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clever responce required - urgent!

G

glosterseagul

macrumors regular
Original poster
Mar 13, 2004
199
0
I have been on a chat site and I want to reply to this......


If you know bugger all about computers then MACs are fine. Ditto if you work in something like the music industry or you just want to work with documents and multi-media. However if you're a serious IT professional and you need to make a computer sit up and beg then it HAS to be a PC. I set up a friend's MAC a while ago and it was a painful process. Is there the equivalent of a Registry Editor and a command (DOS) prompt? Must everything be run through a GUI? I need to feel I'm in control, I need to see the parameters of what I'm installing etc even if I don't want to change them,.

They DO look pretty though. The ultimate triumph of style over substance.


I want to stuff it up him...best reply (ies) get the reply!
 
He thinks a registry editor is an advantage?!? The whole fact that Windows uses a registry is bad alone. So, Macs don't need a registry editor as there's no registry.

As Mr. Anderson said, if you don't want to use the GUI, use the Terminal. It can do everything the GUI can and a lot more.

If these are his arguments, then they are more than weak.
 
PC's are great if you like to do everything for yourself. If you're the type who overhauls their own engine, then go with the pc. But if stability is important, it's Mac all the way. If PeeCee's (spell it like this, he'll hate it) are sooo loyal and powerful, why don't all the supercomputers of the world run XP? Oh, that's right.... Because UNIX is faster, more customizable, more stable, cheaper, and there's no such thing as a friggin' dll error.

I'd continue this rant, but I'm on my brother's XP box and that terrible grinding sound coming from the ugly ass CPU box tells me that windows is about to "recover from a serious error". MAybe it will delete itself, but then that's just wishful thinking.
 
max osx is a gui that runs on top of bsd unix, and as with all unix systems you can access everything through a command line interface if you want to. there's a terminal app included, and you can even boot into the single-user text-only unix shell if you want to start your computer without gui for whatever reason. that's your "dos prompt" equivalent on steroids.

the registry, though... man, what they were thinkin when they designed such a terrible and easily breakable mess? it's only a good thing a mac doesn't have that and have therefore no reason for registry editor. however, all global system preferences are located in "/Library" directory and all personal user preferences in each user's "~/Library" directory - they are all simple text files and can be edited through the command line interface if needed. normal user cannot mess up anything but his own personal prefs and to change global settings one must authenticate as admin user.
 
glosterseagul said:
I have been on a chat site and I want to reply to this......


If you know bugger all about computers then MACs are fine. Ditto if you work in something like the music industry or you just want to work with documents and multi-media. However if you're a serious IT professional and you need to make a computer sit up and beg then it HAS to be a PC. I set up a friend's MAC a while ago and it was a painful process. Is there the equivalent of a Registry Editor and a command (DOS) prompt? Must everything be run through a GUI? I need to feel I'm in control, I need to see the parameters of what I'm installing etc even if I don't want to change them,.

They DO look pretty though. The ultimate triumph of style over substance.


I want to stuff it up him...best reply (ies) get the reply!
Click to expand...




Here we go...


If you know bugger all about computers then MACs are fine.
Click to expand...
Yep, that's true. They're easy to use, easy to configure and work with. PCs, on the other hand, *can* be difficult to configure and use. The MacOS is fairly intuitive, and doesn't treat you like a baby with its wizards that don't always work properly anyway.

On the other hand, you can be a real techie and still love Macs. Look at the PowerMac G5 as an example. The hardware on the G5 system is soooo much more advanced than the general level of X86-based PCs out there (S-ATA, AGP8, 8Gb-DDR, 1GHz FSB, Optical Audio etc...). The G5, as with most Macs, can be 'tinkered' with at leisure. But they're made in such a way that they don't *need* to be for most users - that's the point.



Is there the equivalent of a Registry Editor......?
Click to expand...

Well, as others have said, there ain't no Registry on MacOS. Of course, there is Termninal, which gives you command-based access to the system. And, to be honest, I'm pretty glad that there is no Registry on the MacOS. It's so easy to destroy Windows by changing some Registry keys it's almost unbelieveable!



They DO look pretty though. The ultimate triumph of style over substance.
Click to expand...

Yes, they are well-designed. But the bit about style-over-substance is a load of rubbish!!! MacOS X is a extremely stable operating system, that in terms of overall security and stability, will put a Windows-based machine to shame any day.
 
A four letter word comes to mind when I think of Windows....

BSOD

I've been running Panther since it was first released and the only time I've ever rebooted is after running an update.
 
davecuse said:
A four letter word comes to mind when I think of Windows....

BSOD

I've been running Panther since it was first released and the only time I've ever rebooted is after running an update.
Click to expand...

while i'm not a fan of Windows at all, please don't base your opinion on an phenomenon that is ancient now that it's almost FUDish to hear about it.

BSOD is pretty much a thing of the past.
 
This was his responce.....

Ohhhh! Touched a nerve there didn't I?


quote:
Originally posted by glosterseagul
Real computing?
... You think a registry editor is an advantage?!?


Absolutely! I've never written for MACs but I make extensive use of the Registry for my PC applications. I'm sorry, you're not going to shift me from my view that MACs are a nicely-maintained walled Rose Garden whereas PCs are a free-for-all jungle where you can do anything and everything. Some of the tools and methodolgy may offend those of a nervous disposition but that's the way we like it - the nearer to the bare metal I can get the better.
 
jxyama said:
BSOD is pretty much a thing of the past.
Click to expand...

As I sit here answering Tech Support phone calls, I would have to strongly disagree with you on that one. XP is NOT a rock solid OS... plus a very large number of home users still have 98 or ME, which are abismal.
 
davecuse said:
plus a very large number of home users still have 98 or ME, which are abismal.
Click to expand...

yes, 98 and ME are abysmal. but you can't compare 98 and ME to panther... compare them to OS 8 or 9 and those crashed fairly often, iirc.
 
glosterseagul said:
Absolutely! I've never written for MACs but I make extensive use of the Registry for my PC applications. I'm sorry, you're not going to shift me from my view that MACs are a nicely-maintained walled Rose Garden whereas PCs are a free-for-all jungle where you can do anything and everything. Some of the tools and methodolgy may offend those of a nervous disposition but that's the way we like it - the nearer to the bare metal I can get the better.
Click to expand...

tell him:

it's "Mac." MAC is for wireless networking.

and the kicker...

if you need to rely on windows to affirm being in control, then you've got a much bigger problem at hand than a Mac can fix. :D
 
jxyama said:
yes, 98 and ME are abysmal. but you can't compare 98 and ME to panther... compare them to OS 8 or 9 and those crashed fairly often, iirc.
Click to expand...

I skipped over the OS 8 and 9 phase, I was still using Windows back in those days. I saw the light and switched over to OS X about a year ago. As I said before I do technical support for a Windows based software company, getting a headache from all of the issues that crop up in Windows. It's a real treat to go home at the end of the day and have a computer that simply works.
 
kingjr3 said:
MAC is for virtually all types of networking involving a NIC of some sort, not just wireless :)

http://www.pcwebopedia.com/TERM/M/MAC_Layer.html
Click to expand...

ah, thanks.

i think the best solution is to ignore him, but if he doesn't go away, i am sure many of us could think of more stuff to say...

i do find it rather funny that i've seen defensive windows users who seem to attach some sort of personal issues in "defending" Windows or proving Mac's inferiority...

personally, i couldn't care less if there are people out there who think Windows is the best thing in the world and i don't care to try to convert them or "defend" Mac. i just think to myself that they are just ignorant and leave it at that.
 
As a Lan Support Specialist and having quite a few friends in the biz, ALL with PowerBooks this guy is speaking out of his @$$. We all talk all the time about how our PowerBooks have saved the day many times when the guys with the Windows laptops can't fix a problem.
 
Registry

What have you people done in registry edit? Tell me what? Give an example. The only time that I needed to go into registry edit is to fix a f**k up. A registry is nothing to be happy about, it just a problem when it does come into play for me.
 
I am actually fed up of writing reasons why the Mac is better than the PC. Now I couldn't care less which you prefer - just how many Mac users say "f*cking piece of sh*t" and smack their monitor? Hmmm... a trip to a library or internet cafe might give you an indication to how many PC users say it.

The Registery *cough cough* joke right? THAT IS the problem of Windows.
 
glosterseagul said:
This was his responce.....

Ohhhh! Touched a nerve there didn't I?


quote:
Originally posted by glosterseagul
Real computing?
... You think a registry editor is an advantage?!?


Absolutely! I've never written for MACs but I make extensive use of the Registry for my PC applications. I'm sorry, you're not going to shift me from my view that MACs are a nicely-maintained walled Rose Garden whereas PCs are a free-for-all jungle where you can do anything and everything. Some of the tools and methodolgy may offend those of a nervous disposition but that's the way we like it - the nearer to the bare metal I can get the better.
Click to expand...

I've written plenty of applications for Windows and the Registry Editor is only an advantage after things go wrong. On Macs, we have something similar, the Property List editor. One time out of One Hundred Thousand times you may need it. Properly-written applications don't require it.

I suppose your need to get to the bare metal is the reason OS/2 didn't sell well. It insulated the user from the machine in a way that made it too easy for the user to manage the machine and the applications without the need for some person from IT.

Need the a prompt so you can type? It's there in Mac OS X and quite proper too. You can choose from two different types of shells with various dialects. How often does a person need to use a shell? I barely need it so I can't imagine that the average user would need it. Even an IT person would not need it to resolve user problems. Right now, the reason you need it is to set up certain UNIX services. Most of these needs disappear with the server version, as you can point and click to configure many things.
 
fecking registry is the root cause of most problems in windows, its a stupid anarchic way to store configuration data. As for using the 'DOS' prompt, i perfer to use cygwin, much more powerful and scriptable than ****ty batch files. Granted you can use VBscript instead, but the resource overhead is horrific for even basic admin tasks. :confused:

not a alot I can say to that!
 
glosterseagul said:
I need to feel I'm in control
Click to expand...

That's possibly because he live's at home with Mummy who tells him what time to go to bed. His PC gives him a sense of power severely lacking in his world. :p

Marc
 
glosterseagul said:
I make extensive use of the Registry for my PC applications.
Click to expand...

are you doing something you cannot put into a text file?

mac apps are easily installable and removable, because there is no registry involved. usually there's only one package (acutally a folder, but made in a way that system sees it as one file) to be dragged into applications folder - or wherever - and the first time any given user runs the app, the software writes a preference file for itself to ~/Library/ area. if any given user screws something up, he can delete his preference file and continue using app as if it was just installed. and uninstalling is very simple: just delete the one package that looks like one file, and there it goes. no need to clean up the registry.
 
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