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Thank the Cheese: That's exactly what just about everyone (Mac and PC users alike) said about OS X. Ironically, I recall being one of the few people who thought Aqua was a good thing shortly after it was first unveiled. (I changed my mind after using it, and that awful first impression has never really worn off.)
Look at 10.0 again, and tell me it's not hideous. Use it for a while, and tell me it's not clunky. Is Vista really any worse?
There's another important trend in Apple's design: they're moving away from the standard building-block elements — the push buttons, menus, scroll bars, etc. — that are available to every program. These elements have been the defining characteristic of the Mac since its inception, but Apple has been abandoning them in their apps in favor of completely customized UIs for each particular task. A few examples:
- Front Row. Lots of fancy effects with no standard, reusable objects.
- Time Machine. Same as Front Row, although at least it uses images of standard windows. (Of course I could be wrong, since I haven't actually used Time Machine.)
- iTunes. Each version introduces more unique interfaces, such as Cover Flow. iTunes 7 even creates its own scroll bars.
- Dashboard. This is arguably the biggest. Dashboard widgets don't even have a standard toolbox of buttons and whatnot. Every Dashboard programmer is expected to "roll their own" look-and-feel.
So in a sense, Apple is already moving into the next era of the GUI — an era where consistency gives way to specialization (ideally) or senseless glitz (...probably). This scares me a little. You need only look at today's Dashboard experience to see why: most third-party Dashboard widgets look and feel like garbage. OS X makes it easy for even small developers to create professional-looking (and -acting) apps. This is not the case with Dashboard widgets, and it will not be the case with desktop apps either if Apple keeps moving in this direction.
Is that a price Apple is willing to pay for the undeniable "wow" factor of first-party apps? More importantly, is it a price users are willing to pay?
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