an all Red Hat Linux shop (on IBM/Sun hardware), also on the desktop/laptop. I certainly could do my job with it, but it was hell. My sysop saw me struggling everyday and gave me a SuSe box. Although it was somehow better, I still couldn’t do my job the way I wanted it.
I ended up privately buying a Powerbook wit OS X, my first Mac since dropping the brand in the ’80’s when switching to Atari ST (and later Amiga). The first day I brought it in, all the nerds went: “OS X, wahahahahahaha. Child’s play …. a Mac, especially made for … yes, idiots from marketing.” We all know our dead trolls, don’t we? And boy did those Linux chaps poked a lot of fun about it. Imagine traveling from our branches in cold Holland to those in warm Israel with a PB 17″: “Going surfing again? Finally some good use for that frisbee.”
But in April/June of this year we will be transitioning the whole company from Linux to OS X. Reason: it’s robust and it just works, especially if you need to travel a lot, roaming all kinds of networks. It’s the best of all worlds. And that’s what you want when you are helping some poor sysop with his layer 2/3 WAN problems. And the innitiave for this step came from the nerds who ended up seeing that OS X mixes a terminal with a nice interface and iSight, iMovie and other ‘fun’ things.
Will my iMac G5 (iSight) will run MacOS X 10.6?
It’s obvious Apple and MS made a deal to keep Virtual PC on the Mac. IF otherwise, Apple would of made it easier to just install XP on it’s native processor.
MS is still developing VPC to run on intel macs right?
Very obnoxious…should be a fisherman…because he is surely good at trolling.
“Keep your OSX and shut your f–king mouth”…..these comments go way beyond any acceptable debate about the merits and or pitfalls of OS usage. We do not need to insulted in such ways out of the blue as registered users on OSNews.
Grow up…maybe Mom’s basement is getting a little too musty or something and your oxygen supply is lingering.
Why would you want to run windows which has spyware, viruses, & buggs on a Mac? Ofcourse there is the game issue, but I am sure VPC can solve that. Plus the move to intel may solve that also
Edited 2006-01-21 18:20
Ok folks, the user “Fooo” (id: 3108) has been banned and any offensive comments have been set to -5 wherever possible.
Sorry for the inconvenience.