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The track record for Apple turning third party apps into features (as opposed to their own apps ala iTunes), has been pretty pathetic: usually what happens is t

The track record for Apple turning third party apps into features (as opposed to their own apps ala iTunes), has been pretty pathetic: usually what happens is that its so poorly done by Apple that the feature just stops being used and the functionality just flat out dies. Examples: 1. Quicksilver <-> Spotlight. Spotlight is terrible. Everyone I know who used quicksilver just uses nothing now. They certainly haven't "switched" to Spotlight because spotlight doesn't do anything half as well as quicksilver did, not even launching apps for god's sake. 2. Kaleidoscope <-> Dashboard. Another disaster. Dashboard seems to exist solely to be accidentally opened, or I guess for some people it serves as their dedicated weather "space". Apple does not hype up widgets at all anymore. 3. Safari RSS. Does anyone actually use this? Or how about Mail.app RSS? At least here the third party RSS apps didn't die (although I see less people using RSS than ever, but I don't attribute this to OS RSS integration).

bonch 16y ago
Every item on your list is you projecting your personal opinions onto everyone else. Just because you and your Quicksilver-using buddies don't use Spotlight, Dashboard, or Safari RSS doesn't mean other people don't. The features Apple adds are intended to add value and convenience for the average user. If you have RSS needs so great that you require a dedicated third-party application, you're more than welcome to use one.
- tolmasky 16y ago
  I actually 1: did not use quicksilver, 2. did not use kaleidoscope, and 3. never used RSS. These thoughts are purely empirical: RSS was primarily a nerd feature in the first place, which is why it is so silly that Apple added it for consumers, not once, but TWICE. No one actually uses Safari RSS. If they did, why the need to then add it to Mail.app? Would it add even MORE value to add RSS to the Finder too? Why stop there, iTunes seems to have everything else in there already, one more tab that reads "RSS" wouldn't hurt. Dashboard being a failure is clear. If it was a success (like the App Store), we'd still see Apple touting widgets and maybe even selling them. The fact of the matter is that there is no ecosystem of people writing widgets for this thing. Dashcode was largely repurposed as an iOS web app creation tool (also unused by all). So the result: no Kaleidoscope and hardly any Dashboard use. Spotlight: It has been shown to be much slower than other tools (and was terribly buggy for many releases, where was the value back when it needed to re-index on every reboot and dragged your computer to a halt?) Most of the "Add on" features are broken too: if you type a simple formula into it, it will show the result, but you can't copy/paste it, so what's the point? I'm not hating on Apple, they clearly get a lot of stuff right (such as Expose!), but their track record proves they get more stuff right when its their own idea. These little feature additions that seem designed solely to kill third party devs seem almost like half-hearted mini passion projects of single engineers that then die when they get reassigned to something else. Feel free to directly address each of my points.
  - riffraff 16y ago
    fwiw, cmd+c will copy the result of the simple formula in spotlight.
    - glhaynes 16y ago
      Wow, I've been retyping the results of some simple addition every time I pay my bills for years now. Just assumed Command-C didn't work there, especially because it gives no feedback that it did. Thanks!
  - edd 16y ago
    Either Apple have worked on the speed or hardware has just got better but Spotlight is very usable for most people I know. This is especially true of those on a new MacBook Air where it appears instant. Also if you use it a lot it caches the results you hit, so for repetitive app launching it has always worked adequately.
  - daxelrod 16y ago
    I'm undecided whether I agree with your thesis, but I definitely disagree with much of your evidence. RSS was primarily a nerd feature in the first place Why is the concept of a bookmark that can tell you when it has updates a nerd feature? This was essentially Apple's implementation in Safari. (At least, initially, I haven't paid attention to how it evolved). iTunes seems to have everything else in there already, one more tab that reads "RSS" wouldn't hurt. This exists. It's called "Podcasts", and it's wildly successful. Dashboard being a failure is clear. Here, we agree. I think that if it displayed among your other windows, rather than being relegated to a modal view, it would have been much more successful. I believe this was a decision for performance reasons, but it was still never corrected once performance was no longer a concern. Spotlight ... where was the value back when it needed to re-index on every reboot and dragged your computer to a halt? Anecdote != data, but I never experienced these problems, and I was running 10.4 on a G4 iMac, which originally came with 10.2. Honestly, I think Sherlock and Dashboard would be your two strongest arguments. Then again, let's look at iTunes. Sure, it's bloated now, and sure, they bought it, but the reason it won is because it really was excellent. (I say this as someone who used Audion for years and I still have a giant place in my heart for it). Solving music library management was exactly the right problem, and iTunes (& SoundJam before it) got this right far before their competitors did. How about iChat? It's built in, it's integrated, it's pretty darn good, but almost everyone I know who knows about Adium uses it instead.
netnichols 16y ago
I'll grant you that Spotlight could be a bit quicker and smarter, but I nevertheless use it all the time. I was never a Quicksilver power user, but I've found Spotlight adequate enough that I've never bothered installing any alternatives (ie. Launchbar).
- tolmasky 16y ago
  I think this is actually the crux of the issue. Some really unique ideas were replaced with "adequate-enough" ones that ultimately had the (unintended?) consequence of killing those other special features. Some may say this is a good thing, but it a phenomenon that exists nevertheless.
spullara 16y ago
Most of the people I know that used to use Quicksilver now use Alfred: http://bagcheck.com/item/0238-alfred http://bagcheck.com/item/0238-alfred The rest are very happy with Spotlight, like myself. On the other hand, the Reader button in Safari is awesome and if the new Instapaper-like functionality syncs that content, it will do quite well.
- lukifer 16y ago
  Also worth a mention for a Spotlight replacement: the fantastic and successful Launchbar. http://obdev.at/products/launchbar http://obdev.at/products/launchbar

bonch 16y ago

Every item on your list is you projecting your personal opinions onto everyone else. Just because you and your Quicksilver-using buddies don't use Spotlight, Dashboard, or Safari RSS doesn't mean other people don't. The features Apple adds are intended to add value and convenience for the average user. If you have RSS needs so great that you require a dedicated third-party application, you're more than welcome to use one.

tolmasky 16y ago
I actually 1: did not use quicksilver, 2. did not use kaleidoscope, and 3. never used RSS. These thoughts are purely empirical: RSS was primarily a nerd feature in the first place, which is why it is so silly that Apple added it for consumers, not once, but TWICE. No one actually uses Safari RSS. If they did, why the need to then add it to Mail.app? Would it add even MORE value to add RSS to the Finder too? Why stop there, iTunes seems to have everything else in there already, one more tab that reads "RSS" wouldn't hurt. Dashboard being a failure is clear. If it was a success (like the App Store), we'd still see Apple touting widgets and maybe even selling them. The fact of the matter is that there is no ecosystem of people writing widgets for this thing. Dashcode was largely repurposed as an iOS web app creation tool (also unused by all). So the result: no Kaleidoscope and hardly any Dashboard use. Spotlight: It has been shown to be much slower than other tools (and was terribly buggy for many releases, where was the value back when it needed to re-index on every reboot and dragged your computer to a halt?) Most of the "Add on" features are broken too: if you type a simple formula into it, it will show the result, but you can't copy/paste it, so what's the point? I'm not hating on Apple, they clearly get a lot of stuff right (such as Expose!), but their track record proves they get more stuff right when its their own idea. These little feature additions that seem designed solely to kill third party devs seem almost like half-hearted mini passion projects of single engineers that then die when they get reassigned to something else. Feel free to directly address each of my points.
- riffraff 16y ago
  fwiw, cmd+c will copy the result of the simple formula in spotlight.
  - glhaynes 16y ago
    Wow, I've been retyping the results of some simple addition every time I pay my bills for years now. Just assumed Command-C didn't work there, especially because it gives no feedback that it did. Thanks!
- edd 16y ago
  Either Apple have worked on the speed or hardware has just got better but Spotlight is very usable for most people I know. This is especially true of those on a new MacBook Air where it appears instant. Also if you use it a lot it caches the results you hit, so for repetitive app launching it has always worked adequately.
- daxelrod 16y ago
  I'm undecided whether I agree with your thesis, but I definitely disagree with much of your evidence. RSS was primarily a nerd feature in the first place Why is the concept of a bookmark that can tell you when it has updates a nerd feature? This was essentially Apple's implementation in Safari. (At least, initially, I haven't paid attention to how it evolved). iTunes seems to have everything else in there already, one more tab that reads "RSS" wouldn't hurt. This exists. It's called "Podcasts", and it's wildly successful. Dashboard being a failure is clear. Here, we agree. I think that if it displayed among your other windows, rather than being relegated to a modal view, it would have been much more successful. I believe this was a decision for performance reasons, but it was still never corrected once performance was no longer a concern. Spotlight ... where was the value back when it needed to re-index on every reboot and dragged your computer to a halt? Anecdote != data, but I never experienced these problems, and I was running 10.4 on a G4 iMac, which originally came with 10.2. Honestly, I think Sherlock and Dashboard would be your two strongest arguments. Then again, let's look at iTunes. Sure, it's bloated now, and sure, they bought it, but the reason it won is because it really was excellent. (I say this as someone who used Audion for years and I still have a giant place in my heart for it). Solving music library management was exactly the right problem, and iTunes (& SoundJam before it) got this right far before their competitors did. How about iChat? It's built in, it's integrated, it's pretty darn good, but almost everyone I know who knows about Adium uses it instead.

netnichols 16y ago

I'll grant you that Spotlight could be a bit quicker and smarter, but I nevertheless use it all the time. I was never a Quicksilver power user, but I've found Spotlight adequate enough that I've never bothered installing any alternatives (ie. Launchbar).

tolmasky 16y ago
I think this is actually the crux of the issue. Some really unique ideas were replaced with "adequate-enough" ones that ultimately had the (unintended?) consequence of killing those other special features. Some may say this is a good thing, but it a phenomenon that exists nevertheless.

spullara 16y ago

Most of the people I know that used to use Quicksilver now use Alfred: http://bagcheck.com/item/0238-alfred http://bagcheck.com/item/0238-alfred The rest are very happy with Spotlight, like myself. On the other hand, the Reader button in Safari is awesome and if the new Instapaper-like functionality syncs that content, it will do quite well.

lukifer 16y ago
Also worth a mention for a Spotlight replacement: the fantastic and successful Launchbar. http://obdev.at/products/launchbar http://obdev.at/products/launchbar