swift240 wrote:
If Leopard were to become available for my PC I would get it.
Revelation: a Mac *IS* a PC, and I don't just mean a "Personal Computer", I mean: it has an x86 compatible CPU and it *DOES* run Windows.
In fact, it's like buying TWO computers in ONE.
And believe me, after you play with Leopard, you will dump the "PC" side so fast, as if it was a virus eating up your hard disk space (oh wait, it IS a virus!)
A general comment based on the intial comment and couple of the following comments:
what makes Apple's OS and software so good, is the ideology behind it's programming/development environment (Cocoa):
You see, when Steve Jobs went to Xerox PARC (if you don't know of them, please do some wikipedia research), he got some of the most brilliant technology ideas of the previous century.
Scientists and engineers at Xerox PARC had not only developed the first laser printer, the first Ethernet network, the first mouse, but they were also doing some incredible software innovations (not of the Microsoft "innovation" type).
Steve Jobs said that in creating the Macintosh and it's GUI, he was so blinded by the GUI concept from Xerox PARC, that he had forgotten the other two major scientific innovations: object oriented programming and networking.
After he left (or thrown out of) Apple in 1985 he created one of the most amazing computer companies: NeXT Computers.
That's when he actually remembered to have his engineers implement those two extrememly powerful technologies at NeXT Computers. What came out with in two years, and improved over the next 7 years until 1994 was the uber-amazing, "AmigaOS for the serious boys" NeXTSTEP operating system. It was advanced in many ways, but one of the most powerful was the fact that the applications relied on a fully Object Oriented programming language (Objective-C) and an equally powerful and a complete API (much like Java, C#, Perl, Python, etc have created years later), as well as UI layout tool which allowed chaning the application UI without recompiling an app. This allowed them to create applications far faster and better (code re-use = less bugs), and much more easily (Objective-C is really *clean* and elegant compared to the dirty rotten pile that you have with C++).
Anyways, this technology conglomerate became Mac OS X, and was further improved (unlike what a previous person commented, a TON of changes have happened under the hood of OS X since 10.1, to 10.2 which had the first Quartz Extreme implementation, a lot of cleanup and integration going on, improvements in all aspects of the kernel and especially the APIs such as Core Animation, Core Sound, Core Data, Quartz Compozer, stuff that allows Apple to come out with killer apps like Time Machine, Cover-Flow, iLife '08 - do check it out, or even developer tools like X-Ray), which leads to some amazing applications. Check out what's in OS X, but also apps like Delicious Library (
http://www.delicious-monster.com/).
Prepared to be blown away with the type of applications that will be coming out now that Leopard is here. We're at the edge of a major paradigm shift in desktop application presentation and dynamics. In fact, I can forsee Apple changing the HCI paradigm: multi-touch and voiceover anyone?
For the tech-heads, all I have to tell you is how simple it's to do animated GUI elements: 2 lines of code, using Obj-C 2.0 with managed code. That's IT. Try out the latest XCode/Interfact Builder - it's a killer duo!
Amiga was my Amiga of the 20th century. Apple is my Amiga of the 21st century.
Cheers
EDIT: a clarification for the inebriated: what I mean when I say "Apple is my Amiga for the 21st century" is not that Apple is creating the groundbreaking technology like Amiga did when it burst into the scene in 1985. Macs are "just" plain PCs, and their OS is from the 1980s actually. Nothing "new" there. What's new is that the features they bring forth, especially to developers and users, were "lost" because for the last 15 years it has been a Microsoft show. Stagnant. Boring. Convoluted. Bloated. Unimaginative. And further more their awesome integration, which is what Apple is really good at, is making them more valuable and prominent and in the end causing a major shift in desktop application programming and very likely soon in the UI too.
I'm still waiting for "the Amiga of the 21st century". A hardware & software package, that just blows everything we've known as customary away. Apple's doing well on the software part. I wonder if they can manage the hardware part... Time will tell.
