WWDC: New Tiger Features

[abhishekit]

So much fuss about nothing. Well atleast nothing amazingly exciting for non-developers.
Widgets. WOW...I wouldn't have to download Konfabulator when I shell 120 bucks for Tiger.
The new search feature, double wow. seriously, who really finds the current search so pathetic, as to welcome this new feature as amazing.

It was as damp as today's weather in Akron.

 

[MacRy]

Looks like the chap who developed Konfabulator is none too happy about Apple ripping him off judging by this post on their forums.......can't blame him though really.

 

[Zeekomkommer]

Spotlight seems suspiciously similar to launchbar...

As Dashboard looks suspiciously similar to Konfabulator, they even call the little apps Widgets!

Looks like the banner "start your photocopiers" has an awful ironic touch.

 

[1macker1]

HAhahah, just saw it. Having your own marketing pitch used against u is funny.

Anyone seen the Konfabulator site today?? It says, "Cupertino, start your photocopiers! Why wait 'till "first half of 2005" when you can get the original Dashboard now?"

 

[javabear90]

haha

 

[bryanzak]

Yep.. looks like Apple have ripped off another product, judging by Konfabulator's website.

Apple don't integrate, they rip off products... SwitchX, Watson... now Konfabulator.

Who wrote Konfabulator? What company did he previously work for? What was his job there?

Answer those questions and you might wonder who is ripping off whom.

 

[theROZ]

you guys are boneheads

uhh.. i think 64bit os is amazing in itself...

not to mention maya unlimited wow

 

[wdlove]

It seems that those that predicted that Tiger would not arrive till 2005 were correct. It seems that by the statement of Tiger 1st half of 2005, means that by this time next year we will have Tiger for sure.

 

[johnpg]

You're all nuts.

This is a fantastic update. You are completely missing the point. The Metadata alone is enough. The spotlight technology is revolutionary, although not original (see BEOS). But Apple has done a wonderful job of implementing it, or so it seems from the demos. If it works as advertised, that's enough. This is incredible technology that will change the way you use your Mac. It's bigger than Expose', or any feature before it.

Plus we're still nine months or so away from release. Who knows what else may show up in Tiger or how it will evolve. This will be an exciting time, that's for sure.

Cheers,
John

 

[wdlove]

I'm also very excited by this announcement. The 64 bit OS will be awesome. Now the developers have plenty of time to prepare.

 

[GWhite]

Return of FAT binaries

Remember the 68 to PPC transition? Looks like the same thing is about to happen again. XCode 2.0 you can compile 32bit, 64bit, or FAT. Wonder how long before 64 bit predominates? How painful was the last transition anyone recall?

 

[SiliconAddict]

What is apple thinking? I can't seem to understand the logic behind what they're doing.

Unfortunately I thinking Apple is panicking about Longhorn. There is enough of a revamp in MS's OS and enough features that will most likely bring it up to OS X level that I think Apple is panicking and throwing "stuff" into OS X before its refined. Thankfully they have a year to bring everything together correctly. What worries me is how far ahead they are thinking with their GUI. We aren't seeing any major revamps or changes in OS X, at least not yet. This is going to be the 4th release of OS X with very few changes to the GUI other then adding and removing some of OS X's makeup.
I'm somewhat concerned with Apple's long-term vision of OS X.
That being said I'm also wondering if they might be going for a "major" revamp of the GUI to go head to head with Longhorn in 2006. If you think about it if they released a major overhaul of the GUI in 2005 a full year before Longhorn no one will care in 2006. No release tiger in spring of 2005 then come out with something major in summer of 2006 just in time to smack MS and Longhorn upside the head.
3D GUI interface anyone? Here's hoping that's how it works out.

 

[nacl99]

I don't know if anyone has mention how huge the meta data thing is.

I know Windows is working on it for longhorn, and its a big deal, new file system for them in order to pull it off i think, and obviously it is taking them forever to do it.

I thought a read a little while back that the next version of OSX (tiger) would not have it because of how big of a task it is to implement it.

So I'm amazed they are going to be able to pull it off for Tiger.

*displays are too expensive though ;-)

 

[SiliconAddict]

I'm also very excited by this announcement. The 64 bit OS will be awesome. Now the developers have plenty of time to prepare.

And this is the exact reason why I'm not going near anything other then a 64-bit powerbook. I walk out the store and I'll know it will be obsolete before the end of 2006. Would it run Tiger? Duh. No way in hell is Apple going to abandon all those G4's out there. But its prob a good bet its going to run a little faster. A letter better on a G5 Power*.

 

[johnnowak]

Actually, Xcode 2.0 makes it all worth it. Looks good.. finally!

Wish it had CFM support...

 

[Vicelow]

Beat Longhorn with this (150???) ridiculous features????
-Searching: cool but it is already that good, that I do not feel a major improvement
- iChat: nice but not spectacular
- RSS????? nonsense
- dashboard: only feature being at least a nice innovation, maybe useful in everyday computing
- Automator, .mac, Voice (i'm not disabled), Xcode 2.0 really not spectuacular
- great displays

For me as a normal Mac-User there isn't really anything witch could make me pay 120$ or more

I'm quite disappointed

 

[jsw]

The spotlight technology is revolutionary, although not original (see BEOS).

Good point.

The BeOS had this - or at least a primitive version of this - in, what, 1996? 1997? I remember it being a lot of fun to play with (note that current avatar is an old BeBox like mine).

I'm very happy to see this in Tiger.

 

[johnnowak]

In all fairness, I don't care about a Konfabulator ripoff. Konfabulator itself was a ripoff, and also a scam. Putting widgets in expose will actually make them USEFUL. Right now, i can't stand all that crap on my desktop. Keeping it all hidden away until I need it is a great idea.

LaunchBar is awesome though... so I'm a little ticked about that. However, the new Apple version will incorporate metadata searching, so it will undoubtedly be a lot better.

Overall, it looks like 10.4 will rock... yay corporations!

 

[jettredmont]

Looks like apple is stepping on the toes of its independent developers again...

Spotlight seems suspiciously similar to launchbar...

Huh? Not a longtime launchbar user, but based on the one-line LanchBar synopsis and list of features on their website, Spotlight is *NOTHING* like it!

Dashboard is a lot like konfabulator...

As Steve made abundantly clear in the keynote, the key benefit of Dashboard is that things appear when you want them to and dissappear just as quickly. There was even a slide which said just about precisely that. Konfabulator, even with it's last-week "Konspose" addition does NOT do that! Sure, you can make all your widgets come up when you want them to (in a "special" mode via F8), but they're still (by design) active and visible 100% of the time, taking up window space and cluttering your desktop.

Plus, frankly, I expect Apple's widget toolkit to have a lot better API than Konfab's, just based on some of the effects seen today (widgets flipping around, using CoreImage-ish effects, etc)

It would be interesting to see how much cross-pollenation there might be between the two; might one be able to take a Konfabulator widget and run it as a Dashboard widget? Or vice-versa?

 

[DGFan]

Though I somewhat agree with someone on Konfab's forum who pointed out Apple tried putting widgets in the dock and it didn't work, then tried putting them in the menu and it didn't work, and now they are putting them into Exposé.

I think Dashboard's more like a single extra virtual desktop that just happens to hold widgets. Konspose is a lot more like Expose because it actually shows widgets that are already active but might be buried by other windows.

 

[point665]

What about the firewall?

Stealth mode for Safari:

Identity Protection


Safari protects your personal information on shared or public Macs when surfing the Web. Go ahead and check your bank account and .Mac email at the library or shop for birthday presents on the family Mac. Using Safari’s new privacy feature, no information about where you visit on the Web, personal information you enter or pages you visit are saved or cached. It’s as if you were never there.

that sounds cool...

 

[macnews]

According to apple Tiger will run 32 bit apps. Not sure if this has been made yet.

 

[DGFan]

Unfortunately I thinking Apple is panicking about Longhorn. There is enough of a revamp in MS's OS and enough features that will most likely bring it up to OS X level that I think Apple is panicking and throwing "stuff" into OS X before its refined. Thankfully they have a year to bring everything together correctly. What worries me is how far ahead they are thinking with their GUI. We aren't seeing any major revamps or changes in OS X, at least not yet. This is going to be the 4th release of OS X with very few changes to the GUI other then adding and removing some of OS X's makeup.
I'm somewhat concerned with Apple's long-term vision of OS X.
That being said I'm also wondering if they might be going for a "major" revamp of the GUI to go head to head with Longhorn in 2006. If you think about it if they released a major overhaul of the GUI in 2005 a full year before Longhorn no one will care in 2006. No release tiger in spring of 2005 then come out with something major in summer of 2006 just in time to smack MS and Longhorn upside the head.
3D GUI interface anyone? Here's hoping that's how it works out.

The thing that struck me about the Tiger preview (especially as compared to previous versions of OS X) is how much stuff there is in there for developers to make use of. A lot of the neat features of Tiger (meta data & search, CoreImage, etc...) will be useful really only after apps start to make use of them. By the time Longhorn comes out there should be plenty of really neat OS X apps taking advantage of these features.

So, this should really please developers. And even without a huge new release right before Longhorn it should do well at "showing up" Microsoft.

 

[DGFan]

As Steve made abundantly clear in the keynote, the key benefit of Dashboard is that things appear when you want them to and dissappear just as quickly. There was even a slide which said just about precisely that. Konfabulator, even with it's last-week "Konspose" addition does NOT do that! Sure, you can make all your widgets come up when you want them to (in a "special" mode via F8), but they're still (by design) active and visible 100% of the time, taking up window space and cluttering your desktop.

So why doesn't Steve implement this:

http://www.codetek.com/ctvd/

Surely, that would solve everyone's problems???

 

[ivtrk]

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