[ls -al]

Allright, I have to admit that Panther is shaping up to be a great release, and tweaks are evident in almost every nook and cranny. But IMHO there's a lot more Apple could do with it... Here's my wish list of what else I'd like to see in Panther in terms of new features not necessarily bug fixes.

Post your wish list or better yet append this one... (pls use a separate thread for bug fixes and Terri can start his own thread about Labels ;-) )

Systemwide features

Text model:

1. Ability to select discontiguous text using Cmd key, like Word or Classic Nisus.
2. Fonts palette, expose the functionality to make baseline/kerning adjustments using a slider/drop box rather than using the Font menu a zillion times. As it stands it's fairly useless. This would help make my Keynote presentations/Graffle labeling pixel perfect
3. Ability to remember text Input method in the Edit menu... for example allow me to automatically select a third party input plug-in like Auto-complete...
4. Font menu... enough said. Tie this in with FontBook collections ...
5. Tools menu to enable auto-text formatting ala WordServices (Reformat, remove multiple spaces, Sentence case, All caps, remove quotes etc� support for awk/grep/sed would be a bonus!)
6. Optical spacing features from Quickdraw GX.
7. A few other word processing features like bullets/numbering/auto-indenting... and basic outlining features ...
8. Ability to choose between alternate keybindings (Emacs is standard but how about others...)
9. Mail-merge capabilities so that I can drag and drop contact(s) from AddressBook palette or Appointments from iCal to automatically mail-merge �
10. Text Style manager, steal this from AppleWorks for auto text styles... much better than Word ...

Color palette:

This is one of my favorite features in OS X especially in Keynote/Graffle� But this can become even more powerful...

1. Ability to create and store gradient patches... (linear/parabolic/radial)
2. Ability to store vector/bitmap fills� Sketch does a very good job of providing a number of high quality bitmap fills like wood grain, brick, etc ... I'd like to see this implemented system wide ... would be very useful


New Media browser palette:

Provide access to Tunes/Photos/Movies/SoundClips/Styles from any application ... DVD Studio 2.0 provides an excellent media browser... incorporate it Systemwide ...


New image palette:
Allow for basic image manipulation like iPhoto (brighten/darken/crop/rotate/scale/autocontrast) and few bells and whistles like add frame/border ... ability to work with Photoshop filters would be great! (I remember that OpenDoc image container could do that... ah, memories �)

Systemwide Keyboard shortcut switch : I'm not sure if this is a wise feature but auto support for Mac/Win shortcuts useful for Office Junkies....

Find palette :
1. Ability to highlight all occurrences of find results ...
2. support for grep expressions

PDF support
1. Ability to embed URLs/Links in PDF files... would be great if Safari PDFs supported link click through!
2. Support for transparencies and drop shadows in Keynote. This is a long standing bug that needs to be fixed.
3. Control over PDF output: font embedding, encryption,image compression (zip)

Services Menu
1. Ability to manage services, assign keyboard shortcuts w/o editing .plists
2. Ability to use services without first exposing them in the menu...

Font support
1. Complete your font store...
2. WYSIWYG Font menu with Adobe Type Reunion capabilities integrated with FontBook!
3. Better font hinting, OpenType support.
4. More Unicode glyphs, many are incomplete...


Finder

New Tools Menu item: this would include the following menu items

0. Label ...
1. Archive
2. Version control...
3. Encrypt/Decrypt...
4. Folder actions...
5. Move files ...
6. Summarize ...
7. Find similar files ...
8. Batch process... (batch rename (Windows filename support), change permissions, change default app... etc)
9. Synchronize/Backup using the new HFS+ aware rsync
10. Scripts (Applescript and shell script support... grep+xargs+awk = amazing)
11. User plug-in items ... (for example, touch etc...)

Search improvements
1. Save search results as a live folder ... OS9 allowed it (rudimentary tho')
2. grep support in search field...

Edit improvement
1. Ability to edit clipboard... come on!!

Finder bookmarks
Now that Apple has made the Finder into a browser it would be great if they added support for Bookmarks/History like Safari...


Mail

1. MAPI support, MS is not going to do this... come on reverse engineer this and add it to mail in addition to OWA support.
2. Ability to view Exchange calendar invitations in Mail and integration with iCal.
3. Ability to auto-archive mail
4. Built in GPGP support ... (I see some progress in this direction...)
5. Bring back Lip Service! (NeXTers will know about this one)
6. Support for Outlook .PST files would be great too...
7. Ability to write plug-ins/connectors for example Notes support etc...
8. Support for iCards in Mail. Come one throw us .Mac users another bone! This is great for vacation photos.
9. Fax boxes...
10. Ability to show total unread messages (not just unread in Inbox...). Alternately preference to show number of new messages using a screen overlay much like the "Brightness adjustment" or "Eject" overlays
11. Eye candy.. The eagle flies around when doing a mail run :-)

Calculator

1. Ability to evaluate expressions like 1+sin(pi/2)*cos(pi) (system wide service would be nice... w/o having to install CalcService)
2. Remember recent conversions after app quits...
3. Preferences for: 1. Autoupdate currency information 2. Remember paper tape history
4. Graphic calculator! Of course this is not gonna happen...
5. Ability to add conversions...


iChatAV

1. History support!!
2. Preference to overlay new incoming on the screen like the brightness or eject button overlay
3. Better group support
4. Multi-protocol... or give third-parties capabilities to write the plug-ins.

[arekkusu]

Naturally, you've submitted each of these separately to bugreporter as feature requests?

Otherwise, Apple doesn't know what you want.

[chabig]

This would be a good wish list for 10.4, but for Panther--forget it! It's way too late.

Do send the list to Apple, though.

[HotSoup]

iChat AV does support history...

[Adam Betts]

Wow, that is one huge list!

[ls -al]

I've sent most of the requests to Apple. BTW, how do I access history in iChatAV?

[King Bob On The Cob]

Turn on logging...
It's in preferences under Messages

[richardb]

I'm interested in how the Dock could be improved. Nothing much has happened in Panther. Any ideas?

[ls -al]

-------------
This would be a good wish list for 10.4, but for Panther--forget it! It's way too late.

Do send the list to Apple, though.
-------------

I did send the list to Apple, but seriously is it too late for Panther? I thought Panther was slated for 'before the end of the year'. That sounded like Apple-speak for December. That's 4 months away.

Most of these are minor tweaks etc. Don't you think they can implement/debug a subset of the features in the next few months? Is Panther feature frozen?

I guess these tweaks could be implemented in the next version and could count towards the 100 exciting new features

[sandsl]

Originally posted by ls -al:
-------------
This would be a good wish list for 10.4, but for Panther--forget it! It's way too late.

Do send the list to Apple, though.
-------------

I did send the list to Apple, but seriously is it too late for Panther? I thought Panther was slated for 'before the end of the year'. That sounded like Apple-speak for December. That's 4 months away.

Most of these are minor tweaks etc. Don't you think they can implement/debug a subset of the features in the next few months? Is Panther feature frozen?

I guess these tweaks could be implemented in the next version and could count towards the 100 exciting new features

Development on major new features in Panther is due to freeze in 4-6 weeks, when the focus is turned to fixing old and new bugs.

[Rickster]

6. Optical spacing features from Quickdraw GX.

That's already in Apple's type system. Carbon apps only get it if they use newer text APIs such as ATSUI, and it's not yet used by the Cocoa text system (though it might well be soon), but it's there.

OmniWeb 4.5 uses ATSUI to render text, with a handful of its more advanced features enabled. You can see this on pages like http://www.apple.com/pro/design/mencke/ where having optical character alignment enabled results in hanging punctuation. (Note the paragraph-opening quote marks.)

[gorgonzola]

Originally posted by richardb:
I'm interested in how the Dock could be improved. Nothing much has happened in Panther. Any ideas?

Well, one popular idea that people have been kicking around for a while is to add the ability to drag stuff into Dock subfolders via a Dock popup menu. So let's say you had your home folder in your Dock and you have a file on your desktop you want to file in ~/Documents/Projects. You drag it to the home folder icon, and a popup menu opens (like it does when you right-click on it), then you select Documents, and finally drop it on the Projects thing. You could just use a simple box selector graphic (an outline around the menu item) to show how it worked.

It would be rather useful...sort of like spring loaded folders in the Dock.

Another thing was multiple Docks, custom Dock dividers, etc. I dunno how I feel about those, though.

Good list, btw. Reasonable, feasible suggestions that would actually be useful. I wouldn't use some of them myself, but I can see how others would like them.

[schep]

i Like the list, i just have to add one thing to the ichat section, let us set a friggin profile!

[passmaster16]

How about eliminating .trashes and .ds_store files left on Windows network shares, that drives any Windows admin nuts and it doesn't help the Mac's reputation of being a good "citizen" in Windows environments

[gorgonzola]

Originally posted by passmaster16:
How about eliminating .trashes and .ds_store files left on Windows network shares, that drives any Windows admin nuts and it doesn't help the Mac's reputation of being a good "citizen" in Windows environments

I was under the impression that this had been fixed for a while...? I don't have any Windows network shares to test on, but I remember reading cries of jubilation from many who do several months ago. I thought this was fixed in Jaguar, let alone Panther.

Did I hallucinate the whole thing?

[Moonray]

Some say yes, some say no ... however I don't want any .DS_store on local volumes either, and I know Computers can do that.

-

[gorickey]

About the whole "History in iChatAV" thing...

Sure, iChatAV does have a logging feature...however, what it does NOT have is a "Log Viewer"...let alone, a built-in Log Viewer (like Adium). So having the saved messages is nice, but it needs a fully searchable/scalable viewer built into the program to making finding specific chats and information easier.

[Judge_Fire]

Great list, here are some of my additions:

FocusLayer functionality

You might have used this little app we cooked up with Gul Banana and 00101001 in our own MacNN developer forum. It seems to be unavailable/discontinued at the moment ?

To get an idea, you can see this conceptual mockup from way back then.


Systemwide Audio EQ

All the pieces are there in Core Audio, waiting to be called. This would essentially be an Equalizer like in iTunes, but available on an OS level and with settings for each app.

J

[Chris Grande]

Originally posted by gorickey:
but it needs a fully searchable/scalable viewer built into the program to making finding specific chats and information easier.

This is the app that I use, its a nice little piece of freeware.

http://www.versiontracker.com/dyn/moreinfo/macosx/17491

[Superchicken]

Color palette:

This is one of my favorite features in OS X especially in Keynote/Graffle� But this can become even more powerful...

1. Ability to create and store gradient patches... (linear/parabolic/radial)
2. Ability to store vector/bitmap fills� Sketch does a very good job of providing a number of high quality bitmap fills like wood grain, brick, etc ... I'd like to see this implemented system wide ... would be very useful


New Media browser palette:

Provide access to Tunes/Photos/Movies/SoundClips/Styles from any application ... DVD Studio 2.0 provides an excellent media browser... incorporate it Systemwide ...


New image palette:
Allow for basic image manipulation like iPhoto (brighten/darken/crop/rotate/scale/autocontrast) and few bells and whistles like add frame/border ... ability to work with Photoshop filters would be great! (I remember that OpenDoc image container could do that... ah, memories �)

Systemwide Keyboard shortcut switch : I'm not sure if this is a wise feature but auto support for Mac/Win shortcuts useful for Office Junkies....

Find palette :
1. Ability to highlight all occurrences of find results ...


PDF support
1. Ability to embed URLs/Links in PDF files... would be great if Safari PDFs supported link click through!
2. Support for transparencies and drop shadows in Keynote. This is a long standing bug that needs to be fixed.
3. Control over PDF output: font embedding, encryption,image compression (zip)


iChatAV

2. Preference to overlay new incoming on the screen like the brightness or eject button overlay
3. Better group support
4. Multi-protocol... or give third-parties capabilities to write the plug-ins. [/B]

I essentially deleted the ones I didn't care about to give you an idea how much I agree

haha

one thing, honestly if you're gona let the user edit an image for brightness and contrast, you should be giving them levels control! I KNOW I know, it's hard to figure out at first. But my photos would never look right if they didn't have level control. And I already own a licence of PS Elements, but I would LOVE to be able to use iPhoto, but unless it's just to veiw stored photos or something, it does not make sense at all for me to bother to use it without level controls.

Should also add, Apple should take the one window interface concept and bring it to iChat. SERIOUSLY. I'd love to be able to say the program will be useful to me. But I can't! In all honesty, Proeteus simply works more Mac like, which is sad!

one brushed window, with side bars for user names. You wouldn only need one, just have your online contacts show, and have a IM icon by their name if you were chatting with them! and move all chatting buddies to the top of the list.

EASY navigation! And a whole lot better than having a ton of windows! I recently had someone say "hold on I've got like seven windows open." and I though... this is why I use Proteus when in OS X.

[gorickey]

Originally posted by Chris Grande:
This is the app that I use, its a nice little piece of freeware.

http://www.versiontracker.com/dyn/moreinfo/macosx/17491

This is the freeware I use actually, it's from Unsanity...

http://www.unsanity.org/archives/000149.php#000149

[Keda]

I'd like to see contex. menus beefed up. My 2 requests for this are:

-services accessible through con.menus
-ability to add custom items (a la FinderPop in OS9)

[- - e r i k - -]

Originally posted by Judge_Fire:
Great list, here are some of my additions:

FocusLayer functionality

You might have used this little app we cooked up with Gul Banana and 00101001 in our own MacNN developer forum. It seems to be unavailable/discontinued at the moment ?

To get an idea, you can see this conceptual mockup from way back then.

Ah, you mean like F10 witout the scaling or window switching?

I can easily see this integrated in Expos�

[lookmark]

Quite a list.

Originally posted by ls -al:

Services Menu
1. Ability to manage services, assign keyboard shortcuts w/o editing .plists
2. Ability to use services without first exposing them in the menu...

Also an option to show Services in a contextual menu would be excellent. We're on the same page.

http://forums.macnn.com/showthread.p...hreadid=172141

[-Q-]

Originally posted by gorgonzola:
***Detailed explanation snipped***

It would be rather useful...sort of like spring loaded folders in the Dock.

Now that's a great idea. There have been many times where I've dragged something to the dock hoping that very thing would happen. I would find that incredibly useful.

[Sven G]

A better Dock would definitely be a Good Thing - if not in Panther, at least in 10.4, hopefully.

I'd like to see more integration and customizability among the main interface elements in OS X: the windows, the Dock, the Menu Bar, the Desktop, and Expos� - the latter mainly as a trait d'union (to remain on the French side of words!) between the former ones...

[ls -al]

A few more...

1. Oh yeah... Omnigraffle style palette management would be a great too... Seriously is there a better way? I find Adobe's solution a little too clunky for my tastes..

2. Systemwide component model.. is it time for this to come back?

[passmaster16]

Originally posted by gorgonzola:
I was under the impression that this had been fixed for a while...? I don't have any Windows network shares to test on, but I remember reading cries of jubilation from many who do several months ago. I thought this was fixed in Jaguar, let alone Panther.

Did I hallucinate the whole thing?

As far as I can see, it still occurs in Jag. The worst thing is you can't see it from the Mac side. Even when I copy files to my usb flash drive, I don't see the resource files from OS X but if I mount it on a Windoze box, sure enough, they're there. Is there a reason why this is so difficult to fix?

[nebben123]

i'd like the damn OS X to recognize the CD-Rs that my Sony DSC-CD400 digicam makes. i believe they use the format UDF 2.0 and so far OS X only supports UDF 1.5

come on, Windows has been able to read these cd's for over a year!!! how hard can it be?

[beb]

I want list-shaded windows like Mac OS 9 had and Windows XP now has.