Steve Jobs to Kick Off WWDC with Preview of Mac OS X "Tiger"

[Wonder Boy]

sorry for posting so soon after my first one, but...

i would love an improved ichat. more aim functions! i want a profile, i want to ready profiles more easily, i want to read away messages easier, without dragging the window out or waiting for the hover effect to kick in. i want to be able to talk to one person in two windows (dont ask). i want more reliable file transfers.

the current ichat is nice, but to me, it has a lot of room for improvement. if tiger has anything to offer, i hopes its an improved ichat.

 

[eyeluvmyimac]

I have been surprised in the last week...my Panther computer boots in about 15.

you can't be serious...i just rebooted earlier today and it took 2 minutes 10 seconds from clicking restart until my dock reappeared...and 35 seconds from THEN until the icons appeared...2 minutes and 45 seconds to restart is RIDICULOUS -- that's almost on par with my 500mhz PC....granted it was after installing the new security update which was bound to slow it down at least somewhat, but not that much....im running panther on a 1.25ghz powerbook with 1gb ram...nearly unacceptable performance -- thankfully i only need to restart like once a month....

i sound pretty bitter today lol, im really not though, honest haha

 

[Bendit]

Rebooting times vary much on my powerbook. sometimes it reboots in a matter of seconds and sometimes it takes minutes.

Sometimes it stays at the grey loading screen for a long time, sometimes it will be loading parts of mac os for a long time, sometimes it loads so fast I never see it load any part of the OS and goes straight to the login window.

I've had alot of issues rebooting my powerbook if I have an external monitor plugged in, I'll often have to force a reboot because it will hang at the grey screen.

 

[Chaszmyr]

Are all developers who attend the conference invited to the keynote presentation, or only members of the media and industry analysts?

 

[Haberdasher]

Anyone else find it ironic exactly one year after WWDC 2003 Apple will showcase the next Mac OS, and there is a chance that they'll show the next upgrade to the G5s? Well, hopefully the G5 upgrades will come before then...

I don't think it's ironic...it's good planning/ coincidental timing. From all the delays, we're not really sure which.

 

[pjkelnhofer]

Assumptions

I think it is funny how many people are complaining about paying $129 for Tiger this fall. All we know about it is that it will be unveiled on June 28th. MS has been giving demonstration of Longhorn forever it seems and no one really knows when it will come out. Maybe Apple will sit on Tiger until MS gives a definite date for Longhorn and release it a week or a month earlier.

Maybe they will release it after the next MacWorld.

Maybe they will release it at WWDC.

We have no idea. It is like people complaining about the specs on computers that haven't even been announced.

If you want to complain about paying for Tiger a year after Panther, go ahead, but please wait until we actually know that is when it is coming out.

 

[Hes Nikke]

i havent read through 9 pages of posts but a few things that can be improved come to mind.

4) built in disk-defragmentation. some low-level system process that will defragment drives on the fly or at user specified times w/o the need to reboot or start from special disks.

it's already built into Panther, fragmented files under 20 MiB automatically get moved to contagious space as they are accessed. [link]

No. Welcome 1984. Macintalk was on the Mac since the beginning (or at least, I remember using it in 1989)

I stand corrected, sadly, i didn't have a Mac until 1992, and even if i did, i probably wouldn't have remembered anyway

 

[coolsoldier]

Rebooting times vary much on my powerbook. sometimes it reboots in a matter of seconds and sometimes it takes minutes.

Sometimes it stays at the grey loading screen for a long time, sometimes it will be loading parts of mac os for a long time, sometimes it loads so fast I never see it load any part of the OS and goes straight to the login window.

I've had alot of issues rebooting my powerbook if I have an external monitor plugged in, I'll often have to force a reboot because it will hang at the grey screen.

If you had a proper shutdown, it will boot up a lot more quickly. If you've done a force-restart or if you've just upgraded, it will stay at the gray screen for several minutes repairing the filesystem or updating system files.

 

[bousozoku]

it's already built into Panther, fragmented files under 20 MiB automatically get moved to contagious space as they are accessed.
...

On my system, they're moved to contiguous space. I'm sorry that you apparently have a virus.

I suppose a partial, expedient solution isn't too bad, is it?

 

[ClimbingTheLog]

Where's the boot memory image?

A befs would be great, but does anyone remember the boot times? Nothing is more impressive than booting up inside of 30 seconds.

Hard drives are so much bigger than main memories today. What they should do is:
boot normally
set the proper flags for a sleep state
save a snapshot of RAM to disk with a fast on-the-fly compressor, ala altivec gzip
this memory image is now the fast-boot image. For regular reboots, load this image from the drive into RAM and 'wake'. It's as close to instant-on as you're going to get from a unix OS. Some minor tweaks to the filesystem drivers would probably be the bulk of the work.
Set a menu item for "reconfiguration boot" which is the old normal boot.

Sure, some people leave their computers on all the time but many others don't and this would be great for laptop users. So would sleep-to-disk (which one OS9 beta actually implemented).

 

[Nobs]

Jobs will have a special guest with him on stage. None other than that Roy, or was it Sigfried, guy who almost got his head ripped off by one of his "pet" tigers. He will be demo-ing a new access feature allowing users to operate OS 10.4 when they have no face.

This is the funniest thing I think I've read all week. :lol

 

[savar]

I've heard a rumour that Apple have done a sponsering deal with Siegfried and Roy for the use of the name Tiger, and that during the WWDC, via a live video link (probably iChat), Steve Jobs will remotely cut off Roys life support system.

You just cracked me up, because until the last 10 words I totally bought it.

I expect Tiger will not have any "expose-killer" features, but probably 3 or 4 features that add up to a similar "wow" -- file-system metadata is one example. I fully expect it to be there. (They were already working on it, and Tiger won't be out till what, like next Jan?)

10.5 is going to have a lot of cool stuff though...It's just far enough away for them to pack in tons of experimental stuff. More depth and liveliness on the desktop, plus there will be more hardware to integrate by then. I'm thinking Apple will introduce a networked Tivo type of thing which will interface to iPhoto and iMovie, and of course iTunes for displaying the visualizers when you have people over.

 

[Nobs]

BTW, I'm just waiting for my Mac to finally be compatible with my Coleco Adam computer.

 

[fraeone]

Please don't complain about progress..

Wow. I can't believe how many people are actually upset about Apple's continuous improvement to their OS. I have been building PCs since I was young, but six months ago I bought a PowerBook because Apple has the good sense to actually improve their OS on a regular basis.

10.1 came out at the same time as XP. Is anyone actually still using it? Would you like to be using 10.1 in 2 years when Longhorn comes out? A fresh install of XP these days includes 5 or 6 runs of windows update (and 5 or 6 reboots) to download all the successive security patches and service packs. If MS wasn't in the habit of bundling security patches into 'meta patches' the list would be >100.

It's the price of progress people. Feeling cheap? Linux is free, and will run just fine on your Mac.

 

[savar]

I think the biggest problem with frequent updates/backwards compatibility on macs is our dependence on shareware and freeware software that is developed by one or two individuals -- not enough resources to support older systems.

AMEN! I have a few shareware programs that I have released on versiontracker.com, and when Panther came out it obliterated one of my titles. I've gotten a bajillion emails from users about this, and all I can say is, "Hey, I don't even have Panther, I can't afford Panther..don't expect a fix anytime soon."

I'm not saying this Apple's fault--I can't imagine such a young OS having a perfectly stable API...but it is the current state of affairs nonetheless.

 

[sjk]

I think coolsoldier was talking about developers who've upgraded to newer systems dropping support for older one, but you (savar) seemed to interpret it as developers like yourself who still use older systems and don't have resources to provide support for incompatible changes with newer systems.

Even if I'm mistaken about what you were saying (sorry) it's important for users and developers to keep both those perspectives in mind; they often tend to forget one or the other depending on which "side" they're on.

 

[Windowlicker]

Oh man I'm so hoping they play "Eye of the Tiger" at this WWDC

lol! indeed! ) i'm really looking forward to see what they've done.. Though I'm waiting even more for QT to be completely rewritten. Panther is solid and fast - what really is there to improve? to make it a bit lighter in some way (so that a 266iMac would run it smoothly)?

 

[zkmusa]

Offline Files

Windows XP offers Offline Files, and I love this feature to death!

Here's how it works...

1) At work, you can use your laptop to work with files off of a network.
2) Unplug your laptop. Go home.
3) Work with some more files at home with cached copies of the network files.
4) Go back to work... plug laptop in.
5) OS automatically syncs files back to the network.

I love this feature so much.... please Tiger.. please have this feature!

 

[JFreak]

Windows XP offers Offline Files, and I love this feature to death!

Here's how it works...

1) At work, you can use your laptop to work with files off of a network.
2) Unplug your laptop. Go home.
3) Work with some more files at home with cached copies of the network files.
4) Go back to work... plug laptop in.
5) OS automatically syncs files back to the network.

I love this feature so much.... please Tiger.. please have this feature!

panther already has this feature which is called the idisk. just give apple some feedback that you want this functionality to all network drives and not just the overpriced dotmac one... please, give apple the feedback, always.

 

[aswitcher]

Are we likely (given the history of OSX) to get leaks about what new and imporved stuff Tiger does?

 

[Foocha]

Roaming Profiles

panther already has this feature which is called the idisk. just give apple some feedback that you want this functionality to all network drives and not just the overpriced dotmac one... please, give apple the feedback, always.

The Windows XP feature in question is Roaming Profiles - iDisk is not the equivalent of this. The equivalent would be that you log in to a global user account - with your home folder on the server, and when you log out, the entire contents of your home folder are synced over to your local machine, enabling you to log in to your local machine with the same account, when you are away from your network.

I image Apple will do this sooner or later.

I used to use Roaming Profiles in XP, but became frustrated by how it slowed down logout.

 

[JFreak]

The Windows XP feature in question is Roaming Profiles - iDisk is not the equivalent of this. The equivalent would be that you log in to a global user account - with your home folder on the server, and when you log out, the entire contents of your home folder are synced over to your local machine, enabling you to log in to your local machine with the same account, when you are away from your network.

I image Apple will do this sooner or later.

I used to use Roaming Profiles in XP, but became frustrated by how it slowed down logout.

you were not talking about roaming profiles, but rather syncing a network drive between a local copy and the original. there are no roaming profiles in standalone windows clients, which is what you are comparing when talking about panther/tiger features.

you know, apple also has a server os available. there are global user accounts, too. don't compare apples to oranges...

idisk is perfect example about what you described earlier - there's a network volume "somewhere" and you get a local copy of it. then you disconnect the volume, take the local copy with you, change some files, and finally sync the changes to the original network volume when you connect to it next time.

that is what i'd like to see opened up a bit. in panther osx insists the network volume being the idisk, but i can see no reason why this same method couldn't be implemented to "any" network volume.

roaming profile is totally different thing, and you're right, it slows login/logoff significantly if you plan on keeping your work files on the network server. but you need a server, you cannot do this [roaming profile] with a standalone windows client.

or have i misunderstood you? i think you were talking about client-server where i initially talked about standalone client solution [idisk] that is already implemented in panther client.

 

[Hes Nikke]

reply from an MCP

The Windows XP feature in question is Roaming Profiles - iDisk is not the equivalent of this. The equivalent would be that you log in to a global user account - with your home folder on the server, and when you log out, the entire contents of your home folder are synced over to your local machine, enabling you to log in to your local machine with the same account, when you are away from your network.

I image Apple will do this sooner or later.

I used to use Roaming Profiles in XP, but became frustrated by how it slowed down logout.

the MCP in me stirs: (shudder)

Roaming Profiles allow you to log into an account anywhere on the domain and still have all your settings. one other thing Windows 2000/XP allows for is caching of recent domain logins. that way you can still get to your account wile the Domain Controller(s) is (are) down. Folder syncing (used in conjunction with roaming profiles and the caching of domain logins) allows you to have your home folder available while you are away from the office.

not having any training on OS X server, and being too lazy to look it up, i don't think that there is anything *built in* that compares to the above. i know that there are third party solutions though. (rsync!)

Hes Nikke represses his inner MCP ​

 

[abc123]

am i the only one who thinks that this preview is being hyped by apple to drum up some ticket sales?

 

[Earendil]

am i the only one who thinks that this preview is being hyped by apple to drum up some ticket sales?

In light of Steve saying that this is the 20th anniversary, and to expect "Big Things From Apple This Year" I would expect Bigger than normal things. Of course they can't over do themselves. But I'm sure they have been saving a few things up, working over times on others, and pulling all the cards out from their sleeves. Maybe it won't be released until Dec 30th, but it will be released this year, and it will be more than a few moderate features.

I do enjoy watching the Apple heads talk about what could possibly happen, and how it probably won't be all that exciting, and then watch them as they all jump with joy.
I'm sure Steve likes it too

Tyler
Earendil