General
EXPOSE - DESKTOP IS NOT A 'WINDOW': You cannot use the 'show all windows' feature of Exposé' to get to the background. You still have to click on it if you can see it or use command-tab. Would be nice!
OS X LOOSES TYPE, CREATOR & COMMENT DURING FILE TRANSFER FROM OS 9: "OS X loses type, creator, comment on file transfer During a file transfer (using Connect to Server in the Finder) OS X messes up the file type/creator and loses comments. There are some of us who have been using comments in our files for a long time--moving over to OS X will be a real surprise for some of us if this bug isn't fixed." Submitted by Bruce Horn.
NO WINDOWS EMULATOR INTEGRATION: How hard could it be for Apple to license Virtual PC or some other Windows emulator and have it as a build-to-order option and integrate it (almost) as well as how Classic Mac has been integrated? Could help many migrate...
PREFERENCES LAYOUT: The earliest Macs had a great way of getting around in their preferences, they had a simple menu on the left and showed the specific preference on the right. In MacOS X you click on a preference type, wait a while for it to fill the whole screen and then you have to go back to the list to choose another, unless you want one of the few which has a special place on top of the screen.
COMMAND-TABBING MADNESS: It's real nice to be able to hold down the command key and jump from one open program to another, but it is really hard to see how far a click will take you. Let me explain: You press and hold down the command key and then click/press the tab button repeatedly to move around the open applications on the Dock. Problem is it's hard to see which ones are running so it's easy to over click. So why not just, when command-tabbing, all the items in the Dock which cannot be command-tabbed, be grayed out? That would help. I think. Fitts law anyone?
PREFS LOST WHEN OUT OF SPACE: This must be the single biggest blunder. When I run out of hard disk space, (which is not often on my 60GB drive, but then I do edit a lot of video) I loose all my system related preferences, including all account information for Mail! Why is this? Why are these preferences not saved securely on the disk?
INCOMPLETE WINDOW REFRESH: Windows can take along time to update. If I save a document into my large web site folder, it will not be listed as having been updated. Why is this a big deal? If I am in my HTML editor and change a lot of files and jump around change some more (ie. not opening the files individually) then when I get to the FTP stage and try to upload my files, I will not know which ones have been changed during that session. Annoying! update: improved in 10.3
GENERAL/MAC NETWORKING: NOT Mac like and easy! Just a mess. The advanced networking features are great, but simple file sharing between two machines and file sharing on a small network is not very easy. You CANNOT share your whole drive. It's all UNIX now with special securities, directories and such. update: slightly improved in 10.2
WINDOWS NETWORKING: "The ability to connect to NT domains
or shared drives. Having to type in the SMB URL to mount the
drives needs to be automated. I did not know what SMB:// even
was as a URL, because I never had to deal with it ? Networking
browsing is desperately needed. I'll bet I can automate the disk
mounting in an AppleScript or startup script, but it needs to
be easier. Will this new IP Discovery??? thing in Jaguar may
make a difference. We shall see". Submitted by Chuck Mcginley.
update: fixed in 10.2
FONT BOX FOLLIES: The Font Book sure is neat. But you cannot control-click on a font character (glyph) and get options to copy it etc. Not useful if you want to add a special character to a document.
INCOMPLETE INTEGRATION BETWEEN UNIX CORE & AQUA: Aqua folders and permissions are not an exact map onto the UNIX core. This can be experienced with MySQL where it can deny access to the system due to lack of privileges.
The same goes for using Aqua applications form the command line. You cannot directly call, say BBEdit from command to use it instead of Emacs for example.
GENERAL INTERFACE: To large and fuzzy. Makes a 1024*768 screen look like its closer to 640*480. Reader Adrian Thomas MM Editor (Automatic Television) comments: Useful fix: "Well, I thought so too at first until it dawned on me what Apple had done. Set your desktop to 1024x768, set you font size to 12, then change your desktop to 1600x1200. Text is still 12pt right? So you can still read it., but it looks WAY sharper and there IS more detail. This is one of the best aspects of OSX for me - finally we can have ultra detailed displays without microscopic type. Lesson here is ramp up your desktop res as high as your monitor will comfortably go - don't forget icon size is slider adjustable, as is the dock - so there's no reason not too!" What can we say, good point. Maybe Apple should ship it with that setting as default? Especially for us poor(?!) PowerBook users who cannot change to a larger rez.
OFTWARE INSTALLS: It is far from obvious that the user needs to click the little lock icon and enter their password to get past the 'Admin password needed to install software' warning. update: fixed in 10.2 - now the user is prompted to enter root password S
ALIAS CONFUSION: Aliases in MacOS X are indicated by a little arrow and nothing else. This could be a bit scary when deleting files, especially when deleting a bunch of aliases and a 'real' file is included by mistake. Maybe an alert should come up when you try to delete (command-delete or drag to the trash) a 'real' document while at the same time?
The document icon on the left is an alias. Delete it and you only loose a reference to the document. The one on the right is an actual document. Delete it and you've lost all its information:
Alias and actual document
THE OPEN/SAVE DIALOGS: They open into the new Column View by default. Try to find your hard drive to save a document in. In other words, the top most level in the folder hierarchy. It's real hard. Instead you are directed to UNIX style 'Home' folders for the current user and a 'Desktop' which doesn't show what's on the desktop. Nonsense Apple! What could be more basic and frequent a task than opening and saving documents? Make it a priority to make it real smooth and easy to do from within an application. Useful fix: See the horizontal scroll bar at the bottom of the screen? Move it to the left and there you go, the magical top level, your hard drive now available! How un-intuitive is that?...
MacOS
X Windows
SELCTION NARROWNEWSS: When you select items in a folder, the selection bar does not extend all the way acrosss the folder so it can be difficult to see whcih items are what size etc.
Current window selection and the proposed full bar.
WINDOW BUTTON NONSENSE: OK, in the screen shot below, what do the top left three buttons do? Which one minimizes the window, which one closes it and which one enlarges it? Tough one huh?
The strange window header controls
When you point to them they become colorful and sport 'X', '-' and '+' which is not much more useful.
For years and years the Mac has intelligently used the top left and the top right of the window for window controls, making it easier for the user to associate different functions with different places and not have to memorize three arbitrary buttons which are so close as to be confusing. BTW, yes the Mac has also used the lower right corner for re-sizing, but it still does so that's why I'm not arguing over that point here.
One solution is to simply consider us keyboard-shortcut freaks and give us a shortcut for the + button. Doing this AND adding a preference for power-users to remove all that top-of-the-window clutter and have no buttons, now that would be nice :-)
CLOSE A FOLDER AND IT'S NOT SELECTED: With MacOS 9 when you close a window, the folder is selected. Not in OS X. This means that closing a CD window does not also select the CD for an easy command-e eject.
WINDOWS NOT BEING PART OF THE DESKTOP MADNESS: All kinds of windows madness. You know when you are in an application and click on the desktop (Finder) and expect any Finder windows to come to the front (they were probably the reason you clicked on the desktop to begin with)? Well, they don't. They behave like independent little things. You have to hunt from them as they will still be behind any open application's windows!
UGLY RESIZE-BOX: OK,this is nit-picking but I couldn't help it... The little re-size box in the lower right hand side of windows doesn't seem really well thought out. How about a more subtle one which actually keeps the drop shadow?
Maybe not the biggest deal in the world, but we do spend a lot of time looking at those little windows.
| The current/original lower-right re-size box: |  |
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| A proposed re-design: |  |
And with a scroll bar: |  |
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ODD RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN WINDOWS AND WINDOW OPTIONS: The cool (and useful) interface feature where 'Save' confirmation and such scroll down from the window they are referring to is great. The drawers which come out on the side of Apple's email program is also nice and elegant.
So why not have this kind of relationship with the window 'View Options' window? The way it works in MacOS 9 is you wither select a window and hit 'Command'-J or select 'View Options' (or is it Window Options?) from the menu. And up pops a window which you can set your preferences for how the window should behave. When you are done you can hit 'Command'-W and that 'View Options' window will close.
In MacOS X it works the same way, except this 'View Options' window is not really a window in that once you have made your settings (which really should be 'This Window Only' not' Global' by default) and you hit 'Command'-W you do not close the 'View Options' window, you will close your window! Kinda silly.
So here is an alternative, make it a drawer and have 'Command'-W close it (or you can use that little triangle).
Window with options
You can click on the screen-shot for a full size image.
MacOS
X Dock
BADLY DESIGNED DOCK: That Dock is a bit of a disaster zone, as discussed all over the net, including http://www.asktog.com/ - Top10 Reasons The Dock Sucks.
One main point: there is not obvious difference between open apps and docked apps. Is that icon in the dock there put there because the application it points to is up and running or because it's placed there for easy access later? Those tiny triangles don't help.
Also, you cannot drag a folder into the Dock anywhere you like, it has to go to the same side of the divider as the trash can is on.
And having the trash in the Dock just makes no sense. With the wave-effect, it makes it a moving target. Strange. Head over to http://www.obfusco.com/misc.html for more on this and other issues.
From Death Of An Icon on www.liquid.org: "How organized do you think you'd be if you put a hundred documents and other stuff like CDs, boxes and a dustbin in one large pile on your desk? Probably not a whole lot, though it might make you feel like you're back in college. So you organize things and expect certain things to be in certain places not all in one big lump. Then why does Apple think this would be such a great thing on the computer screen, lumping tons of little pictures together all on the bottom of the screen like that?"
The infamous Dock. What's an application, what's a document, what's a command? What application is running?
Suggestion: OVER-CLUTTERED DOCK : MULTI DOCK! OK, instead of arguing forever about how to get rid of the Dock, since it is a nice concept in some ways... How about just extending the concept even further?
How about allowing the user to have more than one Dock running at the same time? One for applications maybe, like the one on the bottom here, and one for documents and folders, like the one on the right shown here?
And how about allowing the option of an intermediary step between auto-hiding and always shown, where the Dock is faded when not mouse-overed?
I would also like to see an option to have to hold a command key modifier to make the hidden or faded Dock active, especially when working in Photoshop or some other application where I really want to be able to whiz around with the cursor arrow with out things popping out on the sides. Just an optional extra OK, not a suggestion for the default :-) Or even to have to click onto the Finder before the Dock will light up. Just give us options baby.
Additionally, it would be nice to remove the trash can for those of us who know how to 'command'-delete items and think it's just an odd place for a trash can. After all, we can choose to not have the hard drive show in the Finder today, a step away from traditional Mac use I am about to take, but not quite yet...
Mr. Multi-Dock
Suggestion: LONG-DRAGS : DOCK FAVORITES I am not a great advocate of 'Favourites', but why not add them ot the Dock? The user can then quickly open frequently used documents quickly. It's the same as having them inthe 'Last Used Documents' menu many apps have and any propperly associated document just needs a double click (Web files often change type, from Pagemill to Explorer fx). The Dock is the natural place to go to open an appl, hy not leave a few documents around the apps for users convenience?
MacOS
X Icons
NON-COMMUNICATIVE ICONS: The icons are bigger in MacOS X than in MacOS 9 and earlier but don't give more real information.
They icons need to be glanceable and to provide a better better overview & transparency.
Here's one large example from Death Of An Icon on how they fail in MacOS X. BTW, let's make one thing clear; the icon on the left is better looking. I don't think Apple should go back to OS 9 style icons. I am just making the point that icons can communicate more meaning than they do in OS X:
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NO PREVIEW OF IMAGES: The new Quartz graphics layer on MacOS X is real nice. So how come images documents don't have a preview of their image in their icons? Strange. Even Windows XP can manage automatic preview icons.
update: fixed in 10.2 But in the worst possible way. Instead of scanning and creating preview icons once and leaving them with new icons, OS X re-builds every icon every time the folder with images are opened. Duh!
Image previews. Imagine.
And as recommended previously on www.liquid.org, it is very useful to frame the preview to show what kind of data it is. I this example we have a still picture on the left (indicated by a picture frame and a small Photoshop icon) and a movie right (sprockets and Premiere icon):
Still picture and video icons
CUSTOMIZED ICON OR FOLDER ICON - NO CUSTOMIZED FOLDER ICON: The folders are all the same, no matter what's inside them which makes it real difficult to see the difference between folders in the Dock. You need to point to them.
If you add your own icon they no loner look like folders, as shown below, right. They look like whatever icon you pasted into their 'Get Info' box.
The alternative is to allow users to add their own custom icons in the same way they do now, but have those icons show up inside a folder icon, as shown on the left:
