At PDC, I was expecting something extra ordinary in looks like it was when we saw Vista’s aero glass interface after XP and wowed at first sight. But at first look I wasn’t that much happy because it has the same cool aero but a lot tweaked with cool features and multi touch. Also the new superbar that is simple and better. Later on I realized Microsoft is doing what it needs to be done. We need a better Vista and Windows 7 is likely to be that. Criticism starts…and we hear voice around like “There is nothing new in Windows 7”. …Windows 7 actually includes number of new features.
Anyways, my point is the murmuring of people who pay too much for Macs and then think they have the best thing in the world because they pay more and think everything else sucks.
It’s like they are waiting for something from Microsoft to ‘boo’ it madly. Yes Mac has very good features too but its crazy when they say foolish things.
As AppleInsider says:
Like Apple’s Dock in Mac OS X, Microsoft is now taking a more minimalist approach to its task management and has reduced the taskbar to a sliding list of icons that includes both running software and shortcuts to commonly-used titles.
If you have seen Windows 1.0 desktop then you will know from where the idea came from.
Techcrunch says:
Windows has had one of the most ridiculous naming schemes in the history of software. First there were logical (but ugly) version numbers, like the once commonplace “Windows 3.1?. Then with the release of the overhauled Windows 95 the company adopted a naming system based on the year of release, which it continued until Windows 98.
“What’s in a name” by Imran Hussain of RedmondPie explains it well. And I wasn’t expecting such a stupid post on Techcrunch. A funny comment on this post says “Well a lot of people didn’t know how to pronounce Mac OS X, either”
TheRegister says:
Sinofsky and corporate vice president of Windows experience Julie Larson-Green showed off a cleaned-up interface, with revamped task bar and OS-X-style dock. Gone are the multiple locations for launching applications, including separate sidebar and task bar, and in comes a dock-style taskbar at the base of the screen
What about copying shadowcopy as time machine, And integrating Spotlight before Vista is launched and then saying Microsoft is copy cat? (Microsoft presented it in the Longhorn concept before Mac OS X did) And I already mentioned about the superbar concept.
Apple’s senior vice president of Software Engineering Bertrand Serlet, said:
“In our continued effort to deliver the best user experience, we hit the pause button on new features to focus on perfecting the world’s most advanced operating system.”
Lol! Most advanced? And still less than 10% market share? Oops! I forgot Pixar.
Seriously Windows 7 is a great performance improvement. If current build available is installed on a will boot faster than Mac OSX (Try it).
Hey, don’t get angry! Macs are hot…see this.
November 6th, 2008 at 1:21 am
Windows 1.0 didn’t feature a dock. I’m sure you are refering to a single Win 1.0 screenshot that was posted many times by people claiming the same thing. The screenshot shows a row of icons on a green background at the bottom of the screen.
Well, the green backrground is just the desktop, and the icons are simply “icons on a desktop”. The windows above happen to obscure all of the desktop except the bottom part. It’s not a dock, and you could also put icons and minimize applications on the desktop of the Apple Lisa released before Win 1.0.
As for Spotlight, it’s an evolution of Apple V-Twin search engine, which Apple developped at the end of the 80’s, and denied in Copland, Apple’s unreleased OS a few years later, along with smart-folders. That was way before Vista was first demoed.
Shadow-copy is a system backup feature with versioning. Neither MS nor Apple were the first to do versioned backups. What’s new in Time Machine, is the interface, which is functionnaly more efficient (no need to open a dialog box to change the date) and is presented as a consumer-level feature, unlike MS backup feature which is hidden in some specific versions of Windows. Also, Time-Machine is an API that can provide versioning to other apps, you can for example go back to see previous versions of your contacts windows. Shadow copy doesn’t do that.
November 6th, 2008 at 6:04 am
I didn’t said it had dock. It’s just a preview and it doesn’t show everything that we can expect in Widows 7. May be appearance is a lot of more changed in final release.
And Apple Lisa’s (which was a big failure because of its $10,000 price tag) is little different than the bar in Window 1.0 (similarities are everywhere).
Thanks for telling about V-Twin. It will be great if you share some links and more information about it…it can be helpful to justify.
November 6th, 2008 at 6:18 am
Market share has nothing to do with how advanced something is. What is the market share of the new Nissan GT-R? I am pretty confident that it is more advance than my car and yet my car has just a tad more market share…
BTW, I don’t know if OS X is the worlds most advanced OS, how could anyone judge that, what criteria etc… I am pretty sure it isn’t though…
November 6th, 2008 at 6:31 am
@Dave
lol you are comparing OS with cars,its like comparing natural tits to silicon ones.
tell me that the most advance OSX can run exe????
November 6th, 2008 at 8:50 am
Apple copied Spotlight from Vista?
Not true.
I need only to say two words: Digital Librarian.
Try to Google it.
Hint: NeXTstep.
November 6th, 2008 at 2:47 pm
May 1997: Be releases a preview version of their operating system which includes desktop search as one of its features, developed by Dominic Giampaolo and Cyril Meurillon.
March 2002: Apple employs Dominic Giampaolo.
May 2003: Microsoft first demonstrates Longhorn with desktop search at 2003 WinHEC conference.
November 6th, 2008 at 2:52 pm
@ Alistair
Good info
November 6th, 2008 at 6:25 pm
“And Apple Lisa’s (which was a big failure because of its $10,000 price tag) is little different than the bar in Window 1.0 (similarities are everywhere).”
Icons depicted in the 1.0 screenshot are windows minimized to the desktop, not a toolbar. The appearance of a “bar” was due to the lack of overlapping windows in 1.0. Since they could not be moved to arbitrary locations, the system constrained windows from covering the icons when they were tiled.
As soon as full support for overlapping Windows was added in 3.0+, minimized windows icons continued to gravitate to the bottom of the desktop, but could be hidden by other windows, etc.
Windows 3.x screenshots
Displaying icons for minimized windows on the desktop has been around since the early 80s as part of X Windows, which was developed as part of project Athena.
I’d also recommend viewing the 2008 PDC presentation on the Windows 7 Desktop. Specifically, many of the problems in Windows task-bar which were addressed in Windows 7 have been part of the Dock since it was developed by NeXT. Others were added when it was merged with the Mac UI in Mac OS X in 2001.
The presenter touched on the confusion between launching and switching to applications [staring at 11:10] The Dock has always a clearly defined and unified switch / launch behavior.
Clicking on the Dock icon of an application will automatically open a new document / window if one is not currently open. This happens regardless if the application is running or not and is integrated into the Cocoa Document model built into the OS. The end result is a new window always becomes visible and active when a Dock icon is clicked.
For example, instead of minimizing Mail’s main window in Mac OS X, I often close it completely. The dock icon shows me when new messages arrive and There is no minimized window that needs to be managed or tracked down to use it. Instead, I can simply click on the mail icon in the Dock, which will open the message list window, or I can right click and choose “Compose New Message” to open a blank email window.
Why minimize a window when you can close it completely?
Dock icons can also display overlay badges, such as the number of unread emails or progress indicators, such compiling code, rendering video effects or performing image processing, CPU usage [these are all real examples] and can “bounce” when they require attention, display application menus etc. Having application display data without using a window is quite natural since applications are not windows in Mac OS X.
Screen Shot
However, one thing I do like about the new taskbar in Windows 7 is the addition of a most resent items list for apps that are not running.
November 6th, 2008 at 8:49 pm
I wrote:
“Specifically, many of the problems in Windows task-bar which were addressed in Windows 7 have been part of the Dock since it was developed by NeXT.”
But should have wrote…
“Specifically, many of the solutions to problems in Windows task-bar, which were addressed in Windows 7, have been part of the Dock since it was developed by NeXT. Others were added when it was merged with the Mac UI in Mac OS X in 2001.”
In other words, Microsoft solved many problems in the Windows Taskbar by implementing the same features as found in the OS X Dock (unified launch / switch, overlays, application menus, etc.)
November 7th, 2008 at 12:36 am
Good site I \”Stumbledupon\” it today and gave it a stumble for you.. looking forward to seeing what else you have..later
November 18th, 2008 at 3:46 am
“lol you are comparing OS with cars,its like comparing natural tits to silicon ones.
tell me that the most advance OSX can run exe????”
OMFG. *.exe is simply an extension to the filename so that “normal” users can tell what file is which. The binary codes inside the file (which differ from processor to processor and kernel to kernel) are what really count. Can Windows run OSX binaries? No. Can Linux? No. No kernel can read binaries for another kernel unless you get an emulator to translate the binary code into a format readable by the operating system.
November 27th, 2008 at 2:01 pm
I have a big problem supporting any OS that comes from Microsoft. Take a look at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Criticism_of_Microsoft if you’re ignorant of the nature of the beast.
I have a linux desktop - I have a dock style window manager/launcher which is nice to use sometimes, but usually I use neither a dock or a taskbar - they’re mostly unneccessary. I have one panel at the side with notifications taking up around 21 pixels, so I have a 1420×900 space for my applications.
Menu’s are outdated aren’t they? Gnome-do is a launcher which is far superior to any other that I have seen. It isn’t a launcher, sorry - I can use it to find windows, files, or simply do things - play music, open files, send emails etc. and it knows and launches whatever application applies to the task.
One thing that’s sure is that Microsoft will continue fixing the prices, and enforcing Microsoft Taxes, and removing very good choices from the shops - and forcing everyone onto the same desktop where one problem affects everyone - and if you want to buy a mobile, god help you if you don’t go with Microsoft. The same really applies to Apple - but when you find open source software, you’ll find that your portable MP3 player works fine, and you won’t be wasting time doing defragmenting or searching for malware.
Personally, I thought Aero windows looked rather nice, but GTK2+ looks far nicer - and I have a more pleasant desktop environment than my friend has on his Macbook Pro - you pay your money, you make your choices innit.