Snapped: Tired of Aqua!

[Hemingray]

Now don't get me wrong, I absolutely love the transparency and shadows, but the brightness.... my God, the brightness... and the horizontal lines! I got so tired of it I had to find a skin that had square window corners, graphite highlights, and a good ol' platinum face.

Have any of you guys simply gotten tired of Aqua too? I embraced the GUI with open arms... ever since DP3... but now I'm having definite Platinum withdrawls here. In a pixel environment, there is absolutely nothing cleaner than vertical, horizontal, and perfectly diagonal lines that can look every bit as good even when using nothing more than the system's 256 colors--all of which the Aqua environment violates.

 

[Taft]

Too many restrictions.

I think you've put too many restrictions on how a GUI be defined. Aqua adds a lot of value to the computing experience. The problem with it really the lack of ability to customize it.

Apple really should recognize that not everyone is the same; not everyone want a computing environment homogeneous with all other environments. People want personality in their GUI. I think Apple should allow more control over some aspects of the GUI. Animation, colors, transparency, button shape, etc...they should let them all be cutomized.

I think that by simply allow customization, Apple would get rid of a lot of the bad reviews Aqua gets. People do not want to be locked into Steve's vision of computing.

Matthew

 

[mac15]

aqua rocks

 

[newmanium]

rocks is right. i believe that what made the GUI for OS 9 so memorable was that it kept the "look and feel" of the Mac OS no matter what you did to it. no matter how much you changed the background or played with labels, you'll still have the HD on the top and the trash can on the bottom. i think they're trying to do the same with OS X as well. You start playing around with the GUI enough and its not a mac anymore, you just perverted what was a great looking desktop to a "Windows-like" environment where the 'theme' rules all that goes on. gimme a break. apple's engineers put a hell of lot of hard work and effort to try and please their fans while still being able to offer something new and fresh. and my god, drop-shadowing never looked so damn good on a GUI. well, if you're sick of all the blue, you can always do graphite.

 

[AlphaTech]

I love OS X and Aqua.

Apple is making modifications to the GUI all the time, with each update something get changed, or works better. Eventually, I see Apple allowing the user to change, or tweak, more of it. Until then, there are plenty of hacks and skins that you can get and use if you don't like Aqua.

 

[eyelikeart]

speaking of tweaks...

I think he's got a point there...

a perfect example is TransparentDock 1.5.7.....allows to completely change the color or make completely transparent of the dock....killer addition!

plus...I think there are more Unix hackers than from traditional Mac OS....so it's only going to be a matter of time before we start seeing more stuff like this...

 

[Rower_CPU]

Aqua rocks...but sloooooowly

I love Aqua. I would name my first-born Aqua if my girlfriend would let me. I want to repaint my truck Aqua. But...
It needs performance tweaks to make it run better on slower systems. Don't kill me for saying this but XP does a better job at this than OS X. It's simple to turn off drop shadows and other effects from within the control panels. Hell, first thing I do on XP systems is turn it all off and make it look like Win2K, which at least runs fast.
We need this functionality in OS X, without having to resort to third-party solutions.
At this point it looks like the OS is driving Apple to ramp up hardware so that the user experience is more pleasant...not good.

 

[Beej]

I think that anyone that says they don't think Aqua needs to be improved is crazy (in a nice way, of course ). Are you saying you don't want Aqua to be improved ever? Imagine if you'd said that about the Mac OS appearance back in the days of System 6!

Aqua rocks. But there are still a lot of improvements that need to be made. Things like TransparentDock and Tinker Tool should be part of the system. And I don't know if you'd call it part of Aqua, but spring loaded folders are missed by almost everyone as far as I can tell.

 

[Rower_CPU]

Originally posted by Beej
And I don't know if you'd call it part of Aqua, but spring loaded folders are missed by almost everyone as far as I can tell.

From everything I've heard they'll be in 10.2...and yes, Tinkertool and TransparentDock are great!

There are some other apps, like shadowkiller and theme packages that help to turn off the shadows and transparency that slow things down.

 

[Macmaniac]

Aqua

Aqua rocks, end of post

 

[OSeXy!]

Very early days for OS X.

Can't wait to see it evolve and mutate, but love it as it is now.

Wish there were a 'G3 - optimised' toggle for those of us still operating under stream power...

 

[mcrain]

Pardon me.

Originally posted by Beej
And I don't know if you'd call it part of Aqua, but spring loaded folders are missed by almost everyone as far as I can tell.

Forgive me, but I am a PC user after all, but what the heck is a "spring loaded folder?"

 

[Rower_CPU]

"Spring-loaded" refers to the feature in OS 9, that allowed to drag a file over a folder, or your HD icon, and dig down through the directories while still dragging a file. You hover over the folder for a couple of seconds, and it springs open as if you had double-clicked on it.

 

[mcrain]

Oh wow, that's sweet. You mean you can take a file, grab it with the mouse, and then stick it into any folder inside the hard drive just by holding it over the HD icon, then wait till the contents pop up, then hold it over another file, and so on and so on?

That's sweet! M$ has nothing like that (at least in my version).

 

[krossfyter]

aqua makes me proud to be a mac head. this os is unbelievable. i dont think most people who use it are fully comprehending the possibilities and innovation of it. sure it may have some problems now. this is just the beggining. windows is eating its dust right now. aqua fever!

 

[AlphaTech]

With the spring loaded folders, you can also press the space bar to get them to open up faster (if you can't wait the few seconds). This works on any drive, folder, or volume on the system or desktop. I have done it too many times to count to mounted servers.

Why are peecee users so surprised when the Mac OS turns out to be so easy to use?????

 

[eyelikeart]

Originally posted by AlphaTech
With the spring loaded folders, you can also press the space bar to get them to open up faster (if you can't wait the few seconds). This works on any drive, folder, or volume on the system or desktop. I have done it too many times to count to mounted servers.

Why are peecee users so surprised when the Mac OS turns out to be so easy to use?????

for those who are afraid to try something "new" out.....

bluntly put....they finally get their heads out of their @sses....

 

[jefhatfield]

re: aqua

in another six to twelve months, aqua is all one will see on computers

and look at xp, it is a very direct ripoff of aqua and some legacy windows users are complaining about the "brightness" and "colors" of xp

microsoft techies like me have become obsolete due to windows xp and i can either join the xp techies, or die out as a windows NT/98 techie and take up a different occupation

 

[Quark]

Should be another Option

I "Love It", but it needs improvement.

I have a new G4 800, iMac FP. Resizing windows is very slow and I am sure that Apple is working on optimizing it.

I think Aqua Kicks Major Butt!!

Also, from a M$ PC perspective, Windows has had that "spring-loaded folders" capability since Windows 95.

I don't understand why people are so surprised by that.

Hate to do this here, but if you are a Windows PC user, launch Explorer and show the folders along the left side so that you have two panes: directory tree on the left and the files on the right. Now, drag a file over a folder on the left side and hold it there for a second or two. It'll open up to reveal its contents.

This is nothing new, like I said, but it seems that Apple has taken it a step further by allowing it on the Desktop HD icon... nice.

Go Apple!!! Bu-bye M$!!!

Oh, yeah, one last thing: leave King Cobra alone, he/she is just a little kid....

 

[Hemingray]

Re: re: aqua

Originally posted by jefhatfield
in another six to twelve months, aqua is all one will see on computers

That's a bittersweet statement. On the plus side, everyone will benefit from the graces of Aqua, but at the same time Aqua will have become the Windows of GUI's in terms of monopoly. Is this really what we want? If there's no crappy alternative to compare against, where will the fun go?