[Salty]

OK so now that Snow Leopard is coming out and we got our sweet refined version of leopard that we've always been hoping for. Apple just spent two years refining the OS, and will spend the next while making sure all those refinements keep working well. But the question is, now that they'll be ready to start feature bloat all over again, what features do you want to see in the next version of the OS? What things would you like to see get fixed, what things would you like to see overhauled?

I'll start with my hopeful features.

Finder App Store:
The new thing I've realized more than anything I want to see is a Finder App Store. Same back end as iTunes but not done using iTunes. Also done using the Apple ID, but not everything needs to be tied into iTunes! Besides this'd be Mac only.
This would help get rid of people running MSN off a disk image. It would be a HUGE boon to third party developers, it would probably help decrease piracy, and for bigger apps where downloading the App doesn't make sense Apple could allow developers to take orders for Software that would then ship to the customer. Apple could handle a wrapper that would prevent apps from being easily pirated all without the need for a million different serial numbers.
This would be great for devs like Pixelmator, Panic, Omni Group, Delicious Monster, and all those smaller Mac developers that have great apps out that people just don't think to go looking for. Creating one central catalogue of available apps for the platform, under clear headings would probably push 3rd party Mac development a lot more, and would encourage people to use their Macs for even more things, and stop always begging Apple to make the iLife apps into Prosumer apps because a non-apple dev would be able to make a prosumer level app that felt like an Apple made app.
Also it would really help game development for the Mac I think.

Sync:
I think with Time Machine Apple probably has half of this ready now anyway and I hope they're moving towards it more. The Market is progressively more saturated, and the fact is you're going to see more and more people having companion devices like iPod touches and Netbooks and any future rumoured media tablet that I doubt is ever gonna come out. Anyway, it'd be nice to set up essentially master and slave Macs. In the same way that your iPhone always syncs back with any changes you've made with contacts to your Mac, imagine if you could do that with two Macs.
I've been suggesting this situation for a while and I think Apple should still look at doing this. Instead of treating each Mac as a computer, have them be where the network is the computer. A couple could be married and they may want to have their iTunes libraries integrated, husband buys a CD, wife says ooo that'd be nice to have for me, instead of having to manually move the files over, iTunes pops up a message saying Husband's computer has a new album are you interested in this? Afterward iTunes would keep track of each user's play counts and you could either see how many times you've listened to it or how many times all of you have listened to it (since that additional computer could be owned by the same person as the first.)
In addition within the same family you may want to share your Photos with all your computers, cause maybe you've got a MacBook you take on vacation and trips with you, but you've got your workstation Mac Pro, shouldn't your MacBook be able to hand over those Photos to the Mac Pro where you might want to access them locally? A simple utility asking a couple questions could easily prompt the user for this sort of thing, and then afterward the user could refine it. Is it a feature for everyone? Not necessarily but if Apple gets into the netbook space and treats it like a companion device.

Other than that I'd love see Dashboard die cause I think it's pretty well dead now.

Honestly I can't really think of much else that I want in OS X. I'm sure some people want support for certain devices and stuff, perhaps a tabbed finder... other than that I'm really not sure what Apple can do?

[besson3c]

- A modern file system
- Single system wide software update
- Make Time Machine work with other network storage (if not in Snow Leopard)
- Fix OS X Mail (if not in Snow Leopard)
- Apple should make their own hypervisor

[Salty]

Given the trouble everyone's had with File systems I imagine that's a longer term project at Apple.

Single system wide software update meaning for other apps? I could see that happening if they built the back end for something like a Finder App store.

Fix Mail, you mean fix IMAP support?

[turtle777]

Originally Posted by besson3c 

- Make Time Machine work with other network storage (if not in Snow Leopard)

By network storage, do you also mean remote servers?
I'd agree, that would be nice to see in TM.

Other than that, I hope that some of the unresponsiveness is gone with SL.

I just don't freaking understand why I sometimes get the beachball with a 2.4GHz C2C and 4 GB of RAM, w/o running any processor intensive tasks.
It's really annoying and embarrassing.

-t

[besson3c]

Originally Posted by Salty 

Single system wide software update meaning for other apps? I could see that happening if they built the back end for something like a Finder App store.

Yeah, the two would compliment each other nicely...

Fix Mail, you mean fix IMAP support?

Primarily, but not exclusively, yes. If Mail excels as a POP client this is no longer an impressive feat, POP is bread dead simple and bread dead in general.

[besson3c]

Originally Posted by turtle777 

By network storage, do you also mean remote servers?
I'd agree, that would be nice to see in TM.

Other than that, I hope that some of the unresponsiveness is gone with SL.

I just don't freaking understand why I sometimes get the beachball with a 2.4GHz C2C and 4 GB of RAM, w/o running any processor intensive tasks.
It's really annoying and embarrassing.

-t

It is. OS X is great, but efficient it isn't. This should be on my wish list too, because I'm taking a wait and see approach with Snow Leopard. It isn't a given that everything will be rosy with Snow Leopard. Apple seems far better at tacking on new features that they can market than they are at improving upon the fundamental design and inefficiencies of the very low levels of OS X. The file system is the most glaring example that comes to mind.

[Spheric Harlot]

Originally Posted by besson3c 

- Make Time Machine work with other network storage (if not in Snow Leopard)

It already does.

[besson3c]

Since when? Without any hacks or enabling features that are disabled by default and cannot be enabled by the GUI? Does it actually work, unlike in earlier versions of Leopard?

[shifuimam]

Make the Finder not suck.
Make window maximizing actually maximize windows, instead of arbitrarily resizing them.

Those are probably the two biggest issues I have with the OS itself.

In the meantime, WRT Salty's Finder App Store idea - that might be cool, but only if Apple doesn't require it to distribute apps for the OS X platform. I don't think they'd go that far, but you never know. Restricting application usage on an actual OS to stuff Apple deems "good enough" would be suicidal for them.

[OreoCookie]

- a new cat codename
- a resolution-independent UI
- a modern filesystem for storage (what's the hold-up with ZFS)
- reprogram some other apps from the ground up, some of them eat up too many cpu cycles for breakfast (hello, iTunes, I'm talking to you! Perhaps the power of the gpu can be leveraged to decode mp3s?)
- kernel improvements taken from the *BSDs/Linux

[OreoCookie]

Originally Posted by shifuimam 

Make window maximizing actually maximize windows, instead of arbitrarily resizing them.

Big, big no, no. This is, by far, the worst aspect of Windows: even though you have beautiful 16:10 screens, a browser window takes up full width. Maximize should maximize with respect to the content in the windown and not take up all your screen space.

[Big Mac]

Originally Posted by shifuimam 

Make window maximizing actually maximize windows, instead of arbitrarily resizing them.

^^ Windows user at heart.

[turtle777]

Originally Posted by Spheric Harlot 

It already does.

Like I said, TM should support remote servers (FTP, SFTP, WebDav, etc..)

-t

[mduell]

A first class management system for FOSS; ports, portage, whatever. A "Finder App store" would compliment that nicely, but isn't my priority.

[Big Mac]

You can probably understand that Apple as primarily a consumer-based computer company, wouldn't make FOSS management a priority. We're much more likely to see a Finder App Store.

[Andy8]

Proper resolution independence.

[slugslugslug]

Yeah, I can't believe only 2 posts mentioned resolution independence! That's been in the works since Tiger, but they keep conveniently forgetting to announce anything about it. But I want the OS to be ready for 160+ dpi screens down the road.

[slugslugslug]

Also, I want TM to work with FileVault, so I can start encrypting my home directory again. (but really, I think they ought to work that into an update to Leopard or Snow Leopard)

[hmurchison2001]

In no particular order.


1. ZFS or something like it. Modern volume management, RAID features, checksum, compression, variable block size etc.
2. Global metadata- all tags and keywords should be searchable and actionable in any 3rd party app that wants to support it
3. Voice Dictation- We have improvements to voice commands ..go the whole nine with voice dictation
4. Software Update for 3rd party apps as well.
5. Resolution Independence
6. SSD support and boot from PCI Express SSD
7. Media Center features
8. Growl like notifications and an uninstaller
9. A new UI but also a way to easily theme your Mac
10. Core 3D - harness OpenGL and make it easy to incorporate 3D elements

[jay3ld]

I want a feature that fixes spaces issues. Really annoying to be typing a message, and a application wants attention so it jumps to that space and leaves it in the background. I should just bounce in the dock like it is supposed to until I give it attention.

I would also prefer they fix it, so every time I try to wake it up from screensaver, try to save or open a file or unlock a item in a keychain, that it doesn't spin up my external hard disks and take an extra 30 seconds with the spinning ball of death to just allow me to type in my password. I can almost understand saving a file, I would really prefer it only spun up the drive if I was editing a file on that drive or if I clicked on it while opening/saving. Id much rather wait 30 seconds then, instead of every time I was doing something and my drive spins down, just to have it spin up so it can not have anything touched on it.

I would like to see a FOSS, I use a lot of applications. Much of which I have downloaded and compiled myself. It would make my life easier for the basic things and the required libraries I need, if I could just use FOSS to obtain official mac ports that are more likely to work on my operating system with less pain than searching the web to try and find something that hopefully works. Because of that, I can't use the sendmail application currently on my laptop as I screwed it up when trying to add imap support. I just forced all sendmail and imap apps to never run for now, so it doesn't flood my logs as it keeps trying to start it.

[Gavin]

This is both OS and hardware: I'd like to see a memory chip built into the motherboard that has a minimal version of the OS so you can boot the machine from it and fix things without a CD or DVD.

[angelmb]

Salty's "The Finder App Store" makes so much sense that it is a shame nobody here had thought about it before… 

It is crystal clear that Apple has something like that on the works, you start by omitting the given app printed user's manual, then shrinking the app's packages and then delivering them via an app store. Now that others be it RIM, Nokia, Pre… it would be a nice snap on the head, may they realize how behind they are.

And then there is the (MacBook Pro's) SD card slot… it has to serve some purpose besides the so blatant obvious. May it be related with a potential Finder Store.

Anyhow, a good read regarding the Snow Leopard pricing and how it takes a page from the App Store playbook. Makes sense, just see how many bundles the recent macupdate promo has sold… it was less than 50 bucks and you get 15 apps plus two bonus apps for the first 35000 buyers, I may end installing only half of them but it was a no-brainer which goes beyond compulsive buying (since there're useful apps there).

If only that 'Finder App Store' idea helped to lower certain apps retail prices… I still have to wonder why horrid Office 2008 is that expensive… or Adobe's CS line when it fails to 'respect' Mac users by not following the most basic Mac OS keyboard shortcuts.


But those are obviously the last applications you would expect to find there.

[CharlesS]

1. ZFS.

2. ZFS.

3. ZFS.

4. Resolution independence.

5. The "Hide" check box in the Login Items preferences actually doing something.

Originally Posted by Salty 

Other than that I'd love see Dashboard die cause I think it's pretty well dead now.

[JKT]

Originally Posted by Big Mac 

^^ Windows user at heart.

To be fair, I'd like this implemented the OmniWeb way - shift-clicking the zoom button will cycle between zoomed and maximised states. Easy to implement and doesn't break any of the current behaviour.

Personally though, I would hope the they have just fixed all the apps (Preview, iTunes, etc) for which zooming is currently fundamentally broken and doesn't even behave the way it should for a Mac OS, which makes using the zoom button such a damnable hit and miss affair. Snow Leopard perhaps?

[Spheric Harlot]

Originally Posted by Salty 

Other than that I'd love see Dashboard die cause I think it's pretty well dead now.

I'd prefer they leave it in for all of us for whom it's become an indispensable daily tool.

Seriously - you haven't found any use for Dashboard? Not even a TV guide?

For me, it's pollen watch, TV guide, phone book, translation, weather report, and unit conversion.

[JKT]

Just read the following on the Snow Leopard pages and all I can say is halle-****ing-lujah!

More reliable disk eject.
Snow Leopard makes ejecting external drives more reliable. Core system services such as Spotlight indexing and file system events will intelligently stop their work so you can remove your drive. And improved dialogs tell you which applications are using the drive so you know what to close in order to safely disconnect your drive.

[JKT]

Something more on topic:

I would like a App Restore option that would let me save my workspace and have it reopen everything as it was at the time I initiated a log out or shut down. I'd also like to be able to synch other apps preferences and files to my other Macs so that my entire family of computers is in synch with no confusion of what files are the latest versions. That is, I want a rock solid versioning system that operates between my machines. In 10.7 - probably not, but I hope it is on the horizon for OS XI or sooner.

[0157988944]

Snow Leopard should have fixed Spaces... but I guess that will be top on my list for 10.7.
ZFS is a must if only for Time Machine.

I don't really like the idea of a Finder App Store. Perhaps an App Directory, but I don't know that the buying should be done through Apple.

And while not 10.7 related entirely, iTunes needs to get the Snow Leopard treatment really bad. If it were an object, just imagine the dust in it.

[angelmb]

Originally Posted by adamfishercox 

I don't really like the idea of a Finder App Store. Perhaps an App Directory…

Sort of this one?

[Chongo]

Apple is skipping 10.6?

[0157988944]

I was thinking more along the lines of their Downloads section, but as an App of its own or part of the Finder.

Originally Posted by Chongo 

Apple is skipping 10.6?

[mdc]

Originally Posted by shifuimam 

Make window maximizing actually maximize windows, instead of arbitrarily resizing them.

Like OreoCookie said, I think this is a terrible Windows feature. Nowadays with us having high resolution and large monitors maximizing a window should not be system wide feature.
I have a client that has a 30" Cinema Display and I die a little inside when I see him with Mail resized to take up the entire display. What a waste.

Back on topic though.
One feature that I'd love to have is some sort of file integration into MobileMe syncing.
Along with bookmarks, and all the other options it'd be nice if you could select your home folder (for example) and then when any changes are made it'll sync across to your other synced Mobile Me Macs. Very similar to how Dropbox works across all of your registered computers, but built into MobileMe and supporting the rest of my Mac.

[Eug]

1) Support for ALL Intel Macs
2) True resolution independence

[slugslugslug]

Originally Posted by mdc 

One feature that I'd love to have is some sort of file integration into MobileMe syncing.
Along with bookmarks, and all the other options it'd be nice if you could select your home folder (for example) and then when any changes are made it'll sync across to your other synced Mobile Me Macs. Very similar to how Dropbox works across all of your registered computers, but built into MobileMe and supporting the rest of my Mac.

Have you tried turning on iDisk sync? It's pretty close, though you have to use your iDisk's folders instead of any old arbitrary ones. But once you've turned it on, you can make aliases to iDisk subfolders inside any of your local folders.

[OreoCookie]

Originally Posted by Eug 

1) Support for ALL Intel Macs

Huh?
Which Intel Macs aren't supported? Or do you mean that many Intel-based Macs won't be able to take advantage of OpenCL? (In that case, they're still supported by Snow Leopard.)

[Eug]

Originally Posted by OreoCookie 

Huh?
Which Intel Macs aren't supported? Or do you mean that many Intel-based Macs won't be able to take advantage of OpenCL? (In that case, they're still supported by Snow Leopard.)

I'm saying I have a sneaking feeling Apple might arbitrarily drop support for single-core Intel Macs with 10.7.

In fact, I wouldn't be surprised if they arbitrarily dropped support for all 32-bit Intel Macs with 10.7, since the last Core Duo Macs were released in 2006. All Macs since 2007 (and some in 2006) have been dual-core (or more) and 64-bit.

To put it another way, I don't want OS X.7 Fluffy White Kitten to be exclusive to multi-core 64-bit machines.

[0157988944]

I don't think there's any need to drop 32 bit support. It's not like PowerPC where a whole binary would need to be kept separately. It's not like Apple is trying to make as many of it's products obsolete as possible, but theres a point where the $ and resources are better spent dedicated to solely Intel.

[Eug]

Originally Posted by adamfishercox 

It's not like Apple is trying to make as many of it's products obsolete as possible, but theres a point where the $ and resources are better spent dedicated to solely Intel.

I personally believe Apple intentionally tries to obsolete some of its own products to force people to upgrade.

Otherwise, I cannot explain why certain spec cutoffs seem so arbitrary. For example. Aperture (now) supports a 1.8 GHz G5 iMac with GeForce FX 5200 Ultra. However, it does not support a 1.6 GHz G5 iMac with GeForce FX 5200 Ultra. The machines are identical, except for 200 Hz. That's an 11% difference in clock speed. I find a 10-15% difference in clock speed often barely noticeable in most usage.

[0157988944]

Oh, I don't disagree that they force obsolecence, but I don't think they're trying to knock out as many products as they can without at leas *some* reason. There just isn't any real extra effort that needs to be put into 32 bit Intel chips, it's already been done.

As for your example, there *does* have o be a line somewhere. With Leopard, an 800 MHz G4 probably would have ben fine but then people would be whining about their 700 MHz not being compatible and that being arbitrary, etc.etc.

[Eug]

Originally Posted by adamfishercox 

Oh, I don't disagree that they force obsolecence, but I don't think they're trying to knock out as many products as they can without at leas *some* reason. There just isn't any real extra effort that needs to be put into 32 bit Intel chips, it's already been done.

They could easily argue that they don't want to support multiple platforms with their new 10.7 features. They want to allocate all their resources into making as good a 64-bit version as possible, 32-bit be damned.

As for your example, there *does* have o be a line somewhere. With Leopard, an 800 MHz G4 probably would have ben fine but then people would be whining about their 700 MHz not being compatible and that being arbitrary, etc.etc.

Interesting you should mention that, since Leopard DID support 800 MHz G4s, at least in beta. They removed 800 MHz support in the release version.

However, that's mostly a different situation anyway. In my example with the iMacs, the machines are basically identical. They were the same line, released at the same time. With 800 MHz G4s vs 867 MHz G4s, they're often actually different release versions. eg. The G4 800 TiBook was released April 2002, while the 867 was released in November. Come to think of it though, Leopard works on the G4 867 Power Mac, but does not work on the dual G4 800 Power Mac that was released at the same time. For obvious reasons, the dual 800 was the higher end model, and cost significantly more than the single 867.

[Curiosity]

I would really like to have an interface that lets me control the GUI. I would like to change the colour scheme, the cursors, the folders.
I would appreciate packet writing to CDs and DVDs as well.

[kmkkid]

Originally Posted by CharlesS 

5. The "Hide" check box in the Login Items preferences actually doing something.

A little birdie has told me that Mail actually hides at login in Snow Leopard.

Only took like 3 years to fix that one.

[Chuckit]

Originally Posted by Curiosity 

I would really like to have an interface that lets me control the GUI. I would like to change the colour scheme, the cursors, the folders.
I would appreciate packet writing to CDs and DVDs as well.

I give GUI customization about a 0.5% chance of happening. Apple has been moving in the opposite direction for years.

[besson3c]

So, now that the future of ZFS is bleak in as so far as being actively developed by Sun/Oracle, do you think that Apple is going to want to pick up development and assume some responsibility for this, along with the FreeBSD team (who is also working on migrating to ZFS and making it the default in FBSD 8)? How will this work? Apple does need to understand the file system well enough to make the necessary changes to Time Machine, Spotlight, their disk tools, etc., but there are also outstanding problems with the file system itself that need to be fixed. Will Apple just work with the main ZFS code base and other developers outside of Apple that are working on it, or will they fork off?

[OreoCookie]

besson, do you know a little more about btrfs?
As far as I understand it was started by Linux geeks who did not like the license of ZFS and thought they could do the same/better themselves? Is that accurate?

[cwkmacuser]

Originally Posted by OreoCookie 

Big, big no, no. This is, by far, the worst aspect of Windows: even though you have beautiful 16:10 screens, a browser window takes up full width. Maximize should maximize with respect to the content in the windown and not take up all your screen space.

I don't like Windoze, but that's how it should be. Maximize should maximize. I shouldn't have to drag the windows to make them take up my entire screen. Otherwise, delete the Maximize button entirely.

A better speech recognition system would be nice.

[0157988944]

Reading a thread before replying is so last year apparently.

It's not a maximize button. It's a "Size to fit" button. Some applications don't use it right, or at all, but that just makes the application poor in that respect. The button itself, for me, is more useful than maximize (another reason I won't use Firefox, who needs swathes of blank space on either side of their website viewing experience?)

[cwkmacuser]

Originally Posted by Curiosity 

I would really like to have an interface that lets me control the GUI. I would like to change the colour scheme, the cursors, the folders.
I would appreciate packet writing to CDs and DVDs as well.

Good idea. I agree, the colors should be customizable. They could have the Leopard/Snow Leopard scheme, the Tiger Scheme, earlier schemes, Windows scheme, custom scheme, and maybe a few others.

[besson3c]

I don't have any real inside information as to how the politics played out, but I believe that btrfs was indeed created so that the licensing terms would be more compatible:

Another day in development… � ZFS, Btrfs and Oracle

The only other thing that I know is that ext4 is meant to be a bridge to btrfs in Linux.

The more I think about this, the more I'm starting to think that ZFS is really a very long ways off in the world of Apple.

The Linux/BSD developers generally seem to expend more resources towards this low level stuff as we've discussed in the past, and they are carefully plotting bridge technologies such as the userland ZFS stuff (i.e. using the ZFS tools without reformatting your entire system as ZFS) in FreeBSD 7, and ext4 in the case of Linux. The userland stuff in FBSD 7 is said to be complete and functioning. I expect Apple to take a similar path. It would be crazy to just sort of throw ZFS out there without taking a similar conservative path. With the Oracle buy out, I'm sure there is a great amount of uncertainty over the future.

It looks like Apple hasn't even really completed the userland stuff according to the impression I get here: faq – ZFS and issues – ZFS. These problems and limitations look severe. There are also no test versions of Time Machine, Spotlight, or any other technologies which might take advantage of the new features of this more modern filesystem.

Therefore, if Apple is this far behind, we have a ways to wait. I would expect the following milestones:

1) userland stuff is complete
2) people test and hammer away at it, addressing problems along the way. At some point bootable ZFS is available to test
3) Developers start testing upgrades to Time Machine, Spotlight, etc. somehow (I don't know exactly how this would be facilitated)
4) ZFS becomes the default file system

we're not even at #1 yet. I don't even know if Apple has articulated their road map to their developers? Right now ZFS sort of seems like a random pet project of somebody's at Apple.

[Big Mac]

Originally Posted by cwkmacuser 

I don't like Windoze, but that's how it should be. Maximize should maximize.

But it's not Maximize. It's not WIndows you're dealing with. It's Mac OS X, and there are differences.