Mac OS X Lion Notes: iOS Scroll Bars, Any Corner Resizing, Dock Changes

[JRoDDz]

At least we'll have Windows to fall back on. I don't want Mac OSX to become a glorified iPad.

 

[Mochi Hana]

Other then the loss of the indicator lights, I'm not really bothered by the other changes. I must say I'll miss the Aqua scroll bars though.

 

[MacFan782040]

I think the iOS scrollbars will be nice. Aqua is getting kind of old anyway.

Resizing from any corner of the window? Sure. That'll be nice I think too.

But the "lights" on the dock... I'll miss knowing which apps are currently open, and while I doubt they will make that an optional setting rolleyes, I do believe that Apple will develop something to allow us to close apps completely (like in iOS) to free RAM, and probably their Mission Control will allow us to manage all apps currently running.

They're definitely building this for the future-- down the road when you have 10gigs of RAM standard, will you really need to worry about how much RAM Photoshop is taking up? Kind of like right now with hard drives- unless you are editing video or something you really don't need to worry about taking up HD space anymore.....

I see this as positive, definitely interesting though!

 

[tdmurphy]

I'm assuming you will know you can resize a window from a side because the cursor will change. Did they reveal the cursor changing in the video at all? It will probably use the same one that lets you resize the headers in iTunes or columns in any app.

 

[Northgrove]

wouldn't that be confusing? Not knowing what's running at a glance?

A problem I can see especially if you forget that a heavy RAM using application is running. :/ It may not be immediately apparent to the user why the computer is running slow if you can't see what applications are running at a glance. I sometimes forget that I have Aperture running since a photo import, and there you go -- 2-3 GB less free.

On the other hand... IF Apple is very confident in OS improvements that swap out rarely used applications, and swap them in again, so that there isn't much disadvantage in not caring which apps are running -- then I can see them making this move, since it do after all reduce "complexity" in the OS. One less thing to care about. They did it pretty well with their file system and disk fragmentation -- let's see if they can do it well again.

 

[Don Kosak]

Much more intuitive.

No more trying to explain to people the difference between "closing" a window, and "quitting" the app.

Mission Control provides a much better view of what is running.

OSX can now shift "suspended" Programs out of RAM to free up resources for active tasks, and quickly restore state from disk if a user selects a swapped out program.

This is a BIG deal and Microsoft (and Linux) folks will have some catching up to do.

 

[dwd3885]

I keep saying that I think iOS is a step backwards in computing. Maybe simpler, but a step backwards nonetheless. Now that Apple is implementing iOS features, I hope they don't lose their Mac roots.

 

[cmaier]

I keep saying that I think iOS is a step backwards in computing. Maybe simpler, but a step backwards nonetheless. Now that Apple is implementing iOS features, I hope they don't lose their Mac roots.

I said the same thing when the mac came out - no more peek-ing and poke-ing? How do I PR#6? And C++ (real men code assembler). And wysiwyg word processing. etc.

 

[R94N]

I find the little light underneath an icon the best way to see at a glance what's running, although if they do remove it (which it looks like they have) I'd be interested to see what they've replaced it with, if anything at all.

EDIT:Seems like it's going to be Mission Control from now on. I like that!

 

[twilson]

Flash storage or not, I still would like to know when my 120MB Photoshop file and the Photoshop application is eating up my memory. Computers are smart enough to manage certain things, but their resources are hardly unlimited. Human intelligence is needed to know which apps take priority for the project(s) you are working on at the time.

Really, cos I bet that an OS can keep much better control and measurement of the following:

• How much RAM is being used at any given instant by a particular app.
• How much CPU is being used at any given instant by a particular app.
• How often an app has been in the foreground.
• How often that foreground app has been used.
• How much time has been dedicated to USE of that foreground app.
• Provided the app is equipped with the necessary hooks into the OS, the earliest it COULD be suspended if necessary.
• How much idle time an app has had.

Regardless of how 1337 you think you are, the OS will be able to manage resources/applications better than you. Believing anything else is just delusional. We have OSes for a reason, after all.

If you ask yourself a few basic questions, that could go for any app:

1. If you aren't actually doing anything that needs the 120MB of RAM + Photoshop's footprint, does it matter whether or not it's the app is loaded in memory?
2. If you load another app and suddenly need to free up some RAM, can you realistically remedy it faster than an OS that would automatically suspend application X (photoshop in your case), given that you'd first have to evaluate what documents are open in said application prior to closing it?
3. Does it matter that Photoshop was suspended, if it resumes faster than swapping photoshop back in from disk (as would be the case currently), and you notice no degradation in switching back and resuming it?
4. If you have to make these sort of asinine decisions (i.e. to close or not to close depending on what documents an app has open) LESS!

I fail to see how, in a DESKTOP (not a Server) environment this could be considered a bad thing?

 

[theRebel]

EDIT: Actually, now that i think about it, this might mean that we'll be quitting apps far more than before. From the sounds of it, it's possible that all apps will have their state saved to disk so you can easily quit it at any time. Sort of like hibernation mode, except that it's for apps, not for the OS. This would be a huge leap over windows. I like the sound of it.
I'd imagine that this mode would have to be built into apps though. I could conceive of problems where an app that started up a bunch of processes is quit and put into this "mode" while the other processes are still running, and they're all like "WTF?". It's also possible that Mac OS will simply keep track of which processes were started by which app, and hibernate them all simultaneously, or maybe this feature will just be built into apps that come with Mac OS X for now, and adopted by others later on. Then again, i could be far off base. It sounds good though

But I often want my apps to be actively working in the background, not hibernating. What is the point of having 8 processors and 16GB RAM in my Mac Pro if only the foremost application is actively doing anything?

 

[Riemann Zeta]

Certainly seems like Apple is converting Mac OS from a powerful and flexible operating system into an elementary school kiosk. I don't want my computer to be like At Ease or MS Bob. I like having scrollbars, multiple windows, an activity monitor, total filesystem access, etc...

I really don't understand why Apple is so gung ho about going backwards to a single-tasking sort of interface. With 4GB of RAM, 4 CPU threads and a preemptive multitasking/multithreaded kernel, there is also no reason why programs should have to use the iOS 'suspend but not background' quasi-multitasking. Unless Apple wants to ditch modern out-of-order x64 chips entirely in favor of embedded ultra-low-wattage ARM processors, there is no reason to castrate Mac OS. Perhaps, however, that is Steve's ultimate goal: he really seems to be on a battery life kick lately, assuming that a computing appliance with a 21 hour battery is better than a high-power machine with a 3.5 hour battery. I like the iPad and I also like tiny computers, but they aren't always the right tool for the job.

 

[me_94501]

The iPad has shown that "always on" visible scroll bars are not necessary. The context of the page is more than enough info to know that there is more to the page above or below. Are there situations where you want to know where you're at in a document? Of course, but it's a very small use case in the grand scheme.

If you don't have an iPad, find one and mess around for a while. Scroll bars just aren't as necessary as we thought.

The Mac isn't the iPad. It's the Mac.

I use my Mac in a very different way than I use my iPad. Granted, we'll have to see how this all plays out--I expect that we'll see a significant UI revamp when Lion is closer to release--but so far I'm not really on board with the iOSification of OS X.

 

[twilson]

A problem I can see especially if you forget that a heavy RAM using application is running. :/ It may not be immediately apparent to the user why the computer is running slow if you can't see what applications are running at a glance. I sometimes forget that I have Aperture running since a photo import, and there you go -- 2-3 GB less free.

But, what does it matter that Aperture is running, if you don't NEED the RAM it's taking up for anything else?

On the other hand... IF Apple is very confident in OS improvements that swap out rarely used applications, and swap them in again, so that there isn't much disadvantage in not caring which apps are running -- then I can see them making this move, since it do after all reduce "complexity" in the OS. One less thing to care about. They did it pretty well with their file system and disk fragmentation -- let's see if they can do it well again.

That's what I'm thinking, they'll do it right.

 

[theRebel]

Really, cos I bet that an OS can keep much better control and measurement of the following:

• How much RAM is being used at any given instant by a particular app.
• How much CPU is being used at any given instant by a particular app.
• How often an app has been in the foreground.
• How often that foreground app has been used.
• How much time has been dedicated to USE of that foreground app.
• Provided the app is equipped with the necessary hooks into the OS, the earliest it COULD be suspended if necessary.
• How much idle time an app has had.

Regardless of how 1337 you think you are, the OS will be able to manage resources/applications better than you. Believing anything else is just delusional. We have OSes for a reason, after all.

If you ask yourself a few basic questions, that could go for any app:

1. If you aren't actually doing anything that needs the 120MB of RAM + Photoshop's footprint, does it matter whether or not it's the app is loaded in memory?
2. If you load another app and suddenly need to free up some RAM, can you realistically remedy it faster than an OS that would automatically suspend application X (photoshop in your case), given that you'd first have to evaluate what documents are open in said application prior to closing it?
3. Does it matter that Photoshop was suspended, if it resumes faster than swapping photoshop back in from disk (as would be the case currently), and you notice no degradation in switching back and resuming it?
4. If you have to make these sort of asinine decisions (i.e. to close or not to close depending on what documents an app has open) LESS!
   [/LIST
   
   I fail to see how, in a DESKTOP (not a Server) environment this could be considered a bad thing?

1. 
   
   Are you serious? The OS knows better than the user?
   
   If I have Photoshop batch processing 5000 RAW image files, Logic processing some multi-track audio, and Final Cut encoding a few hours of HD video, how does the OS determine which one the boss wants completed first?

 

[ctdonath]

Maybe they're hypochondriacs?

Thank you. That's the term I've been looking for. There are some users who are constantly battling some grievance, fixing this, reinstalling that, modifying whatever, and I just can't comprehend why: install it the way it wants to be installed, use it the way it wants to be used, and most of the time it all just works fine. You got it: they're hypochondriacs! rather than putting up with & working around some minor "aches & pains" they have to go in for full-blown servicing of every perceived issue, creating more problems than get solved. Stop fighting the system, and realize it's probably built by someone who has thought about it a lot more than you and who has probably put in far more time getting it better than your dorking around with it will achieve.

Zen and the art of computer usage?

 

[twilson]

But I often want my apps to be actively working in the background, not hibernating. What is the point of having 8 processors and 16GB RAM in my Mac Pro if only the foremost application is actively doing anything?

What's the point of an app running and consuming a crap load of RAM if it isn't actually doing anything?

This is going to be OPT-IN, as per the "Mac App Store" and apps are going to have to be compiled to take advantage of the suspend functionality (in the same way iOS apps compiled for <= 3.2 don't suspend).

Developers are going to be able to specify when an app can't quit.

Everyone is just blowing this out of proportion...for a change!

 

[MattSepeta]

Are you serious? The OS knows better than the user?

If I have Photoshop batch processing 5000 RAW image files, Logic processing some multi-track audio, and Final Cut encoding a few hours of HD video, how does the OS determine which one the boss wants completed first?

What the heck kind of job do you have
I do agree though.

The Mac isn't the iPad. It's the Mac.

I use my Mac in a very different way than I use my iPad. Granted, we'll have to see how this all plays out--I expect that we'll see a significant UI revamp when Lion is closer to release--but so far I'm not really on board with the iOSification of OS X.

I'm with you here. The "Naysayers" kept saying "No, apple will keep its osx and ios worlds apart, they are different!" then lo and behold, media event rolls around and we get SJ telling us he wants the iPad to influence the mac. WTF?

I am by no means a hater, I even have an iPad that I enjoy using, but I really don't want any aspect of that thing to creep onto my desk. Looking like the conspiracy theorists may be on to something.

 

[blybug]

Are you serious? The OS knows better than the user?

If I have Photoshop batch processing 5000 RAW image files, Logic processing some multi-track audio, and Final Cut encoding a few hours of HD video, how does the OS determine which one the boss wants completed first?

How does the boss determine this in the current OS?

I don't think there's any evidence or reason to believe that this kind of powerhouse multitasking will be handled any differently. FC will not twiddle its thumbs because PS is batch processing. But applications that are actually doing little to nothing can have their resources (RAM footprint) minimized or be hibernated (state stored) by the OS...in order to optimize the performance of the applications that are actually doing work.

 

[ctdonath]

Are you serious? The OS knows better than the user?

If I have Photoshop batch processing 5000 RAW image files, Logic processing some multi-track audio, and Final Cut encoding a few hours of HD video, how does the OS determine which one the boss wants completed first?

Sometimes (often) the customer is not right.

Maybe if the boss wants X completed first, the other tasks should be started after it's done, rather than insisting Y and Z be worked on at the same time sucking resources and wasting time thrashing between the loads. What you describe is a nightmare of storage bottlenecking.

Yes, save for extreme detail and skill, a good OS will do a better job of optimizing the given tasks than the user. Since the directive is, in your scenario, to do all three CPU & storage intensive tasks at once, competing badly with resources in the process, the user will indeed be hard-pressed to hand-manage the sequencing at all short of a straight sequential run. Am I wrong?

 

[twilson]

Are you serious? The OS knows better than the user?

If I have Photoshop batch processing 5000 RAW image files, Logic processing some multi-track audio, and Final Cut encoding a few hours of HD video, how does the OS determine which one the boss wants completed first?

I'm not sure what you are after. Because there certainly isn't an easy way to control the Task priority in OS X (short of the command line).

And also, Photoshop won't support suspend for a while (knowing Adobe).
Logic and Final Cut MAY support suspend, but will have use-cases where suspend won't be possible.

And if it's so important that your boss wants certain things completed first, surely you'd dedicate as much time as possible to the most important and ACTUALLY quit the less important apps.

A combination of the OS+App can easily make a better decision. But to start off with, none of them apps are going to be suspendible, so it'll be the same old "manage it all yourself".

 

[SockRolid]

This isn't the "final Lion GUI" yet.

wouldn't that be confusing? Not knowing what's running at a glance?

I agree that it's better to provide some kind of indication. And I don't like the current blue lights: too hard to see against a light background, and I turn "dock hiding" on anyway.

But it's possible that the specifics of the Lion look-and-feel aren't finalized yet. And it's also possible that Apple wants to keep many Lion features secret until the last possible moment. To keep Microsoft as far behind as possible when they inevitably start trying to copy Lion's features.

 

[arkmannj]

How about instead of getting rid of the lights on the doc, making them have different colors to represent different statuses.

Example:
Whitish/Blueish color they have now: App is running and active
Yellow: App is in suspended mode.
No Dot: App is closed, no resources, etc.

for some reason I see Apple trying to get rid of the dot as having a similar backlash as when they tried to get rid of list-view in the doc.

 

[twilson]

Not quite. With a mouse, you can click on the scroll thumb to quickly move to another area of a document (right to the top or bottom for instance). This is faster than scrolling all the way with two fingers. That said, iOS often allows you to touch the titlebar of a window / app / pane to jump to the top... but what if you want to jump quickly to the bottom? Or the middle? The mouse + scroll thumb is faster. That said, I'm sure Apple has thought about all of this. They know what they're doing when in comes to UX.

Exactly, it's not click+drag, it's some kind of mouse-based gesture.

 

[GroundLoop]

Are you serious? The OS knows better than the user?

If I have Photoshop batch processing 5000 RAW image files, Logic processing some multi-track audio, and Final Cut encoding a few hours of HD video, how does the OS determine which one the boss wants completed first?

How do you tell the OS which you want done first?