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Mac Guru · Jun 23, 2003, 03:16 AM

Go ahead, you know you gotta have SOMETHING to gripe about

Mac Guru

invisibleX · Jun 23, 2003, 11:09 AM

GUI, if anything, is a cheap mockery of what themers have been doing for ages. It looks cheap, it looks stupid.

DeathMan · Jun 23, 2003, 12:06 PM

Metal finder.

http://www.mac.com/1/pantherpreview.html

Its true.

elcuco · Jun 23, 2003, 02:00 PM

$129!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Not cool............

OptimusG4 · Jun 23, 2003, 02:06 PM

Like we didnt know they would charge for it.

Anyhow, I think the iSight along with iChat is something cool. Looking forward to FileVault and fast user switching.

clarkgoble · Jun 23, 2003, 02:31 PM

I couldn't tell. Did "smart playlist" equivalents exist for the Finder? It doesn't look like you can do anything beyond the search box. Smart "playlists" ala iTunes would have been very, very nice. Further you could have configured them for less "savvy" users.

absmiths · Jun 23, 2003, 02:32 PM

Originally posted by elcuco:
$129!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Not cool............

I would pay $129 just for the fast user switching, even without all the other stuff.

Oh, and I don't care if the Finder is metal.

IonCable · Jun 23, 2003, 02:49 PM

Well it's 129 for the upgrade. Starting saving your pennies and dimes. Skip a few Colas and order the medium pizza instead of the large. You got until Sept. to come up with the money. From what I've seen it's worth it.

Simon · Jun 23, 2003, 03:01 PM

The user bar on the right reminds me of Windows. It better be very Mac-like or I will hate it.

This is - so far - my only Panther gripe.

And yes, I will gladly pay 129 for it.

bamburg dunes · Jun 23, 2003, 03:39 PM

Money isn't the problem here, but what exactly is all that great about what was shown?, ok, some useful and good features, but nothing outstanding. I remember when Jaguar was announced, all those lovely new things in it, made my heart miss a beat, but panther seems to lack a certain something. I'm sure there's a ton of feautures to come into it, but from what was shown didn;t really do anything for me. I want to know what's new under the hood, file system changes, exciting finder changes and all the rest.

BTW, the interface looks like s**t, can't believe they've gone down the metal look.

If it's metal, the n it better be metal throughout, hope it's not a mish-mash of stripes and metal.

bamburg dunes · Jun 23, 2003, 03:43 PM

Just checked out Panther at Apple's site, yup, mish-mash of metal and that funny looking striped theme. Seems liek a bunch of updates ot programs already there adn some features I personally won't use, like fast user switching.

Oh well.

bamburg dunes · Jun 23, 2003, 03:45 PM

Even the buttons are schizo still, one type for the metal look, and the other bubble type for the striped parts.

clarkgoble · Jun 23, 2003, 03:45 PM

How can you say that? A rewritten Finder that won't be slow and kludgy? Better font handling? Expose is cool as hell! Multiple simultaneous GUI logins aka fast user switching! Mail supports full HTML. Address now actually prints. Preview is totally rewritten and is about twice as fast as the PC Acrobat 6.0. The open/save dialog changes alone would make me lay down the $130!

Yea I have problems. I was very disappointed in that "smart playlists" were given to Project Builder but not the Finder. That was the one feature we'd discussed the past few months that I was looking forward to the most. It would have been very similar to BeOS. Bummer. I hate the brushed metal, but realistically the Finder is now much more like iTunes so it isn't a killer.

I suspect a lot of the improvements will be to how well things work. i.e. Safari 1.0, X11 1.0, better PC network connectivity, etc.

bamburg dunes · Jun 23, 2003, 03:51 PM

It just seems liek a few re-writes, updates to existing apps, there's only about 4 completely new features mentioned; expose, seems ok; fast user switching, for some of us that don't share our macs, hardly going to be used that much; better font management, that's good; re-written finder, well, we'll need to see what has been re-written, so far a few features have been shown, but nothing that makes me go wow. I don't know, it's not an upgrade on the same scale as Jaguar, IMO.

goose · Jun 23, 2003, 03:53 PM

Tried out the new iChat beta. Okay, so there is support for groups, but I don't like the way it's implemented.

bamburg dunes · Jun 23, 2003, 04:04 PM

The open/save dialog window looks like it's modal, no title bar, that would be a stupid step backwards.

markphip · Jun 23, 2003, 04:06 PM

All in all, I am pleased. I would have liked to have seen Apple offer something like a $60 price for Jaguar users. $129 is a little steep although in the end I do not have any real problem with Apple making some money.

I haven't seen it mentioned, but I am assuming there is no actual 64-bit code or even 64-bit support in Panther? I am not surprised or disappointed by this as I do not think it is needed on the desktop.

absmiths · Jun 23, 2003, 04:13 PM

Originally posted by bamburg dunes:
The open/save dialog window looks like it's modal, no title bar, that would be a stupid step backwards.

Open/Save dialogs should be modal, there is no reason to bring the app to the front while it has an open/save dialog open (It should only be app modal, not system modal).

clarkgoble · Jun 23, 2003, 04:13 PM

I'd be very surprised if the disk functions weren't updated for 64bit. I suspect the math libraries that applications link to are also updated. But yes, most 64 bit benefits will come from recompiled software like Mathematica.

absmiths · Jun 23, 2003, 04:16 PM

Originally posted by bamburg dunes:
Money isn't the problem here, but what exactly is all that great about what was shown?

How about the sync to FreeBSD 5.0? Jaguar is still at 4.4. GCC 3.3 instead of 3.1, built-in rendezvous enabled distributed compiling for C, C++, Obj-C and Java. Those are big plusses for me...

absmiths · Jun 23, 2003, 04:17 PM

Originally posted by markphip:
All in all, I am pleased. I would have liked to have seen Apple offer something like a $60 price for Jaguar users. $129 is a little steep although in the end I do not have any real problem with Apple making some money.

We are just going to have to get used to this - $129 for each 10.n upgrade, period.

bamburg dunes · Jun 23, 2003, 04:20 PM

Sorry, what I mean by the open/save window, is that it doesn't see mmoveable, just stuck in the air at a fixed position, unlike just now where we can move it around, or put it out of the way.

absmiths · Jun 23, 2003, 04:22 PM

Originally posted by clarkgoble:
I'd be very surprised if the disk functions weren't updated for 64bit. I suspect the math libraries that applications link to are also updated. But yes, most 64 bit benefits will come from recompiled software like Mathematica.

I wish someone could write a cross-compiler that could take the 32-bit code and relink a binary with 64 bit code. It seems so simple, especially when you consider that Systems 7-9 and Connectix VPC could all recompile code on the fly for completely incompatible architectures.

Waiting for a performance-tuned consumer app is like waiting for Windows NOT to be precompiled for a 386.

b00tang · Jun 23, 2003, 04:23 PM

It seems like there should be a balance... I'll shell out the cash if its a major upgrade like jaguar was... but 129 for this? I know I don't have a choice and eventually I will upgrade. But No matter how long they show a movie of a cow with home on the range in the background apple makes me sad. I like most of the upgrades sure (except brushed metal finder windows)... but I get the feeling that some of those "major speed increases" might have more to do with G5s than enhanced programming and right now I am sitting here with an imac that was top of the line less than a year ago and crushed hopes for decent finder speed

bamburg dunes · Jun 23, 2003, 04:29 PM

Originally posted by absmiths:
How about the sync to FreeBSD 5.0? Jaguar is still at 4.4. GCC 3.3 instead of 3.1, built-in rendezvous enabled distributed compiling for C, C++, Obj-C and Java. Those are big plusses for me...

I'm glad, and it sounds great, but I don't do much deep development now. I really want to know what's been done to the finder, whether it's a re-design or re-write. The interface is bugging the life out of me too, I've mentioned all the problems I see with it in the GUI forum, it's a mess, a real mess and very sad. Not much has been mentioend of what has been done under the hood in Panther, adn what has been shown as features, just seems lacking to me. I want to liek this, damn, I need to, I use it ever yday, so Ithink what we'r eseeing is jsut really very early features, I just hope there's more to come.

Millennium · Jun 23, 2003, 04:29 PM

Originally posted by bamburg dunes:
The open/save dialog window looks like it's modal, no title bar, that would be a stupid step backwards.

My guess is that it's probably a Sheet. Nothing wrong with that; this is the kind of thing that Sheets are meant to be used for.

A rewritten Finder is a Good Thing, if only because this should mean that the code is much cleaner. My big question is, can you keep the old view types? The current incarnation smacks just a little too much of the horrid Windows Explorer. The blind Cocoa-for-Cocoa's-Sake zealots should also be happy, since this is probably a Cocoa app now. I think this is a Good Thing, not because of any inherent superiority in Cocoa, but rather the opposite: this should have forced them to patch some of the holes currently in Cocoa.

Fast User Switching: awesome. Not for the feature itself, mind you; I very much doubt I'll ever use this feature, which I consider to be borderline-useless fluff. However, the architectural changes which had to have been made in order for this to be possible will likely prove to be very valuable indeed over the coming months.

$129 price tag... a tad on the steep side, but not terribly much. A special upgrade price -$60 or even $90- for Jaguar users would have been nice, though.

The Leaks: I hope more things get leaked in the future. I have always been a staunch believer in the idea that Apple's policy of keeping people in the dark is hurting them far more than it helps.

markphip · Jun 23, 2003, 04:32 PM

Originally posted by clarkgoble:
I'd be very surprised if the disk functions weren't updated for 64bit. I suspect the math libraries that applications link to are also updated. But yes, most 64 bit benefits will come from recompiled software like Mathematica.

Prior to the announcement, those are the sort of things I would have expected to be 64-bit, if anything. However, look at the Panther info they have posted. I see nothing about 64-bit which leads me to believe they do not have much to say.

Again, in my opinion, it isn't needed either. The great thing about the PowerPC ISA is that there is zero performance trade-off either way.

entrox · Jun 23, 2003, 04:46 PM

Just send them feedback on how you feel about the brushed metal finder. Considering that this was only a sneak preview, I'd say there's still a lot of room for changes and further enhancements. Sherlock reverted to an Aqua appearance too, if I remember correctly.

They're violating their very own guidelines left and right: brushed metal everywhere, those tiny dots in the contextual menu, the mish-mash of tabs and those iPhoto-style button bars, etc. etc.

On the other hand, Expose looks /really/ neat

clebin · Jun 23, 2003, 04:48 PM

Originally posted by absmiths:
Open/Save dialogs should be modal, there is no reason to bring the app to the front while it has an open/save dialog open (It should only be app modal, not system modal).

I'm sure it doesn't have a titlebar because it's a Sheet....

Well, I don't know what to make of this upgrade. The new Finder and open/save dialogues are certainly welcome. I hope, as Jobs apparently said, they have got it right at last.

Finder labels, but it doesn't shade the icon like OS 9 for some reason. Easel also had nice icon labels and so on. Perhaps Apple could've been a bit more innovative....

No metadata support that I can see, which is hardly cutting edge! Something like Smart Playlists in the Finder would be good, as someone suggested. As it is, it's hardly pushing the boundaries. I thought Apple would have more time to concentrate on things like this with OS X mostly working and bug-free these days.

iChat is disappointing. Where's the support for other protocols? I don't know anyone on AOL and having video conferencing isn't going to change that. It's just another feature many people won't use.

iDisk is NOT be a major feature in the new OS. iDisk is a feature of .Mac because you have to pay again for it...

A few minimal changes to Preview. I'm sure they'll be worth having - looks like they've expanded the thumbnail stuff.

ActiveDirectory support is nice. But where's the Exchange support in Mail and iCal? Wasn't Exchange Mail rumoured to be in 10.2? Still, it'll help them in the enterprise.

Expose is pretty cool. Fast user switching is pretty cool. No video of the cool cube effect on the site?? The security stuff is cool. Password-protected Sleep should've been there years ago though.

No theme support.

It'll be worth having and I'll pay for it, but I'm frankly a bit underwhelmed.

Chris

bamburg dunes · Jun 23, 2003, 04:59 PM

I think you're right, must be sheets since I don't see Apple going back to the olde days of fixed dialog windows. Lol, I must have got caught up in my own underwhelmed state and thought that nothing they did would have surprised me.

Metadata, that's the sort of thign I want to see. Anyone really know if the Finder is really re-written, or just re-designed?

entrox · Jun 23, 2003, 05:00 PM

Originally posted by clebin:
iChat is disappointing. Where's the support for other protocols? I don't know anyone on AOL and having video conferencing isn't going to change that. It's just another feature many people won't use.

No ****. There's like what.. 5 AIM users in Europe? Considering that the official AIM client also supports ICQ, I think this upgrade is a little lame. But hey, it's only Beta!

Besides the worsened GUI, I like what I saw. It's only a sneak preview after all.

DVD Plaza · Jun 23, 2003, 05:36 PM

I'm going to throw up... they really did make the Finer brushed metal

SMacTech · Jun 23, 2003, 05:39 PM

Originally posted by IonCable:
Well it's 129 for the upgrade. Starting saving your pennies and dimes. Skip a few Colas and order the medium pizza instead of the large. You got until Sept. to come up with the money. From what I've seen it's worth it.

Saving pennies and dimes? I will gladly pay $129 for it, but I will probably get mine with the new dual 2gigger.

dividend · Jun 23, 2003, 06:31 PM

somewhat unhappy with what I've read so far about panther.

I like expose, faxing, filevault, user switching, but

I absolutely DO NOT like metall-Finder at all. I like the features but I cannot understand why it has to be metall. I really really hope it is only optional and i will have to write to apple, hopefully there are more that thinks like me (and who writes....)

Metall takes up space, is ugly, does not look like the rest of the GUI. The only app that I like having metall is iTunes - now I need to hack so that i can get rid of all metall.

Millennium · Jun 23, 2003, 06:44 PM

Originally posted by entrox:
Considering that the official AIM client also supports ICQ, I think this upgrade is a little lame.

The AIM client does not support the ICQ protocol. Rather, they've been changing the ICQ protocol to use the same protocol as AIM.

End result: when the ICQ/AIM bridging is complete, iChat should work with both, without the need for Apple to do anything whatsoever. Therefore, there is no need for them to add ICQ protocol support, since that protocol is Going Away though the network is not.

boardsurfer · Jun 23, 2003, 06:49 PM

I watched the Keynote at the San Diego Apple Store. I swear Steve's finder window wasnt metal. Anyone else actually see it live? Heck, pull up the Quicktime, I dont think it was metal.

edit: yes, I saw the pics on apple.com

JLL · Jun 23, 2003, 07:18 PM

Originally posted by boardsurfer:
I watched the Keynote at the San Diego Apple Store. I swear Steve's finder window wasnt metal. Anyone else actually see it live? Heck, pull up the Quicktime, I dont think it was metal.

edit: yes, I saw the pics on apple.com

It was metal.

ender2002 · Jun 23, 2003, 07:40 PM

are we going to be seeing any speed improvements? (non-hardware related)

Gametes · Jun 23, 2003, 07:52 PM

Metal is cool; my problem is with these nonstandard toolbars, which suck the big one.
standard toolbars are customizable in what's on them and in where they are located, and they have color to make them identifible to boot.
These stupid toolbars are tiny, black and white, elements are either on or off (and most aren't an option). and location is not customizable at all.

It is totally a step backwards! Especially since they function as views and therefore, as a developer, they are harder to imitate.

Disagreement?

Start using your own rules, Apple.

boardsurfer · Jun 23, 2003, 07:58 PM

WHAT!?! NO PILES?! Man, when will they get it right. Dont they know they have to come through when they promise stuff like that?!

Diggory Laycock · Jun 23, 2003, 08:02 PM

just two things I have noticed about the new finder:

1 - The Action Button - as far as I could tell from the repeat stream this simply is an access point to the contextual menu.

Except that you have to go to the top of the window to get to it - much further away than the contextual menu. This is like putting the Services Menu in the Apple Menu - instead of the Contextual Menu where it should be.

2 - I've noticed one thing about all the screenshots of the Panther Finder - there are no Finder Toolbar items that relate to folders.

They seems to have been sacrificed for the Amazing New Dock-Style Thing On The Left�

Which I assume has also consumed the Favourites folder.

JLL · Jun 23, 2003, 08:08 PM

Originally posted by Diggory Laycock:
2 - I've noticed one thing about all the screenshots of the Panther Finder - there are no Finder Toolbar items that relate to folders.

What do you mean?

Developer · Jun 23, 2003, 08:15 PM

Originally posted by Diggory Laycock:
They seems to have been sacrificed for the Amazing New Dock-Style Thing On The Left�

That amazin new dock style thing on the left seems to be similar to the "shelf". Then it's not so new.

I really don't like the brushed metal.

Mediaman_12 · Jun 23, 2003, 08:39 PM

I will wait to use it for the final judgment, but at the moment it's not looking good.
In my 'window' toolbar I have Computer, Home, Applications, the 'search' box and the 'burn' icon, on the 'icons only' option. It takes up very little space & if I hit the 'hide toolbar' widget folders open in new windows. With this new thing I have a giant space on the right (that changes item spacing to boot) that's got to be at least as wide as the word 'Applications' apparently, Burn CD must now be in the 'cog' (WTF?) menu, not everyone has a huge list of 'favorites', that will just be wasted space for me (just like the sidebar thing in XP). Moving the 'toolbar' to the side like this also opens up another wasted space, where the toolbar icons used to be, on the right there is the 'search' box on the left you have the nav buttons & the 'cog' menu, with a big gap in between, why?
I hope the 'classic' multiple windows option is available as simply as it is in Jag (not in some sort of 'global' pref).
Yes the column view needed fixing, But I don't think this was way fix it.
How the 'Open/save' boxes work is almost a direct copy of the XP/Win2000 ones, except with more user config.
Expos� is cool I especially liked the 'show desktop' option.

clarkgoble · Jun 23, 2003, 08:39 PM

2 - I've noticed one thing about all the screenshots of the Panther Finder - there are no Finder Toolbar items that relate to folders.

Yes. And undoubtedly that's one reason not to read too much into this single screen dump. Where is the delete button, the burn button and so forth. What about new folder and the like?

Clearly there is a lot about the Finder that hasn't been shown or discussed.

Personally I'd not discount 10.3 including "smart folders" aka smart playlists, metadata and a new file system.

I'd be very surprised if there wasn't a widget or at least menu item to collapse the left pane. (Much as in Windows Explorer)

BTW - the left pane is very little like NeXT's shelf. It is more akin to the folders you could put in the icon bar in the current Finder. Put an other way they just took the top of Finder windows and rotated it and moved it to the left.

Jim Paradise · Jun 23, 2003, 09:43 PM

Originally posted by invisibleX:
GUI, if anything, is a cheap mockery of what themers have been doing for ages. It looks cheap, it looks stupid.

This expresses exactly what I think about thew new GUI.

Jim Paradise · Jun 23, 2003, 09:53 PM

Well, for those who dislike the mish-mash of brushed metal and Aqua, write to Apple about it. It's the first time I've sent feedback and *grrr*... I hope that if others do the same that it will have some effect on this bastardization of Aqua.

zachs · Jun 23, 2003, 11:02 PM

Originally posted by clarkgoble:
I'd be very surprised if there wasn't a widget or at least menu item to collapse the left pane. (Much as in Windows Explorer)

It's a split view...you can just drag the
side pane closed.

Brass · Jun 23, 2003, 11:03 PM

Personally, I like the concept of the new Finder. I couldn't give a flying fart if it's Aqua or Metal, so long as it works nicely.

It looks like it will work well for me. Every new Finder window has all the most useful file sytem starting points just one click away (and customisable!). And if you don't like them being there, just hide them. Did you notice the handle to hide that pane (ie, the small dot in gap between the two panes)?

I hope that there is a preference to "Hide starting points when I click one". This way, a new Finder window would have the starting points visible, and when I click one, they would disappear to allow more room for columns, or whatever your prefered view is. You could always get the starting points back by clicking the handle (see above), or by opening a new Finder window.

BuonRotto · Jun 23, 2003, 11:36 PM

Originally posted by clarkgoble:
BTW - the left pane is very little like NeXT's shelf. It is more akin to the folders you could put in the icon bar in the current Finder. Put an other way they just took the top of Finder windows and rotated it and moved it to the left.

I agree with everything you've said in this post, including this part. It would be shelf-like if there were one big difference: if instead of "poofing" an item when you drag it out, you could drop it back into the right part of the window. A true shelf is a mechanism for moving or copying files, not just work as a shortcut/favorites bar.

One thing that is good (I should put this in the raves thread) is that it's no just a matter of turning the current toolbar on its side to make the "source" column. The current Finder toolbar mixes tools and location shortcuts. Now, locations have their column, tools have the toolbar, and everything is much neater.

I should make this some sort of rant, and aside from wanting shelf functionality for that source column, I'm hoping they are adding more Dock menu commands like "close," and spring-loaded folder contents in the Dock, plus smart folders or piles, and saved searches.