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Things we've always liked about windows yet never admitted it
- Thread starter nxent
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I Don t miss much now, but i remember i once really missed windows hen i wanted to have restricted access to a folder, like just ask for a password to open the folder, but noooooooooo,, mac os x had to make it very complicated, and the best thing i was told i could do was to make a different hd partition or something like it? that i did not like at alllll, but that is the only thing i can possibly think of.
well for me the ablity to cut and paste files, folder ect. Also the same way with coping. I find it annoying that one can not do that with keyboard commands on the mac.
that you could change sounds with ease (like error sounds)
that when a network drive becomes unavailable during a file copy your system wouldn't crash. (what a dumb thing that is. come on mac, get with it!)
file paths. where the frack is it?
and being able to frequently swear at my computer for malfunction. sometimes that was fun.
that when a network drive becomes unavailable during a file copy your system wouldn't crash. (what a dumb thing that is. come on mac, get with it!)
file paths. where the frack is it?
and being able to frequently swear at my computer for malfunction. sometimes that was fun.
Oh really? Okay, good.
Phew...
If you are referring to schubert's plugin, then it won't work on an intel mac...it only works for PPC machines. PDF support for Safari is fine, it's just Firefox. But the problem with Safari is that there isn't any mouse gestures.
I don't know why, but this made me laugh out loud.
I was going to say that I miss Minesweeper, because it was necessary to wasting time at work. Then I started to think about how I waste time since I got my iBook, and I realize that I spend the time reading Macrumors. I'd much rather spend time here than playing silly games, so I guess I don't really miss anything about windows.
How Windows handles unresponsive disks. I assume it ended up this way because you could eject floppies without interaction from early on, but if a disk stops responding (say, disconnected network mount), Windows generally handles it as gracefully as can be expected. Not always, but generally.
OSX theoretically can do this with network mounts, but in practice it seems to flat-out stall more often than not, and if a non-network volume flakes out but isn't completely disconnected, it usually locks up the entire machine in my experience. This has to do with pretty low-level OS assumptions, but I do wish OSX handled things a little more like Windows in this department.
Windows is also easier to add automatic network mounts, which is nice.
I would say that I like the way that Windows (XP, anyway), handles some printer drivers, going so far as to show an image of the printer with the installed options on it. Except in PRACTICE, the Windows print subsystem has probably caused me more trouble than anything on it when it comes to my office network--I'm constantly getting printers that can't be deleted, ones that stop working for no apparent reason, and such. The MacOS interface may be simpler, but it also works 99% of the time.
ACLs on Windows Server were a nice feature, but Tiger Server can do that now.
That's really all I can think of though--pretty sad.
OSX theoretically can do this with network mounts, but in practice it seems to flat-out stall more often than not, and if a non-network volume flakes out but isn't completely disconnected, it usually locks up the entire machine in my experience. This has to do with pretty low-level OS assumptions, but I do wish OSX handled things a little more like Windows in this department.
Windows is also easier to add automatic network mounts, which is nice.
I would say that I like the way that Windows (XP, anyway), handles some printer drivers, going so far as to show an image of the printer with the installed options on it. Except in PRACTICE, the Windows print subsystem has probably caused me more trouble than anything on it when it comes to my office network--I'm constantly getting printers that can't be deleted, ones that stop working for no apparent reason, and such. The MacOS interface may be simpler, but it also works 99% of the time.
ACLs on Windows Server were a nice feature, but Tiger Server can do that now.
That's really all I can think of though--pretty sad.
It does sometimes, but if you hit a letter for the wrong menu you can't easily get back. For example you hit 'H' for Help but hit it twice, so it highlights History. I'd expect to hit 'H' again to go back to Help but that doesn't work.
No, I am being fair. You're right that you can do it quicker than the two methods I used in the example, but it was just an example.
The method you suggest works, but isn't intuitive and doesn't work the same in all menus. For example the Bookmarks menu has three options that all start with 'A', so how would I know how to get to the one I want?
On this one issue MS Windows is simply better, simpler, more user-friendly. It's like computing for 'the rest of us'.
Most annoying is that I can't believe it would be hard for Apple to implement it in MacOS, so why don't they??
It does sometimes, but if you hit a letter for the wrong menu you can't easily get back. For example you hit 'H' for Help but hit it twice, so it highlights History. I'd expect to hit 'H' again to go back to Help but that doesn't work.
Hit ctrl-f2 again to go back.
Generally, if you hit a menu with two items starting with "A" (for example, Accounts and Appearances), you'd type "A" for the first A item in the menu. If you want Appearances, then just type "ap" and it'll get to Appearance.
However, for menus that have two similar things with differences only appearing at the end (like the bookmarks menu with "Add Bookmark" and "Add Bookmark Folder", you'd have to type "Add Bookmark F" to get to the second item. Which would suck. But then again, it's just one arrow key down, so just use the key. You do have a brain don't you? You can figure those things out
Obviously I can figure these things out, but the point is: Why should I have to?...You do have a brain don't you? You can figure those things out
Apple always claimed to be a simpler, more intuitive, user friendly interface, but navigating around the menus is none of those things compared to MS Windows.
In MS Windows I can hit any(never found one I couldn't) menu item from the keyboard, I don't have to figure it out or remember specific key combos(the MacOS key combos aren't even the same on the different hardware from Apple itself) or shortcuts, just the one concept "Alt, then the underscored option"
EDIT: Oh and incidentally:
That doesn't work. The first four options in that menu are:
- Show All Bookmarks
- Add Bookmark
- Add Bookmark For These Tabs
- Add Bookmark Folder
then do as you suggest and type 'D' and it highlights 'Show All Bookmarks' and if you carry on and try to type the whole phrase with a space you select whichever (random) option is highlighted at the time.
I would think that Windows had it first. Coming from a CLI like MS-DOS, MIcrosoft would have tried to make keyboard entry really friendly for all the hard-core DOS users.this can also b done in osx!!! its reallly handy. wonder hu stole it off whom
Apple, having always had a GUI, and having the luxury of knowing the hardware, could assume a mouse was always there and therefore made a weaker implementation of keyboard access to a menu, because for most the keyboard is not an ideal way to access a graphical menu.
mpw probably likes the Windows method more because in Windows, aiming at a floating menu in a window without the top edge to stop the mouse is harder than pressing a few extra keys on the keyboard in Windows. He probably just carried his preference over to Mac OS.
For me, I don't miss it because Windows had too many ways of doing shortcuts that were inconsistent with each other so it was faster for me to use the mouse and ignore shortcuts when I started with Windows.
Maybe that's why Apple implemented it that way, but I doubt it, but the reason I like it is because it makes me more productive when using non-graphic software like word processing and spreadsheets etc.
It's simply better.
I miss this feature too but rarely used it. The feature i missed the most is being able to use a key to choose an answer when a dialog box popped up (in EVERY dialog box).
Y for yes, n for no
or
A for accept, C for cancel or whatever the dialog box threw up.
In OSX i have to specifically turn on full keyboard control and then all i can do is tab between the choices. Much simpler me thinks to just press n!
This one bugs me too, renaming files is much lower on my priority list when accessing a file than actually executing it.
Lastly i miss windows explorer and how easy it was to move files around in windows with it.
Also one thing i really really miss is how windows handles moving folders. I learnt this to my dismay one day on OSX! Basically if you move a folder to another hard drive and their is some error half way through. Then half the contents are in the new location and half in the original location. Now in windows if you grab the folder again and try copying again it will copy the remaining files into the folder. In OSX, for some stupid reason, deletes the files that were already copied over and then moves the un-copied files.
ARGH! I lost half my itunes library because of this retarded behavior...
Even Apple's own iTunes for Windows is guilty, for example there's a File menu where the control icon should be, so I have to go to File > Quit to get out of it instead of just double-clicking in the top-left corner.
Anchored multiple selections with the keyboard.
In most OS X apps, having to start my selection again because I've gone one item too many is really frustrating.
Discussion about it here -
http://daringfireball.net/2006/08/highly_selective
In most OS X apps, having to start my selection again because I've gone one item too many is really frustrating.
Discussion about it here -
http://daringfireball.net/2006/08/highly_selective
Could always just click the X on the top-right hand corner.
Now that's something i forgot about. I must have blocked it out of my mind because it is so annoying. This is one of the main reasons I still use windows and explorer for my main desktop, because i have so many files.
