Tim,
As Apple prepares to release Mountaion Lion you may want to reexamine users biggest complaints about Lion in order to creat the best Mountain Lion possible.
The major complaints on the web revolve around two major issues - Save As and Auto Termination.
Comments from around the web regarding Save As and Auto Termination
John Brownlee - Cult of Mac
“Save As…” Quietly Returns To OS X In Mountain Lion, But Apple’s Still Being Stupid About It
Finally.
One of the more bizarre changes that Apple introduced in OS X Lion was completely abandoning the “Save As…” option in documents.
In OS X Mountain Lion, Apple’s re-introducing “Save as…” The bad news? It’s still hidden and unavailable from menus, but instead only accessible through a convoluted keyboard shortcut: Command-Shift-Option-S. For power users only, in other words. There’s no way to just discover it.
Here’s a thought, Apple… if you’re willing to backpedal this far, why not just go all the way and put it in the damn menus?"
From Mac Daily News 6-12-12
"Save As… is very useful for those of us who have multiple forms which we customize as needed, or take an existing document and revise it for another client/purpose/date and do not want to write over the existing saved file.
I don’t want to be forced to go to the Finder and copy a document just to open it every time, and Duplicate and then Save is a two-step process when a simple Save As… command (which everyone was used to) could perform the Duplicate and Save function all at once."
"I think Apple was wrong on this one. Save As NEEDS to come back . . . all the way back."
" Save As does work better with how users are used to working, and it is one step less. It’s return is a good thing."
" Lack of Save As… is the one thing I absolutely hate about Lion."
" THIS is why I have not, and will not, upgrade to Mountain Lion yet. I use modified versions of old lesson plans constantly. I agree. It took a simple one-step process and made it a convoluted two step process. RETURN Save As… To its rightful place…"
Mac Daily News 6-25-12
"Really, Apple, what’s with “Command-Option-Shift-S” This is a “solution” that reeks of Microsoft-level committee-think. Don’t fix what isn’t broken."
" Removing the command for “save as” in Lion was just stupid."
" (Command-Option-Shift-S), How Microsoftian, How about reverting it to it’s perfectly functional original state?"
" Command option shift S to save? WTF? Has Microsoft gained control of OS X??"
Apple Discussions 6-13-12
"I downgraded to Snow leopard but was worried about having to (eventually) upgrade to the latest OS so as to get updates for new software. The people that invented versions and that took away save as should be prosecuted for damages to the well being of humanity!"
Mac Rumors 5-19-12
"Hopefully 3rd party programs will allow you to choose which save system you would like to use."
"The one recent change that I dislike is the "save a version", "duplicate," and "export" options for documents. I think this adds a lot of unnecessary complexity. It should simply be "save" "save as" and "restore from save." "Save" would save a version. "Save as" would default to the old behavior of saving it to a new document, rather than duplicating and prompting you to commit the changes you've made to the new document. "Restore from save" would give you the option to roll back to any previous save of the document via the Versions window. This would retain most of the new functionality that had been introduced in Lion and would be more intuitive."
Softpedia 6-13-12
"It eludes us why Cupertino has been so reluctant to just put it back in where it has always been, as requested by everyone. Not a single comment in both aforementioned articles says anything positive about this change. Honestly, Apple."
Auto Terminate Suggestion:
Instead of requiring users to type a command into terminal, provide a check box in System Preferences for systems with 8 gigabytes of ram or higher.
Comments from Apple Disscussions:
"Apple's Lion HUI guidelines tell us that "sudden and unexpected quitting of an application enhances the user experience". This is by far, the stupidest thing ever to be declared as a standard from Apple.
I have machines with 12 and 8 GB of RAM and Apple thinks it will enhance me experience be auto quitting an app that takes up 19.7 MB of RAM? This is not helpful. This is frustrating and makes having to use Lion an inconsistant and unpleasant experience. I do not want my OS to be trying to outthink me. This is another example of Lion being a bad nanny state of an OS."
"It's auto quitting to save 19.7 MB, (with 3 GB free) but it really isn't quitting! It's just preventing me from driving the app from the GUI since I closed the last document and brought another app to the front.
I can understand quitting an app with no documents to save memory in a memory constrained condition, but...It isn't really quitting! It's just disabling the display of the GUI. The application is still running.
You can see this in the Activity Monitor. The user is just prevented from accessing the UI unless they actually go back and launch the app again. This forces the user to perform unnecessary steps for no reason.
This isn't a memory constrained condition! There is 3 GB free! This is one of the reasons I uninstalled Lion from all my 3 macs and restored Snow Leopard."
"Count me in with that complaint. I think auto-quitting -- and in particular auto-quitting document-based applications -- is the worst "feature" ever introduced in an Apple system. I hate it."
"Personally viewing all the arguments in this thread I still think auto-quitting is bad. If Apple thinks that auto-quitting is a feature it should be an option. I'm even fine with it being the default. But it would be nice if Apple provided a way to disable auto-quitting, preferably as a global option as well as a per-app option."
http://vimeo.com/34711608
http://tidbits.com/article/12398
http://tidbits.com/article/13019
" I would love to see it become optional, perhaps even automatically disabled on systems with 8GB RAM or more. With that much RAM, there is no reason why Mac OS should be performing the kind of fake "auto-terminate." - Mac Rumors
"When an app shuts down without my permission it is a crash, not a feature!"
Restore the Save As for those who have Auto Save Disabled
Suggestion:
Insert an option to enable Save As in system preferences that appears if Auto Save is disabled. This would be much easier to than remembering complicated key strokes. Currently, Save As is easier and more consistent on Windows than it is on the Macintosh. This should not be!
The new keyboard Save As option is nice, but what about those of us who prefer using a menu? By doing away with Save As, Apple is just making it difficult for users to save a document with a new name and location. The current situation is similar to when Ford decided to put the horn on the turn signal instead of the steering wheel. Technologically it may have been a better idea, but it failed to increase the usability enough to compensate for old habits.
As Apple prepares to release Mountaion Lion you may want to reexamine users biggest complaints about Lion in order to creat the best Mountain Lion possible.
The major complaints on the web revolve around two major issues - Save As and Auto Termination.
Comments from around the web regarding Save As and Auto Termination
John Brownlee - Cult of Mac
“Save As…” Quietly Returns To OS X In Mountain Lion, But Apple’s Still Being Stupid About It
Finally.
One of the more bizarre changes that Apple introduced in OS X Lion was completely abandoning the “Save As…” option in documents.
In OS X Mountain Lion, Apple’s re-introducing “Save as…” The bad news? It’s still hidden and unavailable from menus, but instead only accessible through a convoluted keyboard shortcut: Command-Shift-Option-S. For power users only, in other words. There’s no way to just discover it.
Here’s a thought, Apple… if you’re willing to backpedal this far, why not just go all the way and put it in the damn menus?"
From Mac Daily News 6-12-12
"Save As… is very useful for those of us who have multiple forms which we customize as needed, or take an existing document and revise it for another client/purpose/date and do not want to write over the existing saved file.
I don’t want to be forced to go to the Finder and copy a document just to open it every time, and Duplicate and then Save is a two-step process when a simple Save As… command (which everyone was used to) could perform the Duplicate and Save function all at once."
"I think Apple was wrong on this one. Save As NEEDS to come back . . . all the way back."
" Save As does work better with how users are used to working, and it is one step less. It’s return is a good thing."
" Lack of Save As… is the one thing I absolutely hate about Lion."
" THIS is why I have not, and will not, upgrade to Mountain Lion yet. I use modified versions of old lesson plans constantly. I agree. It took a simple one-step process and made it a convoluted two step process. RETURN Save As… To its rightful place…"
Mac Daily News 6-25-12
"Really, Apple, what’s with “Command-Option-Shift-S” This is a “solution” that reeks of Microsoft-level committee-think. Don’t fix what isn’t broken."
" Removing the command for “save as” in Lion was just stupid."
" (Command-Option-Shift-S), How Microsoftian, How about reverting it to it’s perfectly functional original state?"
" Command option shift S to save? WTF? Has Microsoft gained control of OS X??"
Apple Discussions 6-13-12
"I downgraded to Snow leopard but was worried about having to (eventually) upgrade to the latest OS so as to get updates for new software. The people that invented versions and that took away save as should be prosecuted for damages to the well being of humanity!"
Mac Rumors 5-19-12
"Hopefully 3rd party programs will allow you to choose which save system you would like to use."
"The one recent change that I dislike is the "save a version", "duplicate," and "export" options for documents. I think this adds a lot of unnecessary complexity. It should simply be "save" "save as" and "restore from save." "Save" would save a version. "Save as" would default to the old behavior of saving it to a new document, rather than duplicating and prompting you to commit the changes you've made to the new document. "Restore from save" would give you the option to roll back to any previous save of the document via the Versions window. This would retain most of the new functionality that had been introduced in Lion and would be more intuitive."
Softpedia 6-13-12
"It eludes us why Cupertino has been so reluctant to just put it back in where it has always been, as requested by everyone. Not a single comment in both aforementioned articles says anything positive about this change. Honestly, Apple."
Auto Terminate Suggestion:
Instead of requiring users to type a command into terminal, provide a check box in System Preferences for systems with 8 gigabytes of ram or higher.
Comments from Apple Disscussions:
"Apple's Lion HUI guidelines tell us that "sudden and unexpected quitting of an application enhances the user experience". This is by far, the stupidest thing ever to be declared as a standard from Apple.
I have machines with 12 and 8 GB of RAM and Apple thinks it will enhance me experience be auto quitting an app that takes up 19.7 MB of RAM? This is not helpful. This is frustrating and makes having to use Lion an inconsistant and unpleasant experience. I do not want my OS to be trying to outthink me. This is another example of Lion being a bad nanny state of an OS."
"It's auto quitting to save 19.7 MB, (with 3 GB free) but it really isn't quitting! It's just preventing me from driving the app from the GUI since I closed the last document and brought another app to the front.
I can understand quitting an app with no documents to save memory in a memory constrained condition, but...It isn't really quitting! It's just disabling the display of the GUI. The application is still running.
You can see this in the Activity Monitor. The user is just prevented from accessing the UI unless they actually go back and launch the app again. This forces the user to perform unnecessary steps for no reason.
This isn't a memory constrained condition! There is 3 GB free! This is one of the reasons I uninstalled Lion from all my 3 macs and restored Snow Leopard."
"Count me in with that complaint. I think auto-quitting -- and in particular auto-quitting document-based applications -- is the worst "feature" ever introduced in an Apple system. I hate it."
"Personally viewing all the arguments in this thread I still think auto-quitting is bad. If Apple thinks that auto-quitting is a feature it should be an option. I'm even fine with it being the default. But it would be nice if Apple provided a way to disable auto-quitting, preferably as a global option as well as a per-app option."
http://vimeo.com/34711608
http://tidbits.com/article/12398
http://tidbits.com/article/13019
" I would love to see it become optional, perhaps even automatically disabled on systems with 8GB RAM or more. With that much RAM, there is no reason why Mac OS should be performing the kind of fake "auto-terminate." - Mac Rumors
"When an app shuts down without my permission it is a crash, not a feature!"
Restore the Save As for those who have Auto Save Disabled
Suggestion:
Insert an option to enable Save As in system preferences that appears if Auto Save is disabled. This would be much easier to than remembering complicated key strokes. Currently, Save As is easier and more consistent on Windows than it is on the Macintosh. This should not be!
The new keyboard Save As option is nice, but what about those of us who prefer using a menu? By doing away with Save As, Apple is just making it difficult for users to save a document with a new name and location. The current situation is similar to when Ford decided to put the horn on the turn signal instead of the steering wheel. Technologically it may have been a better idea, but it failed to increase the usability enough to compensate for old habits.
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