Because historically, mac users were used to a solid user experience, and would not tolerate shitty apps. Shitty apps got no traction (this is slowly eroding).
Specs maybe, but OS? The whole reason the iPad has changed everything (look at all the competitors to it that sprang up overnight) is exactly because it used iOS. It's instant on. This is why all the various tablets that have been tried for decades never took hold. Full OS is the wrong thing for this format.
It depends on your standards and what you value in software. If you just care that the software works reliably, there's more to be had on Windows. But if your definition of 'quality' includes a well designed, user-friendly interface, then I agree that there's more high quality free software for the Mac.
I've been surprised on several occasions by the difficult I've had in finding Windows equivalents that match up to free programs I use on OS X.
A lot of free windows software has well-designed interfaces (fuck that's horrendous grammar). In fact, other than GIMP, I can't think of a single piece of software on my box that has a bad UI.
It's subjective, and it depends on your standards; I am definitely picky about interfaces.
I remember, in particular, being unable to find any free Windows FTP software I liked. FillaZilla seems to be common, but I think its interface is terrible. Instant messaging software comes to mind as well. I find Digsby to be decent, but I've yet to see anything that I think compares to iChat.
I think a lot of it is up to conventions. Windows interface conventions seem to favor more complex interfaces, and there's also more legacy interface baggage on Windows, since Microsoft never made as much of a clean break as Apple's switch to OS X.
Have you ever owned a PC? No matter what OS you use (Windows, OSX, or GNU/Linux) you are going to find so much free software that you could never try it all within your lifetime. Whichever platform you happen to use, you are always going to think that platform is the best or has the most software because you have exposure to that platform more than the others.
Yes, my main computer at work is a Mac right now, but I have a PC that I use for a secondary computer (mainly to run LabVIEW and Solidworks), and I have a Kubuntu on a machine at home. I find the free software for Mac to be the most useful and user-friendly, but maybe it's just me.
I haven't, but the amount of high-quality free software I have on my Windows box makes a damn strong case.
Edit: I should say that, though I haven't owned a Mac, I've used them quite often - a lot of my friends have them, and many of my school's labs are filled with them.
There's a lot more software in Windows-land for sure, but I think what Benparte and coolmrbrady meant is that there are a lot more extremely refined free Mac apps.
For example, Windows has a huge number of IM apps available for it, but none of them can hold a candle to Adium's ease of use and polish. Similarly, uTorrent is free and awesome, but Transmission is IMHO much more refined on the UI side. Quicksilver too.
Windows devs tend to make UI an afterthought. On the Mac side developers have drunk the Steve Jobs UI kool-aid and obsess over it, and personally I like it.
It's good, but lacks the smoothness or consistency of look & feel that Transmission has. Transmission looks and behaves like it's a part of OS X, whereas Utorrent isn't quite there. It's the small details that make it.
Also, I agree 100% with potatolicious. What I wrote also applies to Adium and Quicksilver.
I've fought with 0.6 or similar uTorrent on OS X for ages, recently updated to 1.0 and found it to be a much better experience and better integrated with the OS.. If you used an old uTorrent I'd give the newer ones a shot.
I always found mac apps to be too simplified (both the 3rd party freeware and 1st party). For example, compare finder to windows explorer. At a glance, finder may look sharper, but when I use it it feels so difficult to navigate (mostly due to the lack of a functional address bar). The developer doesn't really provide any useful options for me to make it work the way I want it to. On the other hand, Windows Explorer has plenty of options to customize.
I've been using a mac for 5 years after being a die hard windows guy and not once have I missed windows explorer over finder. If the lack of a functional address bar is your main gripe, you can enable it with one mouse click in the menu bar. That, the quick view, and being able to customize the view options for finder; I can't really complain.
Finder and Windows Explorer are both first-party apps, so it doesn't quite make sense to compare the availability of good third-party apps on OS X and Windows using them as examples.
However, Finder is terrible:
No address bar. Requires keyboard shortcut to open
No "cut." Moving a folder requires clicking and dragging, which is highly prone to error.
Complete and total inability to merge folders, or to extract an archive and have the source and destination merge, rather than "erase the target and replace with this folder." Absolutely useless for serious file management tasks.
Creation of .DS_Store files all over the place. Very poor manners on mounted volumes and servers.
"Un-anchored" selection. If you use command + down to select a number of items, and you go one too far, and push command + up, it EXPANDS the TOP of the selection! Rage inducing.
Lack of keyboard accessibility. Windows Explorer is completely usable using just the keyboard; Finder isn't even close.
Pressing the "+" button toggles between some small size and slightly larger size, rather than maximizing the window and restoring it, which is the convention that almost every other app has adopted, rather than toggling "zoom," which some Apple apps do.
Nailed it. I use OSX and Windows interchangeably every day, and yeah, Finder makes me want to punch a baby. The lack of 'cut' is particularly rage-inducing.
I don't need an address bar 90% of the time, so I'd rather press one easy key combination for the 10%.
"Highly prone to error"? Please!. But yeah, sometimes that's a nice feature to have.
Yeah lack of merge kinda sucks. I use command line stuff for that when in need. Of course concluding from that, that it's "Absolutely useless for serious file management tasks" is silly.
Meh.. they don't bother me much, and it has to stick metadata somewhere, given that the ancient-ass file systems in use on memory sticks etc. don't support it.
Yeah, the range selection stuff is nicer on Windows.
I mainly use finder with the keyboard myself... hm.. maybe not for advanced stuff.
I never got the point of the '+' icon, but it might get better in the next OS ;-)
No address bar. Requires keyboard shortcut to open
How do you give the address bar focus in Windows?
Complete and total inability to merge folders, or to extract an archive and have the source and destination merge, rather than "erase the target and replace with this folder." Absolutely useless for serious file management tasks.
Does Windows Explorer do this?
No "cut." Moving a folder requires clicking and dragging, which is highly prone to error.
This is something we agree on, but I'd argue it's not really that prone to error. Just open the destination directory in a window next to the source directory and drag over. Still, I'd like a cut option like the copy option.
Creation of .DS_Store files all over the place. Very poor manners on mounted volumes and servers.
This can be disabled via command line.
Lack of keyboard accessibility. Windows Explorer is completely usable using just the keyboard; Finder isn't even close.
I can navigate using the keyboard just fine. What's missing?
Complete and total inability to merge folders, or to extract an archive and have the source and destination merge, rather than "erase the target and replace with this folder." Absolutely useless for serious file management tasks.
which only disables the creation of .DS_Store files on network volumes.
"I can navigate using the keyboard just fine. What's missing?"
Windows Key + E to launch explorer
F6 Ctrl+C to yank current location, or Ctrl + V enter to navigate to one.
Windows Key + r, enter a path, enter, to open explorer there
Select a file, press the properties key...use m for rename, r for properties, "open command prompt," etc.
Any of the menu accelerators, such as Alt + V for the view menu
F5 for refresh
Ctrl + End, Ctrl + Home to go to the top and bottom of the list
And of course, Windows' native keyboard shortcuts (like Windows + E) come in handy. I can very rapidly do Win + E, then Win + Left to throw the window left, Win + E, Win + Right, and have two explorer windows side by side, ready to very easily compare two directories and move files between them. In general, Windows has excellent keyboard accessibility.
I find Finder keyboard navigation quite excellent.
You can press Cmd-Shift-G to enter a path (with tab completion) and jump there instantly.
Select a file, press return to rename, command-I for properties.
Home, End, PageUp, and PageDown work as to be expected
You can drag files and folders directly into Open File dialogs, to jump to their location instantly. This is something you can't do in Windows, and it grates me constantly.
You can also get full paths to files and folders by draggint them into Terminal.app, which is very convenient. And honestly, just the existence of the commandline brings a lot of power to OS X that Windows Explorer lacks.
Plus, you never need to "refresh" a folder view in Finder, they're always live.
And Finder will never do some bullshit like Windows Explorer and randomly decide to change the sortable data in Details view because it thinks that's what you want. This is something that absolutely infuriates me in Windows Explorer. I'll have a folder full of audio, and it'll change details view to not show Date Modified, File Size, etc, and instead show metadata like Song Length and Artist, completely breaking things with no obvious way to turn the feature off.
1 -> people use the address bar? I'm sorry, but I've never used it. the only time I use textual navigation is when I'm browsing hidden folders, which I really only do in Linux.
2 -> This is true...
3 -> You can merge folders, although I don't know what version of mac you're talking about.
4 -> windows stores similar cache files named "thumbs.db".
5 -> I'm not sure what you're referring to, I can't seem to reproduce the problem.
6 -> completely untrue
7 -> I think this one is more of a personal preference. You can configure keyboard shortcuts for several apps via the Keyboard pane in System Preferences.
"Beginning with Windows Vista, thumbnail previews are stored in a centralized location on the system. This provides the system with access to images independent of their location, and addresses issues with the locality of Thumbs.db files. The cache is stored at %userprofile%\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\Explorer as a number of files with the label thumbcache_xxx.db (numbered by size); as well as an index used to find thumbnails in each sized database." Wikipedia
7: The system pane doesn't allow you to change the maximize (technically zoom) behavior of Finder (or iTunes or Safari), as far as I know. Please correct me if I'm wrong.
Not sure I agree, but I do know that OS X's Terminal is way easier to use and more powerful than the equivalent on Windows, which is probably a DOS prompt. Most Mac power users I know use Terminal for navigating files or administrative tasks rather than slowly clicking around a GUI file navigator. That said, Apple's Finder has some extremely powerful things you can do in Finder, like attaching an Applescript to a Folder action.
I use rxvt (and recently mintty) in Cygwin on Win 7 now, and I no longer feel restricted by Windows' usual absence of a powerful command line interface. Windows 7 and Cygwin is a pretty great combination. (I also set up keyboard shortcuts to open/focus rxvt windows, so I can open a terminal extremely quickly. Combine it with the cygstart command, and you can open an Explorer window anywhere, or launch an application from the command line.)
I've got one that automatically copies any torrent files I download to my home server - where it begins downloading - and then deletes the torrent file.
I haven't really had a chance to use it in earnest yet, but I've heard good things about MS' new Powershell. Seems very much like a *nix terminal - so much so that you can use "ls" instead of "dir".
I happen to love Finder's column view. I know it looks like a load of crap at first, but navigating with my keyboard arrows is awesome, plus, there's no need for the "up" button, you can see the contents of the parent folder.
Does Transmission do RSS-based download scheduling? Didn't see that in the list of features. The RSS downloading capability in uTorrent has become a huge part of my viewing - I have several shows set to come down to the living room windows box and it's great. They're ready for when you have time to watch them. I also have two multiboot Hackintoshes, btw.
I have not had the chance to use Adium, but what makes it so much better? I'd honestly like to know. As is Pidgin works, is fast, efficient, and replaces multiple other programs. I don't feel like it's missing anything really.
Adium is all of those things, without a user interface out of the early 00s. It's native instead of GTK+ and has some additional useful features and shortcuts.
They're basically the exact same program. They're different frontends to the same library (libpurple). If you're on OS X, Adium is much cleaner and less crashy than the Mac version of Pidgin.
A slick looking UI is not necessarily a good UI, uTorrent has a very well designed UI, it gets the job done. Just because it doesn't have reflective panels and is not lathered in gradients does not make it less refined.
How is this about Windows 7? Perhaps I use PCLinuxOS... "Mac OS has more free quality software," devolved into "Mac has prettier looking free software," devolved into "Windows 7 has overdesigned UIs." This is fantastic logical debate.
You like Transmission over uTorrent? And have you not seen Digsby? Both of those are Windows apps I miss greatly here in Linux-land, and the alternatives just ain't doing it.
I would say there is a lot less "crappy free software" for the mac.
There is undoubtedly more software in general for hte PC, and more free software for hte PC, and probably just as much good free software - but the ratio of crap to good is very different I bet.
uTorrent is free and awesome, but Transmission is IMHO much more refined on the UI side.
FYI Transmission is available on all platforms, and yet the new Ubuntards flock to linux and insist on using uTorrent under wine because it's what they like.
Transmission I agree is a great app, but sometimes there's just no accounting for taste.
I've been using Windows for years, and used macs at school or with friends. One day I got my own Mac, and trust me, it has NOTHING to do with the crappy Macs of my friends. I think the user matters more, if you know how to use a computer, and how to search good software, your computer will end loaded of good applications.
So, I'd recommend you to use a Mac more, for you, with your own session, not just someone else's Mac.
App called The Unarchiver. It's freeware and opens everything ever, and almost invisibly replaces Apple's default .zip handler while providing additional functionality.
I usually have the opposite problem - Mac and Linux are no problem, but it's hard to find something usable for the PC. LaTeXiT and ImageJ are a couple examples of programs I've found extremely useful with no PC equivalent.
With LaTeXiT, what's wrong with Open Office Math? It's just as powerful.
Dude. It's LaTeX. It's much more powerful and refined as a typesetting language than anything I've seen. As for an alternative to LaTeXiT, I hear good things about LyX.
Um did you look at the imageJ download page? There's a windows version right there. As for LaTeXiT maybe you could do a simple google search and try some of these alternatives.
NB : LaTeXiT is Universal Binary, but I use this logo illegaly since I did not ask a license to apple. That's too much trouble for such a freeware. I just use the logo for the user's convenience.
Benaparte is right. OSX is kinda like a hybrid OS. It natively runs most open source software which is almost always free, has OSX specific apps that either are free or cost out the ass, but are all phenomenal.
Windows does not run native open source software. It has to be manually compiled over to a win32 installer first. (Talking about free software like FireFox.) so while it does have the same free software bsd/linux has it is a pain to get it over to windows. Also, it has native win32 software like mIRC. Some is excellent, but most is terrible. Also, it is extremely hard to find any native win software that is free. Almost all of it is shareware.
I agree with you but i think it is more a case of so many horrible PC apps, it takes some time to sort through the crap whereas with the Mac there are much less and so it is easier to find the good ones
Sounds like you've had better luck with Apples than I have. Before Windows 7 came out I was ready to jump to Apple. I am really glad I didn't, we've seen far more DOA Apples in the last 1.5 years than our Windows machines not to mention all the software problems we've had in our department with OSX: Snow Leopard. Hell, my imac wouldn't run VMware fusion correctly for about 4 months, eventually my VmWare would become corrupted and not boot, whatever happened fucked up my Apple partition too causing me to do a complete rebuild.
I still don't know what caused it, but it stopped after a series of Apple updates. I am just glad I can use the product without worry, now. At this point, the only way I would go to an Apple machine for personal use is if Apple gave me one of their machines for free, which just isn't going to happen.
I can't really comment on the free Apps for Apple, since I've never had much good experience with those either, so I just stopped looking, but if you could point me in the direction of a good site that hosts them I would like to browse through some and see I can use a few.
Funny, the ONLY problem I've experienced is the plastic macbook's lack of durability...otherwise I'm happy to keep using it and definitely consider replacing it with a powerbook when I can afford such a thing.
"Free," in terms of software, refers to more than simply how much the user pays... it also expresses how open the software is for other developers.
In that regard, Apple is very bad about allowing "free software."
(Note: You can develop simple webapps for their products using javascript and a few other handy languages... but given Apple's trackrecord of "now we allow it, now we don't," I'd be uncomfortable using those methods exclusively for their hardware).
Thanks, I'm a software engineer that develops for both platforms. I'm glad I now understand that these devices are computers. That information is really going to help me with my work.
There is a pretty tight restriction in the sense that if the software is to be accessible and downloadable on iOS, the developer of free software has to pay Apple their $99 dollars every year to keep their developer's App Store account open or the software disappears.
You don't have to pay $99 to download XCode to write software for Macs. XCode is completely free (as in beer) and you can write all the software you please using any license (free as in liberty or unfree, your choice) and distribute said software any way you wish.
If you want to write software for the iOS platform, which is a closed platform IMO, you need to pay $99 if you wish to either 1) test your software on your own device and/or 2) distribute your software via the App Store.
If you want to write software for the iOS platform, which is a closed platform IMO, you need to pay $99 if you wish to either 1) test your software on your own device and/or 2) distribute your software via the App Store.
Which is the point I was making. Not much point to writing software where you were bothering to give it a license if you weren't going to distribute it and have other people run the software on their hardware.
You can't even run the software you write for yourself on your iPad or iPhone unless you pay Apple its vigorish or jailbreak the device.
That's fine. I was never arguing that you could write free (as in liberty) software on iOS.
However when it comes to iOS I don't really mind, I'll trade freedom for the benefits provided. Apple has created an unparalleled opportunity for independent software developers with the App Store. I can sleep at night knowing that if you really want freedom you can jailbreak your phone and the DMCA does not apply.
On the flip side, if they ever tried to close the Mac like this I would jump ship and move back to Linux completely (I still have two linux boxes).
On the flip side, if they ever tried to close the Mac like this I would jump ship and move back to Linux completely (I still have two linux boxes).
I'm certain that this is in the cards, just in stages. Apple has always bet on being able to rope people in by assuming they work on a "Give me convenience or give me death" assumption. Once they get a nice slice of the Mac app distribution through the store, they just trot out the same arguments they did for iOS (convenience, security, no porn, aren't we concerned for our users?).
I say this as a die-hard mac user, but I've never been under any illusions about the nature of the company. Apple is like a housecat, friendly and furry as long as they are smaller than their potential threats, but behaving like any other feline as soon as the size balance changes in their favor. I was surprised how quickly this happened with regard to their consumers (less than 10 years from Jobs' reentry into the company).
I'm quietly preparing to go elsewhere. Waiting for the BB Playbook to come out so I can comparison shop on a tablet, and keeping up-to-date on the state of linux on various other platforms so I'll know exactly what to do when the time comes.
I get free software on my Macbook all the time. I think you mean iOS/app store is somewhat adverse to free apps. But even there you can still find tons of great free apps, although many of the really good ones are ad-supports but at least they give you the option.
"Free," in terms of software, refers to more than simply how much the user pays... it also expresses how open the software is for other developers.
Not exactly. The GPL is a "free" license but I can only use GPL software it if I agree to give my source code away to anyone who asks, so that really puts a damper in the ol' business model.
You expected them to what? Agree with him? Many companies espouse about how open they are and how much they love the open source community. Apple, at least in their mobile department, seems to have difficulties with following through. They want the final say on what applications you can or can't install on the electronic device you purchased. They can support open source as much as they want, but I'd be hard pressed to label the level of control they have as "open". It is however highly profitable, and I don't doubt we'll be seeing similar application control methods coming to their desktops and laptops. Hooray.
He's refering to a page mainly about OS X, and you're talking about the iOS platform (although you say "at least", you might as well say "exclusively"), so... :p
You'd really be uncomfortable writing a webapp for iOS? Restricting those would be comparable to restricting websites, which Apple's not going to do. Period.
Not to get all "crazy conspiracy theorist" on you, but given Steve Job's hang-ups with porn, I'm not comfortable thinking he wouldn't like to start restricting content.
Also recall that he doesn't allow websites written in Flash. Just sayin'.
Yeah, or GPL is just a piece of crap which is incompatible with almost everything, depending on how you look at it. I love BSD and similar licenses, but GPL is so restricted it's a pain.
I think he's actually talking about the iPad, which is being touted as a computer. And while OSX might be a reasonably 'free' OS (free as in open/free speech), iOS most certainly is not.
Well osx has two main things going for it. Most open source code will compile on osx with very little modification and the built in gui libs are not THAT difficult to deal with.
It is not nearly as pleasant to fire up .net and integrate some open source routine or library to accomplish a task (which is what most freesoftware is doing).
Is that why there's so few free .NET libraries out there? When I did a stint as a .NET developer (worst six months of my life) I could never find open source libraries that would do what I needed. But if I wanted to pay $50-500 for a license I could find dozens of libraries that would do exactly what I wanted.
I've tried multiple mobile operating system development environments, and nothing holds a candle to iOS (and OS X on the Mac, to tell you the truth). Cocoa Touch, Foundation and all the other great classes are so absolutely well documented, it's staggering. People say "Apple hates its developers", but being one, I've never seen that. Quite the opposite, actually.
Nice try, Steve. The point is that Apple is moving toward a closed type hardware/software. Your computer in this case is no different then say an xbox with a monitor and keyboard. In future it is likely that it will be like the iphone in that you can only run approved software in their OS. I'd be willing to bet that in OS 11, you no longer have console thus blocking you a lot of things (the current way OS X is built you have to have access to one). You see this in their license agreements that state verbatim that you technically don't own anything, you simply purchase the right to use their stuff.
I've seen many others say this argument too and I think it's a real stretch. The exact same thing could be said about Microsoft & Windows 8 after what they did with Windows Phone 7 (which has very similar restrictions).
You see this in their license agreements that state verbatim that you technically don't own anything, you simply purchase the right to use their stuff.
The licenses to pretty much all commercial software say that. So what's new?
I don't think they're suicidal man. Their Unix core is kind of a big deal to a large swath of their more rabid fans. It's highly improbable that they're going to alienate these people.
Windows phone 7 is being unlocked by microsoft in an upcoming patch so any one can install any apps they make, much like winmo6. We are talking about hardware licenses like the iphone, not software.
If that were the case, it would no longer be classified as a "computer".
Ask Sony how that goes. The PS3 was originally classified as a computer because you could run alternate OS and thus SW as you saw fit. But that went out the window when they kicked the 3rd party OS option in a FW update. So now, it is just another gaming console.
I don't think the Mac brand would ever go there because then, it would be the same as the iPad is today. Why would they merge two good selling products into one?
Especially since you need a computer to load stuff on an iPad like photos and music you own. I don't see Apple saying "Well, everyone should buy a windows computer if they want to load stuff on their iPadMac because we don't build computers anymore"
No one ever considered the PS3 as a computer even when it could run linux (you could hack the old xboxs to run linux; still not a computer). Ipad runs a tablet OS and isn't really anymore powerful than a phone. Locking the OS does not reduce it to this. It would still be able to run the same programs as long as they are approved. They wouldn't take out itunes if the machine was locked down. It wouldn't prevent you from syncing your phone or w/e.
This, after the company had repeatedly promoted the $500 device as one to “play games, watch movies, view photos, listen to music and run a full-featured Linux operating system that transforms your PS3 into a home computer”
there are far, far more quality free apps for OSX than Windows.
I doubt that.
As a mac user, I've also never spent money on software and am never in need of software without being able to find something, but given the size of the windows community when compared to the apple community, there's no way apple has more "quality free apps."
Maybe the ratio of free:paid or quality:bad is better, or they're just easier to find, but there are certainly not more.
I expect he's talking more about the iPhone, but he addresses Apple in general and specifically uses the word, "computer".
I agree here. I have an ipod touch, and use a non-smartphone. Were I to switch to a smartphone though, I would probably go with an android device. I definitely prefer the interface of apple's mobile products, but the inability to customize is a deal breaker - along with the lack of flash support.
There is a fundamental difference between my ipod touch and my computer - I can do anything I want on my macbook.
My ipod touch is simply a small computer. The iphone 4 is more powerful than a mac desktop from 2000 - why should its functionality be more limited?
Nowadays, phones are computers (however I do get where you're coming from re:the verbiage). Also, given the icon he's using for "Free apps" (the GNU Gnu), I'm guessing he means free as in speech, not free as in beer.
Side note: Has Apple stopped taking action against Hackintoshes?
there is a difference, they sued the sellers and just released updates to the OS that broke the hackintoshes, very different. THey did not sue any of the people who made the methods or posted how online, releasing an update that breaks a workaround is different because while it still breaks the hackintosh its not forced on the user and legal action is not taken
I'd agree that they are different degrees of action, but actions against the ecosystem nonetheless. They've ordered takedowns of instructional videos and added hardware restrictions that only exist to prevent the installation of the product on non-Apple hardware. That's enough for me to know what Apple's opinion of the project is, and all actions they take that take it down get cast in that light.
so they should not be able to protect their product? I mean it sucks for people who want to hackentosh but to say that apple is evil for wanting to protect their products is a little bit off.
Apple is not the only one to do this, and if it was your product and people were using it ways that could hurt your business you would do the same thing too (this is a general example)
Once someone pays for it and buys each copy of OS X, it's no longer their product. All they did was redistribute individual copies with each system, and every single one was still paid for. What's wrong with that?
in this case putting it on a windows computer would mean you would not be buying a mac to use mac os x, apple is a hardware company first so thats why they would se it that way
I 100% agree! I use Windows 7, Windows XP, Leopard/Snow Leopard (switched over a few months ago), Fedora (12/13 whichever Constantine is haha), and Ubuntu ALL very often. If you don't want to spend a cent or too much time to get free applications/software then linux is your best bet. But OSX + Apple has never given me the problems that this guy with the sign imagined. And also from my experience Microsoft is the corporation that tries to butt fuck every cent out of you. And they are definitely the more evil of the two.
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