X response
This post is in response to a post on SVN regarding MacOS X:
Sick of the OS X hype…
Yes, I am inviting a flaming deluge of comments here, but at least hear me out before you start writing back in ALL CAPS.
There are two things about the swarm of commentary on OS X among the Mac faithful that have me scratching my head.
The first:
Mac OS X is the future!
It might be the future for MacOS users, but to the rest of the computing world it’s old news. Ah yes, an OS that doesn’t crash once a day — let us all exult at the revolution! An OS that has support for more than one processor — by Zeus, my world has changed. An OS based on the tried and true UNIX (which is itself 20 years old), if that’s not a revolution, I don’t know what is! Now that brings me to my second point of confusion. I’ve read some form of the following in many a message board:
Unix is inside Mac OS X. It’s here to stay. That is a GOOD thing.
Why? Since when did UNIX become the only possible option in OS foundations? Yes, it certainly is stable and well understood, but what’s with this blind devotion to this very old technology. I’m disappointed that in the seventeen years since the release of the first version of what is now the MacOS Apple hasn’t come up with something better, particalarly considering the fact that Apple controls the entire widget (software and hardware). Jobs says that he wants OS X to be the foundation for the MacOS for the next fifteen years. If that’s the case I’ll be very bummed out because that would mean that very little of substance will have changed in the world of computing.
Here’s my point (which I’ve been slow in getting to), the current computing paradigm sucks. OS UIs are lame and OS X doesn’t do much to change that (prettier control widgets don’t cut it in my book). If that’s the best that they could muster then why not just develop skins for Windows 2000 or Linux?
Millions and millions of people have changed their behaviour and learned to cope with stupidly designed interfaces that force us to jump through the same hoops again and again and again and again. That needs to change if the real potential of the human/computer interface is to be realized, yet all anyone seems to be paying attention to is re-skinning existing interfaces and increasing MHz.
Why am I criticizing Apple? It may be unfair since Microsoft certainly does not seem to be doing anything better with Windows XP, but what do you expect from MS? What we’ve all come to expect from Apple is real change and OS X has been billed as a “revolutionary” product. Instead what Apple has delivered is an incrementally evolutionary product that has arrived about seven years later than it should have. Hey, no doubt that it’ll eventually be a boon to Mac users who won’t have to force reboot their computers several times a week, but it does nothing to solve the fundamental problems with current operating systems and that’s sad.
Ahem. Can I point out one small flaw in just what just about everyone is saying? I know at least one of the Signals crew disagrees with this analogy, but here goes: EK, you said yourself that UNIX is 15 years old, and that X has been in development in one form or another for 10 years. To us (computer users), that seems like a long time. But in reality, I think that expecting to see or being disappointed by not seeing ‘the future’ of the computer UI just 15 short years after its inception is wildly ridiculous. Here’s the analogy: cars. The design of the car did not significantly change 15 years after it was first designed, and in fact still hasn’t fundamentally changed, almost 100 years after its birth. What has changed? Comfort, style, & performance. Now, OSX might not have improved in comfort much yet, but in style and performance, compard to OS9, it’s off the charts. When I use classic now, I feel like I might as well be using System 6 or something… All this talk of Apple dismissing usability for creativity is, I feel, in error. Aqua is just an evolution of platinum. Were you this pissed when 7.6 or 8 came out (I can’t remember which had it) with the Aaron extension (renamed to appearance/platinum) that added nice 1px shadows and depth to windows and widgets? I doubt it, but with Aqua, everyone is up in arms that Apple is ignoring their own ideas, when that really isn’t true. I think, at least.
And one more thing: the act of getting upset with a company for distributing hype along with a new product is retarded. Sure, X isn’t the future: not yet. Apple is a company that needs to sell products in order to survive. Marketing furtheres that goal. Honestly, at this point, a true major evolution in the way humans interact with computers would not sell well, or even be regarded as such.