Linked by Thom Holwerda on Fri 8th Dec 2006 21:24 UTC
Mac OS X OS X is more appealing to enterprises as a desktop operating system than ever before and although it is unlikely to take market share away from Windows, the Mac could reduce the number of Linux-based desktops, according to research group Gartner. In a report published by Gartner this week titled Enterprise Mac Clients Remain Limited, but Apple's Appeal is Growing, analysts Michael Silver, Neil MacDonald, Ray Wagner and Brian Prentice, said that administrators will most likely have to prepare for more Mac systems in their environment even though OS X is "not a suitable enterprise wide platform". Ars weighs in on the issue as well.
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RE: Well
by StephenBeDoper on Fri 8th Dec 2006 23:44 UTC in reply to "Well"
StephenBeDoper
Member since:
2005-07-06

Drag the app to the HD to install, move it to the trash to uninstall. Myself, I like the Mac install/uninstall system more than the Windows way of doing things.

I've often read praise for the ease of software installation in OS X. For the last week though, I've been setting up an old G4 (10.4 installed) and I've found it often requires jumping through a ridiculous amount of hoops. Especially with driver installation, I've run into two or three situations where the install process is: download a SIT file, it gets automatically decompressed after download (with no indication where the files are actually decompressed to - I had to run a search the first time), then you have a DMG file to double-click, it mounts, and there's an install wizard inside it (oh pardon me, install "assistant").

I can't for the life of me figure out why I couldn't have simply just downloaded the binary for the installer in the first place - or a SIT file simply containing the installer. I don't see what advantage the additional packaging of the disk image adds (especially when in many cases, the apps themselves are further "packaged" within a bundle). I've also seen situations, with people who don't fully understand the concept of disk images, where they don't realize they should move the app to their Applications folder and end up running apps directly from the DMG all the time.

Reply Parent Bookmark Score: 5

RE[2]: Well
by MikeGA on Fri 8th Dec 2006 23:59 in reply to "RE: Well"
MikeGA Member since:
2005-07-22

Well to be fair, drivers are a bit of a special case. And there are still a few idiots who package an installer inside a disk image inside an archive.

Apple has a standard package installer. Place that in a disk image. Please.

Reply Parent Bookmark Score: 2

RE[2]: Well
by alcibiades on Sat 9th Dec 2006 08:00 in reply to "RE: Well"
alcibiades Member since:
2005-10-12

Cannot help a wry smile at this. Surely the whole thing about OSX was, it avoided Driver Hell by being specially designed for its hardware as one integrated whole....Now we have a guy installing it on a Mac, and what does he complain about?

Drivers!

Reply Parent Bookmark Score: 3

RE[3]: Well
by steviant on Sun 10th Dec 2006 00:29 in reply to "RE[2]: Well"
steviant Member since:
2006-01-11

"Cannot help a wry smile at this. Surely the whole thing about OSX was, it avoided Driver Hell by being specially designed for its hardware as one integrated whole....Now we have a guy installing it on a Mac, and what does he complain about?

Drivers!"

To be fair, I've been using OS X since the public betas, and have never had an issue installing a driver. Of course I've probably only ever installed 3 drivers during that time. Since (as you point out) the drivers for bluetooth, usb2, fw400, fw800, video, network, wifi, modem etc are all supplied as an integral part of the OS and set themselves up automatically.

Reply Parent Bookmark Score: 1