4 ms·

> Kudos to Apple for taking the risk Apple has always taken the risk, it is one thing I love about them. You only need to look to their processor choices to se

by city41 16y ago

> Kudos to Apple for taking the risk Apple has always taken the risk, it is one thing I love about them. You only need to look to their processor choices to see that: 68k -> PPC -> Intel. All transitions were just as painful as the OS9 -> OSX transition was. All in the name of pushing forward. And I bought one of the first white iBooks (post toilet seat design) with the sole intention of using OSX (I'd used MacOS from 7 through 9, but departed briefly around that time). It was so slow it was literally completely unusable. I do admit though, to this day there are things about OS Classic I really miss.

pillsy 16y ago
They never really did FTFF, did they?
jbrennan 16y ago
I seem to recall the PPC -> Intel transition going rather smoothly, what with Rosetta instruction translation and Universal/Fat binaries. It took them about 9 months between shipping the first and final Intel Macs, and most apps were Universal within the first year (Photoshop and Office being the most notable, albeit gigantic, holdouts).
- chc 16y ago
  I would go so far as to say it was more painful for the last PPC buyers than it was for the first Intel buyers.
- mmphosis 16y ago
  I think it went a little more smoothly than the Motorola 680x0 -> PowerPC transition. Notice the ppc and i386 directories that were in Mac OS X from the get go.
endlessvoid94 16y ago
What do you miss about OS Classic? I'm just curious.
- danilocampos 16y ago
  How about "my voice is my password?" That wasn't bad.
- city41 16y ago
  Apple just had a better respect for consistency back then IMO. iTunes 10 is a great example, now we have the minimize/expand/close buttons vertically down the side? Sure it looks cool, but consistency is much more important. And just lots of other little things that added up. Like placing the close button on its own side of the window. So if you are clicking in that region, then you've only got one target so the app can more confidently know you really did mean to close the window. Now in OSX, maybe you meant minimize? Or how the trash can was always in the lower right corner, using the edges of the screen to its advantage. If you dragged an item that far down, then you only had one possible destination, the trash, so the OS confidently places the item in the trash without nagging you for a confirmation (like Windows does by default). No OSX doesn't nag you, but the trash can isn't taking advantage of the corner of the screen either. Minor things, yes, but I still feel the Apple of old thought about these things more thoroughly.
  - dsspence 16y ago
    Depends which consistency you mean. It wasn't consistent prior to 10 when you went to press the green button to get the mini-player and the orientation of the buttons changed from horizontal to vertical. If I'm remembering correctly. I like your other points though.
akl 16y ago
Out of curiosity, what do you miss from MacOS Classic?
- mdasen 16y ago
  Let's see. . . cooperative multitasking! No, resource forks! Oh, better: the lack of a minimize! Really, that's easy: Apple Platinum (see: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Appearance_Manager http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Appearance_Manager). I know, it's heresy! Still, I like the elegant simplicity of Apple Platinum. The color is brighter than the Windows grey; I like the horizontal pin-striping in the title bar; I like the purple accents which give it a soft, classy feel (rather than a more contrast-y feel) and it feels easier on my eyes than, say, Windows; I like the simplicity of the controls (such as the simple two black horizontal lines for the "shade-up" function) combined with the soft gradient of the square control. I think it made great use of space as well. The title bar wasn't big as is the current trend (damn kids wasting my pixels). I'm also just not the biggest fan of the transparent movement. I don't find that it increases my usability, but rather detracts from it by making things fuzzy. For example, the OS X menu (today) is mostly opaque - you can't read anything behind it. However, the little transparency makes it harder to read as there's fuzzy changes behind where you're trying to read. Windows Aero is the worst. Those transparent windows with the changing fuzzyness depending on how you move them - yikes! I also don't like that the menu is white. Contrast is good, but I prefer black on platinum to black on white for my eyes. There's even a little part of me that misses pixel-based icons. Having a set canvas to work with meant that authors tried to pack good meaning into small space. Now, you're expected to waste lots of pixels. Yeah, I like my screen real-estate. Now, nothing I've said is objective at all. It's just my aesthetic. OS X, as time has gone on, has gotten closer to my aesthetic. Some of the more garish things have left, but the horizontal pin-stripes have also left. I don't want to make this sound like I don't think OS X is nice to look at - it is. But there's a part of me that misses the simple look of OS 9 and BeOS (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:BeOS_Desktop.png http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:BeOS_Desktop.png) which had an elegance about them. Apple has done wonderful things with the OS X interface and I don't want to sound negative about OS X (plus, at least half of this is nostalgia talking). It's wonderful and so much better and I'm really happy with it.

by city41 16y ago

pillsy 16y ago

They never really did FTFF, did they?

jbrennan 16y ago

I seem to recall the PPC -> Intel transition going rather smoothly, what with Rosetta instruction translation and Universal/Fat binaries. It took them about 9 months between shipping the first and final Intel Macs, and most apps were Universal within the first year (Photoshop and Office being the most notable, albeit gigantic, holdouts).

chc 16y ago
I would go so far as to say it was more painful for the last PPC buyers than it was for the first Intel buyers.
mmphosis 16y ago
I think it went a little more smoothly than the Motorola 680x0 -> PowerPC transition. Notice the ppc and i386 directories that were in Mac OS X from the get go.

endlessvoid94 16y ago

What do you miss about OS Classic? I'm just curious.

danilocampos 16y ago
How about "my voice is my password?" That wasn't bad.
city41 16y ago
Apple just had a better respect for consistency back then IMO. iTunes 10 is a great example, now we have the minimize/expand/close buttons vertically down the side? Sure it looks cool, but consistency is much more important. And just lots of other little things that added up. Like placing the close button on its own side of the window. So if you are clicking in that region, then you've only got one target so the app can more confidently know you really did mean to close the window. Now in OSX, maybe you meant minimize? Or how the trash can was always in the lower right corner, using the edges of the screen to its advantage. If you dragged an item that far down, then you only had one possible destination, the trash, so the OS confidently places the item in the trash without nagging you for a confirmation (like Windows does by default). No OSX doesn't nag you, but the trash can isn't taking advantage of the corner of the screen either. Minor things, yes, but I still feel the Apple of old thought about these things more thoroughly.
- dsspence 16y ago
  Depends which consistency you mean. It wasn't consistent prior to 10 when you went to press the green button to get the mini-player and the orientation of the buttons changed from horizontal to vertical. If I'm remembering correctly. I like your other points though.

akl 16y ago

Out of curiosity, what do you miss from MacOS Classic?

mdasen 16y ago
Let's see. . . cooperative multitasking! No, resource forks! Oh, better: the lack of a minimize! Really, that's easy: Apple Platinum (see: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Appearance_Manager http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Appearance_Manager). I know, it's heresy! Still, I like the elegant simplicity of Apple Platinum. The color is brighter than the Windows grey; I like the horizontal pin-striping in the title bar; I like the purple accents which give it a soft, classy feel (rather than a more contrast-y feel) and it feels easier on my eyes than, say, Windows; I like the simplicity of the controls (such as the simple two black horizontal lines for the "shade-up" function) combined with the soft gradient of the square control. I think it made great use of space as well. The title bar wasn't big as is the current trend (damn kids wasting my pixels). I'm also just not the biggest fan of the transparent movement. I don't find that it increases my usability, but rather detracts from it by making things fuzzy. For example, the OS X menu (today) is mostly opaque - you can't read anything behind it. However, the little transparency makes it harder to read as there's fuzzy changes behind where you're trying to read. Windows Aero is the worst. Those transparent windows with the changing fuzzyness depending on how you move them - yikes! I also don't like that the menu is white. Contrast is good, but I prefer black on platinum to black on white for my eyes. There's even a little part of me that misses pixel-based icons. Having a set canvas to work with meant that authors tried to pack good meaning into small space. Now, you're expected to waste lots of pixels. Yeah, I like my screen real-estate. Now, nothing I've said is objective at all. It's just my aesthetic. OS X, as time has gone on, has gotten closer to my aesthetic. Some of the more garish things have left, but the horizontal pin-stripes have also left. I don't want to make this sound like I don't think OS X is nice to look at - it is. But there's a part of me that misses the simple look of OS 9 and BeOS (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:BeOS_Desktop.png http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:BeOS_Desktop.png) which had an elegance about them. Apple has done wonderful things with the OS X interface and I don't want to sound negative about OS X (plus, at least half of this is nostalgia talking). It's wonderful and so much better and I'm really happy with it.