Random thoughts after one week of Mac

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Random thoughts after one week of Mac(codeclimber.net.nz)

submitted by sdorman(1415) 4 years, 4 months ago

All those thoughts led to a consideration: an OS as good as the applications that run on it. An the more the apps, the higher the probability that there is a great app for your needs. This is true for Windows, but a little bit less true for OS X: probably because there are less developers willing to develop on the Mac, and I guess it's because the horrible Objective-C needed to develop native Mac Apps.

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posted by jesse(100) 4 years, 4 months ago 0

It's interesting that he gave it a try, but his review won't be of any interest to readers of this site. His observations are all conjecture about why certains apps are and aren't available, and his only mention of Objective-C is the bash printed in the summary above; he provides no evidence or insight to back his opinion. Sounds like he was already happy with his windows or linux machine, but had a chance to play with a mac, and just wasn't very happy that all his favorite apps weren't around. I'm not a mac fan (.net developer on windows), but that doesn't mean I find uninformed commentary useful.

posted by offwhite(975) 4 years, 4 months ago 0

I agree. Posts like this that bash the Mac without really spending enough time to get to know the Mac are really not helpful. It does not counter the reality of Vista. I have used Macs and Windows as well as Linux/FreeBSD systems for years. I like them all for different purposes. His bash on Objective-C simply shows his immaturity. Many developers feel that Objective-C is really very good. Apparently it has had dynamic typing abilities that we are just now getting in C# 3.0, but I doubt this writer knew that or bothered to spend any time working through a tutorial on development on the Mac. The development tools on the Mac are amazing. Just Google for Interface Builder and you will see what I mean.

And one premise he writes about... the greater # of apps ensures that you will find one you like. Well, I have been looking for years for a decent CD writing/burning application and I am still looking. Each has big problems and limitations. I generally try to get by with the software the comes with the hardware but key features are missing. What I found on the Mac was that only the best survive while the half-baked shareware applications never really make it at all. The level of quality expected by Mac users is much higher. You can browse for all of these applications here...

http://www.apple.com/downloads/macosx/

You can see there are plenty.

posted by simonech(10.1k) 4 years, 4 months ago 0

I'm not bashing anything or anyone: I'm just enumerating the differences and my "random" thought after using a Mac for one week.
On Windows there are lot of apps, mostly opensource or freeware, while on the Mac there are fewer apps available, and all of the them are commercial ones.
And I was not bashing Objective-C... I was only guessing one of the possible causes why there are almost no opensource apps for the Mac.
I DO know about the dynamic typing features of Objective-C, but, as I said in a comment on my blog, the world is going managed... Objective-C, untill Leopard, was manual alloc, dispose and so on..

posted by simonech(10.1k) 4 years, 4 months ago 0

Anyway Offwhite, find me a decent free blogging application, or a decent free texteditor, or a decent free FTP client, that are comparable to WLW, NotePad++ and SmartFTP, and I'll amend the post

posted by freqken(0) 4 years, 4 months ago 0

Simone,

I am a fairly long-term Mac user and .Net developer, and I disagree with certain of your assertions...

Anyway, you asked about decent free blogging, text editor and FTP applications. For blogging, I happen to think that MarsEdit is just fine. True, I got my license as an early user of NetNewsWire, but I still found value in paying for an update to the latest version. See here: http://www.red-sweater.com/blog/393/perfect-preview-with-marsedit for instructions on getting a (nearly) WYSIWYG preview with MarsEdit.

For text editors, Here are two: Text Wrangler <http://www.barebones.com/products/textwrangler/> and Smultron <http://smultron.sourceforge.net/>

For FTP: Cyberduck <http://cyberduck.ch/>

You mention that the 3rd party apps on OS X are primarily for-pay, and imply that this is a bad thing. I have found that having the software be paid for is a good thing. There is an expectation that someone is working constantly to improve it. Most of this software comes from small, independent developers. They have the best communities and support of their software than I have seen anywhere.

Look deeper, and open your mind to the idea of paying someone to support the applications that you use and rely on. You may find that things are better in the OS X world than you think.

Ken Scott

posted by simonech(10.1k) 4 years, 4 months ago 0

Ken,
thank you for the comment.
Since the Mac world is more commercial oriented than the Windows one I think I'll have to pay for some of the apps I'm going to use.
But, the thing that make me think is that WLW is the best blogging app ever written, and it's free... while both MarsEdit and Ecto cost money and are sub-optimal.
Thank you anyway
Simo

posted by offwhite(975) 4 years, 4 months ago 0

Simo,

Here is my response.

FTP client - Transmit (http://www.panic.com/transmit/)

This is an excellent application created by a company that produces several great Mac applications.

Text Editor - BBEdit (http://www.barebones.com/products/bbedit/)

I used this editor for years but eventually started using jEdit because it was more geared towards a developer's needs.

As for WLW, I have only started using it recently. Normally I just use the editor that is built into the web interface. Perhaps a WLW equivalent could be .Mac, but I have no experience with it. A quick search shows that iBlog seems to match WLW pretty well.

http://www.lifli.com/iBlog/index.html

posted by simonech(10.1k) 4 years, 4 months ago 0

offwhite: but they are all commercial apps.
WLW is a general purpose client, not tied to Windows Life Space as iWeb is to .Mac.
Anyway this proves my point again: there are no decent free app in the Mac OS space =)

posted by offwhite(975) 4 years, 4 months ago 0

It is a pointless debate. I only use Vista because I need to run Visual Studio and WinXP became overrun with malware. If I have to pay a measly $15 for an FTP client just because I choose to work on a platform free of malware then that is my choice. And once the full .NET environment and VS is released to the Mac I will move instantly. Everyone knows Vista has been a huge mistake and it will take MS a while to get passed it. They have not released SP1 yet and most people think they will likely wait for SP2 or whatever is the next version of Windows to upgrade. I do not see why you feel the need to tear down MacOS X which has had a great track record over the last several years and has grown in market share.

Spend 3 months on a Mac and then come back and post your thoughts. A single week is hardly enough to really learn to leverage the platform. I first used the Mac in college and it took me 2 weeks to understand the UI and once I did I really liked it. Now I can move between the Mac and Windows very easily, as well as the occasionally Linux/FreeBSD desktop.

posted by simonech(10.1k) 4 years, 4 months ago 0

offwhite: don't get me wrong: I love the Mac UI, and I'm not tearing down MacOSX... I'm just saying that application ecosystem on the Mac is much smaller and expensive than the one on Windows.
That's all

posted by JGregory(375) 4 years, 4 months ago 0

http://www.opensourcemac.org/

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