5 ms·

Excuse me, but Windows had a Taskbar before Apple had a Dock. Windows also had Quick Launch shortcuts before Apple had a Dock as well. So, Apple is the one who

by WayneDB 14y ago

Excuse me, but Windows had a Taskbar before Apple had a Dock. Windows also had Quick Launch shortcuts before Apple had a Dock as well. So, Apple is the one who showed up late to that party. Furthermore, the Taskbar works nothing like the Dock and it looks nothing like the Dock.

kolinko 14y ago
I'm sorry, what? Next had a dock IIRC, and it was released before Win95.
- WayneDB 14y ago
  Oh, so you think that Microsoft copied NeXTSTEP? An OS that practically nobody used at that time? Sorry, but you're assessment is clearly incorrect. First of all...the NeXT Dock was a simple launcher that showed you which program was running by altering the icon. The Taskbar works nothing like that. The Start button was Windows' simple launcher and the Taskbar originally showed one button per window. As a matter of fact, it still shows one task button per window if you want it to.
  - gouranga 14y ago
    Spot on. Also if you want to be pedantic, RISCOS had a dock and taskbar in 1987 that was pretty close to win95.
  - mistercow 14y ago
    >An OS that practically nobody used at that time? How is that relevant?
whateverer 14y ago
Now, now. You can't claim that they aren't similar, because the concept here is unifying both launchers and task lists, which was what distinguished docks from task bars before. They have different features, yes. Their animations are very different, that's actually where most of the differences lie, yes. But now, as far as task/window management goes, they are pretty much the same thing. I wouldn't hesitate to call Gnome Shell's activity bar thingy a dock, for one, even though it wouldn't matter; the dock doesn't have the same prominence that environment as in Windows or Mac OS X. Still, I don't see the problem with them retaining their traditional name for their UI element, given that the new taskbar was still an evolution from the previous one. Now, with respect to the interaction, MS is mostly following the trend here, as most are converging towards search for launching, and with the reduced task management of smart phones, I would expect that developers would now be encouraged to make their apps save and restore their states without the user's intervention, and thus applications where you actually have to do the clean up, save, close, start, open, repeat cycle would also become rarer, so that those session-restore features that some DEs have would actually start to be used, further downplaying the actual launching of applications.
- WayneDB 14y ago
  Claiming that Microsoft blatantly copied "pinned items" is a gross over-simplification though. So is claiming that "they are pretty much the same thing". They're not. And I am correct in saying that Windows had a Taskbar before Apple had a Dock because Apple didn't own NeXTSTEP when the Dock was released.
  - flatline3 14y ago
    > And I am correct in saying that Windows had a Taskbar before Apple had a Dock because Apple didn't own NeXTSTEP when the Dock was released. Given Apple's history, that's a stretch. Modern Apple is essentially NeXT. They 'acquired' NeXT, but internally and politically, it was practically the other way around. Apple owns NeXT, including previous inventions.
    - WayneDB 14y ago
      That's absurd. Let's go back in time to 1995...NeXT and Apple are two separate companies. NeXT had a Dock. Windows had a Taskbar. Apple had neither. Stop trying to change history to suit your fanboy-dom. (Also, as gouranga mentioned below...RISC OS had them both before NeXT or Win95 anyway.)
      - whateverer 14y ago
        I only see one person throwing a fit over a product comparison here.
        WayneDB 14y ago
        So, disagreeing and showing facts is throwing a fit?
  - mistercow 14y ago
    >And I am correct in saying that Windows had a Taskbar before Apple had a Dock because Apple didn't own NeXTSTEP when the Dock was released. Only technically. As I mentioned in my other comment, System 7.5 had the Launcher, which was years before Microsoft introduced the Quick Launch toolbar in Windows 98.
mistercow 14y ago
>Excuse me, but Windows had a Taskbar before Apple had a Dock. Of course they did. But the Dock was used quite differently than the taskbar (it is primarily used to hold shortcuts, not to show you what is open), so it made sense to rename it in that case. But Microsoft seems to rename things just so they can feel unique. Don't get me wrong; I don't think it's some horrendous crime, or that it's unethical or anything. I just think it's funny. Apple has, of course, been known to do the same thing. For example, it was rather silly how before Lion, they insisted on referring to all perfectly ordinary 802.11 WiFi technologies as "AirPort", and how they wrapped OpenAL in the most cursory of framework boilerplate and called it "Core Audio". >Windows also had Quick Launch shortcuts before Apple had a Dock as well. And Apple had the Launcher three years earlier than that. But the Launcher wasn't the Dock, and neither were Quick Launch shortcuts. Pinning to the taskbar, on the other hand, is the Dock, almost to a T.

by WayneDB 14y ago

kolinko 14y ago

I'm sorry, what? Next had a dock IIRC, and it was released before Win95.

WayneDB 14y ago
Oh, so you think that Microsoft copied NeXTSTEP? An OS that practically nobody used at that time? Sorry, but you're assessment is clearly incorrect. First of all...the NeXT Dock was a simple launcher that showed you which program was running by altering the icon. The Taskbar works nothing like that. The Start button was Windows' simple launcher and the Taskbar originally showed one button per window. As a matter of fact, it still shows one task button per window if you want it to.
- gouranga 14y ago
  Spot on. Also if you want to be pedantic, RISCOS had a dock and taskbar in 1987 that was pretty close to win95.
- mistercow 14y ago
  >An OS that practically nobody used at that time? How is that relevant?

whateverer 14y ago

Now, now. You can't claim that they aren't similar, because the concept here is unifying both launchers and task lists, which was what distinguished docks from task bars before. They have different features, yes. Their animations are very different, that's actually where most of the differences lie, yes. But now, as far as task/window management goes, they are pretty much the same thing. I wouldn't hesitate to call Gnome Shell's activity bar thingy a dock, for one, even though it wouldn't matter; the dock doesn't have the same prominence that environment as in Windows or Mac OS X. Still, I don't see the problem with them retaining their traditional name for their UI element, given that the new taskbar was still an evolution from the previous one. Now, with respect to the interaction, MS is mostly following the trend here, as most are converging towards search for launching, and with the reduced task management of smart phones, I would expect that developers would now be encouraged to make their apps save and restore their states without the user's intervention, and thus applications where you actually have to do the clean up, save, close, start, open, repeat cycle would also become rarer, so that those session-restore features that some DEs have would actually start to be used, further downplaying the actual launching of applications.

WayneDB 14y ago
Claiming that Microsoft blatantly copied "pinned items" is a gross over-simplification though. So is claiming that "they are pretty much the same thing". They're not. And I am correct in saying that Windows had a Taskbar before Apple had a Dock because Apple didn't own NeXTSTEP when the Dock was released.
- flatline3 14y ago
  > And I am correct in saying that Windows had a Taskbar before Apple had a Dock because Apple didn't own NeXTSTEP when the Dock was released. Given Apple's history, that's a stretch. Modern Apple is essentially NeXT. They 'acquired' NeXT, but internally and politically, it was practically the other way around. Apple owns NeXT, including previous inventions.
  - WayneDB 14y ago
    That's absurd. Let's go back in time to 1995...NeXT and Apple are two separate companies. NeXT had a Dock. Windows had a Taskbar. Apple had neither. Stop trying to change history to suit your fanboy-dom. (Also, as gouranga mentioned below...RISC OS had them both before NeXT or Win95 anyway.)
    - whateverer 14y ago
      I only see one person throwing a fit over a product comparison here.
      - WayneDB 14y ago
        So, disagreeing and showing facts is throwing a fit?
- mistercow 14y ago
  >And I am correct in saying that Windows had a Taskbar before Apple had a Dock because Apple didn't own NeXTSTEP when the Dock was released. Only technically. As I mentioned in my other comment, System 7.5 had the Launcher, which was years before Microsoft introduced the Quick Launch toolbar in Windows 98.

mistercow 14y ago

>Excuse me, but Windows had a Taskbar before Apple had a Dock. Of course they did. But the Dock was used quite differently than the taskbar (it is primarily used to hold shortcuts, not to show you what is open), so it made sense to rename it in that case. But Microsoft seems to rename things just so they can feel unique. Don't get me wrong; I don't think it's some horrendous crime, or that it's unethical or anything. I just think it's funny. Apple has, of course, been known to do the same thing. For example, it was rather silly how before Lion, they insisted on referring to all perfectly ordinary 802.11 WiFi technologies as "AirPort", and how they wrapped OpenAL in the most cursory of framework boilerplate and called it "Core Audio". >Windows also had Quick Launch shortcuts before Apple had a Dock as well. And Apple had the Launcher three years earlier than that. But the Launcher wasn't the Dock, and neither were Quick Launch shortcuts. Pinning to the taskbar, on the other hand, is the Dock, almost to a T.