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One (minor) disapointment in iLife '06...

mrgreen4242

mrgreen4242

macrumors 601
Original poster
Feb 10, 2004
4,377
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Does it annoy anyone else that iPhoto QUITS when you click the red circle button (whatever we call the upper left most button :p)? No other iLife app or OS X bundled program does this; they all just "hide"...

I had hoped they'd change this in '06, just for consistency, but alas. It's frustrating since I have FINALLY gotten in the habit of hitting that button to 'hide' an application I know I will need again shortly, and cmd-Q'ing when I know I am done with the app. Load times for most applications are moderately significant on my mini due to the 4200 rpm drive... (man I need to break down and get a high speed FW drive).

Anyways, my only guess is that iPhoto is like this just because it probably takes more RAM while open than other apps due to the often huge photo libraries people have?
 
I imagine the reason it does this is that iPhoto is a "one window" application. Say in iTunes, you can have multiple windows open. So clicking the red button closes the window. I'm not sure thats how all the other iLife apps work, but I do know you only have the one window in iPhoto.

Generally the red button isn't a hide window button, it's a close window button (which is why on unsaved documents the button has a little circle in it)
 
mrgreen4242 said:
Does it annoy anyone else that iPhoto QUITS when you click the red circle button.

I had hoped they'd change this in '06, just for consistency, but alas. It's frustrating since I have FINALLY gotten in the habit of hitting that button to 'hide' an application I know I will need again shortly, and cmd-Q'ing when I know I am done with the app.
Click to expand...

Some apps do that (system prefs), and the only consistency between them is that they are all apps that have only one window. I think I would find it annoying too if I used that button. Another example of Apple not following their own design rules. (though we only complain because our OS is close to uniform, windows users don't complain because their used to every app acting completely different)

As for using that button to hide an app, that's not technically hiding it, thats just closing the window, leaving no other windows of that app open. If you want to hide an app, either press cmd+h, go to the <App> menu and select Hide <App>, or hold the option key while clicking on another app's window, dock icon, or the desktop. that keeps the window open, and the app running as it was, button hidden from view. use the dock to unhide it. In the <App> menu you'll also find Hide Others and Show All, self explanitory and very useful.
 
Even if you think of it as a hide window button it STILL doesn't make sense. If all programs behaved like iTunes they would quit once you closed the last window. As far as I can tell, iPhoto is the only application that actually quits when the last (or in this case only) window is closed.

System Prefs is more of an OS dialog to me, but I suppose that if you count it as it's own application then it behaves this way as well.

Ooh, I stand corrected... Calculator quits on the close window button click. Although, in that case, I suppose I prefer it, since it's such a tiny app...

Ah well. :/
 
I think this happens because it auto saves your work (unlike idvd or iMovie) there is no work to save in itunes so that doesn't make all that much sense. Maybe?
 
Peyton said:
I think this happens because it auto saves your work (unlike idvd or iMovie) there is no work to save in itunes so that doesn't make all that much sense. Maybe?
Click to expand...

Even if I save my work in, say, TextEdit closing the window doesn't quit the application.

In my opinion, there isn't any good human interface reason for this.
 
I got used to Apple+H anything I want to hide. I much prefer that to clicking the yellow button and having it sitting next to my trash can.
 
mrgreen4242 said:
Does it annoy anyone else that iPhoto QUITS when you click the red circle button (whatever we call the upper left most button :p)? No other iLife app or OS X bundled program does this; they all just "hide"...

I had hoped they'd change this in '06, just for consistency, but alas. It's frustrating since I have FINALLY gotten in the habit of hitting that button to 'hide' an application I know I will need again shortly, and cmd-Q'ing when I know I am done with the app.
Click to expand...

Actually, by hitting the red button, you're closing the window. Most OS X apps stay running when you do so, but apparently iPhoto (and also System Preferences) quits when you do so. To "hide" all your windows of an app or whatever, hit Apple-H (as the poster above me stated). To test this, open iChat and start a few chats, then hit Apple-H. All your windows will disappear, but the app will stay running. Click on the iChat icon on your dock, and all your windows from iChat (all) will come right back.
 
I use iPhoto 4 and yes, this does annoy me too. I'm a big fan of just closing windows and knowing the app doesn't really quit. It's one of my most favorites features about OS X... but why doesn't iPhoto do this? Probably like you said, with RAM and all.

I really don't know...
 
asherman13 said:
Actually, by hitting the red button, you're closing the window. Most OS X apps stay running when you do so, but apparently iPhoto (and also System Preferences) quits when you do so. To "hide" all your windows of an app or whatever, hit Apple-H (as the poster above me stated). To test this, open iChat and start a few chats, then hit Apple-H. All your windows will disappear, but the app will stay running. Click on the iChat icon on your dock, and all your windows from iChat (all) will come right back.
Click to expand...

I know this. :p The point I am making is that you can close all the windows of an app but leave it running by clicking on the 'red button' [in each window]. I much prefer there to be a mouse AND keyboard based way to do everything.

When you close the iPhoto window it QUITS iPhoto. There are (almost) no other apps that do this, and certainly none as 'large' as iPhoto. System Prefs (which again, I think is more an OS dialog, so if it closes you're not really QUITTING the application - the system is still running), Calculator does this (it's a tiny little thing, so I can kind of understand this.

This seems to be an issue with programs that have only one possible window... however I think I just found the exception to that exception of the rule. iCal doesn't quit when you close it's window.

Except that it has like half a 2nd window... the info tray can be detached, but then it's not a real window... it's a sub window, with the smaller title bar, no text in the title bar, no minimize command, and the little title bar buttons. It's still part of the main window, just a floating part.

Bah. I still don't like it. :p
 
This has always annoyed me about iPhoto also. I just don't understand why it has to quit, when just about every other application stays open. I just don't get it. :confused:
 
i prefer iphoto to close when you click the red button. it saves ram. if i want it to stay open and avoid the loading time i click the yellow button. it's in the dock then and i can open it in a second or less.

but i agree, it's not consistent with other apps.
 
All non-MDI applications close when you close the main (only) window because the applications serve no purpose if their only window is closed. Textedit you can close one window and then open up other documents and such because its an MDI application.
 
DavidLeblond said:
I imagine the reason it does this is that iPhoto is a "one window" application. Say in iTunes, you can have multiple windows open. So clicking the red button closes the window. I'm not sure thats how all the other iLife apps work, but I do know you only have the one window in iPhoto.
Click to expand...

Yup, this is a quite old Mac convention - any single window applications quit when that window is closed.

In this case, it's not very obvious, considering iPhoto can open many windows, dependant on what you're doing with it.
 
GarageBand does this, since it's a one window app, except it opens a dialog box asking if you want to open something else or start a new project.

Guess iPhoto doesn't do this 'cause there's no question about what you would want to open... you just have your one library.
 
Is there a way to use interface builder or something like that to change the behavior of the red button? So that it give iPhoto a 'hide' command instead of 'quit'?
 
It is a glaring oversight.

I would like to have iPhoto "open" but the window closed, due to the length of time it takes to startup and load but I cant due to the way it currently works.
 
Heb1228 said:
Is there a way to use interface builder or something like that to change the behavior of the red button? So that it give iPhoto a 'hide' command instead of 'quit'?
Click to expand...

I was just thinking that. I'll have to check it out.

edit: Doesn't look like it has an actual window instance like most other apps. I'm out of ideas.
 
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