“Apple’s BSD-based MacOS X 10.3 Panther offers 64-bit processor support and new features wrapped in the latest version of a GUI that has its roots in the NeXT desktop. While Panther sets a new standard for ease of use and interface look and feel, it still lacks features that Linux users have long enjoyed.” Read the article at NewsForge by C. Gulker. Update: SunSpot has a review too: “One more cool cat“.
An Early Eval of Apple’s MacOS X 10.3
About The Author
Eugenia Loli
Ex-programmer, ex-editor in chief at OSNews.com, now a visual artist/filmmaker.
Follow me on Twitter @EugeniaLoli
ANyone know if expose is patented in any way? Could we implement a Open Source equivilent?
Complaints(article), I say if you want Linux just use it along with Mac OS or Windows. Apple isn’t and can’t please everyone. It’s the reason all OS’s have thier appeal to thier users.
Personally I haven’t tried Panther yet, but it looks pretty sweet!
That had to be one of the most whiney articles I’ve ever read. Can you say “nitpicking”?
I got the feeling that the author was striving to find something negative to write about Pather because it has been reviewed so positively in the press as of late… as apposed to his fav Os… which I can only assume (based on the nature of NewsForge’s focus) is Linux.
Its right to call OS X out if it lacks features that are desired, but if you’re going to do it, you should be consistant that your arguments for other OSes.
Very few of the arguments the author made against OS X hold any weight as they appeared to be way over exagerated or simply not true.
in the opening paragraph the writer says that panther lacks features that linux users have long enjoyed, but fails to mention what these might be. anyone see this in there?
“ANyone know if expose is patented in any way? Could we implement a Open Source equivilent?”
Rather than try to copy Apple, why not come up with a better UI feature to best them?
As long as Linux keeps copying ideas from other OSes, it will be still considered by a large percentage of the population as an also-ran operating system.
in the opening paragraph the writer says that panther lacks features that linux users have long enjoyed, but fails to mention what these might be. anyone see this in there?
Virtual desktops.
it seems as if the guy never used Jaguar or earlier. the speed increase alone is worth the price, this is the first retail aqua OSX release that can run comfortably on a G3 or a system with 256M RAM. the finder is elegant and responsive compared to other releases, and compared to other OSes, it’s a complete dream. it doesn’t try to show me my pictures or play my audio or video files, and it doesn’t steal valuable screen real estate like WinXP’s explorer or Nautilus. the Finder is freezes a bit when connecting accross the network, I haven’t noticed it except via http://ftp... try putting in a CD on Windows and see real freezing.
and, if you want a more *nix-like experience, install X and KDE/Gnome with fink, do a >console login and startx.
Virtual desktops is also an non-intuitive feature. It adds a layer of abstraction, and non-cs people don’t handle abstraction very well. Better to leave that feature for third-party developers.
There is nothing wrong to look at OS X from the point of view of potential “switcher”. Read the end:
“Will Panther tempt Linux users? Sure!”
You people are really oversensitive.
captain america (IP: —.ne.client2.attbi.com):
“i think i missed something”
Yes you did: try to browse smb across subnets for one.
Panther is nice step forward but there are some issues as with any OS. I dont see anything wrong wth his review from linux user stand point.
How hard is it to understand multiple desktops? “Imagine that you have several desktops, so you can put work stuff on one, do your $hobby on another, and books, newspapers and journals you read on the third. Just how hard is it to understand for a lifeform that (mostly) managed to grasp the incredibly complicated concept of walking on two legs? Everytime I operate a cellphone, copier, fax machine or VCR, I got a lot more abstraction and complexity flying in my face.
Virtual desktops aren’t a feature of an OS, are they? And there *is* an application that allows virtual desktops. I could understand saying virtual consoles, but desktops? That’s not true.
Features that linux users have enjoyed for years that aren’t part of Mac OS X? A mature TCP/IP implementation (darwin’s is good, but is still more sub-optimal than the standard linux stack). Assuming you’re going to put the window-manager in bed with the OS, X is still better for network transparency (not much else – but I love running X sessions using my big server box as, well… a server). Mac OS X is my favorite OS, even though it lacks the ability to do some things I want (finder is still brain-dead when it comes to networking, the filesystem isn’t the best, and the java implementation of things like the media framework (now part of standard java) sucks).
There is nothing wrong with the review of OS X from the point of view of potential “switcher”. Read the end:
“Will Panther tempt Linux users? Sure!”
You people are really oversensitive.
captain america (IP: —.ne.client2.attbi.com):
“i think i missed something”
Yes you did: try to browse smb across subnets for one.
Panther is nice step forward but there are some issues as with any OS. I dont see anything wrong with his review from linux or any other OS user stand point.
Panthers Finder has two modes, the metal browser being the default. Another mode, that exactly copies the OS9 finders behaviour, is accessed by clicking the upper right button. (it’s an aqua window by the way, not metal).
No multiple views of the same folder, but a 1:1 relation between folder and window. Size and position for each folder is preserved, as is background color, sorting and positioning of the icons,.. Pretty much the spatial finder Ars Technica would like.
Having tried both modes, I like the metal mode the best. I just can navigate allot faster with it.
Can anybody tell me how to install the classic environment after a clean panter install? I have the cd that came with my imac but the installer wants to install a bunch of other crap along with classic (which the only thing I want).
I am not saying no to new innovation but copying is how our societies stand today. We stand on the shoulders of Giants. Should we abandon using a mouse because it is copying Xerox? How about overlapping windows (lowercase W)? How about using icons to represent data? Copying good things is good for technology and society – else everyone would be doomed to reinvent the wheel. Apple have a cool wheel in their OS and I think it is good enough to copy.
Try Pacifist (search for it on versiontracker and macupdate). It can open up / list the package files from your CDs and install only the application(s) you want.
The first paragraph is flame-bait, if only because he never backs it up later. However, the rest of the article isn’t bad. I think this is a canonnical list of complaints he had with OS X:
– The new finder is sacrilage to old-school MacOS users
– The hierarchical listing could be confusing to new users
– NFS can only be turned on via the CLI
– Panther wouldn’t connect to an NFS share
– Finder stalls while accessing remote shares
– The GUI locked up
– Doesn’t have virtual desktops
– Mail doesn’t integrate well with the iApps
Other than that, the review was very positive. Part of it was from a Lnux user’s point of view (mostly the networking) while part of it seemed to be from a classic MacOS point of view (the GUI stuff). All in all, it seemed to be quite a fair review for the stuff he used the OS for. You personally might think some of the network complaints are minor, but people who work in a networked environment find this important. For example, I use Konqueror’s built-in FTP/SSH support to access lots of content on my campus network. If Konq didn’t behave properly when I tried to do this, I’d certainly mention it in a review.
I found the review ok, mostly similar to what other Linux users say.
I find that whoever says Virtual Desktops are essential has evidently not worked with technical support. Adding that additional dimension would really be too much to bear for common, non-technical users.
I find that initial releases of OS X are buggy. I think it’s the fact that the APIs are not yet mature enough and that the kernel is still undergoing massive changes. I mean, it was based on FreeBSD 3.3 on 10.0, FreeBSD 4.0 on Jaguar and now FreeBSD 5 on Panther. I think next versions will enjoy more stability and will really evolutionize.
Just a note, a few of the XFCE(xfce.org) developers have began work on an Expose clone to incorporate into their Desktop Environment.
If you want this(like I do), be sure to send a message to the mailing list or message boards encouraging this.
I’ve seen a number of comments that virtual desktops are not needed or that they are to hard to work with for the average user, or complicate tech support, etc.
I personally find them extremely helpful. I’m a long time UNIX geek tho. It would be perfectly acceptable to have the default setting be 1 desktop. If I want to enable them, I go system configuration, turn them on and specify how many I want.
It would also be really cool to map the F8 key to Expose to tile virtual desktops like F9 does for open windows. That way I can switch windows very quickly w/ Expose, using an animation like the fast user switching to switch between the desktops.
In fact, when I think about it, there is a really cool way this could all be set up……
1. Allow multiple instances of the same login with Fast User Switching (FUS). Each session would be discrete, in that in one instance, I can’t access applications open in another instance. Typical multi-user.
2. Allow FUS Groups. This means if I make accounts “KelsonWork”, “KelsonHome”, “KelsonCoding”, I can put them all in FUS Group “Kelson”. Accounts in the same FUS Group can do FUS w/o requiring a password, after the initial login for each session.
3. Bind the F8 key to do Expose between all open FUS open sessions.
This allows virtual desktops and fast convenient switching between multiple accounts, w/o having to enter passwords everytime you flip around between users. Plus, it reuses all of the eye candy already developed for FUS and Expose.
Before people argue that you don’t need multiple logins for a single person, I would point out that alot of us use our laptops for personal and for work. I don’t like to have my personal projects/data getting mixed up with my work data. I want to back them up separately, etc.
– Kelson
I think not. While Mac OS X is a good operating system and I do have a copy and I have installed it. I love SUSE more, in other words you would have to pull SUSE out of my cold dead hands before I even considered switching full time to the Mac
In our shop we have 6 G5(decked with 8 gig ram) and 60 macs.Everyone has 2 23″ monitors at 1920X1600 res ..Who needs virtual desktop.!
Come on, OS X has more end-user features than any linux available… have you seen the graphical interface? have you seen the availability of high-quality applications?
If a mac user still wants all those “linux” features he can get a copy of yellow dog linux and use it… I bet they will all stay running Panther.
When are we going to understand that linux still lacks of high quality applications for the end user? I would _love_ to have panther for i386.
“I find that initial releases of OS X are buggy. I think it’s the fact that the APIs are not yet mature enough”
Please think a little bit before to write such things. Do you really think that COCOA is not mature enough, are you killing or what?
And the author makes a lot of mistakes, the colomn view is absolutely not the default view is osx. The user can use any view he wants. And anyway, i think the colum view is a very nice feature for previewing files, and navigate easily accross the file system.
And for people who say that HFS+ is not good, i would like to know why. So far its gives really good results. its now journalised, its has a built-in defragmentation, and don’t forget that osx has the best search engine around.
I have the feeling that the author of the articke give us a lot of points that he doesn’t like but he doesn’t explain clearly why he thinks so. and i really don’t undertsand why os9 users may have problems to use osx. it doesn’t make sense at all to say so!!!!!
Forget Panther, just get PATH FINDER! It RAWKS! It is also much cheaper than upgrading AGAIN. From what I can tell, it is actually better than Apples Finder.
Not kidding!
Dan
Hi all,
The author of that article used to work for Apple until he was fired. He’s obviously still bitter about it. That’s why the article reads as a complete flamebait.
“Virtual desktops is also an non-intuitive feature. It adds a layer of abstraction, and non-cs people don’t handle abstraction very well. Better to leave that feature for third-party developers.”
The Amiga public screens system is a more advanced equivalent of virtual desktops, and ordinary users never have any problems with it. An Amiga user just expects a program to open on its own screen.
I haven’t seen Expose, but it sounds complicated.
In the article he says…
“I think nothing of leaving apps and files open for days or even weeks on the Linux machine.”
He is referring to his use of virtual desktops, but the implication of this this statement is that leaving files and apps open for days or even weeks in OS X is a problem. I can say with great certainty that it is not. OS X excels at having a large array of apps and files open for long periods of time. I rarely ever close anything, instead just hiding it. I often find myself with nearly two dozen apps of varying sizes open at any one time—many with files open—with no appreciable slowdown, especially in Panther.
Having no real experience with Linux I cannot claim OS X is better at this, but in my experience it does exceed Windows’ capabilities in this area.
The only exceptions I have seen are apps with memory leaks.
i have both an iBook and a linux desktop, and neither has any trouble having dozens of apps open for months on end. windows is the only machine with an issue there……
as for virtual desktops, the average user will have an easier time with expose. personally i agree, they should be an option (and there are apps for X that let you have them, it should just come standard) but not on by default. even though i loved it in linux for years before i got the Mac, i wouldn’t turn them on, but i do understand why you would want to.