Thoughts on the new iDisk icon

July 16, 2008 by Dr. Macenstein · 17 Comments
Filed under: Leopard, Opinion, design 

Faithful Macenstein reader Kyle writes:

“WTF is up with the new iDisk icon!? I get it, “cloud computing”. But seriously, why purple? What was wrong with the blue globe? I guess this got snuck in with the MobileMe 1.1 update.”

Nice point, Kyle. Now I have a question for YOU. WTF is up with using the Apple “stones” desktop background? You don’t find that distracting?
:)
-The Doc

Windows 7: The Search for Dock

Based on these concept pics, the “future” of Windows looks remarkably like the “present” of OS X

Speaking of stealing… Is it just me, or are these shots of the upcoming Windows 7 looking a little too similar to OS X?

I can’t wait to see what Microsoft decides to call that transparent Dock-looking thing. Given that they call OS X’s Widgets “gadgets”, I’m going to assume it will be called the “Spock”.

[images via techdreams]

Apple begins 10.5.4 speculation by releasing 10.5.3

May 28, 2008 by Dr. Macenstein · 5 Comments
Filed under: Apple Fanboyism, Leopard, OS X, Software, Updates 

Apple today released the highly rumored 10.5.3 update for Mac OS X Leopard, which means we can now begin looking for hints of a 10.5.4 update.

According to Apple, 10.5.3 includes a laundry list of fixes, far too lengthy and boring for me to bother copying and pasting. If you care, you can read about them here. I for one pretty much just install these things without questioning why, and have only been burned twice (Damn you QuickTime!), but until an OS update ruins my system, I will just keep on hitting “Install 1 item”, and trusting the almighty Cupertino.

Video: Multi-touch Mac OS X - Great. Now I need to save for a 150-inch monitor

I will definitely not argue that this video isn’t cool, it is. Yet I have always been somewhat underwhelmed by the real world application of a fully mutli-touch computer interface. It seems to me you need a giant screen, small fingers, and a borderline made-up reason for why you need to zoom in and out of things with two hands. More often than not, the demos come across as technology without a purpose. Usually there is an example of some crazy genetic DNA data, and we are shown how you can zoom in, twist and rotate little molecules and such, and it all looks overly complicated. Likely the data presented in an Excel table would be more useful to scientists, but you only need 1 hand and a mouse for Excel, so it isn’t cool.

Seeing this lux demo with its oversized icons, weird “finger painting glow trails”, and messily spread out, unorganized photos strewn across the screen has done nothing to convince me I want to work this way, but yes, it looks damn cool.

Warning! This song WILL get stuck in your head

May 11, 2008 by Dr. Macenstein · 16 Comments
Filed under: Apple Fanboyism, Awesomeness, Leopard, video 

Ah HA! See?! All of you who pissed on our giving away a copy of Office 2008, look how creative you can be with Word if only you put your mind to it!

This video for “Again & Again” by the Bird & the Bee was made by filmmaker Dennis Liu using only the Leopard interface and Mac OS X applications – and as a sometimes editor, I find this to be a very impressive display of some insane editorial skills.
Thanks to faithful Macenstein reader TheCos for sending this in [via TUAW].

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