# Longhorn Release Date...woot.



## Stridder44 (Sep 24, 2003)

Go here to see what I mean. Now tell me, are they really gonna call it Longhorn!? Windows Longhorn!? Is it just me or does that not roll off my tounge?


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## Arden (Sep 25, 2003)

So they'll release it when it's half-baked instead of still doughy.

I think Longhorn is the codename, like Jaguar or Panther.  Who knows if they'll keep it as part of the name like Apple's doing.


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## fryke (Sep 25, 2003)

Well, in 2005, we'll be talking about 10.5 if everything OS X continues as expected. Quite surely, even 10.4 will be quite a tough competitor, as even Panther looks to me like a clear winner.

But Longhorn isn't the only thing Microsoft. I'm pretty sure that Microsoft will release some pretty service packs for XP until then.


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## UNIX X11 (Sep 25, 2003)

It's Microsoft Longhorn. Not Microsoft Windows Longhorn... altho there are still flapping windows in Longhorn... hmm...
I heard Longhor is just gonna be a service pack... I'm wrong, right? Heh.


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## Jason (Sep 26, 2003)

IIRC the flapping windows are more a technology demo than anything else, no?

I'm still surprised that MS isnt releasing its next OS until 2006... they must have something planned for XP... or otherwise its just a stupid move and they are going to be a bit behind if Apple keeps up with the OSX improvements


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## Sogni (Sep 26, 2003)

2005???
Wow, I'm suprised M$ can keep that train of thought for THAT long as I thought everyone working at M$ suffered from a very bad case of ADD or worse! 

Can you just imagine how much better Mac OS will be by then? Surely surpassing whatever they come out with by then!


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## gwynarion (Sep 26, 2003)

Mac OS X came of age in 2001 and Windows is catching up in 2005 -- sounds about right.


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## Arden (Sep 26, 2003)

What, it's not even going to be called Windows anymore?  Geez, set up a standard for once in our lifetimes, Microsoft!

They are working on a 64-bit version of XP to compete with Panther, so I presume we'll see that at some point before Longhorn's release.  Yeah, I know, big whoop.


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## Ripcord (Sep 26, 2003)

> _Originally posted by arden _
> *What, it's not even going to be called Windows anymore?  *


*

Who said that?  People here have clearly said that Longhorn is a codename.  Every recent version of Windows has had one.  OS X, of all things, has had codenames as well (believe it or not!)




Geez, set up a standard for once in our lifetimes, Microsoft!

Click to expand...


Please tell me you have a better gripe with them than what the consistency of their product naming.




			They are working on a 64-bit version of XP to compete with Panther, so I presume we'll see that at some point before Longhorn's release.  Yeah, I know, big whoop.
		
Click to expand...


The fact that they're building a 64-bit version of XP has nothing to do with Panther - Panther is barely even a 64-bit OS itself (which Apple has said repeatedly)

Longhorn, on the other hand, could be considered more of an OS X competitor, attempting to steal some of the technology ideas from Apple and one-up them.  Some of the materials released so far, if they in any way reflect what Longhorn will look like, may actually provide some real competition to OS X from a usability and "digital hub" standpoint, and surpass it in several areas.  I would, however, love to see OS X blow past anything that Microsoft is trying to build in the 2-3 years' lead time that Apple has...*


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## MisterK (Sep 26, 2003)

NOt only does Windows Longhorn not roll off my tounge, It also sounds a bit.. well dirty, I dont wanna sound like an oversexed teenager but I mean LongHorn??  Thats just asking for bad jokes.


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## fryke (Sep 26, 2003)

... and quite surely, Steve Jobs himself did one. He showed both a panther and a longhorn and asked which one looked better. ... And also mentioned that Panther would arrive at the end of this year.


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## Zardoz (Sep 26, 2003)

Lognhorn is pretty naff really. Especially considering that M$ can't design UI(s) to save their lives. All that blue! To much of any saturated colour like that is a no, no. After staring at that for a few hours it will send your vision orange!


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## Ripcord (Sep 26, 2003)

> _Originally posted by Zardoz _
> *All that blue! *



And when 785,000 of the 786,432 pixels on my screen are _dull grey_, it's that much better?

(Though I'll agree, the guys that built the XP default theme appear to be colorblind, whereas Apple appears to at least had a real design team on Panther, even if I don't agree with their choices =)


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## Arden (Sep 28, 2003)

Ripcord:

1) I was just going off of what Cow (a.k.a. UNIX X11, that's what I call him since I don't want to call him UNIX and I can't call him Hacker anymore, and he moos all the time) said: "It's Microsoft Longhorn. Not Microsoft Windows Longhorn..."  I don't know how much basis this has, though.  (Yeah, I know OS X has codenames: Cheetah, Puma, Jaguar, and Panther.)

2) I actually do, that was just about the previous sentence.  I have quite a few better gripes.

3) Okay, so it's not really to compete with Panther (though it is, since it's Windows), it's to function on 64-bit AMD architectures.  It's still an intermediate step between the original XP release and Shofar (a shofar is a long horn that makes a loud noise).

In your last post, are you referring to the brushed metal theme?  Because that really needs to go...


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## rubicon (Oct 5, 2003)

I'm a recent convert to OSX from Windows XP.  Rather, a own a nice TiBook for mobile use and an XP desktop.

After a few months of using OSX and the PowerBook I can see why the Mac "just works better".  The user interface is friendlier and smarter.  Icons are easy to see - you need to squint to see the taskbar icons in XP.  The Dock's ability to hide apps is far and away better than XP's grouping of application windows.

Microsoft has been taking such a hammering in the security dept. that it's no surprise they're sitting on Longhorn until 2005.  I think they're also trying to figure out a way to make all the embedded Internet-to-OS-to-Office crap work properly.

By the time Microsoft gets Longhorn out the door, Apple will already be ahead of the game with 10.5 or whatever.

At the end of the day, OSX and my PowerBook just works - no fussing with it.  And there isn't 18 different ways to do the same thing like in Windows and Office.  Hell, no wonder the system requirements keep going up.

I can just imagine the marketing department talking about new ways to "enhance" Office:

"Yeah, I think we need another way to Bold text.  Right now we can use the B icon, right click the selected text and choose Format, use the drop down menu, or use the Style Sheet editor."

The group stops and looks around, silently wondering if any of them use anything except the B icon to bold text.  The speaker continues...

"Now I think we need to have a taskbar icon as a shortcut to bolding text.  We'll put it in the collapsable system tray with the 50 other icons that Dell and IBM users already have."


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## Stridder44 (Oct 5, 2003)

lol, this is so true. That lousy system tray has 50+ items in it, I always shut down as many as possible.


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## celeborn (Oct 5, 2003)

I hear the next version of Windows will have a database-based filesystem instead of the familiar files-inside-folders we've grown use to. If this is true, it is certainly something to look forward to, whether it is Microsoft doing it or not. If you don't get what I mean, here's an explanation: the current way we browse files was really designed for floppydisks with just a few folders and files, not for the current tens of thousands of files we have on our huge hard disks. A database approach would mean that files have certain attributes, and one file can be viewed in many different contexts. Why Apple hasn't done anything like this is a mystery - I believe something like it was included in the scrapped Copland project. Implementing it in OS X wouldn't even be a big jump in current UI ideas - consider having something like the iTunes browsing window in the Finder...


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## hulkaros (Oct 6, 2003)

LongHorn will still be using NTFS and not a new file system... They will just add a service on top of it which will offer database like functions for folders/files. So, nothing new there actually... Only Marketing hype! 

As for Apple, they already have a powerful search in Panther (the iTunes browsing window you said is already in place for the release of Panther... Finder acts pretty much like the iApps ) and who knows what Apple will offer us by the time LongHorn will come? Surely something better!


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## celeborn (Oct 6, 2003)

> _Originally posted by hulkaros _
> *LongHorn will still be using NTFS and not a new file system... They will just add a service on top of it which will offer database like functions for folders/files. So, nothing new there actually... Only Marketing hype! *



Whether it is a service or an actual new filesystem doesn't change the fact that it is new, and by the sound of it anyway, an extremely good idea. 



> *As for Apple, they already have a powerful search in Panther (the iTunes browsing window you said is already in place for the release of Panther... Finder acts pretty much like the iApps ) *



I don't think you quite understood me - the new Finder does _look_ like iTunes, yes. What I meant was that just like you can browse your music library by genre or artist you would be able to assign files multiple catogories such as "work", "school project" etc. and browse your files according to this criteria. I think the idea Apple had in Copland was something like dynamic folders - one could do a search and save the result as a continually updating folder. This way any one file could be visible in many folders at once.

BTW, is it possible to do live searches (à la iTunes/Mail) in (the Panther) Finder yet? 



> *and who knows what Apple will offer us by the time LongHorn will come? Surely something better!  *



I certainly and sincerely hope so, but bashing good ideas just because it's MS doing it doesn't benefit anyone.


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## Ripcord (Oct 6, 2003)

> _Originally posted by celeborn _
> *BTW, is it possible to do live searches (à la iTunes/Mail) in (the Panther) Finder yet?
> *



Yes, which is both good and bad (mostly bad, in my opinion, though I may start changing my opinion since they seem to have fixed/improved it quite a bit in the recent builds).

This appears to be the ONLY way that the find box in the finder window works, though you CAN perform a find in a seperate window that doesn't do a "live" search.  (CMD+F, just like in Jag)


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## celeborn (Oct 6, 2003)

> _Originally posted by Ripcord _
> *This appears to be the ONLY way that the find box in the finder window works, though you CAN perform a find in a seperate window that doesn't do a "live" search.  (CMD+F, just like in Jag) *



This is great news! Does it work in icon and column view as well as in list view?


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## rubicon (Oct 6, 2003)

The downside to any database enabled system is keeping the information accurate.  MP3 tags are only as good as the information that goes into them.  If you're anal retentive and take care to carefully enter tags, you're OK.  Many people are pretty sloppy about organization.

We'll see the same issue with a database-enabled file system.  Have you ever actually used Word's document Properties feature to add Author, Project, Company, Keywords, etc.?  You may be surprised at what you find in there and there is a well known bug that tracks private information in Word docs.  But getting back on topic, will you bother using keywords in your document files?

Maybe their system will index all of the words in the documents - that would be helpful I suppose but you can already search on content.

It'll be interesting.


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## Koelling (Oct 6, 2003)

"Yeah, I think we need another way to Bold text. Right now we can use the B icon, right click the selected text and choose Format, use the drop down menu, or use the Style Sheet editor." 

Don't forget the ctl-b shortcut, I learned that one by accident the other day.


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## Arden (Oct 7, 2003)

Celeborn: 1) Any search will turn up results, no matter what view you use, which is irrelevant to the search anyway.  If you select a folder, it will search through that folder no matter what view you use, etc.  2) You can preview files in Column view, if that's what you were wondering above.


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## hulkaros (Oct 7, 2003)

_Originally posted by celeborn _
*Whether it is a service or an actual new filesystem doesn't change the fact that it is new, and by the sound of it anyway, an extremely good idea.* 

Which we don't know how exactly will end up! Remember that LH will be 2 years maybe down the road from now!!!

*I don't think you quite understood me - the new Finder does look like iTunes, yes. What I meant was that just like you can browse your music library by genre or artist you would be able to assign files multiple catogories such as "work", "school project" etc. and browse your files according to this criteria. I think the idea Apple had in Copland was something like dynamic folders - one could do a search and save the result as a continually updating folder. This way any one file could be visible in many folders at once.

BTW, is it possible to do live searches (à la iTunes/Mail) in (the Panther) Finder yet? *

Yes, as already others posted, IT IS possible to do live searches and especially on newer, faster Macs, is DAMN fast!  Also, the Places SiderBar keeps EXACTLY the same logic in Finder as in iTunes and not just looks like it! Let me make this crystal clear for you:
-Library (Macintosh HD)
-Radio (iDisk)
-Audio CD (DVD/CD-R)
-iPod (Image Disks, FireWire/USB devices)
-Rendezvous Playlists (Network)
-Smart Playlists (Movies, Docs, etc.)
-Playlists (other folders/items that the User can drop in Places SiderBar)
Got it? 

*I certainly and sincerely hope so, but bashing good ideas just because it's MS doing it doesn't benefit anyone. *

Where exactly was I bashing M$ in my previous post? 

Panther rules and I cannot even imagine what Apple will offer us 2 years down the road


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## Arden (Oct 7, 2003)

Bashing MS because they have good ideas doesn't happen because they have so few. [/bash]


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## texanpenguin (Oct 15, 2003)

He's right though - Panther isn't the same as a Media Library.

A media library, of course, works far better with MEDIA than it would with documents and applications, because every media file has the same attributes - an author, a title, a source, a year, a genre.

The glorious thing about departing from a heirarchical operating system comes from relocating files. Rather than remove a file from one location and place them back in another, you can simply alter a file's attributes so that it seems as though it exists in a new path.

You could also think of wonderful query-based goodness - sorting is awesome. Plus think of reports! You could instantly list the attributes of all the files in So and so location, or with so and so attributes, for analysing.

The advantages are amazing.

The OS would be far quicker too in every way, just because databases have ORDER.

It's a good system and I heartily agree Apple needs to incorporate a system like it.


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## ccuilla (Oct 15, 2003)

Has anyone stopped to noticed the UI migration and think about what it might mean.

iCal
iTunes
iPhoto
Finder
AddressBook
Safari

If you factor in the concept of FS meta-data, and "objects" vs. "files", suddenly iTunes starts looking like nothing more than a "Music Finder", iPhoto a "Picture Finder", Address Book a "vCard Finder", etc.

Safari and iCal are little less clear, but they are following similar UI models for managing thie special data.

This thought actually jives with a rumor/comment I heard some time ago (12-18 months) that this was the direction Apple was going. That "Finder" would change quite a bit and there would be a set of "specialized Finders" for different tasks.

Then again it could just be that Steve thinks it looks cool.


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## Arden (Oct 17, 2003)

Well, all applications are really "specialized Finders" in one way or another if you think about it really hard and jab a pencil in your ear.

And iTunes will sort your songs based on the ID3 tags if you set it to organize your music folder, though it still has to move files from one directory to another.


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## magnus (Oct 17, 2003)

I just had to post it, the  power of the Windows System Tray or wathever you call it.  

Longhorn does really sound like a bad copy of the os x codenames. As you probably have figured out yoursleves.


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## Arden (Oct 19, 2003)

Ouch!  LOL... I hate it when it does that!

I also hate the way the menu bar is at the top of the _window_ and not the screen.  If the window is very small, part of the menu will get cut off, and if the window is very close to the bottom of the screen (and also relatively small), large menus will hide part of the menubar... GRR!  So annoying!


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## Satcomer (Oct 19, 2003)

Maybe the release date has been pushed back because Apple had the gull to come out with a new Operating system again and they have to start over in reverse engineering Panther?


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## Arden (Oct 21, 2003)

The nerve!


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