Any sign that the OS X team has taken it's head out of it's behind in ML?

[PurrBall]

I think this new option will make a lot of people happy

[blow45]

@purrball Finally, looks good! if they could lose the linen background it would be great, but I can do with it too. To the chagrin of the apologists here and the others who don't have anything better to do, than deride those who are critical of apple and are demanding more options, and all those who say apple doesn't read forums it seems like we are making some progress here for the better. Kudos to them for listening as they should and they should be decent enough to bring these options to lion too via an upgrade, all the more so since pre 2007 macs (by and large) won't be able to run ml.

Originally Posted by slb

Stop obsessing over post ratings. Stop complaining so much about memory consumption and other bugs in a beta.

The memory consumption issues my friend are a lion thing, that I have yet to see apple addressing in either lion or ml, and I have a sneaking suspicion they won't because apparently and as per apple's policy these days they won't fix something by technologically advancing their os if they can offload it on the hardware - the hardware here being the ssd. Go read the relevant threads at apple forums to understand what I am talking about because it will take me a while to get technical here. It's goodbye then to memory management on hard disk macs. And this is a win win for them, slower systems with hard drives more people buy current macs with ssds.

OS X has memory management problems at its core and there are ways to address them with better algorithms that others have been implementing some time ago (sun for example), and it pisses me off to no avail that whatever os improvement would mean older macs get a better chance to be long lasting pro machines it's a no no for apple. Macs are going the forced obsoletion way following the trend of i-devices.

That's not the apple I was accustomed to, they were never before so addicted to making money at the expense of their user base. And they might be able to hide it from the average joe who they rip off, but they can't hide it from those who have a clue.

As for post ratings, I don't care about them, I care as much that when someone replies to me they don't downrate me at the same time, because it's in bad taste.

[Sdreed91]

Originally Posted by blow45

@purrball Finally, looks good! if they could lose the linen background it would be great, but I can do with it too. To the chagrin of the apologists here and the others who don't have anything better to do, than deride those who are critical of apple and are demanding more options, and all those who say apple doesn't read forums it seems like we are making some progress here for the better. Kudos to them for listening as they should and they should be decent enough to bring these options to lion too via an upgrade, all the more so since pre 2007 macs (by and large) won't be able to run ml.



The memory consumption issues my friend are a lion thing, that I have yet to see apple addressing in either lion or ml, and I have a sneaking suspicion they won't because apparently and as per apple's policy these days they won't fix something by technologically advancing their os if they can offload it on the hardware - the hardware here being the ssd. Go read the relevant threads at apple forums to understand what I am talking about because it will take me a while to get technical here. It's goodbye then to memory management on hard disk macs. And this is a win win for them, slower systems with hard drives more people buy current macs with ssds.

OS X has memory management problems at its core and there are ways to address them with better algorithms that others have been implementing some time ago (sun for example), and it pisses me off to no avail that whatever os improvement would mean older macs get a better chance to be long lasting pro machines it's a no no for apple. Macs are going the forced obsoletion way following the trend of i-devices.

That's not the apple I was accustomed to, they were never before so addicted to making money at the expense of their user base. And they might be able to hide it from the average joe who they rip off, but they can't hide it from those who have a clue.

As for post ratings, I don't care about them, I care as much that when someone replies to me they don't downrate me at the same time, because it's in bad taste.

The features that are now brought back in ML, I imagine will not be added to Lion. I say this only because if the features everyone wants are only available on one OS people will upgrade and Apples earns more sales. Just speculating of course, yet that is what I imagine will happen.

[nuckinfutz]

John Siracus on Automatic Reference Counting in Lion

My emphasis added


Apple has done a tremendous amount of work to modernize its development platform, including completely replacing its compiler, overhauling its IDE, and adding features and new syntax to the Objective-C language itself.

All of these things are great, but none address my specific concerns about memory management. Apple did eventually see fit to add garbage collection to Objective-C, but my fear that Apple wouldn't really commit to garbage collection in Objective-C turned out to be well-founded. Today, years after the introduction of this feature, very few of Apple's own applications use garbage collection.




More :

There's a good reason for this. Runtime garbage collection is simply a poor fit for Objective-C. For all its syntactic simplicity and long, distinguished history, the C programming language is actually a surprisingly complex beast, especially when it comes to memory management.

In summation :


Long story short: garbage collection for Objective-C is out. (It's still supported in Lion, but I wouldn't count on Apple putting a tremendous amount of effort into it going forward.

Automatic Reference Counting (ARC)


To understand how ARC works, start by picturing a traditional Objective-C source code file written by an expert Cocoa programmer. The retain, release, and autorelease messages are sent in all the right places and are in perfect balance.

Now imagine editing that source code file, removing every instance of the retain, release, and autorelease messages, and changing a single build setting in Xcode that instructs the compiler to put all the appropriate memory management calls back into your program when the source code is compiled. That's ARC. It's just what the name says: traditional Cocoa reference counting, done automatically.

More :

ARC versus garbage collection

Apple's Objective-C garbage collection came with some drawbacks. As alluded to earlier, the programmer has little control over when the garbage collector will run, making object reclamation non-deterministic. A garbage-collected application with a memory management bug may crash or not depending on when the collector actually runs.

Value Prop

ARC offers a very different value proposition. To start, it suffers from none of the disadvantages of Objective-C's runtime garbage collection. ARC is deterministic; all the memory management code is baked into the executable and does not change at runtime. Memory management is integrated directly into the program flow, rather than being done in batches periodically. This prevents execution stalls, and it can also reduce the high water mark.

I'd argue against statements that Apple isn't working on memory management. In fact it was well known 8 months ago via this review that Apple in fact had decided against going forward with Garbage Collection and was moving towards ARC. It may take another couple of revisions of OS X but any gap between OS X and other OS should be shortened rather quickly.

[blackhand1001]

Originally Posted by Senseotech

I've been using OS X since 10.3 and like Lion, so there goes that theory. Really, to complain that the lack of colored icons completely ruins your workflow??? Its called basic reading comprehension or, failing that, shape recognition. A small icon with colors and shaped like a document is no easier to see than a monochrome icon shaped like a document.

I guess you have never instructed a client on how to do something over the phone. It makes things much more difficult to explain to someone over the phone.

----------

Originally Posted by chrono1081

Not even close. Lion works, Vista didn't (pre-service pack 1). It took months before a fix was released to be able to transfer large amounts of data from one drive to another.

The only people crying about Lion are those who can't adapt to a change in the computer system.

Vista in its current state is faster and more organized then lion is at this moment. Vista was not as bad as people made it out to be even when it first came out.

[blow45]

@nukin

A couple of os x iterations? That's not working towards memory management, that's not allocating enough resources to work on memory management... At least apple's suppliers are working to provide even better hardware to make up for it... Btw the article you posted doesn't address problems within the kernel. Lion is slow to release memory for some reason and thus it's a memory hog. What you posted is irrelevant to this.

Now we come to the 65,536 byte question. Does ARC put Apple back on an even footing with its competitors when it comes to programming language abstraction? The answer, I'm afraid, is no. ARC takes care of almost all the mundane Objective-C memory management tasks, but everything outside of Objective-C remains as it was. Furthermore, ARC does very little to address the other pillar of modern, high-level programming: memory safety.

John Syracusa wrote the most ass kissing review of lion on the web btw...

[hkim1983]

I'm finding a lot of people defending Lion (and now ML) are missing the crux of the two main arguments being presented by the objectors:

-Change is being implemented purely for the sake of change, and not for the sake of increased productivity. This is bad because it can result in a loss of productivity, which is exactly what is happening for these users. I have yet to read a coherent response that defends these changes in Lion that isn't along the lines of: "well, it works for me, maybe something is wrong with YOU".

-The change is ok, but it's currently poorly implemented and needs to be improved upon. Again, I have yet to read a response that legitimately argues against this that isn't along the lines of the rubbish I stated above.

It almost seems like the defenders are feeling defensive about liking something without any rational behind it (there's nothing wrong with this per say), and thus feel the need to justify their irrationality with a "psuedo rational" argument, which I have seen fail with a 100% rate. If someone can direct me to responses that go against what I have seen in my limited time browsing these forums (I sadly do not have unlimited time to keep track of all mac forums on the internet), please feel free to, I am open to hearing a good stance on the other side of the fence. As it stands however, the objectors in my eyes, are making you guys look like fools with the wool over your eyes.

Apple seems to be finally realizing this themselves by slowly giving back what the objectors are arguing for...if that isn't a sign of defeat, I don't know what is. Apple is notorious for (mostly) ignoring objectors in the past, so this is something worth noting (and I have been using Mac OS since System 6, man, it was awful back then).

[Mal]

Originally Posted by hkim1983

I'm finding a lot of people defending Lion (and now ML) are missing the crux of the two main arguments being presented by the objectors:

I don't know how many people are missing any of these arguments. Most of the time, when you think people are ignoring arguments, it simply means that they're not agreeing, no matter how obvious you think those arguments are (and they're probably not as cut-and-dry as you think).

-Change is being implemented purely for the sake of change, and not for the sake of increased productivity. This is bad because it can result in a loss of productivity, which is exactly what is happening for these users. I have yet to read a coherent response that defends these changes in Lion that isn't along the lines of: "well, it works for me, maybe something is wrong with YOU".

I haven't seen any changes in Mac OS X that weren't intended to increase productivity or "customer delight," as Apple stated recently with something similar. Not every change is going to help everyone, but Apple has never provided any significant number of options for interface changes (not unless you go back to before the return of Steve Jobs, which was not a good time for Apple's history). While you may not like the changes, don't assume that they were not implemented for a good reason. Even if Apple ends up reversing course or adding back in old options, they don't make changes without a good and specific reason being articulated to those who make the decisions.

-The change is ok, but it's currently poorly implemented and needs to be improved upon. Again, I have yet to read a response that legitimately argues against this that isn't along the lines of the rubbish I stated above.

While sometimes this can be true, often it's simply the perception of the person making the argument, and not objectively true (or false). Try to keep in mind that not everyone uses their computer or those features in the same way, and some may benefit from implementations that you feel harms your productivity. Doesn't make the change right or wrong, but you should understand that it's rare for a change to be negative for everyone.

It almost seems like the defenders are feeling defensive about liking something without any rational behind it (there's nothing wrong with this per say), and thus feel the need to justify their irrationality with a "psuedo rational" argument, which I have seen fail with a 100% rate. If someone can direct me to responses that go against what I have seen in my limited time browsing these forums (I sadly do not have unlimited time to keep track of all mac forums on the internet), please feel free to, I am open to hearing a good stance on the other side of the fence. As it stands however, the objectors in my eyes, are making you guys look like fools with the wool over your eyes.

Apple seems to be finally realizing this themselves by slowly giving back what the objectors are arguing for...if that isn't a sign of defeat, I don't know what is. Apple is notorious for (mostly) ignoring objectors in the past, so this is something worth noting (and I have been using Mac OS since System 6, man, it was awful back then).

I can't speak for everyone, but anytime I see an argument like this, I assume that the person making the argument just doesn't have a reasonable argument to make. It's kinda like calling someone a troll. It's not an argument, it's attacking the person you're arguing against instead (usually referred to as an ad-hominem attack). I'd recommend not making arguments like that if you want to be taken seriously (and considering how well-written your post is, I'm sure you can manage a debate without such arguments).

Apple has always responded to significant customer feedback, but only when they actually received it from a significant number of customers. FireWire being added back to the first unibody 13" MacBook Pro's is a good example (the Aluminum MacBook 13" from Late 2008 did not have it, which was the direct predecessor to this 13" MacBook Pro). You're right that it's somewhat rare, though.

jW

[bedifferent]

Originally Posted by PurrBall

I think this new option will make a lot of people happy

God yes! Finally, "All Windows" Exposé is offered as a "new option". With ReSpaceApp being bought by BinaryAge (TotalFinder) and renamed TotalSpaces, offering 10.5/6 Spaces in Lion and ML, it seems ML will be what many people had hoped Lion should have been. Great that Apple is listening to its customers, Jobs always believed consumers didn't know what they wanted and gave little choice. However, sometimes consumers aren't all that ignorant. Choice isn't a bad thing .

[blow45]

Originally Posted by hkim1983

I'm finding a lot of people defending Lion (and now ML) are missing the crux of the two main arguments being presented by the objectors:

-Change is being implemented purely for the sake of change, and not for the sake of increased productivity. This is bad because it can result in a loss of productivity, which is exactly what is happening for these users. I have yet to read a coherent response that defends these changes in Lion that isn't along the lines of: "well, it works for me, maybe something is wrong with YOU".

-The change is ok, but it's currently poorly implemented and needs to be improved upon. Again, I have yet to read a response that legitimately argues against this that isn't along the lines of the rubbish I stated above.

It almost seems like the defenders are feeling defensive about liking something without any rational behind it (there's nothing wrong with this per say), and thus feel the need to justify their irrationality with a "psuedo rational" argument, which I have seen fail with a 100% rate. If someone can direct me to responses that go against what I have seen in my limited time browsing these forums (I sadly do not have unlimited time to keep track of all mac forums on the internet), please feel free to, I am open to hearing a good stance on the other side of the fence. As it stands however, the objectors in my eyes, are making you guys look like fools with the wool over your eyes.

Apple seems to be finally realizing this themselves by slowly giving back what the objectors are arguing for...if that isn't a sign of defeat, I don't know what is. Apple is notorious for (mostly) ignoring objectors in the past, so this is something worth noting (and I have been using Mac OS since System 6, man, it was awful back then).

Precisely that last point, emphasis mine.

I would also like to add a third point to the first two you mentioned:

-Lion seems by all accounts to be lacking in terms of core os work: kernel, memory management and file system improvements, and appears to be particularly buggy even after a .3 release in core os software such as safari, preview, mail and calendar, and even if the last three are occasional culprits in some systems, safari is a repeat offender in most systems. It is particularly problematic in systems without ssds and systems with less than 4gbs of ram. This has been my experience in all four of my systems, and in all, hmmm, just about 20 macs I 've been helping out friends with. I am now crystal clear in my advice to anyone who wants it: don't install lion in any system with 4gbs or less

OS X has become an os where work that doesn't only involve a few .doc and .xls documents, mail, preview, and safari is close to impossible on a 2gb and 4gb system. This is a parody for machines that sell at 20-30% higher margins than their competitors. It's a parody that windows 7 on a run of the mill a a few years old hp with core 2 duo and 2gbs of memory is more efficient and faster than lion on a latest and greatest i-core cpu and a 4gb mini. It's a parody and a disgrace for apple that windows 7 on pre 2010 (or even pre 2011) macs extends the life time of the computer and makes for a more responsive system. It's a parody that my 1.25gb memory powerbook g4 had comparable speed and responsiveness with basic tasks to lion on a 4gb mini and a cpu that is oh, about 5X more powerful. OS X is simply not taking much advantage of the increased refinement of the immensely more capable hardware apple now use.

Simply put, apple hasn't developed lion's programming core enough. It is self evident to anyone who isn't an apple apologist or cultist (and a lot here are, which is both apple's saving grace and pitfall) that apple didn't allocate enough resources to lion, ios got the, well... lion's share of them, and it's apparent apple doesn't have the proper resources to allocate, and by now their user base is so large that they can't afford not to. They can't keep band aid solutions any longer

What's even more worrisome is that they don't seem to be able to do this core work for mountain lion either - mountain lion is btw a service pack if there ever was one, and apple is shameless in calling it a new os - and by now they can't do this work even if they hired many more people because this is development that should have started and progressed at a much speedier pace 3-4 years or so ago when lion was in the works.

I will state this in closing: Had it not been apple releasing lion but ANY other os manufacturer without the cultish following apple have and the attachment of people to their apple products (warranted to a great extent because of some very commendable design and attention to detail (what os x used to have), as well as the money on pays for it and thereafter rationalizes their purchase.) they would have a big, big problem in their hands.

No one could have put out lion, with such dubious interface choices, such unpolished or downright badly implemented choices, such little core os work, such high number of bugs affecting it, and such poor performance in both older and new systems, and have gotten away with it. No one.

[nuckinfutz]

I'm still seeing more bluster and not enough information.

The difference between opinion and fact is that facts are verifiable.
This thread is filled with a few people opining about how poorly the Lion
OS performs yet we're supposed to take their opinion as fact.

Sounds a bit fishy. No school would use text that didn't have umpteen references.

I'll be first to admit that Lion is lacking in the UI polish on the new features but they always do better after they've got feedback from users. We've had a lot of features come back over the years based on consumer feedback.

I do not believe Apple's issue is an architectural one. OS X is fine and the shift from Carbon to Cocoa API is getting better and better.

LLVM, CLANG and the new debugging tools coming are all a breath of fresh air. In short Apple's on the right track but when i've got time i'll provide references to back up my assertions.

[blow45]

Originally Posted by bedifferent

Jobs always believed consumers didn't know what they wanted and gave little choice. However, sometimes consumers aren't all that ignorant. Choice isn't a bad thing .

Steve though would have never let out a release like lion had he had his wits about him and his health the last couple of years of his life...by then os x had become an aside to all that he was dealing with in his personal life and apple and he couldn't oversee it. It's one thing to be a perfectionist and seek to find the best way to do things and then only offer that, it's quite another to have poor judgment on how things should be done and then impose on others that they should be done one way only.

Steve, more often than not, had good judgment... the heads of os x currently simply don't. Also Steve didn't think consumers were ignorant when using a device, and didn't have worthwhile requests on how it should be used. He thought most consumers lacked vision on if/why they would want a new product type and what they would want it to do, and he was mostly right there too. 90% of the forums a year or more before the ipad was out (and for that matter the ipod, although I have only read about it, not lived through it) thought there was absolutely no purpose for an ipad, and only about 10% of us were raving about it and saying this is going to take the computer world by storm. Once they got an ipad, they got it. Now as people start using it they might have pretty good suggestions about it as they gain insight by using it more and more.

One of the best things I ve read about Steve, and I don't remember it verbatim to quote it, but it was something along the lines that he could take a complex set of data and details in a system and figure out what is essential and what isn't, making it as simple as it should be, but not any simpler... it's something Ive shared with Steve, that and a desire and feel for the aesthetic, that's why he was his soul mate at apple. These are extremely hard to do unless you have a talent for them. Most techies can see the trees and miss the forest, they are great in detail but not so good in overall judgment of the bigger picture... and hence bloatware is all too common in the industry. Apparently the current os x leadership seems to be poor in both attention to detail and the bigger picture. The fact that os x's innards don't lend themselves well to many programming improvements, and that apple hasn't allocated enough resources (and doesn't have enough resources to allocate) to make considerable technological advancements to it building upon the work of snow leopard is making things even worse.

Let's face it, if apple had really concentrated their resources to it (instead of spreading themselves thin due to the i-devices - the moneymakers) lion should have been snow leopard and leopard rolled into one: considerable under the hood work and improvements and considerable user interface improvements enabling our work flows. It's been neither. And mountain lion feels like a rushed product fixing the most glaring of errors and adding a few very minor tweaks. And mountain lion shouldn't have been that. It should have been the tick to the tock, tick for core os improvements, tock for ui "over the hood" improvements. Mountain lion is simply a marketing gimmick, pre-released unlike any os x version by marketeers (Schiler) to marketeers (Gruber), it's a service pack. But even as service pack it doesn't address the problems at the core of os x, and only barely scratches the surface of debugging lion. It's no wonder several people here have said rip os x.

[finkmacunix]

Originally Posted by blow45

Steve though would have never let out a release like lion had he had his wits about him and his health the last couple of years of his life...by then os x had become an aside to all that he was dealing with in his personal life and apple and he couldn't oversee it. It's one thing to be a perfectionist and seek to find the best way to do things and then only offer that, it's quite another to have poor judgment on how things should be done and then impose on others that they should be done one way only.

Steve, more often than not, had good judgment... the heads of os x currently simply don't. Also Steve didn't think consumers were ignorant when using a device, and didn't have worthwhile requests on how it should be used. He thought most consumers lacked vision on if/why they would want a new product type and what they would want it to do, and he was mostly right there too. 90% of the forums a year or more before the ipad was out (and for that matter the ipod, although I have only read about it, not lived through it) thought there was absolutely no purpose for an ipad, and only about 10% of us were raving about it and saying this is going to take the computer world by storm. Once they got an ipad, they got it. Now as people start using it they might have pretty good suggestions about it as they gain insight by using it more and more.

One of the best things I ve read about Steve, and I don't remember it verbatim to quote it, but it was something along the lines that he could take a complex set of data and details in a system and figure out what is essential and what isn't, making it as simple as it should be, but not any simpler... it's something Ive shared with Steve. And it's extremely hard to do unless you have a talent for that. Most techies can see the trees and miss the forest, they are great in detail but not so good in overall judgment of the bigger picture... and hence bloatware is all too common in the industry. Apparently the current os x leadership seems to be poor in both attention to detail and the bigger picture. The fact that os x's innards don't lend themselves well to many programming improvements, and that apple hasn't allocated enough resources (and doesn't have enough resources to allocate) to make considerable technological advancements to it building upon the work of snow leopard is making things even worse.

Let's face it, if apple had really concentrated their resources to it (instead of spreading themselves thin due to the i-devices - the moneymakers) lion should have been snow leopard and leopard rolled into one: considerable under the hood work and improvements and considerable user interface improvements enabling our work flows. It's been neither. And mountain lion feels like a rushed product fixing the most glaring of errors and adding a few very minor tweaks. And mountain lion shouldn't have been that. It should have been the tock to the tick, tick for core os improvements, tock for ui "over the hood" improvements. Mountain lion is simply a marketing gimmick, pre-released unlike any os x version by marketeers (Schiler) to marketeers (Gruber), it's a service pack. But even as service pack it doesn't address the problems at the core of os x, and only barely scratches the surface of debugging lion. It's no wonder several people here have said rip os x.

Lion was released after Jobs' death?

[blow45]

Originally Posted by nuckinfutz

I'm still seeing more bluster and not enough information.

The difference between opinion and fact is that facts are verifiable.
This thread is filled with a few people opining about how poorly the Lion
OS performs yet we're supposed to take their opinion as fact.

Sounds a bit fishy. No school would use text that didn't have umpteen references.

Not all facts are verifiable, especially facts intermingled with financial power, control and secrecy. And that's how apple is run (and should be run, btw) to avoid "facts" coming out that are not putting them in a good light. We are also not dealing with the hard sciences here, so I could reference a few papers to you and you could counter reference a few more to me. Forget about it, this just can't happen.

I am not in possession of the bug reports filed at apple, nor can I perform a large scale study and verify them thus. This only apple can do, and obviously they are not going to show us the results. I go by my personal experience in dealing with apple computers, which is ample, as most here do. Most of us also go by our judgment, and of course at the end of the day most of it is opinion. What hard fact do you want that lion has made poor choices, other than the reaction of a large part of apple's user base. What hard facts did vista have to be branded a miserable failure?

This is not a school text, it's an adult discussion based on some facts and some well or not so well informed opinion. Btw good luck in finding a school text where the references provide backing to hard facts in other than the hard sciences, go to anything close to the humanities, politics, sociology and history to see how well the references at the back work. Even in the hard sciences go to anything with vested interests involved and try to tell me if the conflicting references provide any help. To go even further, go to any complex, sub section of a hard science subject and see if anyone other than the 50-100 people on the globe dealing with this sub topic can make sense of it and value one reference over the other in terms of its merits... most of the times even they can't do that, they only know the small circumference of their own work. And you want hard facts about not only programming, but business, and os development...forget it...

Anyway...this has gone ot, apologies for the digression.

----------

Originally Posted by finkmacunix

Lion was released after Jobs' death?

Where did I say that? Lion was the last thing Steve had on his mind though the last couple of years, and it shows.

[Tom8]

I wish people would stop trying to justify claims by saying "Steve this" and "Steve that". The fact of the matter is, he is dead, so you can't prove anything you're saying.

[blow45]

Originally Posted by Tom8

I wish people would stop trying to justify claims by saying "Steve this" and "Steve that". The fact of the matter is, he is dead, so you can't prove anything you're saying.

huh? We 've read his bio you know and have followed his public life pretty closely for more than the last decade, so what's your point exactly? What would we be able to prove if he were alive?

[Tom8]

Originally Posted by blow45

huh? We 've read his bio you know and have followed his public life pretty closely for more than the last decade, so what's your point exactly? What would we be able to prove if he were alive?

The point is, people are speaking on behalf of a dead man. The simple fact is, no matter how much you've followed Jobs and Apple, only Jobs knows what he was thinking. So to say "Jobs wouldn't have released Lion" is completely asinine, because you simply do not know that.

Same goes for people who're saying "Jobs would never release an iPhone 4S"

[blow45]

Originally Posted by Tom8

The point is, people are speaking on behalf of a dead man. The simple face is, no matter how much you've followed Jobs and Apple, only Jobs knows what he was thinking. So to say "Jobs wouldn't have released Lion" is completely asinine, because you simply do not know that.

Same goes for people who're saying "Jobs would never release an iPhone 4S"

What is asinine is to to emphasize the obvious: Yes at any point in his life only Jobs knew his intentions and the rationale behind his actions, and obviously what he was thinking. You are pointing out the bleeding obvious? This hasn't stopped any of us dime a dozen pundits, or any of the supposed non dime a dozen (but actually perhaps even more so than some of us) journos continually commenting on, and hypothesizing about his actions and decisions even when he was alive. Could they prove why he acted one way or another when he was alive? No.

No we don't know what he would have done, but we know rather well what he didn't have the time and energy to do, be hands on with lion, and we can make a pretty informed prediction that a perfectionist such as Jobs wouldn't have released such a buggy and unpolished os. This is not some deep arcane hypothesizing and conjecturing on his thoughts, this is as self evident a prediction as it can get. Would he have been happy with lion? Certainly not if one judges about how happy he was with the equally buggy mobileme and how he publicly derided it on a keynote.

This is real life, go elsewhere to find proofs, real life is seldom about proofs.

[thejadedmonkey]

If Expose is any indication, Apple may actually be listening to user feedback for once. I hope.

Originally Posted by Senseotech

I've been using OS X since 10.3 and like Lion, so there goes that theory. Really, to complain that the lack of colored icons completely ruins your workflow??? Its called basic reading comprehension or, failing that, shape recognition. A small icon with colors and shaped like a document is no easier to see than a monochrome icon shaped like a document.

I've been using OS X since 10.3 and don't like Lion, does that make your opinion null and void now, too?

[scubus]

Originally Posted by Senseotech

I've been using OS X since 10.3 and like Lion, so there goes that theory. Really, to complain that the lack of colored icons completely ruins your workflow??? Its called basic reading comprehension or, failing that, shape recognition. A small icon with colors and shaped like a document is no easier to see than a monochrome icon shaped like a document.

While you could certainly be correct, one anecdotal experience doesn't disprove (or prove) a point.

There is a considerable body of work in psychology and interface design that shows identifying a color is easier and quicker than reading a tag or identifying a shape.

For the record, I don't dislike Lion per se, but I do find it is clumsier than earlier versions of X. I don't mind the monochrome icons, but would prefer an option to go back to color keyed icons, among other things, although I find other issues mentioned here contribute far more to the clumsy feeling of Lion.

I hope that Apple makes changes to both the interface and under the hood issues in Mountain Lion. As for whether or not the majority of users like the Lion and Mountain Lion, and whether or not Apple is on the right track with the changes to the OS, only time, and sales, will tell.

[bedifferent]

Originally Posted by scubus

There is a considerable body of work in psychology and interface design that shows identifying a color is easier and quicker than reading a tag or identifying a shape.

As a former I/O Psych student, I can attest to that fact. Colors rely/affect many varying emotions. In marketing, color's are extremely pertinent in logo's and other paraphernalia. Imagine a world in which no color existed; logo's and billboards were all grey or black and white. It is much easier for an individual to identify with an object if it has more characteristics such as color hues/cues than a myriad of grey objects. Tests have been performed (The Stroop Effect is one, but that deals with word/color symmetry than identity) that indicate it is much quicker for an individual to recognize an object with color as opposed to its black and white counterpart for many obvious reasons.

Having color doesn't necessarily mean a lack of uniformity and thus a visual mess. When done right, color in an OS assists workflow by adding color cues to icons that lead to quicker recognition. 10.7 seems more in conflict with itself than previous OS X variants. There is certainly a lack of uniformity that is much needed.

[blow45]

To add to that, John Medina's excellent book brain rules also provides neuroscientific evidence why the human brain takes an immensely smaller amount of time (immensely in human reaction terms) to process and associate an image in colour to something than read a single word. That's why custom pictures in sidebar folders when you have 10 folders there are an immense help as opposed to reading through monochrome generic ones.

Surely apple are aware of this as well as what the other posters have mentioned, because they have some pretty smart guys working for them, that's why their choice of monochrome defies explanation. Branding, ios similarities and/or generational differentiation of lion for other os x's taking precedence over well documented and scientifically verified ui and human perception criteria should not be an accepted practice by apple if that is the case. It's also sadly an ever expanding trend in apple's ui design, greying everything out which is very alarming. It's one thing to have to switch to chrome so your 15+ tabs can have a custom colorful icon next to them and be easily differentiable (all my google tabs spotted in miliseconds, my mr tabs, my apple tabs, etc. etc.), it's quite another when this bad marketing and product differentiation trend is becoming a broader os ui trend with no choice to revert it.

[nuckinfutz]

Originally Posted by blow45

To add to that, John Medina's excellent book brain rules also provides neuroscientific evidence why the human brain takes an immensely smaller amount of time (immensely in human reaction terms) to process and associate an image in colour to something than read a single word. That's why custom pictures in sidebar folders when you have 10 folders there are an immense help as opposed to reading through monochrome generic ones. That's why even people who think they are reading through

Surely apple are aware of this as well as what the other posters have mentioned, because they have some pretty smart guys working for them, that's why their choice of monochrome defies explanation. Branding, ios similarities and/or generational differentiation of lion for other os x's taking precedence over well documented and scientifically verified ui and human perception criteria should not be an accepted practice by apple if that is the case. It's also sadly an ever expanding trend in apple's ui design, greying everything out which is very alarming. It's one thing to have to switch to chrome so your 15+ tabs can have a custom colorful icon next to them and be easily differentiable (all my google tabs spotted in miliseconds, my mr tabs, my apple tabs, etc. etc.), it's quite another when this bad marketing and product differentiation trend is becoming a broader os ui trend with no choice to revert it.

I have the Medina book. Haven't read it yet but just the premise of how color is important makes sense. The whole grayscale look of the Lion sidebar is still perplexing to me I'm always looking for the color and it's gone.

We'll see if Apple retracts this decision and brings color back. I'd better go make some comments on the official feedback or my voice will never be heard.

[bedifferent]

Originally Posted by nuckinfutz

I have the Medina book. Haven't read it yet but just the premise of how color is important makes sense. The whole grayscale look of the Lion sidebar is still perplexing to me I'm always looking for the color and it's gone.

We'll see if Apple retracts this decision and brings color back. I'd better go make some comments on the official feedback or my voice will never be heard.

Apple [sort of] returned "All Windows" Exposé in the recent ML DP release by allowing windows to be ungrouped. As an ADC member, many of us have been filing bug reports re: color for Finder sidebar, 10.5/6 Exposé and Spaces features (ReSpaceApp was bought by BinaryAge, makers of TotalFinder and is now TotalSpaces, definitely returns pervious Spaces to OS X very well), OpenGL and multiple display support since the first 10.7 DP. Glad engineers are [somewhat] listening.

[blow45]

Originally Posted by nuckinfutz

I have the Medina book. Haven't read it yet but just the premise of how color is important makes sense. The whole grayscale look of the Lion sidebar is still perplexing to me I'm always looking for the color and it's gone.

We'll see if Apple retracts this decision and brings color back. I'd better go make some comments on the official feedback or my voice will never be heard.

The last one is always a good point. I probably should reread Medina's book too since I left a sentence midway on my original post. (something about multitasking...) Btw, there's a good dvd version of the book too as well as website.