Thought i’d list a couple of Mac OSX annoyances, as you generally dont see them documented any where. Bare in mind I use Linux, OSX, and all windows flavours (including vista (ick 
)), so I constantly flick between them.
I’m not an OS bigot theres definately a place in the world for all the *nix’s OSX & Windows (and vista?). Redmund did steal a lot of ideas from apple, i think thats generally accepted. However isn’t it time apple did the same. There are some usability bits and pieces on Windows where the mac is left behind. I’ll try and add ( or delete if I find a solution) more to the list as I find them.
Just to be clear, with the exception of gaming (bootcamp!) I still think Mac OSX is the best home OS by far.
Just been playing around with leopard for a couple of days now. No problems with Isync and my (Nokia 8800) or my wife’s (Sony k800i) hoorah!. However I just went to send a text message to my wife using address book over bluetooth, as I would of in 10.4 and the feature has been removed. There appears to be no mention of bluetooth at all in address book.
This begs the question:
Is the constant addition of features per release a good thing?
Should the OS provider stay more focused on usability and avoid bloatware?
I personally answered yes to both questions yet am still annoyed features I used disappeared.
note to self: Quit moaning James, look at the big picture!
Last night rebuilt my Mac book Pro with leopard, a very painless exercise. First new and amazing feature, the welcome movie is now full screen! The OS UI has been tweaked every so slightly notably making the top bar slightly transparent and the dock is now a bit shiny and a bit slanty. Your probably realising that the new features are a bit weak so i’ll list them:
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Nokia Series 40 iSync plugins can be found here
I posted a week ago about how to get your nokia 6085 working on you Mac with iSync (2.4 & 3.0). Well it appear the method will work for any series 40 nokia phome.
So I have knocked up a simple script that will out put the contents of the MetaClasses.plist file for you.
Script Here
If you use the script and it works for you could you please post a comment saying which model of nokia your using so its clear others whats what.
Update added a list of the Nokia Series 40 phones to the script thanks to
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Found another missing key on the macbook pro (probably the macbooks too). The delete key is quite conspicuous by its absence on the keyboard. However this isn’t a great draw back as 99.9% of mac software don’t appear to use and rely quite rightly on the backspace key. I have only found to reasons to find the delete key, the first is in RDP sessions to a windows machine and the second is using PSI to map msn gateways etc. to my googletalk account.
FN+BACKSPACE = delete
Thought i’d also add here that the windows key by default in RDP is the Apple key. getting lots of traffic here trying to find out what the windows key is
This has been superceeded by a Nokia Series 40 script
Update: i have created a script to make plugins for any series 40 nokia here
I have been trying to get my Nokia 6085 to sync with iSync 2.4 for some time. I finally cracked it, if you replace the Nokia 6131 plugin with the code below it all works :).
- Right click iSync from the with applications in the finder and “show package contents”
- Navigate to
- Contents\Plugins\ApplePhoneConduit.syncdevice\Contents\
- Plugins\Nokia-6131.phoneplugin\Contents\Resources
- make a backup of MetaClasses.plist
- replace contents of MetaClasses.plist with the file here Nokia 6085 isync plugin (remove the .txt extension)
So I have been living with my Macbook pro for about a week now. I’m still very impressed, I have discovered MAMP a MySQL Apache and PHP, which is making my random web developing very easy. I can see why designer types use macs. The the way the interface is layed out, so the would be windows file menu is always at the top simply makes sense, (though perhaps not immediately).
I have also this week installed Windows XP on my mac. Specifically so i can play Counter Strike Source. Which runs at 45fps at 1400×900 which is very impressive. Once im out of boxes I will be able to try Battlefield 2 and Call of Duty 2 (See how out of touch with games I am).
The only Mac funny i have come across is with the “UK” keyboard layout. Which isn’t very UK at all any one familiar with Sun Sparc Workstation will know what I mean, I’m pretty sure just because you have a pound symbol on the keyboard doesn’t make it a UK keyboard. This though takes but a few moment to adjust to, remembering the @ symbol is above the 2 isn’t too hard to remember. One key that has proved somewhat of a challenge to locate for the # (Obviously a problem I have now overcome). The # doesn’t appear on the keyboard at all, it took a quick question from the only other mac user I’m familiar with, ( who incidentally has an Australian keyboard) to Point out it Option + 3. Option is the Mac way of saying Alt, it even has alt written on the key so why they insist on calling it Option I dont know.
The only real annoyance that I can find with the laptop is im slightly worried about wearing my Omega Seamaster while typing (OK its a fake, I would of been rumbled with a barrage of sarcastic comments so I’ll come clean now), as im worried it my scratch they metal case.
I recently took delivery of a spangly new macbook pro. I needed this as I wanted to use it for web development and some surfing etc. I am and have been using Windows for about 13 years, quite a long time, but not huge compared to others in my industry. Professionally in IT I have a different view point to most of my counterparts, in that I believe that most OS’s have a part to play that can make an excellent enterprise architecture on the server side. Of course to me this doesn’t apply to OS2, AIX or any other IBM flavor of anything, have you seen lotus notes? I mean who “replicates” their email hello! .Erm, anyway across my career so far I haven’t had the opportunity to use Mac OS X at all. Recently a friend of mine while traveling around the world picked up a macbook, my friends tend to have an unnecessary one-upmanship rivalry which is very childish, this is one of the main reasons I had to buy a macbook pro. Seriously I have had a Mac in the back of my mind for some time and Darren buying one, confirmed to me that this was the right thing to do.
So now Yesterday I open up the box and turn on the Mac and it springs to life.
Observation Number 1: Remember when you install windows XP and during the install it tries to do the dynamic update over the internet, but it cant because you haven’t given it any drivers yet. Well this works and works well in the initial Mac setup. After a couple of screens what’s your name etc, it picked up my WiFi and prompted me for the key etc and it was away.
Observation Number 2: After you install you windows XP client you spend the next four hours going back to windows update rebooting and repeating. This is similar on a Mac after my first boot I was prompted with about 400Mb of patches and a firmware update. The fact Macs don’t need patching and AV is Myth spread by Pro Mac Anti Windows people. Any one who reads the register will appreciate that Mac OS X is as if not more bug ridden than windows. I believe Apples Attitude to this will have to change as did Microsoft some 18 months back.
Observation Number 3: One button on the mouse Seriously ? This isn’t a big a deal as I thought it was going to be all the context menus appear where you’d expect in Windows (Probably due to some UI “borrowing”), and instead of a right click its now a CRTL+Click.
Observation Number 4: The @ key has moved. This was a shock and Initially I thought I had an US keyboard, but upon further inspection the Euro and Pound Key we’re right there just along side the @ on shift+2 weird. That will take some getting used to. On a similar note as a Windows power user and frequent user of laptops (another IBM gripe how can you use a laptop properly without a windows key eh!), Apple has included a similar veritable feast of shortcuts which use the weird apple key thing. Some are similar to windows some aren’t. Again this is something that is going to slow my transition.
Obviously the Macs are drop dead gorgeous and you cant get anything close that runs windows (interestingly this only applies to the laptops as you can get some Very sexy atx cases now). Technically the screen is comparable with those Shiny Sony/Toshiba laptops.
So far touch wood my Max OS X experience (though still less than 72 hours old) is a good one and one that I would recommend.
Finally my macbook has arrived. So now I can do rinky stuff like publish entries like this one from a widget, widgets like Vista Gadgets but the spelling is subtly different!
I can talk now, have new toy to play with!
