A Month with a Mac: A Die-Hard PC User's Perspective
by Anand Lal Shimpi on October 8, 2004 12:05 AM EST- Posted in
- Mac
Multi-tasking
It is somewhat ironic that I would praise Apple for the multi-tasking capabilities built into OS X, given that the Mac OS trailed Windows in its support for preemptive multi-tasking. Needless to say, the mistakes of yesterday are not true of OS X today, and its multi-tasking prowess was my biggest draw to it.Multi-tasking under OS X works just like it would under Windows; you have multiple applications open, some of them doing things concurrently, while others are waiting for your input. I will address the two types of applications in a multi-tasking scenario separately.
In the case of applications running at the same time while performing tasks concurrently, OS X does one thing very well that Windows does not - the foreground application is never intruded upon by any other application that's running. Say you're encoding a video and typing a document in Word, should a dialog box popup in the encoding application, it will do it without shifting the window focus to that application. Instead, the dialog box will pop up in the background and you're free to dismiss it when you're ready and willing. It is all too often that Windows left me annoyed by a dialog box taking focus while I was typing a message to someone online or writing a document.
OS X has been designed to be as unintrusive to the user as possible. For that reason, one of the basics of the Windows interface is not echoed in OS X. While double-clicking a file or folder will open the item, hitting "enter" when one is highlighted will not cause the same effect. Instead, if you hit "enter" on a highlighted item, you'll be able to rename the item. In order to launch the file or open the folder via keyboard, you have to hit Command-Down Arrow (Command-Up Arrow will traverse up a folder tree). This takes a bit of getting used to and if approached with an open mind, you can get used to it in a couple of days, but it can be frustrating at first - especially if you are a keyboard addict used to Windows.
Another way in which OS X allows for less intrusive multi-tasking is in its ability to let you close a background window of an application other than the one you're currently working in without shifting focus to that application. Say that I have a browser window open behind a Word document that I'm typing. I can hover over the red close button on the browser window and click it without actually shifting focus away from the Word document - I can continue typing away right after clicking the browser's close button without any additional mouse use.
Next, there is the more frequently used type of multi-tasking, where multiple applications are open and the user switches between them. I've already mentioned that OS X has the equivalent of the Windows ALT-TAB functionality; the task switcher is activated by holding down the Command key and hitting "tab" to sequence through all of the open applications. Releasing Command activates the selected application and everything continues as it would under Windows.
Command-Tab in action. The more applications that you have open, the smaller each icon becomes as the Command-Tab list grows in size.
There is also the equivalent of the taskbar, which in OS X is best likened to the "dock". The dock is a fully customizable bar at the bottom of the OS X desktop (you can position the dock along any side of the screen that you'd like) and it contains application launch icons for applications to which you want quick and easy access, as well as icons of any running applications. If a running application already has its icon in the dock, a little arrow appears under the icon to denote that it's running; if not, the application's launch icon will appear to the right of the dock. The dock does have a divider to which you can also drag folders and links; to the right of this divider is where minimized windows go (with a very nice accompanying animation). Clicking on any application's icon in the dock will either launch the application if it's not already running or it will switch to that application; but, of course, that requires using that pesky mouse.
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addragyn - Friday, October 8, 2004 - link
RE: Safari's SpeedThere is a delay built into the browser.
You can reduce it - http://www.oreillynet.com/pub/wlg/4924
David Hyatt is a Safari developer @ Apple, he covered this on his blog - http://weblogs.mozillazine.org/hyatt/archives/2004...
Zak - Friday, October 8, 2004 - link
The biggest problem with the article I sa so far is overlooking the iApps. Also, the apps equivalents are not correct. Entourage is Outlook counterpart and there is Acrobat Reader for OSX as well. Other than that it's a good article, but it's clear that Anand missed some things and got some others wrong, like the mentioned mouse cable, etc.Zak
azkman - Friday, October 8, 2004 - link
This was a very good editorial/experience piece. Compared to other articles by Windows-users trying Macs, it was very open-minded. However, I have to agree with some of the earlier posters. The hardware used was dated, and the reviewer did not mention some of the key strengths of the Mac platform.It seems to me that Windows-users are fixated on certain characteristics and define a computer by MHz, framerate, etc, and this came out to a certain degree in the review. The author readily admits that he is used to writing hardware pieces for this type of audience, and again, I applaud him for his open-mindedness.
Here is some information for posters and readers who want to learn more about Apple's computers and understand the overall value equation:
price - http://www.linuxinsider.com/story/36120.html
performance - http://www.linuxinsider.com/story/36964.html
proof - http://www.tcf.vt.edu/systemX.html
http://www.colsa.com/cover_page/news_front/news_de...
http://www.top500.org/list/2003/11/
http://www.roanoke.com/news/roanoke%5C6133.html
http://www.pcmag.com/review/0%2C2491%2Cs%3D1564&am...
http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,1759,1369037,00.as...
Applications & tools included in the price (beyond normal MS Windows offerings):
video conferencing (high quality, easy to set-up, easy to use)
music creation
jukebox / music management / cd burning
photo management
movie editing
dvd authoring & burning
all-purpose search tool
PDF export from any printable page
font management
full development environment (c, c++, objective c, java, scripting...)
full unix shell, w/ x11
Yes, I know a few of these applications are included with Windows, but I work in a tech-savvy Windows-dominant company and none of my co-workers use the bundled programs. In fact, most of them don't video conference or edit videos.
Anyway, the Mac is really an "experience" in that the traditional concept of a computer disappears and the Mac becomes an extension of what the user wants to do. That is of course unless the user wants to work specifically with Windows issues. The value of a Mac comes from its ability to empower the user to do terrific things straight out of the box without thinking about things like viruses and security while also being a supercomputer-class piece of equipment.
rxmz - Friday, October 8, 2004 - link
Thanks, very good article.I agree with some earlier posts that the Unix aspect of Mac OS X is a big advantage over Windows. I have a company web server and mail server (with IMAP and web mail access) running on the same G4 tower that is used as a desktop (not an ideal setup, I know, but it has to suffice for now ;-). I have PostgreSQL, cvs, and Subversion installed on my PowerBook. I can ssh to the office to administer the mail or web server. The Unix foundation is a terrific aspect of the OS.
Anand, you might want to take a look at Camino for web browsing. And if you have a chance, check out the capabilities of AppleScript; it's cool now and only going to get more accessible to non-power users when Tiger comes out.
mjtomlin - Friday, October 8, 2004 - link
oops one other point to make on the GUI responsiveness ...OS X GUI is timed. Things happen at a constant rate based on time not on CPU speed ... a lot of bench-markers like to use the scrolling test ... to see which system is faster. This is not a vaild test, because Mac OS X times the speed. This is actually a feature of the system. The whole point of scrolling was to quickly skim through a document. If the system scrolls through the document too fast, how do you know what you're missing?
A lot of the GUI is designed like this ... that is, someone actually thought about the purpose of the feature and made sure it remained useful.
To get to the end of a document, just drag the scroll bar down to the bottom or press the "end" key on the keyboard ... you'll be there in less than a second, that was those were designed for.
mjtomlin - Friday, October 8, 2004 - link
A couple of points...#1 - i thought it was a fairly good article. You have to remember he was not writing a definitive guide to OS X/PowerMac. This was his take on the system from a Windows user perspective. There is obviously going to be a lot of details left out and many misunderstood "features"
#2 - poster #60 regarding patching security issues... Apple has been releasing security fixes for OS X ever since it was released. I believe we're up to a couple a month in fact. Most OS X users update their systems without incident and continue on... The biggest difference between OS X security patches and those for Windows is that all the security fixes for OS X are for issues that have NOT been exploited yet.
THERE WILL ALWAYS BE SECURITY ISSUES IN ANY OPERATING SYSTEM.
But because of OS X's open source base (Darwin/BSD) most security issues are discovered before they're ever exploited. The opposite of this is true under Windows.
#3 Dual CP's are not necessarily faster than a single CPU ... You have to remember, this is only true if the application that you're running is multi-threaded. And the OS itself is highly tuned for multi-tasking.
The GPU in the PowerMac does the screen drawing, so it doesn't make a difference how many CPU's are in the system.
#4 GUI responsiveness ... OS X using buffering to draw the GUI, Windows does not. This is obvious as seen under slower systems when trying to move windows around... XP will leave screen "artifacts" (garbage) ... OS X windows appear to "jerk" and "jump"
the end.
shuste73 - Friday, October 8, 2004 - link
I'm a Linux user (Slackware), and one of the biggest challenges to Linux continues to be the very people that are trying to promote it - poor, misguided zealots that reflect poorly on the entire community.Judging from the feedback to this article, I see that the Mac users are generally no different. It's a shame.
I thought the article was very good, personally, from the perspective of a long-time Microsoft user-turned-Slacker.
indd - Friday, October 8, 2004 - link
Although this is experiential writing I'm really surprised at the understatement of the difference between the OS's. The effort Apple has put into usability results in a very solid feel for the OS. Windows really feels very unsophisticated in comparison, especially in error handling.Which brings me to the fact that I'm disappointed to see the page on crashing so glossed over. Need examples of the Mac crashing to back it up! It really appeared like something was omitted here.
Reading the article leaves me with the feeling he really loves Windows, and still brought a lot of old anti-mac feelings into the experience. I don't want to sound harsh here, just relating my reactions to the article.
At least he tried :)
asimuth - Friday, October 8, 2004 - link
One of the hardest things I have ever tried to do was explain to someone why I use a Mac and why it is a different experience. In the end the explanation always comes down to "it is the little things". Your article was the best review I have read. You had a clearly stated experiential bias and you refused to let past predjudices get in the way of a thgoughful review.As a softcore geek I am disappointed that my platform of choice did not knock it out of the ballpark for you. Having said that, I think your criticisms are very valid. I will certainly want to refer people to this article to give them some idea of why I'm a Mac user.
In my working life I am the development manager for a small software company - windows only. You cannot imagine how frustrating it is to be without the small thoughtful additions that make my OSX experience.
: )
BopTop - Friday, October 8, 2004 - link
Great article, I haven't touched an apple computer since the powerpc days.An article like this will always have detractors, that apple hardware and pc hardware weren't comparable, dual cpu or single, etc. All I can say is re-read the first page - this wasn't to compare hardware, or really software. It was to compare the "experience" of using a system that has a different work method.
That's exactly what the article did, and did it excellently.