But I like writing nasty multithreaded code.
Slugs? Couldn’t we have stuck with cretin, or dork, or nerd? In know that many of us have hygiene issue but must we insinuate a general slime trail?
Geesh.
Keith:
Think you’re being a little shortsighted. Apple’s still a computer company – some of their computers are just getting a lot smaller, and you can make phone calls on a few of them. The Mac and the iPhone are not on parallel tracks; they’re traveling along converging lines. Seems to me that soon, Apple is going to return to one OS that works on everything, and iPhone news* will be Mac news.
S
[size=85]*and [INSERT NEW TABLET-LIKE PRODUCT HERE] news[/size]
I agree with Sean.
OS X on the iphone and Mac OS X are sharing code when feasible.
Core Data was evolved in Mac OS X and now has moved over to the iPhone. Quicktime X in Mac OS X was borne from the iPhone’s Quicktime stack.
I like this because it forces Apple to keep API small and as lightweight as they can get away with.
Mac OS X is not dead in fact it just may see a revival.
Snow Leopard is getting a smaller footprint because it does away with all the PPC legacy code. I’m not being “short-sighted”, thanks, just expressing my opinion. OS X is lovely in general and light years ahead of other OSes but there are a lot of areas that could do with work that haven’t been touched for a while (by which I mean years), and speaking as a developer this can be frustrating. The text system is a prime example of this - the rich text control in the Windows API ten years ago was in many ways more advanced that the NSText system in use by OS X today, which is what many programs (such as Scrivener) have to rely on. I’m sure Snow Leopard will be very nice - Leopard is superb and it sounds as though my major gripes with Leopard are gone - but after two years really we are just getting a minor update to Leopard, with lots of internal fixes; the interface has yet to be properly unified and there is still stuff outstanding. To me it seems as though Apple are trying to trumpet something that they know is really a point update because most of their focus has been on the iPhone. And it is a little unrealistic to think that the iPhone and a full Mac can ever run exactly the same OS even if the OSes are based on the same code.
Sorry, and with all due respects to Alexander Bell, but I’m just one of the few who cannot get very excited by a mobile phone. But then, grumpy luddite that I am, I think that the mobile phone is one of the worst inventions of the modern age anyway. Fantastic things for when you’ve broken down or find yourself in the middle of nowhere, but the most annoying things on the planet when you’re trying to read a book on a bus or train - and no amount of apps in the App Store will fix that, unless they have got one that tells the user to shut up and let the people around him or her sit in peace. 
I hope that JackNewcastle is right and that Apple have put a lot of work into getting the underlying architecture right for the next ten years. And I am heartened by the rewrite of the Finder in Cocoa - that shows a strong commitment to Cocoa that stands us Cocoa developers in good stead. There are just other hoary old issues that I wish they’d sort out too.
Apologies for the grumpy reply but I’m not big on being called “short sighted” and I’ve just come out the other side of two hours of hideous paperwork with never puts me in the best of moods!
Best,
Keith
Well reasoned and insightful comment! Welcome to the forum!
I’m sorry. I meant narrow minded.*
[size=85]*A joke! I kid! I just like to poke fun at the short sighted, because they never see it coming. I apologize for calling you a name. You grump. [/size]
Oh, “grump” and “narrow-minded” I can live with, my better half calls me those every day. And for your information, my astigmatisms quite cleared themselves a number of years ago so am glasses-free these days thank you very much.
Amber - I have wanted one of those for so long; I completely empathise with the architect.
I want one of these too:
It is a tiny remote that turns off TVs. That is all it does. I had to have my car repaired and this place has a huge, loud TV in the waiting room. I knew that I would be there for two to three hours. So… when no one was looking I pulled the plug out just enough so that it looked plugged in but the TV wouldn’t work. Watching the people trying to get the TV to work was better than the book I had brought. No one tried the obvious which was the plug.
Apollo16
I bought one of those TVBGone devices and was really disappointed. In US airports, where I spend a lot of time, the loud TVs in gate areas are encased in boxes/brackets that hide the IR port so it’s tough to get the signal thru to the TV.
Even in areas where the TV is fully exposed, the range on the little device is quite short. I could never get it to work from more than 15 feet away. I emailed the company and they said they’d replace it, that there must be a problem with the battery, but they wanted me to return the original one and I never bothered.
Great idea though.
I fully agree with Keith in his negative perception of certain aspects of Apple’s politics.
Apple has been investing and is still investing countless millions into the development of iPods and iPhones. Apple is putting a lot of care into the development of applications like Aperture and Final Cut.
But it doesn’t come to the mind of those who are in charge over there, to invest a hundred thousand dollars into their text editor. And probably much less would be sufficient. Two gifted developers could do a lot of good in six months time.
The reason of this stubborn refusal is clear. The costumers Apple has in mind aren’t people who read and write, but people who chat, listen to their favorite music and take pictures. Superficial people. Apple is an American company; and just under the surface of American society illitteracy is lurking everywhere.
It’s a shame, but I’m afraid we’ll have to live with it.
I think you meant “illiteracy”. (Ducks.)
It’s one thing to attack American society for illiteracy, but ducks as well?
I’m going to disagree with both sides. While I abhor apples focus on things that I consider “trivial” (my life would be no different if I used a blackberry instead of an iPhone), I think there focus on sellable products has actually BENEFITTED many folks.
- All the idiots are funding R&D that eventually trickles down to me.
- They focus on core OS, while annoying, makes folks like nessus needed.
- If apple made the OS “perfect” then many small shops like L&L would be non-existent.
- Isn’t the idea behind winblows exactly the same, an OS that does it all? Who wants OSX to turn into another vista?
That said I do think Apple should improve the standard text system. And open pages formats. What I don’t want to see them to is kill the small shops or become the “big brother” on my OS.
Timotheus:
Wow. Someone woke up on the wrong side of the bed, huh? At least you’re on the right side of the Atlantic, I suppose.
I have to say, I admire the thoroughness of your post. You managed to be insulting not just to the Americans in this forum, but also to the photographers, filmmakers and musicians (I’m sure they were all as surprised as I was to discover that their art is superficial.)
I’ve heard a lot of criticism of Apple over the years, but your is definitely unique. Forgive me if I’m oversimplifying, but your complaint seems to be along the lines of “Yes, Apple has created some of the most innovative, useful, productivity-enhancing, beautiful products ever, and they allow me to use a wonderful tool like Scrivener, but in the end they suck because I can’t do footnotes like I want to, even though I can, but I can’t do it without another application so they suck and iPhones suck and cell phones suck, and anybody who doesn’t do what I do also sucks.”
Well argued, friend!
Mr Coffee, might you be taking Mr Tim a little too seriously? What I read was “I don’t like the fact that my favorite company is shifting focus to the infantile population in America.” I think )that is a dangerous activity for me) that we are both able to agree that the infantile population in America is probably closer to a true majority than most suspect. And the activities of the afore mentioned population line up with what Mr Tim mentions.
Could his post have been a little clearer? Certainly. But it might, just possible be true that you need another gulp of coffee. Or maybe scotch. Then again, I am the one without a head. What do I know.
I’m not going to fault Apple here.
They haven’t let the text tools just languish. Leopard attempted to unify some things and improve others but I’m sure things still need to be fleshed out.
For Snow Leopard I’m thrilled to have concurrency API that make it as simple as it’s going to get, a move towards using the GPU for general purpose computing and a recommittment to Services and further evolution of Applescript.
I’d love to see 10.7 offer outstanding text services and the largest update to scripting support that we’ve seen. Let’s be honest though …Apple never said Snow Leopard would be chalk full of new features. I guess the’re saving a little meat on the bone for 10.7
Brother Tim: A few months ago I would have agreed with you 100%, but then I got an iPhone. 99 bucks for 8 gigs. I don’t have a single tune or photo on it. It’s a mobile computer that fits in my pocket, and I have it full of text and data apps that support my work as a writer. See editorialengine.com/?p=1554
With it, I can take notes, look up data, consult library catalogs, order offprints, and store reference books. (Also make phone calls, which is handy.) The new 3 GS has voice recognition. Down the line, we’ll have image recognition. I’ll be able to walk in the woods, show the “phone” a leaf, and get an ID on the species. It’s a computer, not a silly gadget.
Now, because July 4th is coming, I must rise to the defense of our national literacy. Despite what you think, not every American is a moron. (Even Wock and Jaysen write purty well, when they have access to corn likker.) I was recently in Europe and saw lots of phoning and texting. Sure, new tools may be used for dumb tasks. True of all technology, back to quill pens and papyrus. But a mass market enables writers and scholars to play, too; and no telling where we’ll take it. --D
(PS: “costumers” and “illitteracy” in your rant are priceless!)
That I need another gulp of coffee is without question. That it needs a shot (or four) of whiskey is beyond doubt. That I took Tim’s post a little too seriously… I don’t know. I own an iPhone, I listen to music, and I use Final Cut and Aperture to make my living. Oh, and I live in America. As I read some of the previous posts, that makes me an illiterate idiot, sucking valuable resources away from serious people. Can’t see how I possibly could have taken that the wrong way.
Dear friends, don’t shoot at me! I just wanted to be a little provocative; and a knew I would get the reactions that a got.
Nobody has to explain to me that the United States have some of the best universities in the world, that the majority, or at least a very substantial part, of Noble Prize winners are American, and so on.
And yet … but I won’t insist on this point, which is completely off-topic here, because I don’t want to offend anybody.
But let me insist instead on another point, which is on topic: I think it’s almost Apple’s moral duty to invest some more money into the further development of their text editor, which has been incorporated in so many applications on their platform.
@ Druid: thanks for pointing out to me the advantages of the iPhone. But I’m still doing most of the things that you mention with my MacBook, which as a computer I greatly prefer to the iPhone, because of its far larger screen. It’s true that a MacBook is far less transportable than an MacBook, but nothing is perfect!
And as far as illit(t)eracy is concerned: thanks, jebni, for correcting me! I’m usually writing in languages in which words deriving from the Latin word LITTERA are spelled with double t; but now I know that in English one t is enough!