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Tiger - eyecandy. Replacement for the genie effect?

B

brap

macrumors 68000
Original poster
May 10, 2004
1,705
3
Nottingham
I've been wondering...

I looked at a (dubious) copy of 8a263, or whatever it was, and the minimise effects of the widgets were stunning.

Now they've appeared in Mail (from te SF keynote) for the 'send to iPhoto' link. Is anyone else here hoping they add this as a general 'minimise' animation? Genie looks so outdated next to it, in my eyes at least.
 
brap said:
I've been wondering...

I looked at a (dubious) copy of 8a263, or whatever it was, and the minimise effects of the widgets were stunning.

Now they've appeared in Mail (from te SF keynote) for the 'send to iPhoto' link. Is anyone else here hoping they add this as a general 'minimise' animation? Genie looks so outdated next to it, in my eyes at least.
Click to expand...
Ya, I am too. I watched the keynote for the first time yesterday, and that new effect looks awesome. While it resembles the genie effect in a small way, there's something different and more fluid about it... I've got my fingers crossed! :)
 
That effect has been in OSX for a while now, they just didn't put it in the menu for minimise effects... I guess they just didn't like it. :)

Anyhow, to enable it get hold of Cocktail (a good system maintenance app) and you can choose from all three minimise effects there - Genie, Scale and Suck In.

Neil.
a.k.a. Arnel
 
I loathe the genie effect.
It's one of the first things I turn off when setting up a new system.

If I want a window to minimize, I want it to do it in the quickest, least obtrusive way possible.

It's an inelegant distracting gimmick.
 
I like the genie effect! I know it's a gimmick but for some reason it tickles me.

Hold down shift to watch the genie effect in slow motion (works for exposé too).
 
The suckhole effect is already in Panther, it's just not enabled as a Dock option. You can unlock it with Onyx
 
jlewis2k1 said:
suckhole? im curious on what this looks like. i have only seen the genie and scale effect.
Click to expand...

Download Tinker Tool or Onyx to find out! ;)

Basically it's similar to the scale effect, with the window getting sucked in by the bottom corner.
 
i use "transparent dock" to enable the suck feature (it looks just like the dock sucking the application down into it!)

it also does really cool things like make the dock completely transparent (hence the name, obviously), so you just see the icons. you can also anchor it right in the corner of the screen, instead of the midde of a side.
 
kewpid said:
The suckhole effect is already in Panther, it's just not enabled as a Dock option. You can unlock it with Onyx
Click to expand...
Hmm... I last had Onyx on a different macine, and this wasn't an option. But yeah, cheers, I'd forgotten about Onyx!

The suck effect just doesn't look... right, as it stands in Panther. If you slo-mo it there's no transparency (as there is in Tiger), and as such it looks kinda crappy. Probably why it wasn't enabled? Maybe Tiger will see a fix.
 
jackieonasses said:
When you minimize a window - it scales and shrinks to the dock....

or look at wrldwzrd89's avatar for a picture
Click to expand...

is Wdlove's


Yes, the minimize effect sucks but I like it.. thx onyx! :)
 
bigandy said:
i use "transparent dock" to enable the suck feature (it looks just like the dock sucking the application down into it!)

it also does really cool things like make the dock completely transparent (hence the name, obviously), so you just see the icons. you can also anchor it right in the corner of the screen, instead of the midde of a side.
Click to expand...

I just downloaded "Transparent Dock" after reading your post... very cool app. I love making the dock background completely transparent with no border. :)
 
jackieonasses said:
When you minimize a window - it scales and shrinks to the dock....

or look at wrldwzrd89's avatar for a picture
Click to expand...
Since you mentioned it...

Anyway, I've yet to watch the keynote until its conclusion. It always drops frames somewhere in the middle, which is highly annoying. This is good news though, and I look forward to seeing Tiger once it's finished.
 
Blue Velvet said:
I loathe the genie effect.
It's one of the first things I turn off when setting up a new system.

If I want a window to minimize, I want it to do it in the quickest, least obtrusive way possible.

It's an inelegant distracting gimmick.
Click to expand...

It's neither, it is an extremely elegant visual feedback.

Unlike a regular minimize, the genie effect gives an immediate visual feedback to show you where the minimized window is going. When you have a regular minimize you pretty much have to guess where it's gonna end up based on the angle of the movement.
 
NickFalk said:
It's neither, it is an extremely elegant visual feedback.

Unlike a regular minimize, the genie effect gives an immediate visual feedback to show you where the minimized window is going. When you have a regular minimize you pretty much have to guess where it's gonna end up based on the angle of the movement.
Click to expand...

I disagree and this is why.

First off: It moves and is therefore distracting. I'm minimising it because I want to see something else and am already looking for that other item. I don't want my eyes to be following that old window down to the dock. I know exactly where it's going anyway – to the far right end of the dock, right next to the trash...

Second: I don't like the shape of the animation. I don't find it elegant in the slightest... that's an aesthetic judgement and is a matter of taste.

Third, and lastly: It annoys me that Windows users get so excited about it. There are far more important & valuable things about OS X than an animated window. It's pure eye-candy designed to help sell Macs – it has the 'wow' factor that helps distinguish OS X from dull old Windows...
 
Scale effect minimizes faster and it looks more elegant than the genie effect. How about a folding paper effect?
 
Blue Velvet said:
I disagree and this is why.
First off: It moves and is therefore distracting. I'm minimising it because I want to see something else and am already looking for that other item. I don't want my eyes to be following that old window down to the dock.
Click to expand...
Well, it's not like mimimize doesn't cause the windows to move... If I read you correctly you would probably prefair if the window just dissapeared from the desktop and then appeared in the dock. In my view the more visual feedback you can get from the system the more intuitive it becomes...
Third, and lastly: It annoys me that Windows users get so excited about it. There are far more important & valuable things about OS X than an animated window.
Click to expand...
I agree...
It's pure eye-candy designed to help sell Macs – it has the 'wow' factor that helps distinguish OS X from dull old Windows...
Click to expand...
...I guess we'll just have to agree to disagree. I find it to make the system more intuitive.
 
eye candy is good

It's understandable that not all people are happy with eye candy and prefer that things just happen, kind of like in the (ahem...) wintel world (you know... the appear disappear kind of approach) with no visual stimulation.
I like eye candy, since I have to spend between 9 and 12 hours a in front of my computer i enjoy any kind of effect that makes things look nice, I must say that I hardy minimize anything since the introduction of exposé.
At work I use a PeeCee and I do miss the OSX eye candy.
I can't wait for Tiger, that will give us the mother of all Finders and Exposé, I know that those 2 features alone will make using a PeeCee unbearable.

S.
 
Just for the record: I'm not implying that everybody have to like the genie-effect. I do however react when people claim that it's just eye-candy...
 
NickFalk said:
Well, it's not like mimimize doesn't cause the windows to move... If I read you correctly you would probably prefair if the window just dissapeared from the desktop and then appeared in the dock. In my view the more visual feedback you can get from the system the more intuitive it becomes...

I agree...

...I guess we'll just have to agree to disagree. I find it to make the system more intuitive.
Click to expand...

Nick, I agree with you too. While it is, imho, very nice eye-candy, it's just the form part. It's very functional to see where your windows are actually going—I can't imagine my mom accidentally minimizing a window into the dock and it's just gone. At least the genie, scale, and for all of you hackers out there ;) the suck effect, let you know where the windows are going.
-Chase
 
rendezvouscp said:
Nick, I agree with you too. While it is, imho, very nice eye-candy, it's just the form part. It's very functional to see where your windows are actually going—I can't imagine my mom accidentally minimizing a window into the dock and it's just gone. At least the genie, scale, and for all of you hackers out there ;) the suck effect, let you know where the windows are going.
-Chase
Click to expand...

Why do you need to watch where they are going when they go to the same place consistently, each and every time? Which is to the far right of the dock right next to the trash.

I'm not disputing a small amount of feedback: it's just that the genie effect is so slow, flashy and informatively useless it's like go-faster racing stripes on your car...

This word 'intuitive' is bandied around too much. If it was truly intuitive then you wouldn't need to see it, you'd know exactly what it was doing...
 
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