“Look at the first desktop screenshot at left. It looks like a Mac OS X machine, right? Wrong. It’s a Windows XP box made up to look like a Mac. Look closely, and you’ll see that its creator has done a very good job; although the machine is running Windows XP, the interface is almost indistinguishable from an OS X machine. Notice the dock, desktop background, menus, system font and icons for applications and folders. Even the keyboard shortcuts belong to the Mac OS X.” Read the rest of the article with screenshots at Wired.
Windows XP Users Copy the Feel of Mac OS X
About The Author
Eugenia Loli
Ex-programmer, ex-editor in chief at OSNews.com, now a visual artist/filmmaker.
Follow me on Twitter @EugeniaLoli
Don’t get me wrong, I love OS X, but this guy has WAY to much time on his hands. Anyone this good should be overworked by his employer.
And besides, I can’t imagine a copy of Windows XP made to conform to the MacOS interface would be particularly easy to use.
if you go to such great length to emulate the MacOS X look&feel, why not buy a Mac then?
Don’t tell me it’s price
Object Dock and Lite Step, salvation from an otherwise boring XP desktop.
Do these Aqua emulators include a “finder” app for windows?
Although I use 2xExplorer/xplorer2, I’m always on the lookout for a better file manager.
btw: they may be able to emulate the l&f of Aqua, but I don’t believe they will ever achieve the ease of use of a Mac (e.g. in/uninstalling appliations)
Hi. I would buy a Mac, if it wasn’t for the price. It isn’t a situation where I can say, “I will buy this Mac, because though it is extremely pricey, I can take comfort knowing that for the money I spent, I am getting a far superiour computer.” It’s more a case of, “I simply do NOT have the money to buy this Mac.” I’d also rather have a Lexus than my ’88 Grand Am with an exhaust system that’s falling off, but, again, I don’t have the money. At least with Mac, there are ways to simulate the look and feel without forking over the money.
I thought I read a while back tht Apple has a copyright on their icons. Anyway it is a pipe dream, but I would run OSX if it were available for x86. You can pick up a refurbished eMac from Apple for about $600, maybe it’s time I make better use of my KVM switch.
Oy, this is why people think Mac OS X is nothing special. No matter how much you make Windows XP look like Mac OS X’s aqua is completely unimportant. The great thing about Mac OS X is the display engine which cannot be replicated by surface modifications. Frankly, I don’t like the whole transparent white thing, but I love Mac OS X. Here, he’s reproduced what is the most questionable part of Mac OS X and left out the good part.
Longhorn will probably bring a lot of the OS X enhancements to Windows, but might not.
Oh, this guy has some serious copyright infringement problems on his hands too.
“Oh, this guy has some serious copyright infringement problems on his hands too”
no if he actually bought a mac and doesnt redistrubute it.
so much for the blame of open source people cloning stuff
“Oh, this guy has some serious copyright infringement problems on his hands too”
Oddly, Apple got a cease and desist against YZ Dock but not Stardock…OS X looks great. People are going to copy it’s look regardless. You can can Panther lookalike themes for most Window Managers. It’s about LOOKS, it’s not about the FEEL of OS X.
Everyone loves Macosx.Just go to kde-look.org and see how many different themes revolve around emulating OSX
ex: http://kde-look.org/content/preview.php?preview=1&file=5609-1.png&n…
I wouldn’t mind getting stiffed on the price – but on top of that any computer is obsolete so quickly that Macs, altho full of attractive panache, have never been worth it. My wintel box gets the job done more than adequately and is more easily replaceable every couple years.
The article does tend to reinforce my view that Apple has lost a lot more market share and profit by being priced for the snob market than it has ever gained. Coulda been a contender.
We always get the pricy Mac argument whenever there is an Apple story. I personally own a Mac and make only about 32k a year. If you would learn to save your money it might not be an issue. eMacs are even cheap enough that you could add one to your existing setup.
Back on topic. Why would you want your WinXP machine to look like OS X, better yet why would you spend all that time? Why not put your tallents to make a original theme, something different that a copy. Just my thoughts.
I used to do this to my XP box but then I bought a Mac.
Sure you can make it look like OS X but it doesn’t work like OS X. You end up with a clunky system that looks nice and not a smooth operating system that looks nice.
Also, the reason people do this is because it’s fun. I had a lot of fun modding my desktop to look like OS X or even better in some cases.
Do these Aqua emulators include a “finder” app for windows? Although I use 2xExplorer/xplorer2, I’m always on the lookout for a better file manager.
It’s kinda funny you should mention this, because the Finder is one part of OS X that is roundly criticized. I personally don’t really like it that much. I have an alias of my drives in the dock and use a right click (Yes, Macs have supported 2-button mice for a long, long time, you just don’t need them to work effectively) to navigate. It’s a great deal faster. Although, for sheer navigating speed on OS X, you can’t beat xfile:
http://rixstep.com/4/0/xfile/
It is freakishly light and fast (but of course not as feature-laden as Finder). Oddly enough, it reminds me a lot of Windows Explorer.
Speaking of mice and Macs, I use a Logitech 4-button trackball and I have the other 2 buttons mapped to expose functions (the “clear to desktop” and “all application windows” ones). If you have the hardware, give this a try. I found it really to increase efficiency. The only problem was actually mapping the buttons in the Logitech system preference. If you try and map the button to a keypress, the system preference won’t take the expose hotkey (it just invokes expose). You have to first map the expose hotkeys to different keys in the expose preference, then use the Logitech control panel to assign the buttons to the old keys (F13 and F15 by default), and then use the expose system preference to switch back to the now assigned hotkeys. It takes an extra step, but once you’ve done it once, you never have to bother with it again.
“It’s kinda funny you should mention this, because the Finder is one part of OS X that is roundly criticized.”
yes. nautilus has revived the classic finder in a better way that os X
This just made me laugh…
“Much of it is price,” agreed Mazer. “We are all geeks, so we already own $3,000 PCs, or we simply own a PC we’re happy with. We don’t have the money to go out and buy a brand new Mac. We have more time/skills than money basically.”
They can’t afford a Mac but they can afford a $3000 PC?! For that kind of money, the differences between a Mac and PC aren’t great. A Mac might cost $100-$200 more, but you get more software out of the box and a nicer overall package. Also you don’t have 6 different shell extensions competing to emulative (the gorgeous) Mac look a feel.
That said, I’m just after buying a Dell ($1200, I like to leave money over for a pint!). Guess all I can do is wait for E17..
Well, it’s always a matter of personal preference. But I personally don’t think the aqua look is very professional. It looks cool the first few hours then you just grow tired of it.
As for the window decorations I much more prefer the agualemon theme for XFwm, it looks like the aqua windowbar only 10 times more professional. It’s there, it looks good but it doesn’t steal the show.
While making Windows look like OSX won’t replicate OSX in terms of technology I can understand why some people want to do that, especially since the default XP themes are horrible. Some people actually prefer windows over mac, but they may want the looks of OSX.
mapping the buttons in the MS explorer mouse is easier… just map them!!
you want the classic finder?
see that elongated button in the top right corner of your finder window? click it…
ta-da!!!!!! classic finder.
what is professional anyway?
no photo realism for icons?
square boring windows?
bland look and feel?
because if OS X looks unprofessional, then I would have to conclude that that is what you consider professional.
The rest of the modifications like dock, aqua theme & windowblinds are superficial, but does anyone here know how one could get the menu detached from the MDI windows and have it displayed on the top just like in MacOS? Looking at the screenshot, it would seem like this is possible, so I am very curious to find out how its done. Thanks!
were all those Mac loving fans, when I was selling my 2 G4s with OSX. I was selling them for 2 months until I sold them for almost half of price just to get rid of them.
Most of the reason for selling them was that annoying OSX (10.2 in that time, but as far as I looked Panther is not getting better either at least for my taste), which I really can’t stand.
For my taste the most stupid thigs in computing world are:
1. Trying to make your system look like another – It will just slow down your computer and probably interface won’t take all advantages that it could (Windows and OSX WM handle things completely different), besides you’ll be prone to run some middleware that could be corrupted in next Service Pack.
2. Using your computer for tasks that are not part of it’s regime. example: Compiling fink etc. on OSX to make environment semi Linux like to take advantage of simple system administration (OSX terminal sucks, just as X11 isn’t included in base OSX).
Administration – use Linux or Windows if you control Windows environment, it’s stupid to spend time preparing environment just as peoples time is worth nothing (but nothing can’t beat Linux)
DTP – Windows or OSX, (middleware runed software does not take all things together as it should)
Games – PS2 or XBOX
CAD – Windows or OSX (or Linux if your software runs on it)
Coding – Use the environment you code for
Simple user (e-mail, office, internet) – Any system but Linux is the cheapest solution here, and as I look at my self it’s the most productive too (no downtime, Windows has it’s faults being prone to spyware and viruses and requires additional software installation, OSX just doesn’t cover everything from the base setting, and to admit I’ve never felt good doing this tasks on Mac)
And for the last: THE FEWER THE CHANGES TO BASE SYSTEM, THE BETTER CHANCE YOU HAVE THAT YOUR SYSTEM RUNS AS IT SHOULD
that’s funny, because of ALL the things to copy, those abominable shortcuts are the worst!
I *hate* hunting for that rotten apple key, when the CTRL key is sitting at the unmissable corner of the board :/
interrupting the flow of my touch typing is not high on my list of enviable Mac OS X features.
I dont know why this stuff is all of a sudden ‘news’. This stuff has been arround for atleast two years, maybe more.
It’s shameful, but Windows XP with the latest Nvidia drivers has FAR superior multi-monitor support compared to Mac. Using a Mac is like going back in time to some dark ages.
And not having anything comparable to ClearType is clearly hurting Apple, a company that used to focus on ergonomics and now only focuses on music players and nasty metal eye candy.
The Mac news is getting more and more to be outliers — data points that just don’t fit into any sort of distribution. While most people may not see it yet, the Mac has just about become irrelevant.
You Windows people are funny. You are too cheap to buy something good so you try to bash Macs because they are supposedly too expensive. Sure I could build a car for a lot less than a production car. But it wouldn’t be near as good. Same with PCs and Macs. My time and sanity are worth something. Apparently yours is worth a lot less as you end up spending a lot more time fighting the OS and apps and fighting viruses. That’s your choice.
Note: My original iMac (blue) version B is still used quite a bit by my wife to surf the web, do e-mails, and basically everything she wants. And my 2 year old 800mhz G4 iMac lamp is very happy doing all the same things plug GarageBand.
Meanwhile my wife’s sister’s family keeps upgrading their PCs every 18 months. They have spent more money buying Dell computers to do supposedly equivalent things. And they’s had a LOT more issues with Windows support than I’ve had with my Macs.
Now it’s your turn to tell me how few problems you’ve had with your PC and Windows. But you never admit to yourself or to anyone else how much you’ve really had to do. That’s ok. I don’t mind if you lie to yourself. I really couldn’t care less. I’m happy. That’s what matters.
Am I a Mac Zealot? All I can say is this. I don’t buy junk cars but that doesn’t mean I’m a car zealot. I don’t buy junk motorcycles. It doesn’t make me a motorcycle zealot. I just like stuff that works and doesn’t break down very often.
Well, my whole little rant wasn’t posted in the article, but the main point of Aqua Emulation really isn’t about Aqua or Macs at all.
The people at Aqua-Soft love to tweak their computers. They like graphic design, they like resource hacking, and they like making themes. It’s that simple. They enjoy doing it, and even after they own macs they continue to. It’s not always about the money.
In fact, basically the entire staff at Aqua-Soft owns a mac (many own multiple macs). We do it because we consider it a type of art, that is all. Seriously, these Mac zealots are getting all worked up (and frankly sound jealous) over this.
And yes, we may technically be infringing on Apple’s copyrights, but we are completely non profit, and have convinced HUNDREDS of users to buy macs. Read the forums some time, and you’ll see all the users that bought macs solely because of Aqua-Soft.
what is professional anyway?
Not to sacrifice functionality and usability for eyecandy.
no photo realism for icons?
It doesn’t always have to be a problem. But icons are there to give you a quick knowledge about what kind of file you are looking at. Icons that are too “photo realistic” often needs a much large size to be recognizable, this leads to more use of screen real estate and the user needs to do more scrolling. Professional icons should be slick and clear. The Crystal SVG set is much better at this even though it has some problems. The icons in Zeta is even better.
It takes a lot of knowledge and skill to make good icons. It’s not just a downsized photo.
square boring windows?
Windows can have rounded borders (I actually recommended the agualemon theme which has rounded borders). But the colors of the buttons make them stand out way too much, and the horizontal lines is disturbing and for some visually challenged people it can be a real pain. The theme is also a bit too bright to be used in a graphics creation environment where the surrounding color should be a neutral gray. It might sound boring, but the computer is a primarly a tool for most poeple, it may be an artwork but it’s primarily a tool.
because if OS X looks unprofessional, then I would have to conclude that that is what you consider professional.
In a graphics designers perspective, OSX looks very professional since it’s very polished and “cool looking”. But for functionality and usability theres just too many compensations.
There’s nothing wrong in good looking things, I love design. But it should never sacrifice the usability of a tool.
Out of curiosity, on what are you basing your claims of superiority? Macs have and have had multiple monitor support for a long time, and Macs do have something comparable (and arguably superior) to cleartype (Quartz rendering). You can google for debates about superiority, but they are clearly (GET IT) comparable.
where has OS X sacrificed functionality for eye candy?
“You can “pretty up” the pig, but in the end… it’s *STILL* just a pig. A big fat, lazy animal born to be slaughtered… for bacon, ham, and spareribs!”
lol Got to Slashdot that one…(Score:1, Funny)
exactly. anyone who would say cleartype is better looking than a PDF is just being silly.
“It’s shameful, but Windows XP with the latest Nvidia drivers has FAR superior multi-monitor support compared to Mac. Using a Mac is like going back in time to some dark ages.”
Yeah Im sure most people need something more than using 2 23″ displays running 1920 by 1200 resolution, it’s barely enough space to contain Mail, iChat, Adium, Safari, Camino, Word, Excel and 20 other apps. Seriously every multi-monitor setup I’ve seen on Mac’s has worked fine and many much better than I expected… your the first I’ve ever heard to complain about this.
“And not having anything comparable to ClearType is clearly hurting Apple, a company that used to focus on ergonomics and now only focuses on music players and nasty metal eye candy.”
Im just curious if you’ve used Mac OS X, because everything on Mac OS X is very clear to read and has some great anti-aliasing controls which Windows lacks right now. Mac OS X has other controls comparable to ClearType. Oh and you can remove a lot of the metal from your apps if you want you can go into the app and find the NIB and change it yourself, something you will never be able to do on Windows. I have personally de-metalized iChat & Safari which in total took like 2 minutes to do… thats a lot of hard work.
I think this elaborate skinning is kinda neat just for the sake of doing it. I wonder if this new attention might catch Apple’s eye, however, and they are pretty litigious about this kind of thing.
That being said, while this is pretty cool, I actually try and differentiate all my systems as a visual reminder of where I am. That is to say, my Mac, windows, and KDE desktops intentionally look and act very differently so that I don’t plow through a file hierarchy only to remember that I am in the wrong system. The visuals are a graphic way of reinforcing the data structure in which I am currently working.
Where is the Safari icon?
lol
I find anti-aliased fonts look better under Linux and Mac OS than they do under Windows. Actually, font support is one of my major pet peeves about Windows. ClearType looks horrible, and is ultimately less readable than the standard font support. I think a lot of Windows users force themselves to believe ClearType is more readable, and then when they see other OSes they say, oh man, how horrible those AA fonts are. Meanwhile their eyes are deteriorating, and they are practicing self-deception.
Ah well.
Do you all have little ant concentration camps next to your computers so you can be the ruthless overlords of *something*? god you people judge and make comments as offensive, demeaning and self-aggrandizing as possible so you can make sure you feel superior to the “others”.
Makes me nauseous, honestly.
Instead of looking at this as not only an interesting phenomenon, but also good graphics craftsmanship, flattery by imitation, etc., you all just spew the first ignorant crap that arrives to your brain, or use it to keep pushing your little egocentric agenda.
where has OS X sacrificed functionality for eye candy?
If you read the whole comment you would have noticed that I gave a few examples.
I’d give you more if you where actually interested, but you are obviously not.
The wole pricing argument concerning MACs boils down to the fact that they are not upgradeable in the same way x86 based PCs are. I have not bought a complete PC system in 7-8 years but my system has always been resonably up-to-date. I guess I have spent about $200 a year on components.
But if I am ever going to buy a _laptop_ with my own money it’ll sure be a MAC! Laptops are in no way upgradeable to the same extent as desktops.
cd /usr/share/man/man3
open .
results: finder opens and the files are displayed instantly
Don’t know what the xfile guy is worried about….
If you already own a PC but then decide you like the look of a Mac it’s not like you can sell your PC for anything close to that.
Plus, when you consider these geeks are probably into gaming, dumping the PC is not really an option.
100% agree with you, this and few other reasons kept me from geting used to OSX.
Interface on OS9 was nice and clean (the first look and you knew everything, even the beginners), while OSX is … well … colorful.
I think the point people don’t get in the mac vs pc price arguement is that many of us geeks already own the $3000 PC. Personally I would like to try a mac but I don’t have the money to go out and buy a mac (even if it is comparable in price) for the same reason I don’t have the money to buy another pc (Not to mention that i probably don’t need a new pc or mac to do what I need).
“what is professional anyway?
Not to sacrifice functionality and usability for eyecandy.”
So, what you’re saying is that Windows XP is not professional?
“It takes a lot of knowledge and skill to make good icons. It’s not just a downsized photo.”
I agree. And many of the extra icons available for OS X on the theme sites are both very artistic and very easy to comprehend.
“In a graphics designers perspective, OSX looks very professional since it’s very polished and “cool looking”. But for functionality and usability theres just too many compensations.”
At this point I have no idea what you’re talking about.
Everyone’s entitled to their opinion about usability and looks. For me, and a few Mac switchers I know – OS9 was a painful eyesore and if OS X had simply been a Unix conversion of OS9 we would still be using XP. OS9 really was that bad in our minds.
Why do these things always become Mac OS v XP?
That is an argument no one can win, becasue it is always based on emotion, rarely facts.
I used to argue how “crap” Windows 3.x was compared to the version of Mac OS (7 I think) that was out at the time. All my friends thought the Mac way of doing things was stupid, the concept of a desktop and all.
Then 95 came out which pretty much took alot of the features my friends hated about the Mac OS and put then into Windows.
All of a sudden these features are cool. Hmmm… I know of features that have come from Windows and put into the Mac OS that are now considered cool by Mac users as well. It works both ways it seems…
What I am saying here is that the decision to stick with XP or OS X is an emotional one, no matter how many “facts” are thrown around.
The article is clearly aimed at people who like the Aqua interface, but don’t own a Mac. It is not aimed at people who own Macs, nor people who own XP and dislike Aqua.
These things are always a matter of taste, emotion and so on, things you can’t prove, things you can’t measure so easily…
I have looked at the subpixel anti-aliasing with a microscope on five different digital LCD monitors. From the microscopic to the macroscopic, ClearType is obviously superior to Mac’s hacked anti-aliasing.
Linux/FreeType’s sub-pixel rendering is pretty good, better than Mac.
For long term work, I would use either Windows or Mac. Apple has low quality text.
If you are using a Mac and have not used a PC recently with Nvidia’s nView desktop manager, you have no idea how lame Mac is these days when it comes to multi-monitor and multi-desktop.
Nvidia has delivered a world-class feature set to Windows, including mouse gestures (throw a window from one monitor to the next for example) and kinematics (mouse shake, rotate, etc.) There simply is nothing that compares to nView on any platform, Windows or Mac.
“ClearType looks horrible, and is ultimately less readable than the standard font support. I think a lot of Windows users force themselves to believe ClearType is more readable”
You have to be kidding right? Cleartype is wonderful and far far better then the default setup. I think it’s better then whatever OSX does in my experiance. Far as linux, well maybe it has changed with newer distros and such but i find the computers i have used to be near unreadable far as fonts.
Most windows users arn’t aware of cleartype since it’s an obscure option thats not set by default. Also it takes a little bit to get used to. When i first tried it I thought it was bad and went back, but tried it a few more times. Now It’s one of the first things I set.
Anyways back to the topic. I really don’t see why anyone would do this. Sure it looks nice and all. I like the look of OSX, but i’m not going to do some crazy hack to make something look like something. I much rather have something as it was ment to be. In the end you are just using a hack job. Sure you can reskin a Feiro to look like a Ferrari but I wouldn’t want that. I’d stick with one or the other, not the freak mutant. Aqua looks nice as it is out of the box. Also in the end the function and apps are still windows. What good is having a mac interface if whats underneath was not ment for it.
OS9, easily, has the most efficient look and feel. And you are able to just get things done faster. OSX isn’t bad, but it is basically a ballooned os9, and it doesn’t matter if you have a G5, interaction is dog slow compared to even a G3 running OS9. 99% of the time a computer is waiting for user interaction, why do we feel the need to delay our input even more with all of this “eye candy”. Yes I understand OS9 completely sucked in terms of core OS features. But the gui, the gui makes it seem much faster than anything running OSX.
You do have to give credit to Apple and Microsoft for being able to take these huge behemoths of gui’s and eek out the performance that they do.
Damn you apple for not buying out BeOS.
i think a os should have its own appearance and style. copying off another os look is simply lame and stupid
“Right. But until I saw the BSOD…”
That would have been funny about 8 years ago.
Go here and tweak to your heart’s content: http://www.microsoft.com/typography/cleartype/tuner/1.htm
Why is that? Because you are used to branding, trademarks and patents? Or because you have spent thousands of dollars just to get the aqua look only to find out that you could have gotten it on your cheap x86 box?
I agree that companies copying the looks of another product is kinda lame, but we are talking about individuals doing it for fun here.
That bitmap is the best cleartype can do??? (From the perspective that this is M$ press material) It simply sucks.
If this is the best antialiasing that Windows does, then it’s sad. btw. compared with the same font case on Linux on LCD and CRT. I tuned my antialiasing on Linux to appear best on each screen (not using default settings) right after instalation, so theree’s no way back to tell you how distro does out-of-the-box.
My monitors: Compaq N800v (ati) and Mitsubishi Diamond Pro 2070SB (nvidia)
somebody, are you trying to say that the cleartype version is not far better? The non-clear type is horrible (barely readable), the cleartype side is beautiful. If your saying the non cleartype side looks better something is extremely wrong with your setup.
I’m not even using a LCD for the record, i’m using a CRT (older 21 inch NEC), and cleartype most definitly makes things far better.
I don’t know why I answer you, you’ve completely missed the point.
But, here I go doing my best.
How it started
==============
Original talk was about OSX-Linux-Windows font rendering and not Cleartype-w/Cleartype on Windows.
My comparision
==============
When I was comparing I wasn’t comparing pictures that M$ provided which one is better. It’s a fact! Cleartype is better!
READ THIS: I was comparing quality of M$ Cleartype (right picture) sample with real rendered font on my linux notebook and CRT. Guess what M$ Cleartype sucks comparing to XRender on Linux. Taken to observation that this is press material M$ obviously checked that they posted very very good sample of best looking font.
TRYOUT FOR YOU
==============
Just try to look at your computer:
Times New Roman-Italic (same size as the sample)
What do you notice TNR is much more complex font and most of the font parts are not even blacked but grayed which makes readability closer to zero.
Conclusion – Only Windows taken at this part:
==========
Everybody knows that Cleartype produces better results than rendering without it. But it drasticaly slows all font rendering (slowdown is default for every system).
Info
====
You got that right but you still missed the point.
The great thing about Mac OS X is the display engine which cannot be replicated by surface modifications.
I am surprised that no one ever mentions this. The quality of the display on a mac is far closer to a printed page that XP or Linux is capable of at this point. If an XP desktop were made to copy the mac exactly, I could tell by looking at it that it wasn’t running on a mac every time.
And not having anything comparable to ClearType is clearly hurting Apple, a company that used to focus on ergonomics and now only focuses on music players and nasty metal eye candy.
AA on Jaguar was not quite as good as ClearType, but Panther’s AA is as good or better.
what is professional anyway?
Not to sacrifice functionality and usability for eyecandy.
Ah yes, the “if she’s beautiful, she must be stupid” argument. BTW, I was interested so I reread rain’s comment. He gave no examples other than the display was too colorful.
The different colors of the buttons add to the functionality. It makes it easier to distinguish which is which.
The news just showed a way to change the theme of a OS (win) like the skin change for WinAmp. There is nothing with the comparison between the OSes or the OS emulation. Can we just discuss how to improve the theme change in a OS?
very tired of reading the battle concerning about the damn Mac.
Why fake it?
Ah yes, the “if she’s beautiful, she must be stupid” argument.
Please don’t put other peoples words in my mouth, they taste bad.
I seriously do appreciate a beautiful interface, and I know that it doesn’t have to be useless because it looks good. I have worked as a graphics designer for a few years and I know that you always have to compromise a lot when it comes to good looks vs functionality. The rule is: functionality/usability first, looks later.
As I said, from a graphics designers point of view OSX looks good, but as for actually using it several hours every day, no thanks.
BTW, I was interested so I reread rain’s comment. He gave no examples other than the display was too colorful.
I also noted that the panel color is too bright to be suitable for graphics creation, and that the horizontal lines makes the GUI really hard to look at for some people, and that the icons are to detailed to look good in small sizes. So he gave other examples, just that you chose to ignore them
The different colors of the buttons add to the functionality. It makes it easier to distinguish which is which.
That’s true. Though my comment was about the saturation of the colors.
um, I did read the entire comment, and the only thing you claim as impacting functionality is photo realistic icons, which IMHO are not a problem when the icons are created right.
and it is not like OS X uses actual photos for their icons except for devices which are pretty easy to identify exactly what they do because the artwork is done correctly.
I will tell you what, unless you can site a spesific example of an icon in OS X that you cannot tell what program the file belongs to or what the program does, I want some other example with specific instances that you have experienced a functionality impact from the eye candy because unless you can site specific examples that you experienced that are not tied to simple learning curve, all you are arguing are theoreticals
and it is not like OS X uses actual photos for their icons except for devices which are pretty easy to identify exactly what they do because the artwork is done correctly.
You must have some kind of superpowersight if you actually think that document icons are recognizable at 16×16 without focusing really hard.
But then again, you probably don’t since you reread my post and still didn’t realize that I made other notes about the usability of the interface.
That said, there iApps are very well designed in general. And the brushed metal look(even though I don’t fancy it that much) is much easier on the eyes.
The rule is: functionality/usability first, looks later.
As I said, from a graphics designers point of view OSX looks good, but as for actually using it several hours every day, no thanks.
I and a lot of people I know use MacOS X serveral hours a day and find it very funtional so much so that I am often trying to use the MacOS X interface, ecspecially the key board shortcuts, on Gnome/Mozilla.
I also noted that the panel color is too bright to be suitable for graphics creation, and that the horizontal lines makes the GUI really hard to look at for some people, and that the icons are to detailed to look good in small sizes. So he gave other examples, just that you chose to ignore them
If you think the buttons are too bright go to System Preference -> Appearance-> Graphite. Graphite grays every thing out even the traffic light window management buttons. Hide the dock if you find it distracting, I always have my dock hidden, no I don’t find it distracting. You can customize OS X fairly well to suit your taste if you don’t like the defaults
I set the dock to the smallest size and every icon is very recognizable to me and I have acute astigmatism. Stop making general statements, if you find OS X interface to be a problem, qualify your statements as your opinoins don’t try to pass them off as facts.
http://www.arstechnica.com/reviews/003/panther/macosx-10.3-4.html
You also mentioned the stripes are distracting, panther did away with the pinstripes. the above link has a good comparison between panther and the older MacOS X releases
Has anyone yet managed to hack an expose-like feature into WinXP yet?
Yes. One is here:
http://www.winplosion.com/
One of the developers (Siwu) at Aqua-Soft is working on an implementation (he did one called iEx during the Panther betas which was only ok) that has complete hardware acceleration, nifty animations, etc.
It’ll be free of course, and possibly run on UNIX along with Windows.
From the article (page 2) :” We are all geeks, so we already own $3,000 PCs, or we simply own a PC we’re happy with. We don’t have the money to go out and buy a brand new Mac. We have more time/skills than money basically.”
I usually understand people who don’t want to spend a lot of money on a mac machine like a G5 or a big powerbook (I have been able to go up to a 12″ PB, and it’ll take me two years on a loan to pay it…). But why someone who is able to buy a 3k$ PC is not able to afford a 999$ eMac (hey, you’ve got a SuperDrive!) is beyond my comprehension. 1k$ might be a bit out of your reach if you’ve already paid for that 3k$ PC, but why complain that macs are expensive when they’ don’t have to be if they’re your primary computer??
I really like the way OS-X works, I work with it at work. We have several dual G4’s, dual G5’s with plenty of ram (1gb). But it’s just slow..
b-slap-the-e, somebody, brad… etc. What probably you don’t know, is that the technology Microsoft used in ClearType (sub-pixel font smoothing was used in older Apple systems since the Apple II to Mac Os 9.
As Kevin Arvin have said, Mac Os X font smoothing system was created thinking in print. The fonts looks the same in the screen and in paper.
MacObserver published an article about it last year:
http://www.macobserver.com/columns/devilsadvocate/2003/20030523.sht…
Generally in CRTs it’s true, that in some cases at smaller sizes low quality TrueType fonts looks better in Windows XP & Mac Os Classic than in Mac Os X, but not PostScript.
But I think LCDs looks better with the Mac Os X way.. Though its a personal preference. You can change this in System Preferences switching to the old way of font smoothing for smaller fonts.
For me, the thicker and “fatter” fonts in Mac Os X looks good, its more comfortable reading large texts for my eyes..
Quartz smoothing antialias in 2 dimensions vs 1 dimension..
Try using ClearType at high resolutions (1920×1080+) and you will see why the Quartz way its better, actually halo the game uses it..
Mac Os X is a New Age Operating System, Windows XP is a Old Age Os.
Subpixel font smoothing was an Apple patented technology, by Steve Wozniak, but it isn’t future proof. Because this it was cross licensed in the 1997 deal. In 2 years, when the prices of high resolution LCDs drop down, you wouldnt say the same thing…
“I wouldn’t mind getting stiffed on the price – but on top of that any computer is obsolete so quickly that Macs, altho full of attractive panache, have never been worth it. My wintel box gets the job done more than adequately and is more easily replaceable every couple years.”
Why do you have to buy a new computer every two years? I would think four or five years would be more reasonable. I don’t see Photoshop etc stopping working on the second birthday of a computer.
A reasonably well built machine ought to go on working for ten or fifteen years, like audio equipment.
Most people who are real Macheads are so totally brave at asserting facts which are total bullshit it still continues to impress me.
ClearType is a system of subpixel rendering for digital LCD screens. It is not something that Apple (oh great Apple!) ever had before. It is still NOT something that Apple does well on their LCD monitors.
Because ClearType is an LCD technology it is not related to the monitor’s resolution (number of pixels) on the LCD monitor, but more to the size of the LCD pixels and they color capabilities of each pixel.
Everything that Apple draws on the screen, but mostly text, would be vastly improved if Apple used a high-quality subpixel rendering system. But they don’t. And Apple is too cheap and too proud to license ClearType which would run them $500,000. And Apple is at heart too anti-open source to use FreeType, at least in a way where others could see Apple copied yet more technology (where’s that innovation, Steve?).
Most people who are real Macheads are so totally brave at asserting facts which are total bullshit it still continues to impress me.
ClearType is a system of subpixel rendering for digital LCD screens. It is not something that Apple (oh great Apple!) ever had before. It is still NOT something that Apple does well on their LCD monitors.
The problem here is the pot calling the kettle black. It is always amazes me all the BS anti-machead come up with.
Apple had sub-pixel rendering for 20 years now, ever since the Apple II.
http://grc.com/ctwho.htm
“The Distant Origins of Sub-Pixel Font Rendering
Microsoft’s November 1998 Comdex announcement of it’s “breakthrough” new display technology, dubbed ‘ClearType’ was regarded by many as the most important event of the show.
I COMPLETELY AGREE that incorporating this technology into Microsoft’s Windows operating environments will be an absolute win for its LCD display panel users. But Microsoft was apparently unaware that twenty-two years ago Apple II programmers were using these techniques — rooted in Apple technology patents — to improve the effective resolution of their video displays.
……. skipped
Hmmmmm. So, although the Apple II and LCD display panels obviously utilize very different technologies, they share a coincidental common nature which allows these old and well worn sub-pixel graphics programming techniques to be re-used with today’s modern LCD panels! Isn’t that very cool!?
So Who Did This First?
Given the array of players who have occupied and explored this territory through the years, it would be difficult to say who was here first. Sure, if we needed to reconstruct history we certainly could. But enough has already been learned, revealed and documented for any doubt to be quenched that this sub-pixel font rendering technology was long ago established and is based upon technology that’s soundly located in the public’s hands. And this is as it should be, since the popularity and falling prices of active matrix LCD panels, coupled with the well-known benefits of sub-pixel graphics rendering, promise to soon revolutionize the readability of LCD displayed text.
Thus, Microsoft’s ‘ClearType’ application of sub-pixel text rendering does not represent the dramatic breakthrough that they claim and it can not be the valid subject for intellectual property acquisition. Nevertheless, I’m excited to have them participating in this field, and I eagerly anticipate the day when our desktop LCD, laptop, and color PDA display screens will be empowered with sub-pixel text rendering technology created through the research efforts of all these fine participants”
What Apple did on the Apple ][ (and I have an Apple ][, so please stop the lies) is in no way to comparable to ClearType other than the word “sub-pixel”.
I know Macheads are not too big on factual accuracy as their entire mythology would fall apart and they would start screaming.
ClearType is vastly superior to Apple’s sub-pixel rendering (maybe they are still using the Apple ][ code, eh, Raptor?). Apple should buy something comparable or license ClearType for $500,000.
As my original post stated, Mac today is far behind what you can get on Windows when it comes to display quality and multi-monitor ease of use and capabilities. As Mac long ago had industry leading multi-monitor support, I consider how far Mac has fallen to be shameful.
Nasty metal-apps are not a substitute for basic ergonomics. Since the return of Steve Jobs, Apple has focused on hype, eye candy, and glam instead of substance. As Mac market share has continued a devastating plummet during the tenure of Mr. Jobs, it is obvious that for computers the glam approach doesn’t work (it seems to be doing well for iPods, though). So perhaps the entire discussion will be moot as Apple will soon be a Windows peripheral vendor (iPod for Windows outsells iPod for Mac 3 to 1).
man you are the super win troll of all trolls.
Jesus, guys, ENOUGH with the holy wars.
I have a couple of Macs. Several Windows and Linux boxen. An Amiga with a Toaster I still use on occasion for some video work.
Know which one is best? The one that gets any particular job done in the shortest amount of time and maximizes my profit most efficiently so that I can do things OTHER than fucking about with computers. I know, the concept that there are other things than computers may come as a shock to some of the people on here, nonetheless, there they are.
Heated debates about eye candy are so much rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic. Go out and get LAID, for Christ’s sake.
I’ve looked at “Bookman Old Style” font on my Powerbook in Word for Mac, and it looks great.
But, on every PC here at work it looks like crap.
Must be that ClearType technology.
Moron’s should actually take a Look at a Mac before they open their mouths and speak.
ClearType is vastly superior to Apple’s sub-pixel rendering (maybe they are still using the Apple ][ code, eh, Raptor?). Apple should buy something comparable or license ClearType for $500,000.
Can you walk through a technical descpription if why it is superior? I want you to back up you vastly superior claim with some technical facts.
As my original post stated, Mac today is far behind what you can get on Windows when it comes to display quality and multi-monitor ease of use and capabilities. As Mac long ago had industry leading multi-monitor support, I consider how far Mac has fallen to be shameful.
Again Demonstrate how the mac is far behind. I don’t know, plugging in a second montior on my powerbook automatically configures it, oooh that is so difficult. I can drive a second 21″ monitor at 1920×1200 all with a drop of a menu, mirrored or extend the power books display. Close the lid and it automatically drives only the external, hmmm so hard and clearly inferior. Ecspecially, after seeing how my colleague contected his xp laptop to the infocus projector and display being all grabbled, clearly windows xp is superior.
May be you can back up you claims with some real facts. I have been called a machead, a Sunhead too. Always when someone can’t compete with fact and reasoning. Those who resort to name calling have a very specific name on discussion boards… hmm I can’t recollect what it is. It is some thing to do with creatures that dewel under a bridge.
Please don’t make the mistake call Steve Gibson of grc.com a machead, he is well respected security expert, CPU magazine (predominently PC magazine) held an interview with him in high regard, His FREE securtiy tools are windows specific.
Good lord, I read thru these comments and, after sifting thru the antialias-v-pdf argument, it’s as if everyone ignored one of the one main points stated in the article…
Many of us DO own Mac’s.
So please, READ the article. In fact, here’s the email I sent to Leander. It was in response to his previous blog entry which led to the article:
“Dear Leander,
Hello, my name is Duckie. I run therealduckie.net, a popular conversion site for Mac users who are stuck on peecee’s.
We purists are not “enamoured” nor too cheap to “BUY A MAC!”. In fact, if you get past the 95% of 16 yr old kids that clutter those sites, you will see a few of us who are true to the nature of Apple. Point in fact, I own 5 Mac’s:
Powerbook
Mac Plus
Quadra 950
Powermac 8100
iMac rev2
It is common for me to be bashed by fellow Mac users because the Mac-o-phile hidden underneath their artsy exterior comes barreling out screaming that oh so popular, if not tired, battle cry–“BUY A MAC!” without them ever asking me or researching whether or not I DO own a Mac.
You see, this isnt about being “enamoured”, it’s about realism, usability and comfort.
What I mean is this–In 1996, Richie Chow opened the proverbial “Pandora’s box” when he released WinMac, a Finder bar clone, which emulated the Mac OS 7/8 scheme. The reason for this?
Mac users stuck on PC’s at work.
We(Mac Users)needed something better than the clumsy and awkward Windows OS. We needed something that felt like home. So Ritchie’s Finder clone did the trick and soon after THOUSANDS of items became available for the peecee.
What you have seen is only the surface. Also, you only see the knuckleheaded kids who post incessantly demanding this or that, but never staying true to the Mac OS look and feel.
There is still a small percentage of us purists in the community, but with the onslaught of Mac OS X and 16 yr olds modder/skinners, the realism isnt as predominant.
I hold true to my Mac ownership and always will. I will continue making skins and apps that emulate Mac OS for PC users because I know it creates ‘switchers’. Since I have been involved in the emulation community, I have
seen HUNDREDS of ‘switchers’. Proof of that can be seen all over the SpyMac and ResExcellence archives. The number could very well be in the thousands, but I only know from personal experience.
So please, when you’re back out on the town looking for more of these items…look deeper. You might just find the REAL mac users under the shell.”
Duckie
We always get the pricy Mac argument whenever there is an Apple story. I personally own a Mac and make only about 32k a year.
Do you live at home, or share your expenses with others?
no, he is just more fiscally responsible.
Wow i’m a brave!!!
Babylon Translator:
Brave:
n. American Indian warrior,como diría George Stobart estoy hecho un guerrero!!
Actually, ClearType, Sub-pixel font smoothing or what you want to call it, was an Apple patented technology, it’s the same patent!!!
It was cross licensed (which means Apple and Microsoft owns it) in the 1997 deal. So if Apple wants to implement it, it doesn’t need to pay 500.000 or nothing to Microsoft… Simply IT IS NOT A NEW TECHNOLOGY.
Check it out if you don’t want to believe me:
http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO2&Sect2=HITOFF&u…).ABST.)&OS=an/Microsoft+and+abst/(fractional+and+pixel)&RS=(AN/Micros oft+AND+ABST/(fractional+AND+pixel))
No, ClearType is not an LCD Technology, it’s a font smoothing technology which is better for LCDs TODAY, but it was used in NTSC systems by Apple…
In words of Steve Wozniak:
“Back in 1976, my design of the Apple II’s high resolution graphics system utilized a characteristic of the NTSC color video signal (called the ‘color subcarrier’) that creates a left to right horizontal distribution of available colors. By coincidence, this is exactly analogous to the R-G-B distribution of colored sub-pixels used by modern LCD display panels. So more than twenty years ago, Apple II graphics programmers were using this ‘sub-pixel’ technology to effectively increase the horizontal resolution of their Apple II displays.”
Sub-pixel font smoothing it’s good for LCD displays because they work in a similar way as NTSC color video signal.. But it will work in other systems..
Only that no as good..
And especially for CRT, depends in the technology used by the display..
Sony Trinitron represent RGB elements arranged in a cluster/grid, like LCDs..
So in those displays, ClearType will work very well…
In Reality, ClearType will work well in *ANY* display, all depends in the technology the display is physically constructed…
Sub-pixel font smoothing includes other techniques for anti-aliasing.. so even without a LCD it will look great…
Any font smoothing technology it’s resolution related, directly or indirectly..
number of pixels, aspect ratio, dpi…
At low/normal resolutions a sub-pixel font smoothing of only one dimension like cleartype will look good, and quartz method will look too thick/fatt..
But at High resolutions cleartype will look too thin, a Quatz will look good..
And cleartype, is unprofitable for portrait displays.. Quartz uses a 2 dimension font smoothing, vertically and horizontally so it will look good in portrait and landscape displays..
Windows XP do not support character kerning, so the fonts too much times look too dense or too close..
//OffTopic//
And.. Apple is anti-open source? Sorry, but without Apple, what other opensource streaming server will be using unix servers? Apple has embraced opensource software in a lot of products, and they help the opensource community in a lot of ways.. for example: Which format is more Open, Mpeg-4 or Windows Media Video?
So, if Apple it’s anti-open source, what its Microsoft.. This is totally offtopic..
//OffTopic//
A tip for the future: Use more wikipedia and google..
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LCD
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cathode_ray_tube
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Font
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cleartype
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TrueType
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PostScript
Of course, Apple never innovates, this is because Microsoft it’s using a 25+ years old technology in windows xp….
Sorry for my bad english.. I’m spanish…
Since this thread is getting old, I doubt that you’ll read this so I’ll keep it short.
I and a lot of people I know use MacOS X serveral hours a day and find it very funtional so much so that I am often trying to use the MacOS X interface, ecspecially the key board shortcuts, on Gnome/Mozilla.
I didn’t say that it wasn’t functional. It’s more or less as functional as most OSs. However, my point was that they did sacrifice functionality for eyecandy, the dock is another good example for that. It’s not made with the focus on making an element that is as functional and usable as possible, the primary focus is “make something that is graphically impressive”. What I’m saying is that it could have been a lot better if the focus was right.
And thanks for pointing out that some of these things changed in more recent versions. I must admit that it’s been some time since I’ve used OSX and I haven’t kept myself updated on GUI changes. I’m glad that they are trying to correct their mistakes.
I just find it amusing that when an article like this is posted people get offended. It’s almost as if someone insulted their mother or said something sacreligous. I remember before skinning was popular people didn’t even want someone who uses windows to put their icons to the right with the same kind of arguments that are used now with OSX.
Isn’t there more important things to worry and get offended about other than what skin and theme someone chooses to use on their desktop? I myself don’t care what others choose. With things like this it doesn’t matter which position you take because there is someone to oppose you always.
I guess the answer is if you have a certain system then you should be forced to use certain looks or the most bare stripped down look the system can have? For some people that might work but not for others. Think about it, does what other people do to their computer affect you personally on a daily basis? If you can answer yes to that you really need to step away from the computer.
It kind of reminds me of gangs claiming colors in a way and someone gets shot for wearing it. Like “Your wearing purple, it’s our gangs color”.
Think about it, does what other people do to their computer affect you personally on a daily basis? If you can answer yes to that you really need to step away from the computer.
Politically yes, it affect all of us 24/7. But I don’t really care what kind of skin people are using. I care about the default looks of an OS though.
I do need to step away from the computer though as I’ve promised myself not to get deeply involved in these kind of things again. Yet here I am
I am the lead pre pressman in a small print shop ( 3 presses foiler and die cutter) and yet have had problems with this wonderful font rendering issue. The real issue for design work and pre press is the availiblity of the fonts. Yes at smaller point sizes Fonts can look a bit different. But anyone who RIP’s Film for a living knows that the actual rendering of a FONT on the screen and what is produced are 2 different animal. And anyone that is going to have a bug-a-boo over this needs to find a hobby. The main issues with design work( not withstanding the few in this area that think PCs are far superior for graphic design) is that fonts are handled in OSX at the postcript level.
And for you know it alls which platform handles these fonts with less issues:
OpenType PostScript Type 1
PostScript Multiple Master
TrueType
dFont
With Opentype PC users are now just getting into the realm of what mac users have had with all the extra characters among other goodies.
Bottom line just becuase it looks pretty on the screen does not mean you are going to output it to a high resolution images setter or DTP.
I wont even comment on people saying OSX is slow, must be using the original release.
I *hate* hunting for that rotten apple key, when the CTRL key is sitting at the unmissable corner of the board :/
I had this issue too, and it was because I started on a PC keyboard. After realizing that the left hand’s thumb steadily rests on the left Apple key while the right hand uses the mouse, I found that many of the two-handed Windows shortcuts (or one-handed with look and overextended thumb) can be done with one hand on a Mac.
i.e. – With your left hand on the Apple key (ALT for PC), your index (pointer) finger can rome to many different keys in the vicinity.
Z – Undo
X – Cut
C – Copy
V – Paste
A – Select All
S – Save
D – Duplicate
F – Find
Q – Quit
W – Close Window
Since I started doing this, I have become way more productive with these shortcuts. Sure beats:
ALT+F4 – Quit
CTRL+F4 – Close Window
on Windows.
I think that’s a little misleading. While that may have been true some time ago, the costs of building a x86 system have dropped drasticly.
You can easily get yourself a nice system for $500, or you can get a beautiful system for $1000.
$500: Athlon XP 3200, 1gig PC3500 DDR ram, 2 80gig HDDs, Geeforce FX 5200, etc.
$1000: Athlon 64 3400, 2gig PC3500 DDR ram, 2 120gig HDDs, Geeforce FX 5900 256mb
Of course some may take it to the extreme, but $3,000 seems a little unrealistic nowadays.
When all is said and done, I stay with x86 because of the wide range of hardware (nice and cheap, too) I can choose from, and the easy of upgrading specific components.
If you want to pay an outrageous amount of money for a system that only has parts avalible from a few companies, go ahead.
“Look at the first desktop screenshot at left. It looks like a Mac OS X machine, right? Wrong.”
What? Yes it does!
@anonymous
um, no it is a horrible reproduction…look at it.
he left the ‘My pictures/my documents/my videos’ names intact
it has bad icon placement
the finder bar doesnt match the theme nor does the finder menu have the correct menu items
too many icons next to the clock
his iChat skin for Trillian has ‘grouping’
iTunes isnt shadowed nor does it have the right buttons like the Mac OS version
the Finder menu doesnt have a shadow
where is the dock?
why yes, I AM critical.
thosde are my desktop’s in the article(the second and third ones)