# Thoughts on OS-X/UNIX/and MacOS



## devnul (Oct 4, 2000)

Hello,

Actually I am glad that people are discussing this, but it raises a HUGE issue with me....  First of all, I'm a UNIX systems integrator, but I love the Macintosh interface....

It troubles me *tremendously* that Macintosh users are going to have to contend with the UNIX shells, etc just to get something done.. This is simply not what the Macintosh should be about....   

I think that Pandoras Box has been opened here and loyal Macintosh users are going to be fed up with this very quickly.... 

I've not seen one post yet siting the ease-of-use of OS-X, which is indeed what the mac is suppose to be about.. Instead there are posts of stuff like:

"login as root"
"cd to /"
"chown on this"
etc...

As much as I love UNIX, I never wanted to see it on a Macintosh and this really *really* is a shame for all Macintosh users..

I always thought the day would come where instructions for installing programs in OS-X would be:

"start a terminal session"
"su to root"
"mount the cd-rom"
"gunzip the archive file"
"run ./install.sh"
"edit inetd.conf and add _______"

I just didn't think it would be here so soon... This is a sad day for the Macintosh - again.. As much as I like UNIX this is just not what the Macintosh is about...

I sincerely hope that average users will be able to use the Macintosh just as they have since the day it was created....   All this stuff is great for techies and it's great that people who want to learn it can - but it should be *strictly* optional....  The last thing the Macintosh needs is UNIX software installation procedures....  Or the UNIX filesystem layout, but I guess I'm too late on that one...

OS-X would have been just perfect if Apple had simply wrapped MacOS around a UNIX kernel.. I fear they have brought too much UNIX to MacOS and that loyal users are either not going to upgrade or get incredibly frustrated....

As UNIX developers we OWE it to the existing Macintosh users to not simply re-compile UNIX code to run under Mac OS-X, but to port it - so it works the way Macintosh users expect it to with the types of administrative interface they expect to see , and with an installation process that doesn't involve command-line interfaces....  MySQL ported to Mac OS-X is just MySQL... But MySQL ported to the Macintosh outta be MySQL with a comprehensive installer, GUI interface, and all the sophistication Macintosh users expect.....  (of course, keep the CLI for those of us who love it.. ;> )...

Sure, it's extra work - but it's the only way to preserve the Macintosh now that Pandora's Box has been opened (in my my not-so-humble opinion..)...

Sincerely,

Greg Saylor
Senior Systems Integrator
Integrated Suport Services

[Edited by devnul on 10-04-2000 at 02:08 PM]


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## hotani (Oct 4, 2000)

I agree, it should not be there for most users. Maybe the final release of OS X will not even come with the Terminal program. This would ensure that the new users, even the mac veterans would not need to use any UNIX ever ... if they don't want to. 

however, I use command line daily - even prefer it sometimes, to the gui. I think it is great that it is there for those us who know how to use it, and WANT to use it. 

Example: maybe php will be a push-button install that can be done from the gui one day (I think it is pretty much there with Xtools from tenon). Until then, here is something I would have never dreamed of trying to install on my old mac OS, and it is now running on my powerbook with X beta - this is great! I installed it from the command line, and learned something in the process.

I think for the mac user with no unix experience, the final version of OS X will be what it is intended to be: a more stable, modern operating system. For the UNIX/Mac users, it will be a dream come true: the macintosh interface on top of our beloved unix - we now have the option to use gui or not, to use our machine for games, word processing and graphics work, or as a full featured web-server. 

just some thoughts...


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## devnul (Oct 4, 2000)

That's what it should be and I totally agree with you - nothing interests me more then being able to get at the command line of OS-X... I love UNIX and I always will....

I just hope that Apple is getting the point that we both see so clearly....   OS-X needs to be another MacOS upgrade to Macintosh users.....

That being said, for the UNIX developers out there - we have an outstanding opportunity here and a great responsibility to the Macintosh users to produce the high quality software they are used to seeing....

I just fear that in order for all this great stuff to work - the users are going to HAVE to resort to the CLI....   .. Mainly because it's easier to recompile then it is to port.....    

UNIX developers should step up to the plate - not force Macintosh users to change the way they've been using their computers for the past 16 years...

(just more thoughts and ramblings)

- Greg


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## hotani (Oct 4, 2000)

also - regarding posts on these discussion boards: most, if not all of these users are Mac OSX/UNIX finatics; the beta testers, hackers, early adopters etc... I think that has a lot to do with the amount of posts sending people to the command line. 

If my mom was using OS X and she emailed a question, I would carefully explain a GUI route to fix the problem (even though she was a mainframe programmer at one point, i dont think she has ever logged into a unix box!). On these boards, I tend to assume the person is a hacker to some degree; at least not scared of the command line.


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## play42day (Oct 4, 2000)

I agree.
The average MacUser will be road kill.

This is not the Mac OS.

May never be.


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## Zesty (Oct 4, 2000)

I would like to point out that a regular mac user does not need to launch terminal at all. This is still a mac in that it runs regular mac apps the way it always did. I love using the command line, so I do so. My wife uses Photoshop and never even knows it's there. The average user need not be troubled with all this stuff because s/he has no reason to start mucking around with it if they don't want to.

As far as Mac apps are concerned, the documentation that comes with the developer tools (and is available on apple's website) talks about the new way to write applications under OSX that greatly *simplifies* everything. The key word here is "bundle", an application that contains within it everything it needs to run on a machine.

Apple has done an amazing job, in my opinion, in providing for two seperate and diverse camps. You have, on one hand, the Unix folks who can do extremely useful and productive work and never even *see* Aqua, and just the opposite, people who need to do work that requires some kind of gui (photoshop, maya, whatever), and the command line is totally outside their radar.


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## devnul (Oct 4, 2000)

hatoni:
Your statement is right on - but it *IS* also the problem.. MacOS users have never had to have things carefully explained to them....  There's a really serious problem here and I'm deeply concerned for those users who have invested so heavily in Apple's products.....  Personally, I like almost everything about OS-X (of course I've been using OS-X server)...  But, this is going to get brutally ugly I think....  I hope Apple has a solid plan for this, otherwise Mac OS-X is just going to be another UNIX with a pretty window manager.....  And the bottom line is, OS-X would definately *NOT* be my first choice as a UNIX OS....  That being said, I can certainly understand writing to tarket the "hackers" which frequent this message board - it's not really that which concerns me so greatly.......

Things in MacOS should not need to be "explained carefully".....  It should be intuitive, clear, and work...

As a rediculously simple example of how out-of-control this is... Apple bundles Apache with OS-X..  Now if a user wants to turn it on or off they have to edit text files...  Before they would have gone to a control panel and clicked "disable web server" or something similar...  In Windows/NT one just goes to the service manager and "disables" the web server...  What about upgrading Apache?... What about adding modules to Apache?.... What about setting up virtual domains, proxies, and secure services?....

The Mac has *somehow* become even more complicated to use then Windows....

So lets take these problems one at a time, the first problem of the day being:

Where's the GUI interface to administering Apache?...

(and no, I don't mean the crappy web-based administrative tools floating all over the place - where is the native MacOS tool for administering apache?...)...

I don't think any application belongs on OS-X that has not had the care taken to ensure it works the way MacOS users expect it to.....

I hope to that these types of tools are there when MacOS ships or this product is going to die a miserable death...  The problems are much greater then what has been suggested repeatedly on this message board: "should we hide the terminal program or not?"...   We are all thinking like UNIX-heads, not MacOS users - and that is going to be a terrible mistake for everyone...

I do  not see how I can reasonably suggest to current MacOS users that an upgrade to OS-X will benefit them... They'll be completely miserable in this new environment....  Maybe when these concerns are actually addressed things will be different....  Until then, I guess it's WebStar with Mac OS-9 (for example)...  

I make a strong recommendation that any MacOS user reading this evaluate OS-X very carefully before shedding any money for it....  

Don't let us UNIX developers get your mindshare so easily - take us to task and make us work....  Don't buy this product until it meets your high standards...  Don't "suffer through" with it....


play42day:
I think using the term "roadkill" may be an understatement...

- Greg


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## devnul (Oct 4, 2000)

Zesty,

I used to think that Apple did a fantastic job until I started poking around on the message boards, newsgroups, and managed to get 5 minutes to play with OS-X beta....   Please someone win me back, I realy hurts me to have to say things, such critical things, about something I liked so much less then a year ago.....

On the contrary to your point - there are all sorts of new features of MacOS that are not configurable the way Mac applications outta to be... Apache is only one of them - a crucial piece of this new "internet technology" that everyone keeps talking about - yet it's the same old Apache and you have to use the same-old-unix tools to administer it....  This is decidely un-Mac-like and an insult to the millions of existing Macintosh users.......

There's problems here, big problems....   Unfortunately, I am speaking only from the few minutes that I played with OS-X beta, so I am not sure what all the applications are that you have to get to CLI in order to do anything with them - perhaps you can let us know what they are?...

In other words, what UNIX services does Mac OS-X run that require CLI to configure?...

DNS?
SMTP?
POP3?
FTPD?
INETD?
APACHE?
NIS?
SSL-related?

Why are there no GUI utilities?.. If they are so hard to configure - perhaps UNIX utilities shouldn't have been patched-to-compile.. Perhaps OS-X apps should have been WRITTEN....

.. from what I saw in the 5 minutes I played with it there were quite a few, though I am hoping you can clarify this for me if I am mistaken....  Or elaborate on my observation if I am correct...


Sincerely,

Greg

Yes! It's hard work!  So what?!




[Edited by devnul on 10-04-2000 at 07:37 PM]


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## sverre (Oct 4, 2000)

Actually I think some people are just not looking for ways to do things in the gui. For example ppl are telling others to use Terminal and chmod when there's a perfectly good way to do this in the GUI. Apache has some config in the GUI, at least you can turn it on and off and change the root dir. Theis is enough for most home web servers.

Other things are more hidden, like when you _do_ want to edit something in /etc/ (hostconfig most often I assume), you can do it with TextEdit (type /etc/ in the Go To field). You don't even have to login as root.

I personally have told ppl to use Terminal when it isn't really necessary, but I'm learning new ways as I play along...  Hopefully Apple won't include it in a standard install in Final. Put it in cd extras or something. That way most ppl wouldn't have it and wouldn't use it.


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## devnul (Oct 4, 2000)

> _Originally posted by sverre _
> *Actually I think some people are just not looking for ways to do things in the gui. For example ppl are telling others to use Terminal and chmod when there's a perfectly good way to do this in the GUI. Apache has some config in the GUI, at least you can turn it on and off and change the root dir. Theis is enough for most home web servers.
> 
> Other things are more hidden, like when you _do_ want to edit something in /etc/ (hostconfig most often I assume), you can do it with TextEdit (type /etc/ in the Go To field). You don't even have to login as root.
> ...



I sincerely hope that you are correct.... :>   I look forward to seeing the final release... And if it is as good as it should be, I will be thrilled...

- Greg

P.S. I feel like I need to say again that I want to use the CLI, I am more comfortable there... THe problem is, of course, Mac people are not.. Nor should they HAVE to be...


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## Zesty (Oct 4, 2000)

devnull-

yes, i agree that apache could use a nice gui. actually, a *lot* of the underpinnings could use a nice gui, but the fact of the matter is, nobody's had a chance to! it's perfectly conceivable that someone knowledgeable in apache configuration could write an app in cocoa or carbon if s/he wanted to and make that available. 

My point was that there are two distinct camps, the Mac camp who understand that if a particular config option isn't available in a control panel or dialog box, that option just ain't there. That makes sense, there is no other way to configure it otherwise. Unix, however, was built on the idea of the command line and the text file, with zero gui. In an environment like Unix, where you cannot take for granted that the person configuring your software has anything other than a telnet session to begin with, configuring through text files and likewise utilities is the only way to do it.

Apple, I think, is doing a good job straddling the two fences, but the fact of the matter remains that their attitude has to be, well, if you want a gui to configure Apache, you are free to write it. The bulk of people who configure Apache, in my experience, are very well versed at doing it sans gui completely. I'm not saying one is better than the other, and I know no would would object to having a gui to use, but the fact remains that there are some parts of the operating system that simply require some knowhow, in this case, Unix knowhow.

OSX opens up a world of possibilities for the Mac that simply do not exist in previous versions; my machine is currently running mySQL and Apache ... two things that you wouldn't dream of running on MacOS 9 or earlier. The fact that these tools are now available should, and I suspect, will inspire someone (like me  ) to 'put a gui where there ain't been a gui before'.


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## devnul (Oct 4, 2000)

Zesty,

Once again I find myself in agreement with your overall analysis, but I disagree on one and only one point....  These "features" should be available to Mac users - they are, after all, the ones who have spent all that money up until now on the Macintosh platform...

These "gui tools" in my opinion are not optional for a Mac system.....  

I agree that developers need to spend a SIGNIFICANT amount of work to bring these tools to the Mac - or else Mac users are not going to be upgrading.....  One hand feeds the other here....

I hope that this nuance does not get lost - because I think it's crucial to the acceptance of OS-X by the folks who love it for it is right now...


Respectfully (as always),


- Greg


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## hotani (Oct 5, 2000)

I am going on a tangent here but ...

A control panel could probably be easily written in REALbasic that spits out the apache config file... You know, tabs at the top, radio buttons to turn things on or off, bla bla bla...

I guess my thought is that if the demand is there, someone will step up and create the missing gui elements.


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## Pascal (Oct 5, 2000)

This comment from sverre is sadly true :





> Actually I think some people are just not looking for ways to do things in the gui. For example ppl are telling others to use Terminal and chmod when there's a perfectly good way to do this in the GUI.


As a proof, here is a quote from the <A HREF="http://www.macfixit.com/ultimate/Forum27/HTML/000158.html">following thread</A> read on MacFixIt, by E. Shawn :





> This goes hand in hand with my personal philosophy with linux -- 'never trust a gui to configure your system' -- they just don't work


I, for one, hope that this way of thinking will never prevail on the Mac. Of course, a good GUI is always hard to find (design) because it requires more thought and more understanding of the _lay person's_ psychology on the programmer's part. This "tidbit" explains why so many applications come with horrid user interface at first. And remember : _the Mac interface was not built in a day._ (If you are interested, you can read my answer to Mr Shawn four posts bellow his, in that same thread.)



> yes, i agree that apache could use a nice gui. actually, a *lot* of the underpinnings could use a nice gui, but the fact of the matter is, nobody's had a chance to! it's perfectly conceivable that someone knowledgeable in apache configuration could write an app in cocoa or carbon if s/he wanted to and make that available.


Nobody should have to hack an interface for services already in the OS. Nobody ever had to do that in classic Mac OS and I firmly believe it would be a betrayal to the spirit of the Mac to force anyone to access any feature using the CLI (except willfuly by the so-called power users). As John Siracusa wrote, in <A HREF="http://www.arstechnica.com/reviews/4q00/macosx-pb1/macos-x-beta-16.html">Ars Technica</A> :





> It's my position that the goal of the OS X interface should be to equal or surpass that of Mac OS 9. (...) I want to like Mac OS X. I want to use it as my primary operating system when it is released. I'm tired of applications bringing down the entire system in Mac OS 9. But technical merit is just one part of what makes an operating system, and it has historically been a very small part of what defines the Macintosh experience. The Macintosh is defined by its interface, and any redefinition of that must be at least as good as what it's replacing. Mac OS X Public Beta does not reach that goal.


Pushing a little bit further this comment, I would say that Apple has the responsibility of providing a visual interface to these potentially useful features. Finally, as written in the <A HREF="http://www.macjournals.com/">MDJ</A> :





> Remember this rule: any time a Mac OS X procedure {requires} you to manipulate files from the command line instead of the Finder, no matter why, it is a complete and total failure of the OS.


It says it all.

Nobody has succeeded in besting the Mac as far as the interface's ease of use goes. Maybe even Apple will not succeed.

_Quod erat demonstrandum ?_

[Edited by Pascal on 10-05-2000 at 07:09 PM]


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## The DJ (Oct 5, 2000)

I know it all, heard it all. I'm one of the guilty aswell. I wrote an installscript (sh), to install samba binaries.

I know it's not the way to go, but i am no developer, and i have no idea how to make a GUI installer and even more so a graphic interface to samba.

All i know is that i need OSX to serve a share to my co-workers and currently this is the only way to do it.

I also like to remind you of the port of PPPoE. This first consisted only out of some binaries. Next came a shell installscript, then startup scripts and now people are developing a GUI for the port. UNIX and Mac developers collaberating to make an excellant program

I would love to learn to develop for the mac and i know it can be as userfriendly as our good old OS.
But it will take at least until the final and prob. until OSX 2.0 until we will see that happen.
That is not a bad thing. We will get there.

DJ


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## fmalloy (Oct 5, 2000)

How quickly everyone forgets that this is a Beta. Not complete.

All the install scripts and command-line hacks are for the folks who simply can't wait for the supported GUI to get their fix, then complain that OS X is a failure because you have to resort to the command-line! The examples are:

- PPPoE
- AirPort

Remember, Apple never said these were supported, so no GUI.

For those who doubt, I can configure TCP/IP, set my preferences, setup PPP, unpack and install applications, copy files, etc. thru the GUI.

What do you think is missing that *won't* be available when the true release comes out?

I can't believe how folks want to play with the guts of OS X, then in the same breath whine that there's no GUI support.

Let's face it, the only ones using OS X right now are the Mac weenies (like myself) that want to play, play, play. When it gets released en masse most folks will never fire up Terminal.app, or start it by accident.

My recommendation? Apple should *not* include Terminal.app with OS X. However, it should be available as a free download with lots of warnings and caveats about its usage, you need to be an expert, etc. etc. This forces you to have to actively go out and find it and download it.

Or, everytime you start Terminal.app, you have to correctly answer a series of multiple-choice UNIX questions to prove your worthiness to approach the command-line temple ;-)


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## peterjhill (Oct 6, 2000)

I agree that the reason Airport was not included in the Beta was that they did not have the GUI done. I can't think of one thing that Apple claims that you can do with the Beta that requires a CLI. That does not mean that you need to make it difficult to access the Terminal App. 

It is hard to hurt the system with it, unless you are logged in as root. The file permissions protect most of the system files, more so then OS 9 did. Anyone could go in, using the GUI Finder of OS 9 and delete files from the system folder. With OS X, there is more security.

When I go to work, I log in as >console and run the text-only version of setiathome and get great results. It really shows the power of the PPC.

Most users will be apprehensive around the shell prompt, but that does not mean you need to make them prove their worthyness.


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## devnul (Oct 6, 2000)

Pascal and TheDj, 

I couldn't agree more with your posts....  The question is, how can these issues be addressed in a constructive way?... It does not seem to me that these are a priority right now.....   I wonder when/if they will be?...  

Pascal, your points are *right on the money*, you articulated this better then I ever could....  Your post should be framed and hung next to every developer porting applications to OS-X...

As for the last two replies - I don't think anyone is complaining....  Just stressing the importance of this from both a ISV and the manufacturer of the software....  Why bother produce something that Mac users aren't going to use?........   And make no mistake - Mac users want to take advantage of the features of UNIX, such as Apache, PHP, MySQL, etc... But asking them to resort to a CLI interface to do it is not going to happen - Microsoft WIndows would be easier to use.. THis is backwards - not forwards....   I wouldn't so lightly dismiss what Mac users will want to do with OS-X...   THey've been waiting for this a long time and now that it's hear it doesn't seem to be what it should be.....  What good is an OS if all you are going to use it for is copy files around and stuff like that......   That's not what Mac users use their computers for - and they aren't going to start now.. Yet, as I read more and more posts of developers gleefully porting all this UNIX code to OS-X just to see it work - well, I can't help to think that's the wrong way to go....

Almost all the "UNIX" compiled stuff I've seen is freely available and there seem to be some really smart developers.....   Why not expend your efforts creating something that a typical Mac user will actually like.... ;>

Imagine Samba wrapped into an "AppleShare-style" administrative application.. That's what they expect - and anything less ain't gonna cut it with this group......

Sincerely,

Greg


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## Pascal (Oct 7, 2000)

> And make no mistake - Mac users want to take advantage of the features of UNIX, such as Apache, PHP, MySQL, etc...


... and I would probably be one of them ! 

As *devnul* wrote, I am truly looking forward to Mac OS X for all the problems it will solve. Classic Mac OS has some genetic flaws that have become, over the years, true headaches for everyone who uses the Mac - the most frequently cited being the OS's intolerance to programming errors resulting in system wide crashes.

This being said, I wish to reassure *fmalloy* : I truly understand that this is a beta, albeit public, and I know that the programming resources are still not completely available (installers à la _InstallerVise_ and GUI resources for instance). Combined with the fact that the programmers also have to accustom themselves with the new OS paradigm, it is completely understandable that the applications now available for OS X require the use of the terminal app. I, too, remember that _the Mac interface was not built in a day_.  This is to say that I do not blame *The DJ* or anybody else that has made / will make public any given hack ! Indeed, hacking the Mac has probably never been so easy. So from a power user point of view, it probably never was so easy to personalise the Mac environment (but not in the same way as we were all used to with Classic Mac OS, this is a paradigm shift after all). Indeed, this is - ironically - a truly _positive aspect_ of OS X : it is now possible to quickly port apps from any other platforms to OS X, provided they are Unix source codes, while the Classic Mac OS's reliance on a GUI rendered any porting of applications a difficult task.

What I understood from *devnul*'s post is this : while this way of providing apps can be understandable in the present state of affairs, this should not be the way for installing and using apps every day in the long run. The terminal app should remain (it is not an aberration in the system), but it should also remain an instrument for the true power user. (As an aside, installing an app, using it or setting preferences _are not_ and _should never be_ power user things.)

_Unix hackers_ and _traditionnal Mac users_ are all welcome aboard the same train ! The thing is, we now have to get to know each other ! 

[Corrected "in Unix binaries" -> "Unix source codes"]

[Edited by Pascal on 10-07-2000 at 02:18 PM]


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## Jaded (Oct 7, 2000)

"Things in MacOS should not need to be "explained carefully"..... It should be intuitive, clear, and work...  "

(This is a quote from early in the thread, in response to someone saying that if they were explaining to their mom how to do something, he'd explain carefully how to do it via the GUI.)

I'm a bit unusual in that I've been a Windows user for a long time. I bought my first Mac last spring, in anticipation of OS X. 

I think (and this is just my opinion) that Mac users feel nothing should need to be explained carefully because they've been using MacOS for so long. I found OS 9 very confusing when I first switched, and I'm still learning things about it.

Now, it has been my understanding the OS X is an acknowledged paradigm shift for Apple. When OS X comes out, OS 9 isn't going to disappear, right? Apple plans to take OS 9 to OS 9.5? (I read that somewhere but couldn't refer you to it off-hand.)

And I understood their reasoning for this overlap was to give OS X time to mature and become a polished and friendly OS. Or more specifically, to give Aqua time to mature and become a polished and friendly GUI.

A lot of the command line talk that I've read has to do with things that "our moms" wouldn't ever bother with. You can start up a Mac with OS X, get onto the internet, install Photoshop or whatever commercial apps you have, send off some emails to the kids asking them when you're going to be a grandparent, watch The Matrix on you DVD-Rom, all without ever seeing the command line. 

Does my mom need to set-up virtual domains in Apache? If she needed to set-up some kind of NAT box, would she do it herself, or would she yell for a geek helper? She'd do the latter... not because of the command line -- she wouldn't get that far. But because of the -concepts- being dealt with. She'd never get as far as worrying about the command line.

Right now, we've got a beta product that doesn't even install on a significant number of machines. Clearly it isn't finished. But when it does run, suddenly there's this whole 'net full of geek toys to snag and see if we can get them to run. So of -course- everyone's trying to get every bit of open source code they can get their hands of to run! It's natural curiosity.

You don't read posts on "How do I turn on File Sharing?" because you open the GUI and click on 'Turn on File Sharing.' There's nothing to discuss there. 

I'm running OS X on my iBook right now. I installed it last weekend and haven't gone to 9 since, unless you count running Classic apps. I haven't fired up the terminal yet, insofar as I can recall.

I'm confident that by the time OS X is released to the public, the command line will be an obscure tool that geeks play with now and then. I know this is blasphemy, but look at Windows. It has a command line, and there are a lot of long time Windows users who don't even realize its there, or at least, never have cause to use it.

If MICROSOFT can give us a GUI that doesn't force us to use the command line, don't you think APPLE can, too?! 

Thanks for listening!

PS Before the PB came out there was a lot of speculation about whether it'd even contain the terminal.app. Was that just idle speculation, or did Apple seriously consider not including it?

My guess is that when the final comes, the terminal will be there, but stuck someplace obscure where an average user wouldn't stumble upon it. Like (sorry to do another Windows comparison on you) RegEdit in Win98.


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## devnul (Oct 7, 2000)

Pascal,

Thanks again for your well articulated comments and you did represent what I was trying to say very well...

As always, your comments hit the problem squarely on the head....

......

Jaded,

As for the whole virtual domain/IPNat issues....  Well, lets just say I disagree completely....  There is no reason why configuring a Mac OS-X workstation for IPNat should not be point-and-click easy..  Yes there are things that need to be explained, such as private address space, etc.....

I.E:
Enable IPNat? O yes  O no
What ip addresses do you want to allow access to the Internet from you LAN
(appropriate easy-to-use selection method)

As for virtual domains, it could be just as easily explained and managed.. And YES, I definately think that Mac users should have access to this..

Remember: OS-X is competing with Windows 2000 *AND* Unix...
It needs to be easier to use the Windows while providing the power of UNIX....  And if it doesn't, it is not going to impress UNIX people and it's not going to impress Mac people....  

Right now, if you want to use the features of OS-X that make it competitive to Windows 2000 you have to resort to UNIX.......   And it's not a particularly great UNIX when compared to others that have been around for a very long time (although being built on BSD helped a great deal)....  

So yes, it's beta...    I realize that...  But, it's also not as easy to use as NT (when one attempts to utilize competitve features) - to say nothing of MacOS, and it's definately not on the level of say a Sun 1000 workstation..

Casually dismissing these features as something a "mother would not want to do anyways" is what the problem really is..... Apple did it, you are doing it, and so far it looks like thousands of other people are too....

Yes, it's a tall order.... Yes, it's a lot of work.. Yes, it needs to be done.....

- Greg

P.S. THis is exactly what has me aggravated right now... How I read so many posts about "this doesn't need to be in the GUI" or "why would Mac users want to do that?"... It's just not a good argument to make when OS-X is suppose to be everything that MacOS was with the benefits that come with UNIX...    This mind-set has got to change if anyone expects OS-X to garner the hearts and minds of native Mac OS folks...


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## Jaded (Oct 8, 2000)

Hmmm.

I'm probably rambling too much, as its clear you've come away from reading my post without the full context of what I said. My fault, I need to be more concise.

"There is no reason why configuring a Mac OS-X workstation for IPNat should not be point-and-click easy.. Yes there are things that need to be explained, such as private address space, etc..... "
.
.
.
"Right now, if you want to use the features of OS-X that make it competitive to Windows 2000 you have to resort to UNIX......."

Yes, -RIGHT NOW- you do.  But will this be the case in January 2001, or whenever the release hits? Will it be the case in January 2002, or whenever Apple officially kills off OS 9 and starts shipping all its systems with OS X.5 or whatever?

"But, it's also not as easy to use as NT (when one attempts to utilize competitve features)"

I'd disagree there. NT makes me nuts because I can never figure out where they've hid the parameter that I need to tweak.  It's in a window -somewhere- but where? In a *nix-esque environment (like OS X) I just open the config file and scan through it until I find the parameter I need to change.  

Should I have to do that? Of course not. Apple (or someone) needs to eventually give us tools with the point and click ease-of-use, but more intuitively laid out than Windows is. BUT, if I'm configuring Apache on OS X, darnit, I don't want to learn a GUI. I know how to configure Apache; I've done it on Solaris and I've done it on Linux. I want to use that knowledge in OS X. I'm not saying that there shouldn't be a GUI for it... by all means, give people that choice. But if you're going to offer an OS that will run software available across a wide range of platforms, don't make us re-learn the skills we already know. We need BOTH ways of configuring the tools. THIS is near and dear to my heart because for some odd reason, my place of business is running Apache on one NT box, and when something got scewed up the other day , I couldn't immediately fix it since the NT version either didn't use the config files that Solaris, Linux and OS X do. Or if it did, I couldn't find them... 

"Yes, it's a tall order.... Yes, it's a lot of work.. Yes, it needs to be done..... "

And, OTOH, Apple is going to have to ship this product. Their resources are not infinite. So where should they focus their effort? On squashing bugs, polishing the UI for the parts of the OS that are going to be used most often and by the widest segment of the audience, or creating GUI tools for sys admins to use to do the same kinds of things they do now via text config files?

I mean, in a perfect world, I agree with you. Everything _should_ have a GUI for those who want to use one. 

I suppose I'm mis-reading you, but it seemed to me that your initial post was triggered off by reading messages that folks posted about using the terminal app to get some open source software running, or to hack in support for features that aren't officially supported yet. And that doesn't seem fair to me. As an example take the "Airport Hack." I'm very glad someone figured that out so that I can use my airport card in the PB. But that doesn't mean I think it would be OK for Apple to ship the Release Version like this!! But you seem to project from one instance to the other. 

I do think that under the release version some people will still be hacking in support for things like PHP or other Open Source projects. And as the OS matures, hopefully Mac developers will join these Open Source initiatives and build out nice installers and GUI interfaces so that less tech-savvy  users can have access to these projects.

First we learn to crawl, then to walk, then to run. The tools aren't available to non-paying ADC members yet, and not even to some paying members. I think part of the reason Apple released this beta is so that the 'weekend developer' community would have some time to come up to speed and start cranking out polished ports.

Enough rambling.. as I say, I come at this from a very different angle than you. I hope, in the end, that we both get our way -- that for you, everything has a great GUI interface, and for me, I continue to have a shell to hack around in.


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## LunaMorena (Oct 8, 2000)

> _Originally posted by Jaded _
> *Now, it has been my understanding the OS X is an acknowledged paradigm shift for Apple. When OS X comes out, OS 9 isn't going to disappear, right? Apple plans to take OS 9 to OS 9.5? (I read that somewhere but couldn't refer you to it off-hand.)*



I don't know of any plans currently to have an OS 9.5.  I do know that OS 9 does still work for people not ready for X yet.  I also know that for long-time mac users, this is going to be a hard switch to make... but they still don't need to learn the command line.  Anything they would want to do as part of a typical Mac setup is available in the GUI.



> *I'm running OS X on my iBook right now. I installed it last weekend and haven't gone to 9 since, unless you count running Classic apps. I haven't fired up the terminal yet, insofar as I can recall.*



I have... but that's mostly because DVDs aren't working in X yet, nor is my printer (no not even under classic) or my Palm's HotSync function.  I didn't want to play Diablo under classic either.  But otherwise I've had no trouble with X and have been using it for everything else.  

I have used the command line, but not for anything that can be gui-configured.  So far with the command line I have:

1) telnetted into my other systems so I could use my shell accounts (something I use Nifty Telnet for under 9)

2) Setup sshd access.

If I were to set up a web page under X, I don't need a command line.  If I were to set up ftp access, I don't need a command line.  If I just wanted regular telnet access, I wouldn't need command line.  (I just happen to not like the idea of people sniffing my password when I'm telnetting in so I enabled ssh instead.)

Why isn't there a gui for the apache configuration?  because this is an end-user product, not a server product.  it has all the functionality of the "Personal Web Sharing" setup in 8.5 and above.  It has an on/off switch and a setting for where your files are, and that's all it needs for an end-user product.  If you want to put on your system admin hat and set up multiple domains, you have that option but it's not something that the average user is going to do.  And if you need a gui to set up virtual domains on apache, then that's probably not something you should be doing anyway.



> *PS Before the PB came out there was a lot of speculation about whether it'd even contain the terminal.app. Was that just idle speculation, or did Apple seriously consider not including it?
> 
> My guess is that when the final comes, the terminal will be there, but stuck someplace obscure where an average user wouldn't stumble upon it. Like (sorry to do another Windows comparison on you) RegEdit in Win98. *



I don't think there were ever plans to not include the terminal app.  It's part of the appeal for the end user, and it's not something that the basic user ever needs to worry about.  really, the worst thing that can happen with it is some user is browsing through their applications folder and finds this thing called "terminal," launches it, doesn't know what to do, and quits again.  part of the good news of a command line is that you have to know what to type in order to use it. 

Please, people keep this in mind: We may be going into the command line a lot here because we're power users and we want to do things that are above and beyond the basics.  The average user will never need it.  The average user can get on with hir point-and-click life with all the menus and control panels sie will ever need.  Apple won't even support using the command line, because it really is something that you don't need to use for basic use of the computer.  Hell, I don't even need it for network tools like pine and traceroute because there's even a gui app for that (NetProbe).  I can do anything with OS X that I could do with OS 9 (results of the beta release aside; once it's finalized I'm sure my remaining limitations will be removed) plus I have a command line to work with, which I think is just great because I'm one of those people who prefer one to a gui.


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## devnul (Oct 8, 2000)

I, of course, respect the past two posts.. But, I think my points (and indeed my view) have been seriously mis-characterized...

First of all, I *love* the command line interface....  I'm a major UNIX-head and this is the way *I* like to work...  You must understand that first and foremost...

Secondly, I recognize there are not "infinite resources"...  However, given the resources that are available (including both of the previous posters - I might add) there is simply not sufficient resources being put into ensuring that OS-X is going to appeal to MacOS users...  And - if you think otherwise that's fine, but 2 years from now when this comes back to bite you - please let me say "I told you so"....  MacOS users are *NOT* going to tolerate this sort of thinking in their operating system...  And if you think they will - we're never going to progress beyond OS-9... (which, BTW, everytime I see I think of a great operating system from Microware)...

.. now onto random comments...

You said "Yes, -RIGHT NOW- you do. But will this be the case in January 2001, or whenever the release hits? Will it be the case in January 2002, or whenever Apple officially kills off OS 9 and starts shipping all its systems with OS X.5 or whatever?"...

Well, from whjat I am seeing - yes it is going to be the case.. Because very few people seem to be acknowledging the problem.... As an example, I'll use a quote from the post following yours:

"Why isn't there a gui for the apache configuration? because this is an end-user product, not a server product. it has all the functionality of the "Personal Web Sharing" setup in 8.5 and above. It has an on/off switch and a setting for where your files are, and that's all it needs for an end-user product. If you want to put on your system admin hat and set up multiple domains, you have that option but it's not something that the average user is going to do. And if you need a gui to set up virtual domains on apache, then that's probably not something you should be doing anyway."

I don't really need to say anymore then that....  This whole "line" of thinking is not at *ALL* in-step with the way Macintosh users expect their software to work...  It would almost be better to not "port" Apache to OS-X at all, but to wait for someone to develop  a real web server that works the wway MacOS users expect it to...

If you think I'm wrong, that's fine...   This is one of the biggest problems in the UNIX industry - we've been severely out-of-touch with this whole issue and many of the responses here just impress upon me the same problem....

So, I don't really care.. that's the bottom line.. I don't.. I use MacOS because it's MacOS..  I use UNIX because it's UNIX....   If Apple, with the assistance of forward-thinking developers can make this happen the "right" way (dare I say, a "different" way?..) then you've opened up a huge market that never exists and opportunities for MacOS, UNIX-heads, and everything else to compete squarely with Microsoft....

If not, then a couple of years from now when OS-X basically has become the "NT" of Apple and everyone is still using OS-9 on their desktops I guess I'll be able to say "I told you so"...  WHich, make no mistake, I don't want to do.... So please start looking at this from a higher level or everyone - Apple, ISV's, and users are going to suffer...

If not, OS-X will become the "OS everyone installs because they heard it was cool, but then removed because it didn't work the way it was suppose to"...

- Greg

P.S. Make no mistake --- I hope I am proven wrong and only time will tell... But, the outlook is indeed dismal if this is the way you see the problem...


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## AdmiralAK (Oct 8, 2000)

Well see I am probably the most pro mac person you are going to find but I think UNIX+Mac is a great combo.
Why you ask???
OK.. let begin with OS X's features...

1) International... Just love the way my menus and programs change to display the Language I want, and I am sure this will be an international hit!  Imagine that you dont have to install a localized version of the OS if you live outside of the USA or an English speaking country (English is my promary language but I prefer from time to time to change the language just to practive other languages I know)..

2) The interface... I for one like the Aqua interface, I like the dock, its a quick launcher for my programs (The launcher in my opinion under OS 9 and less was an eyesore so I never used it.

3) The new finder I like, its very fast and easy to navigate ( like Craigs browser for OS 9 and below)

4) The Terminal, while I agree 100% that it's NOT geared towards novices, I like it.  Why?  Because recently I had to learn UNIX in order to use the Sun machines at my University for my CS classes, and since I learned UNIX, I find it intreaguing and worth playing around with and apple SHOULD keep it. (Before my UNIX classes I was tottaly  again CLIs mind you )
	I think that Apple should have a slightly better interface so that novices dont have to meddle with the CLI to get some things done.  But at some point those novices, in order to take full advantage of what they have under the hood of their macs.

5) Classic...Classic rocks!, it's the reason a UNIX system will succeed on a PPC platform.
OS X has something that LinuxPPC and BeOS didnt... the ability to use existing apps with the new OS.
LinuxPPC had MOL but it ran as en emulator, BeOS plainly didnt have this, and the BSDs for Mac didnt.


There are other reasons why OS X ROCKS, but these do it for me, UNIX is a positive influence in my opinion..


C'est tout


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## Jaded (Oct 8, 2000)

LunaMorena -- Thanks for jogging my memory. Truth be told I did use the command line to install the Airport hack, so I lied when I said I'd never used it on the iBook. 

Thanks also for correcting me on some factoids I'd picked up from forums (that Apple intended parallel development of OS 9.5 & OS X, and that there was talk of not including Terminal in the PB).

Devnull, if I am, or appear to be, mis-characterizing you, I apologize.

And if Apple plans to suddenly start shipping all new Macs with OS X in January, then I'm willing to swing way over towards your point of view. I was debating based on the (potentially incorrect) assumption that there was going to be a lengthy over-lap between the two OS's, giving OS X time to mature and become more polished.

"However, given the resources that are available (including both of the previous posters - I might add) there is simply not sufficient resources being put into ensuring that OS-X is going to appeal to MacOS users..."

Agreed, but again I want to point out that we don't have the tools to do anything about it at this point. Granted we could plan projects, but without knowing the capabilites of the system from a developer point of view, its tough to do much more than speculate...

"Make no mistake --- I hope I am proven wrong and only time will tell... But, the outlook is indeed dismal if this is the way you see the problem..."

And I'll make this point one last time... _it seems to me_ (and I may be wrong) that you're taking the experiences and attitudes of a small group of early adopters (the people on this forum) using an incomplete beta product with, at this point, no good tools available, and you're projecting those experiences and attitudes onto the Apple team and the Mac development community.

But if you look around at 3rd party apps that are already available, and I'm not talking about open source ports, I'm talking about OS X apps, I suspect you're not going to see any mention of the CLI. BUT IF YOU DO then please point them out to me and I'll _happily_ send them an email urging them to change their attitude.

And keep using that Feedback form at Apple's site -- I know I do -- pointing out the rough spots in the UI, the places you might find where you have to open Terminal.app to do what you want to do, the places where you find yourself unsure of how to proceed. I mean, that's what a beta is all about...


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## Pascal (Oct 8, 2000)

*devnul* is absolutely right when he writes :


> This is exactly what has me aggravated right now... How I read so many posts about "this doesn't need to be in the GUI" or "why would Mac users want to do that?"...


I think the problem is that some (but, allow me to insist : not all) Unix geeks look down on classic Mac users as a stupid bunch of idiots. The fact is that most Mac users like to _use_ their computers, not _work on_ them. They see the computer as a tool to achieve a goal, not as a goal in itself. This fact alone colours the relationship between the computer and the user.

But the lack of interest for _autoexec.bat_s, _win.ini_s and other _registries_ does not mean that Mac users are devoid of intelligence : it only means that they are not interested in the computer as a hobby. Probably in the same way that most car drivers do not have any interest in tinkering with their car's motor on a sunny Saturday morning. 

A good example of looking down on the classic Mac user can be found in the following quote : 



> We may be going into the command line a lot here because we're power users and we want to do things that are above and beyond the basics. The average user will never need it. The average user can get on with hir point-and-click life with all the menus and control panels sie will ever need. Apple won't even support using the command line, because it really is something that you don't need to use for basic use of the computer


_Everything_, I insist, *everything* that can be done in a CLI can also be done in a GUI. Sometimes, coming up with an efficient GUI for a particular use (for instance, the Apache web server) can be hard because it requires dissecting the interactions between the user and the application. A good ergonomic design is not always easy to come up with, but _it is_ feasible.

As a user, I do not expect that I will have to adapt myself to the computer (or minimally so). I expect that the computer design will be adapted to _me_, the _human_, the _user_, the _sole reason this machine was brought into existence in the first place_.

 Who are these people to decide that I am not allowed to use a given programme because I am not a CLI user ??? Hey ! I am a visual guy, give me a break ! (Huh ! I meant : give me a window !  ) And, I insist : I do not need to be protected from the computer because of this ! Not being interested in the inner workings of a computer does not mean that I must be kept under guardianship.

On a final note : some of you have the feeling they are power users because they have full grasp of the Unix workings of OS X. It is true, that fact allows you to be referred to as a power user. But that does not mean that there is only one kind of power user. Look at the graphic artist and try to do everything s/he does in PhotoShop and Illustrator. That artist may not know an extension from a daemon, but s/he still is a power user in her/his own right. Only not of the same type as the first. And both are valid. So why dismiss the second type as having a point-and-click life ? This is Apartheid, clearly. 

I remember, in 1984, a lot of computer experts looked at the Mac and said Gee, look at that new Fischer Price toy ! Funny that nowadays, even Linux geeks feel the need to install an X-Window of some sort on their machine ! So maybe, just maybe, a GUI is not as bad as some want us to believe.


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## Pascal (Oct 8, 2000)

I just want to add that I do not hate anyone on this forum. I simply do not agree with some of your posts...


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## Jaded (Oct 8, 2000)

"But the lack of interest for autoexec.bats, win.inis and other registries does not mean that Mac users are devoid of intelligence : it only means that they are not interested in the computer as a hobby. Probably in the same way that most car drivers do not have any interest in tinkering with their car's motor on a sunny Saturday morning.  "

Actually, this illustrates my point very well.

*IF* you decided that you wanted to dig into the "guts" of your car as a hobby, you could learn to bore out the cylinders for more performance. Adjust the fuel mixture. Tweak the suspension. You could do all kinds of things if you felt the urge to 'get your hands dirty.'

But, following your OS X arguement, that would mean that the car manufacturers should include an easy interface to doing these things. You want total GUI control of every aspect of the OS, right? And you want to make every possible modification to your car by pushing a button as well? 

Then the question becomes, is it economically practical for the auto-maker to build in this functionality for the small percentage of people that have need of it? And my feeling is, the answer to that is "No." At least not now.

OS 9 is a workstation OS. OS X is a workstation AND a server OS. You should definitely have a slick GUI interface to all that parts of the system you will need in order to USE YOUR MAC AS A TOOL! I definitely agree with that. And in an ideal, infinite resources world, it'd be great if you had a GUI to set-up your Mac as a DNS server, or an LDAP server, or whatever. But for the small percentage of users who are going to need to use their Mac as a DNS server, it doesn't make sense for Apple to dump a lot of time and money into creating a GUI interface. 

Can you folks give some examples of the kinds of things you're not able to do in OS X without resorting to the CLI? Maybe we're arguing apples vs oranges, no pun intended.

In the end, we probably just have two camps here who'll never see eye-to-eye. But it is interesting to see how the other half lives, so to speak.

Pointless anecdote: I work for a publication that has a fairly high percentage of Mac users. Personally, I'm a web developer, and I have a P-III and a G3 on my desk. I'm a 'native' Windows user. Before OS X, the G3 went weeks without being used except to test pages on our site for MacOS compatibility.

I work closely with 3 others guys, all of home are long time, dedicated Mac users. Two of them have a bitter hatred for all things Microsoft, including Mac IE which is, in my opinion, the best "mainstream" browser on either MacOS or Windows.

Now OS X beta shows up. Suddenly my G3 is my main machine (since I spent a lot of time connecting to *nix servers). One of the Mac guys -- he's straddles the line between designer and developer -- grabs it, runs with it and is having a ball digging into it. He's like a kid in a candy store. He and I are constantly swapping URLs and tips and stuff.

The other two Mac users -- both fairly 'pure' designers -- took one look at OS X, groaned and walked away. Clearly they are -not- looking forward to a time when they have to make the switch and learn a new OS. And I can't blame them. They aren't "hobbiests," they're overworked graphic designers who want to get their jobs done as efficiently as possible.

So we have two camps at work, too. Though since we all drink beers together on Friday afternoons, we're still friends. 

To me, OS X is a web developer's dream. You get all the best graphics and page creation tools, and you have a *nix shell to set up a complete test environment on, or to give you seamless access to the servers that host your site. And you finally have Java2.


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## AdmiralAK (Oct 8, 2000)

I agree on the argument of customization.
Customization is something personal, sothing that makes your computer unique.
If you want your computer to reflect your personality, or accomondate you better
you shouldnt expect Apple to provide everything.
How many of you knew most of apples KB shortcuts when you bought your mac ??
Probably no one, but through  time you learned them to make your work, or play,
go much faster and be more efficient.
The terminal is like that, if you want to meddle with it and make your computer more
customized, maybe faster etc etc then by all means use it.

One other point is shareware.  everyone uses shareware to "better" their computer,
There will be shareware for OS X just as there were for OS 9, 8, 7, 6 and other OSs...
There is an apple menu, there is a control strip, there is a NeXT style dock.... there are
many many things to make your computer more "likeable"

The car argument goes well with me and whoever uses shareware on their computer does indeed
"look under the hood" of their compuiter because shareware is something non-apple, non-factory
so if people say "I dont experiment" or "I dont want to experiment" and use shareware, they are
kidding themselves.

Back to Java HW


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## everydayJ (Oct 8, 2000)

Wow, you guys have been pretty busy with this topic!

For what it's worth, here are my thoughts:

I'm a Mac sysadmin for an Information Technologies department at a major university.  As you might imagine, I'm sorrounded by hardcore W2K and *nix users.  We provide excellent Mac support to our students, but we have always been treated as a third-class OS by networking operations, web developers, email admins, etc.  MacOSX is changing their perception.  I've enlisted the help of some friendly Unix support people in our organization to take a look at the underpinnings of OSX; what version of SSH, services activated by default, etc.  They have all been tremendously impressed.  They're not Mac users and they are not Mac haters, they just love the power of *nix (well that, and they hate MS).  If they had the machine requirements, they'd jump at the chance to start running OSX.  The company that mastered user interface is now running it on a rock solid OS.  

I think that everything that a typical Mac user expects with their machine will be there with OSX Final, they'll finish the GUIs for everything that has been part of the user experience in the past.  But I dearly hope that they keep the Terminal.  I've been wanting something terminal-like for the MacOS for years, there are just some things that are much more efficient to do from a command line.  While the typical user might feel more comfortable setting up their IP address from a graphical interface, I'd be happier doing it from the command line and editing a text file.  It's a preference for efficiency.   

At this point, Apple has the opportunity to really have an impact with hard core services in both business and academics.  Most non-Mac people have no idea what OSX is all about, but I'm pretty sure that they'll catch on fast enough (if my *nix friends' reactions are any indication).  By leaving the CLI installed, it really opens up the opportunities for expansion.  Users who would never have used a Mac before will go with OSX because of the obvious power and efficiency underneath a really slick graphical interface.

If Apple wants to prosper, they will leave the Terminal.app installed.

-jonathan


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## LunaMorena (Oct 8, 2000)

> _Originally posted by devnul _
> *"Why isn't there a gui for the apache configuration? because this is an end-user product, not a server product. it has all the functionality of the "Personal Web Sharing" setup in 8.5 and above. It has an on/off switch and a setting for where your files are, and that's all it needs for an end-user product. If you want to put on your system admin hat and set up multiple domains, you have that option but it's not something that the average user is going to do. And if you need a gui to set up virtual domains on apache, then that's probably not something you should be doing anyway."
> 
> I don't really need to say anymore then that....  This whole "line" of thinking is not at *ALL* in-step with the way Macintosh users expect their software to work...  It would almost be better to not "port" Apache to OS-X at all, but to wait for someone to develop  a real web server that works the wway MacOS users expect it to...*



Okay, allow me to put this another way then... if they had a GUI interface for all of the powerful server products already included in OS X (such as apache), then they wouldn't have any means to sell OS X SERVER.  Why buy a $500 server product when you can get a $100 workstation product that is just as powerful?  THAT is why I said the above.  Not because end-users "wouldn't need it" necessarily but because if they do include something like that, their server software becomes pointless.  Even with ASIP and the inclusion of AppleShare over IP in OS 9, they had to limit it somewhat so there was still reason to sell their server product.  With Apache they can't build in such a limitation since it isn't their product in the first place, it's an open-source one, so they can limit it by limiting the gui instead.


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## synaptojanin (Oct 8, 2000)

I've read most of the posts in this thread with interest.  I must commend everyone on their comments - it's been a very interesting discussion.

There has been much debate about the lack of certain functionality in the GUI.  Put another way, one might ask, how usable is the GUI, how "enabling" is it for the average user?  What can they do and accomplish?  What are the limitations?  How does a user (not a tech-weenie that has been anticipating OS X for years) respond to the interface?

I'd encourage everyone to introduce the interface to people they know. Just watch over their shoulder and see how they work.  Of course, somethings will need to be explained, but I think you'll find the experiment enlightening. Clearly, much thought and research has gone into the design.

Re:  Incorporating many *nix functions into GUIs:  In deference to those suggesting that most *nix functions should be in the GUI, I'm not so sure.  I agree that the shipping OS should include more GUI control;  however, it could easily become bogged down as well (perhaps basic, advanced, admin panels of each GUI would be in order).  

I like the other suggestion much better - encourage developers to develop Mac-like GUIs to their ports.  As users upgrade their systems to add more functionality, these additional GUI elements could be added.  

It seems an impossible task to add GUI elements for every possible task someone might want to do.  Linux sure hasn't done it yet,  and even the GUIs that do exist aren't necessarily so hot (like gtop - crash-o-matic).

Anyway, good discussion! Thanks a bunch!


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## Pascal (Oct 8, 2000)

Let me start by saying that I am truly enjoying this conversation, because every participant here shares his or her opinions quite frankly. Like I said earlier, I do not agree with everything written here, but hey : this is a forum ! And this is exactly for these kind of exchanges that the Greeks invented the thing ! 

*AdmiralAK* wrote that :





> The car argument goes well with me and whoever uses shareware on their computer does indeed "look under the hood" of their computer because shareware is something non-apple, non-factory so if people say "I dont experiment" or "I dont want to experiment" and use shareware, they are kidding themselves.


Sharewares could also be seen as decals on the car's body...  Seriously, playing with sharewares or any other commercial system utilities _on the Mac_ has always been a clean, safe and painless game : no need to get your hands dirty : if unhappy, simply put the offending software to the trash and restart. Of course, I understand that by sharewares you were thinking about extensions and control panels, and not about standard apps. The latter I would liken to stuff in the trunk, on the back seat or in the trailer ! 



> OS 9 is a workstation OS. OS X is a workstation AND a server OS. You should definitely have a slick GUI interface to all that parts of the system you will need in order to USE YOUR MAC AS A TOOL! I definitely agree with that. And in an ideal, infinite resources world, it'd be great if you had a GUI to set-up your Mac as a DNS server, or an LDAP server, or whatever. But for the small percentage of users who are going to need to use their Mac as a DNS server, it doesn't make sense for Apple to dump a lot of time and money into creating a GUI interface.
> 
> Can you folks give some examples of the kinds of things you're not able to do in OS X without resorting to the CLI? Maybe we're arguing apples vs oranges, no pun intended.


*Jaded*, I agree with you, as far as specialised software goes. When I wrote :





> Indeed, this is - ironically - a truly positive aspect of OS X : it is now possible to quickly port apps from any other platforms to OS X, provided they are Unix source codes, while the Classic Mac OS's reliance on a GUI rendered any porting of applications a difficult task.


this is what I was trying to say (not with a lot of success, apparently  ). And I am serious about this : for the first time in the Mac history, one will be able to devise a quick hack, test it, and if it works OK _then_ design a GUI for it.

My understanding of *devnul*s arguments, and what I have been trying to say also, is that while this way of thinking might be okay for a software destined at a specific and limited sub-group of users, it will not be acceptable for distribution of software to the general public. Once the quick hack moment of a given software will be overcome, I firmly believe that Mac users will demand a GUI.

Let us take a specific example : the PPPoE hack. At this moment, it is totally acceptable that the PPPoE software distribution has no installer and no GUI. First of all, there are no installers available on OS X as far as I know, so it sort of pushes that problem aside. Secondly, a single knowledgeable person compiled the PPPoE software as a service to others that had the same problem he had. The rest of the problems with that hack were solved in the context of a forum exchange such as this one. This is absolutely great. This is wonderful. This I hope will remain and continue. *But*, and here is the point I was trying to make, stopping here is not acceptable. In the Linux world it would be perfectly OK to leave the hack as is : after all, to use Linux, you _have_ to be a programmer. On the Mac, however, this is not the way of doing things. To use a Mac, you are not required to think computer. So even if one insists on asking _me_ to type ls -askiewisd pppoe every time I want to access the internet : forget it ! No way ! Ill go back to OS 9 or Ill search for another company that offers me a graphical method to get there.

*LunaMorena* wrote :





> Okay, allow me to put this another way then... if they had a GUI interface for all of the powerful server products already included in OS X (such as apache), then they wouldn't have any means to sell OS X SERVER. Why buy a $500 server product when you can get a $100 workstation product that is just as powerful? THAT is why I said the above. Not because end-users "wouldn't need it" necessarily but because if they do include something like that, their server software becomes pointless.


This is really something I had not thought about. And it probably explains the current limitations of the file sharing part of OS X in a more realistic way than the preceding proposed explanation (it doesn't make sense for Apple to dump a lot of time and money into creating a GUI interface), because the day is coming quickly where we will have one family, one web-page server (an example can be found here : http://caslis.com/). So as far as I can understand, there is no good reason to make web publishing unreachable to the un-initiated.


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## Pascal (Oct 8, 2000)

On a topic related to this thread : *devnul* has written twice that OS X was not a very good Unix, while *everydayJ* seems to say that his Nix friends are impressed by the underpinnings of OS X. Could both of you explain the goods and the bads of the Unix foundation of OS X ??? (or anybody else, of course !)


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## AdmiralAK (Oct 8, 2000)

I was under the impression that n order to be qualified to be called a UNIX OS, you had to
exhibit certain traits or features... like the ls command for example, and that you had to be certigfied, or approved of being called a UNOX from a board, panel, or whatever.
So under those factors a UNIX system is a UNIX system underneath no matter what, on top of that UNIX system you can have all the X-tras that the OS maker wants to put on its OS.

This at least was my understanding of UNIX


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## devnul (Oct 8, 2000)

WoW, so much to respond to.. I don't know where to start......

AdmiralAK,

I just wanted to point out that you identified 5 things you like about OS-X... Only one of which has anything to do with the UNIX aspects of OS-X.....

As for your second post:

"Customization is something personal, sothing that makes your computer unique. If you want your computer to reflect your personality, or accomondate you better you shouldnt expect Apple to provide everything."

The reason Apple has to provide this is because: they always have and that's why people have purchased their products....


Jaded,

I'm glad that we generally agree.. I'm not attempting to be overly critical - I merely want to make sure that this issue is recognized and dealt with.....  But, it seems there have been more people posting messages, on this very thread, defending the use of the CLI instead of recognizing the need for a Macintosh-interface to it....  This is what has me troubled, it's the attitude of "we don't have to do it , because it's something only 'power users' would want to do anyways"...    The Macintosh has *NEVER* been like that and now is not the time to start bringing these UNIX-isms to the Mac world....  I knew if this thread carried on long enough that eventually this way-of-thinking would be expressed... And it is being expressed in a way that is very unfortunate for existing Macintosh users....

That being said, I agree with you on all of your points in  your first post.....

However, your second post leaves me troubled....

"*IF* you decided that you wanted to dig into the "guts" of your car as a hobby, you could learn to bore out the cylinders for more performance. Adjust the fuel mixture. Tweak the suspension. You could do all kinds of things if you felt the urge to 'get your hands dirty.'"

Mac users have never had to do this before..... I'll feel very good when I see a control panel for an "open source" initiative, such as Apache, Postgres, or IPNat - because then I'll have the sense that this is as important to developers as it is to Macintosh users......   But, I'm just not seeing it....  I also, by the way, frequent many message boards on this subject - I just find this one to be a step above the others in quality....

Perhaps it would be better to say:

"*IF* you decided to buy a car and wanted to get the upgraded radio, you shouldn't have to learn about electrical engineering just to be able to install or use it.  The operation of the radio should be the exact same way a radio has always worked, just with new features."

Also, as far as I know there are two versions of OS-X.. At least I am running OS-X (server) here, which is very much UNIX like - it does not have Aqua, etc, etc, etc....  I'm not sure if this model will continue into the future or not.. But, we are, in fact discussing the workstation (not the server) product......

"And in an ideal, infinite resources world, it'd be great if you had a GUI to set-up your Mac as a DNS server, or an LDAP server, or whatever. But for the small percentage of users who are going to need to use their Mac as a DNS server, it doesn't make sense for Apple to dump a lot of time and money into creating a GUI interface."

This exemplifies the problem...  Macintosh users have never been willing to give up functionality...   And, mark my words, they aren't going to start now....  If these features are available only to people who "want to use a CLI", then the whole point of MacOS has been lost and this product will, simply put, be a failure both economically and in spirit....

I don't think we need to give examples of things you have to use a GUI to configure, you've given several yourself ... ;-)  So lets start with this list:

apache
ldap
dns
ipnat

....

One last comment....

"Pointless anecdote: I work for a publication that has a fairly high percentage of Mac users. Personally, I'm a web developer, and I have a P-III and a G3 on my desk. I'm a 'native' Windows user. Before OS X, the G3 went weeks without being used except to test pages on our site for MacOS compatibility."...

I don't think that's pointless at all.. You see, the issue is that MacOS users do NOT see the world the same way you do, being that you come from a Windows environment....  And they've flatly rejected the WIndows way of doing thing as being inefficient for them....  To them, UNIX is going to be even worse....  That being said, you should consider checking out "iCab", a web browser that works only on MacOS.....    I always used browsers for testing in much the same way you do, but there's an error report that is just an incredible feature....   Frankly, I've not found one site that I've ever visited that is "truly" HTML compliant.....  I think you would really like it, as a developer...  Oh, it's also very small (1.3mb download) and very fast...  It's javascript support is not 100%, though it's worked with everything I've used it with...

You can find it at http://www.icab.de

Pascal,

As always you are right (again) in my opinion....  But our points seemingly are getting lost in obscure references to "boring pistons in automobile engines", which is a different subject entirely...

I don't know what to say or add that would add anything to your message....

My own random comments again:

There seems to be a lot of talk of using the CLI to tweak the system... In the UNIX world I guess we'd call this "tuning".. And I actually agree on this!...  If someone wants to "tune" their system, like for example tweak the kernel then the CLI makes a lot of sense..  But, it seems arguments are being made that the CLI should be used for other purposes because it falls into this category of "tuning"...  Well, lets just say that I think that is the wrong attitude to take.....   WHen someone bores out the cylinders of their car motor they are not adding adding programs to it and configuring those programs - they are tuning it for maximum performance -- not functionality.... SO the car analogy is probably not as good as everyone might think...

I've only got one more point to make....  Even HP-UX has a GUI interface to configuring these resources - it's not at all Mac-like of course, but they have one...   You can configure virtually everything.....  We aren't even meeting that standard yet, much less MacOS standards for a user interface.....

Yes, I am aware, that installing and configuring Apache on HP-UX requires the CLI...  THat's fine - it's UNIX.. OS-X is *NOT* UNIX, it's the next version of MacOS and we need to keep that in mind!.....

- Greg


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## devnul (Oct 8, 2000)

WoW, there are 3 pages now instead of just 2..   What a spirited discussion!.. thank you everyone!...

Everyday,

yes OS-X can definately garner the respect of UNIX admins now - that's for sure....  Being able to do 'ps' on a Mac system to a UNIX admin is a dream come true...


I would love to see MacOS people learn UNIX cuz they want to and it engages their imaginations - not because they have to... That's all...


LunaMorena,


"Okay, allow me to put this another way then... if they had a GUI interface for all of the powerful server products already included in OS X (such as apache), then they wouldn't have any means to sell OS X SERVER. Why buy a $500 server product when you can get a $100 workstation product that is just as powerful?"

There is no reason that I can think of that OS-X workstation users should not be able to install and administer Apache, LDAP, DNS, etc.. You can do this on UNIX workstations all day long with no difficult what-so-ever... I think the server product should be geared to a completely different genre - just like it is in UNIX.........


Synaptojanin,

Yes that is what I have been trying to articulate...As these applications are developed the additional step of developing a GUI interface to them should be done...  WHen the app is installed the gui to is added too, sort-of like a control panel in earlier versions of OS-X I guess.....

MacOS is the pinnacle of user inteface in my opinion... that's it's greatest asset - so lets not loose that to a bunch of UNIX commands.....  We'll regret it - if we do...

Pascal,

Once again you have outdone me....

"My understanding of devnuls arguments, and what I have been trying to say also, is that while this way of thinking might be okay for a software destined at a specific and limited sub-group of users, it will not be acceptable for distribution of software to the general public. Once the quick hack moment of a given software will be overcome, I firmly believe that Mac users will demand a GUI.

Let us take a specific example : the PPPoE hack. At this moment, it is totally acceptable that the PPPoE software distribution has no installer and no GUI. First of all, there are no installers available on OS X as far as I know, so it sort of pushes that problem aside. Secondly, a single knowledgeable person compiled the PPPoE software as a service to others that had the same problem he had. The rest of the problems with that hack were solved in the context of a forum exchange such as this one. This is absolutely great. This is wonderful. This I hope will remain and continue. But, and here is the point I was trying to make, stopping here is not acceptable. In the Linux world it would be perfectly OK to leave the hack as is : after all, to use Linux, you have to be a programmer. On the Mac, however, this is not the way of doing things. To use a Mac, you are not required to think computer. So even if one insists on asking me to type ls -askiewisd pppoe every time I want to access the internet : forget it ! No way ! Ill go back to OS 9 or Ill search for another company that offers me a graphical method to get there. "

These are words every OS-X developer should live by and understand.....   If not, then by all measurements OS-X *will* be a failure economically and in spirit to the existing MacOS...

As far as my comments about OS-X not being a particular good UNIX.. I'm not really saying it's a bad UNIX.. It's based off BSD , which is a *GREAT* start....   And it certainly will make it easier for software developers such as Oracle to bring thier software to it......  What I mean though, is that it's certainly not the first OS that comes to mind when someone is considering a UNIX database server or an application server.....  Although, OS-X (server) from what i have seen could definately get there, but the two products should definately be distinguished....

The reason why UNIX fiends (sorry, I like the word 'fiend' better heheh) like OS-X is because the UNIX commands they've always used are there, they can telnet into a workstations computer and add a user, kill a process that has locked up, or remotely use the resources of that workstation...  Windows 2000 has some of these features now as well, but OS-X definately gets a solid 5 points in my book on implementation....


Sincerely,

Greg


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## Jaded (Oct 8, 2000)

Ugh. I just spent about 30 minutes composing a reply and somehow caused IE to crash or quit (unsure which it was, might've been errant keystrokes on my part). Damned beta software! 


And i don't have the ambition to type it all out again, so I'll encapsulate.

The 'gray area' where I disagree with Pascal and Greg is actually fairly narrow.

I totally agree with Pascal when he says:

"while this way of thinking might be okay for a software destined at a specific and limited sub-group of users, it will not be acceptable for distribution of software to the general public. Once the quick hack moment of a given software will be overcome, I firmly believe that Mac users will demand a GUI. "

And that has been my argument from the start! If I've given the impression that I think its ok for some task or module or program that is going to be used by any significant portion of the Mac community to rely on the CLI to install or configure, then I apologize for that. I don't feel that way at all.

And when Greg says:

"There seems to be a lot of talk of using the CLI to tweak the system... In the UNIX world I guess we'd call this "tuning".. And I actually agree on this!... If someone wants to "tune" their system, like for example tweak the kernel then the CLI makes a lot of sense.."

I certainly agree with that.

But here's where we diverge:

"But, it seems arguments are being made that the CLI should be used for other purposes because it falls into this category of "tuning"... Well, lets just say that I think that is the wrong attitude to take..... WHen someone bores out the cylinders of their car motor they are not adding adding programs to it and configuring those programs - they are tuning it for maximum performance -- not functionality.... SO the car analogy is probably not as good as everyone might think... "

The argument, I guess, that every executable in OS X needs a GUI interface, and that every obscure piece of software that we d/l needs one as well. That I don't believe. To quote Pascal again, I think that its ok if the 1.0 release ships with no GUI for certain "software destined at a specific and limited sub-group of users" (and I'd definitely throw running a DNS server in this category. NAT/IP forwarding, not so much... plenty of people have home networks to share their cable modems, so that should in fact have a nice GUI. I stand corrected on that point after considering it further. LDAP? Probably not... Apache? It already has a GUI to get you up and running... if someone were to extend this it'd be nice, but you can host a website via the GUI as it stands.

Greg, if your take on the Mac developer community is accurate, and no one has any interest in crafting GUI's for shareware/freeware tools, then I'll stand beside you and start carrying your torch. But I think what we're seeing is just the initial euphoria of geeks with new toys. "Can I port this?" and "Can I compile that?" No one is yet thinking of "OK, now let's make it slick and easy to use." I guess I just have faith that that attitude will come, but maybe I'm giving people too much credit.

And in part, unix folks are just throwing out answers the easiest way they know how. For example, on another list someone asked how to change the default shell in Terminal (dangerous example, of course!) and a unix wonk told him to go to the .tschrc file (I think that was it) and edit it and blah blah blah. And that was accepted wisdom for a good few messages until someone came along and said "Open NetInfoManger, click on Users, then on Your Name, then in the bottom panel of the window there's a line where you can select your default shell." My point being, sometimes the GUI way is there and no one has noticed it yet since they know the Unix way.

synaptojanin -- I've done a bit of that "user testing" thing with my girlfriend. She's not a great example since she's  a webmaster and fairly comfortable in Unix. But what I found from doing that is that it wasn't a GUI or lack of GUI that stumped her. It was the whole new Aqua interface and figuring out what Apple had put where.  In fact, in her case the CLI might be a huge boon as she could just do things the Unix way rather than digging around in the GUI. 

I think, and its just my thought with no real facts behind it, just a gut feeling, that Apple is going to take a lot more heat / lose a lot more customers over the radical change from OS 9 Finder to Aqua, than they are to the fact that you can't configure virtual domains in Apache without going to the CLI.

One last point to Greg:

"I don't think that's pointless at all.. You see, the issue is that MacOS users do NOT see the world the same way you do, being that you come from a Windows environment.... And they've flatly rejected the WIndows way of doing thing as being inefficient for them.... To them, UNIX is going to be even worse...."

Agreed! But do you think we can cover up OS X's Unix-ness with a GUI? (I don't mean that in a leading or rhetorical way.) I just see, already, people irritated about the whole concept of users, and having your own home directory. They want to put things wherever they want to put them and hate that the OS is limiting them. But that's just Unix, right? I mean, can you GUI a way around that without, y'know, just hiding big chunks of the directory structure? 


I'm going off on a tangent here... sorry.

Today I downloaded OpenUp, which is a archive decompressor for OS X. I thought of you guys then... I had to go to the CLI to install it. That was bad...

(OTOH, as CLI's go, this one is awfully easy to use... try dragging a document into Terminal sometime... it auto-pastes the path and filename of the document into the CLI. In the case of this OpenUP, I cut and pasted the instructions from the html page where I d/led the tar file into the CLI, and it worked like a charm. I KNOW! that this doesn't excuse things... I'm just pointing out what I thought was a neat OS X feature.)

It'll be interesting to see how things work out. I'm looking forward to getting the Dev Tools to see if I can build a GUI front end for Apache config files.


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## Jaded (Oct 9, 2000)

Did everyone catch the thread pointing to the http://www.resexcellence.com/ page?

An un-named developer says that Apple plans to yank the CLI from the release version of OS X. Now of course we have no way of knowing if this is a legit message, but, for the sake of argument, let's accept it at face value.

What say ye? Yea or Nay? 

Does this make you feel more confident about the future of OS X?


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## Pascal (Oct 9, 2000)

*devnul* wrote :





> What I mean though, is that it's certainly not the first OS that comes to mind when someone is considering a UNIX database server or an application server.....


I may be overly idealist, but couldn't OS X be a good UNIX _and_ a good "standard" workstation (à la OS 9) ? In other words, what would prevent OS X from being considered a nice everyday Unix ? (Or the base system in a nuclear facility, for that matter...  )

[Some people might wonder what is going on with me, so I might wish to make things clear : I am not against the existence of the Unix underpinnings of OS X. I only wish that this transition to a Unix system will be done without losing the qualities that have made a Mac unmistakably a Mac. In an ideal world, I would like Mac OS X to be perceived as a marriage of the best in both worlds...]

Meanwhile, *Jaded* wrote :





> And that has been my argument from the start! If I've given the impression that I think its ok for some task or module or program that is going to be used by any significant portion of the Mac community to rely on the CLI to install or configure, then I apologize for that. I don't feel that way at all.


Well, I cannot tell you how happy I am to see it was only a misunderstanding !  Once again, I would like to stress that I am not against the very existence of a terminal window in OS X : in fact, if you search elsewhere in this very forum you will find posts by yours truly defending the existence of the terminal. So, once again, I am not against anything that could even remotely look like a command line. (Isnt that whats AppleScript, after all ?  He ! He !)





> But I think what we're seeing is just the initial euphoria of geeks with new toys. "Can I port this?" and "Can I compile that?" No one is yet thinking of "OK, now let's make it slick and easy to use." I guess I just have faith that that attitude will come, but maybe I'm giving people too much credit. And in part, unix folks are just throwing out answers the easiest way they know how.


I totally agree. (My God, whats going on with me today ?!) My fear, at the moment, being that if the importance of the GUI is not stressed enough, the importance of having a GUI for a given application might not be perceived by the Unix newcomers. They come from a culture where this type of thing is more like icing on the cake, while in the traditional Mac community, the GUI is no icing at all : it _is_ part of the cake.

Maybe the basis of our non-agreement lies in the perceived importance or lack thereof we see in the Apache software. You seem to think that the Apache web server is something not important, whereas I perceive the presence of such a powerful web server in the guts of the OS an element of utmost importance for the integration of the OS to the Internet. This is, in part, what the future will look like (Steve J. says the other part will be movies, but I have my doubts). For me, there is no point in hiding it from the user because this software is empowering. Thats why I think that what should be available to the normal user is much more than on or off. Managing options should be easily accessible. Then again, as *LunaMorena* wrote, this may be a (bad, IMHO) marketing decision

<FONT SIZE=-2>By the way, Jaded, I always write my answers in Word just to avoid these @#$% crashes. What takes longer than typing an answer ? Typing it all over again !</FONT>

On a final note, could someone answer *AdmiralAK*s post ? I would be interested to know a little bit more on this


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## Pascal (Oct 9, 2000)

Nay.

As long as the terminal is not necessary to use OS X on a daily basis.

Because the lack of a terminal window is going to decrease the charm of the OS to the non-traditionally Mac crowd.


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## cutterjohn (Oct 9, 2000)

FWIW IIRC the command line and BSD layer of OS X will be purely optional install packages on the final release of OS X.  

Developer packages PB/IB will be downloadable from Apple's dev site ala MPW (don;t see anyone bitching about MPW, and it seems to be pretty CLI oriented to me...)

In any case the short of it is that CLI is NOT intended for end user use, and should NOT be required to manipulate, install, remove, etc ANY program on Mac OS X as Apple will nnot, and does not guarantee that the CLI will always be available, and it defeats the purpose of the GUI.  (Well, to some people, but that is debatable as it is purely subjective.  I guess a better way to phrase this would be to say that it defeats the philosophy of the Mac OS...)

I have been using OS X since DP 3 on both an iBook (airport/160M/3G hd(need to fix this....it getting to be annoying)) and a G4/500/192M/40G.  Various Apple developer articles that I have read, and conferences that I have been to, while not explicitly spelling out the fate of the BSD layer & CLI implied these idea heavily.


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## Jaded (Oct 9, 2000)

Pascal -

"My fear, at the moment, being that if the importance of the GUI is not stressed enough, the importance of having a GUI for a given application might not be perceived by the Unix newcomers."

Ah, that _is_ a good point. I keep thinking in terms of Mac developers who're used to taken a GUI for granted. Ironic that I should forget about the prospect of Unix fans moving over to the OS X platform,since I myself am a recent immigrant! 

"Maybe the basis of our non-agreement lies in the perceived importance or lack thereof we see in the Apache software. You seem to think that the Apache web server is something not important, whereas I perceive the presence of such a powerful web server in the guts of the OS an element of utmost importance for the integration of the OS to the Internet."

Well, Apache is just an example, but in any case I'm saying that, as things stand now, you can set up apache and start running a website with the GUI. What you can't do is set up virtual domains and such, and in order to use those you need a static IP and a registered domain name. They're of no use to cable modem or DSL users since the provider won't support them. So probably the only users who'll be setting these up are network admins.

Still, that's a wobbly soapbox I'm standing on in the case of Apache, because there are other things, like the look and feel of the directory browser, that you can't at this time configure from the GUI, and you should be able to.

That's why I've started to angle my arguments over to the DNS Server issue, as presumably the only folks who'll need that are an ISP.

cutterjohn, thanks for the input on the CLI situation. That sounds like a pretty decent way of handling it to me.

Consider: if Apple ships new Macs with OS X without a terminal.app or CLI, then no one developing software will be able to assume the existence of these tools on the end users system, and so every product that expects to get any kind of widespread acceptance will have to have a nice GUI interface.

But hacker-types can d/l the tools for amusing themselves, tuning the OS (to quote devnull's example), and for any other niche reasons they might have.


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## LunaMorena (Oct 9, 2000)

> _Originally posted by cutterjohn _
> *FWIW IIRC the command line and BSD layer of OS X will be purely optional install packages on the final release of OS X.*



The BSD layer will _not_ be an optional install; it is the base of the OS.  The CLI I haven't heard anything about it being not included, but that one could potentially be optional.  My hope is that the development tools will be an option as well so I can run my BSD applications on the computer.  I don't see why it wouldn't be, especially if Apple intends to draw in the unix crowd.


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## devnul (Oct 9, 2000)

Pascal,

What I meant by OS-X not being a "first choice" has nothing to do with it's potential.. The potential is definately there - especially if they can at the same time bring down the cost of ownership of a typic UNIX system....  

Yes, it could also be a good UNIX workstation....  ;-)  The question is: Will it be a good MacOS?.....

Also, what message of AdmiralAK are you referring to?... I'll try to answer if I can...

On the subject of terminal.. 

OS-X server, absolutely
OS-X workstation, should be a patch for "geeks to play with"...  It should include development tools too...  If a developer releases something that requires a CLI to use, install, or configure they should have to use a 386 running DOS 4.0 (and nothing else) for 1 month for each occurence of the offense...

Jaded,

Once again we almost agree.... ;>  I see absolutely no reason that OS-X could NOT be used as a fully-featured Apache web server and a DNS server... Especially since it has such a strong (BSD) UNIX architecture....  Just imagine how much popular OS-X will be if a "typical" Macintosh user *CAN* set all this stuff up using a GUI interface that is as concise as the Mac has always been....   Apple will, once again, re-affirm their position as THE user interface to beat..........

"Consider: if Apple ships new Macs with OS X without a terminal.app or CLI, then no one developing software will be able to assume the existence of these tools on the end users system, and so every product that expects to get any kind of widespread acceptance will have to have a nice GUI interface."

As much as I dislike the idea of limiting software, I too have to agree that this seems to be the bet way to handle this.............

- Greg


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## everydayJ (Oct 9, 2000)

Should Terminal.app come pre-installed or as an extra downloaded *utility*?:

Installed.  I don't understand why it should be hidden.  I've read the arguments about developers being forced to have a GUI installer if there is not a default CLI.  But, I think that by not having the CLI, it would remove usability options.  With OS9 (and earlier), geekier stuff like ScriptEditor came preinstalled.  How many of our moms played around with ScriptEditor??  Users also have had the option of different Views in the GUI, as icons, buttons, lists, and now as multiple panels.  All different ways of navigating and manipulating the environment, some more graphical than others.  The Terminal is non-graphical.  So what?  It should be there as an option to anybody and everybody.

Having the CLI gives us the option that both Windows and *nix users already have.  Having to use a solely graphical interface dumbs-down Mac users in the eyes of many non-Mac users.  We know better than that, of course, but it is a tough battle to change the other side's mindset and we MacHeads could use all the help we can get.

-jonathan


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## AdmiralAK (Oct 9, 2000)

Just throwing my two cents in:

In my opinion I think the Terminal.app should be left there as it is, perhaps it should be made better by giving us a few more shells, and some color (before you shoot at me, I have not experimenented with color on my Terminal )

Why do I think this?
I am one of those people that has to telnet to a Sun machine to get work done.  I have to do everything online to make sure it works properly, but with the terminal (and the Java DK ) I could do all the stuff offline, make sure it works, and then upload everything to the Sun machine.

On the non-programmer side of things, the terminal is an alternate way of doing things, and there is a demand for it, before OS X when I wanted a CLI on my mac I used some mac dos program, and a macshell program to have a CLI on my mac.  It is just better for somethings in life.

I admit that I dont use it a lot, but when I do use the CLI it's damned convinient, and I am sure that other mac users will find it convinient when they start using it.

Admiral


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## Pascal (Oct 9, 2000)

*devnul* wrote :





> Also, what message of AdmiralAK are you referring to?... I'll try to answer if I can...


The message can be found in the first third of page 3. It was posted on 10-08-2000 09:15 PM.


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## Jaded (Oct 9, 2000)

Greg, I think "almost agree" is doing pretty good for us. 

Let me just say this: If devnull software released a slick GUI interface to allow users to set up a DNS server, or full apache features, or -anything- I certainly wouldn't jeer at them! I think it'd be great, in fact! But, if some open source initiative released a "fubar" package that ran on Darwin and didn't have a GUI, but let experienced users do something [what, exactly? I dunno, some obscure function, ergo the 'fubar' placeholder name] that up to that point couldn't be done on a Mac, then I wouldn't discount the package because it wasn't GUI configurable.

And if the 'fubar' became popular, I'd expect that devnull or someone would code a GUI frontend for the package eventually. 

But I still think that, given non-infinite resources, there are certain tools or apps that will be used infrequently enough that its ok to ship them with a CLI interface, if the alternate option is not including them at all.

And now, to totally muddy the waters....

What about compatibility? So The Fubar Group creates this great new 'net service via its Fubar tool. Fubar runs on Solaris, Linux, FreeBSD, Windows, HP-Unix and OS X. Everyone runs Fubar on their server! It's the new net sensation! But the Fubar server package depends on a command line for installation and configuration. 

Now Jaded Software remembers this thread and thinks "That ain't the way it should be." They get a build of the Fubar open source and they rip into it. Six weeks later is an OS X specific version of Fubar with a very slick GUI interface. The Mac Community heralds Jaded Software as "just a great buncha guys." Everyone converts to the new version, dubbed OS FubarX.


But Jaded, being a flake, decides that BeOS is where its at, and he disbands Jaded Software to go work on BE stuff.

Six months later, a notorious cracker discovers a security flaw in the Fubar server. This gives him root access to any server running Fubar!  The Fubar Group quickly issues a patch to plug this hole. The patch works on Solaris, Linux, FreeBSD, Windows, HP-Unix.... but not on Jaded Software's OS FubarX port! There's a quick scramble for the source, but when its found, the Mac community is horrified to see what sick minds the Jaded Group had. The code is convoluted, undocumented, and just plain ugly. It takes 3 months to retrofit the patch, during which time all OS FubarX servers have to be offline.

The moral of my story? If Mac developers are going to port open source projects, I would urge them to build a nice GUI installer for it, and I would urge them to build a separate GUI interface that essentially 'punches buttons' on the generic open source machine. That way, as the Open Source folks update the guts of the software, the patches should be able to be applied to the OS X versions without much effort.

Take for example Apache. Write a GUI that just writes standard apache.conf files. Don't actually make the GUI part of Apache itself. (Hmm, actually with Apache you could probably write some kind of a mod package, but for the sake of argument lets ignore the 'plug-in' nature of Apache.)

And a bit more mud... 

DEFINITELY don't remove the CLI interface to these packages. We don't want an OS X sysadmin to be helpless in the face of having to configure Apache on Linux. So make sure there is always the option to use the 'standard' CLI way of configuring the software -- that way OS X users can know how to do it that fast and easy way in OS X, and also the more obscure way on other OS's.

BTW, on the CLI issue and the release version. Someone pointed out to me that a member of the Applescript DevTeam on another forum mentioned that "You can't (apple)script the Terminal YET, but that ability will be in there." which would sortof imply that Apple plans for Terminal.app to be around in some shape or form.


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## asterizk (Oct 9, 2000)

> _Originally posted by everydayJ _
> Should Terminal.app come pre-installed or as an extra downloaded *utility*?:
> 
> Installed.  I don't understand why it should be hidden.  I've read the arguments about developers being forced to have a GUI installer if there is not a default CLI.  But, I think that by not having the CLI, it would remove usability options.



How about simply having Terminal.app as an option in the installer, which is, by default, turned off?  Then the developers couldn't assume its existence, and you, as the user, could still have easy access to it.

Krishen

[fixed typo]

[Edited by asterizk on 10-09-2000 at 06:10 PM]


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## devnul (Oct 9, 2000)

Pascal,

I went back to page 3 , top 1/3rd and did not see a question from AdmiralAK anywhere... ;> Can you please repaste the question?....


Jaded,

Yeah I suppose that is pretty good for us... BTW, I should point out that your ideas for the "gui" interface is exactly what I've been talking about and suggesting.....  THus making your "scenarios" virtually a non-issue....

The only thing we disagree on is the important of that GUI for adoption by MacOS users...  ;>


I think the CLI should be there for developers and admins who like to use it as a tool to administer their systems....  But nothing, and I repeat nothing, should require the use of the CLI from an average-users perspective - or even a "power user" perspective... Or even "my mom who knows next to nothing about configuring DNS, Apache, or sendmail and wants to run a web hosting company on a network of 4 or 5 OS-X servers"...

(well, okay, maybe that last one is pushing it just a bit - but that is what we should be aiming for...  Don't you think?...)

- GReg
- Greg

[Edited by devnul on 10-09-2000 at 06:34 PM]


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## AdmiralAK (Oct 9, 2000)

I think Pascal is talking about the "What makes a UNIX system a UNIX system" talk on page 3.
** not 100% sure though  **

I would like to throw this question at you guys.
I used to have LinuxPPC on my mac and I used it a lot before erasing it to install OS X
on that partition.  Do you guys think that eventually there will be other, hmmm what's the word I am looking for here.... GUIs available for Darwin ?
I was pondering the question of OS X on intel (which I emphatically oppose )
and I was wondering "They have ported Dawin to X86, Apple continues to refuse to bring aqua
to the "dark side", and someone ports windowmaker, or gnome or kde, what are the chances that people on the PC side of things are going to want ot use Darwin as much as they want to use/have it now????


Admiral


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## Jaded (Oct 9, 2000)

"(well, okay, maybe that last one is pushing it just a bit - but that is what we should be aiming for... Don't you think?...) 
"

Yes, I -do- think that's what we should be aiming for! But I wouldn't hold off the release of OS X until we arrive at quite that point. 

AdmiralAK -- Is this Intel port of Darwin something anyone can get ahold of? I might like to try that out on an old PC...


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## AdmiralAK (Oct 10, 2000)

To be quite Honest I do not know where you can get a copy of Darwin for Intel, I will look into it though.

A lot of people claim it's been ported (on osxonintel.com and some other sites ), so it's either true, or one huge conspiracy lol 

Will get back to you on the whereabouts of Intelized darwin



Admiral


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## Pascal (Oct 10, 2000)

*AdmiralAK* wrote :





> I was under the impression that n order to be qualified to be called a UNIX OS, you had toexhibit certain traits or features... like the ls command for example, and that you had to be certigfied, or approved of being called a UNOX from a board, panel, or whatever. So under those factors a UNIX system is a UNIX system underneath no matter what, on top of that UNIX system you can have all the X-tras that the OS maker wants to put on its OS. This at least was my understanding of UNIX.


So : could any one comment on this ?

(I mean, with a little perseverence, we could push this thread well into its fifth page !  )


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## devnul (Oct 10, 2000)

On the subject of OS-X on Intel:

I don't think it's ever going to happen.. Microsoft has embedded themselves too much into the hardware side of things and trying to convince developers to write drivers for another OS running on Intel hardware will be very difficult.. Especially with such non-sense as Winmodems, etc....  Personally, I think the Intel people have let themselves get screwed - which is why I don't use them....   Microsoft has been bad for consumers - because they have muscled every software and hardware manufacturer right and left.....  OS-X would be seen by consumers, the media, and software developers as a dismal failure on Intel - always been compared to "Windows" (just like Linux is)...  I think it would be a really foolish marketing decision to port OS-X to the Intel platform...  It would just "downgrade" OS-X success - actually...


Pascal,

Actually this is, I believe, one of the most active discussions on this message board (this will be reply #56!!) and it's been read over 1,000 times...  What a great group of people do be discussing such an important issue with - I must say...

"I was under the impression that n order to be qualified to be called a UNIX OS, you had toexhibit certain traits or features... like the ls command for example, and that you had to be certigfied, or approved of being called a UNOX from a board, panel, or whatever. So under those factors a UNIX system is a UNIX system underneath no matter what, on top of that UNIX system you can have all the X-tras that the OS maker wants to put on its OS. This at least was my understanding of UNIX."

This is also why HP-UX is not HP-UNIX and IRIX is not SGI-UNIX, etc... In order to be called UNIX it has to be licensed as UNIX (which I believe is currently SVR 4.2)...  OS-X is not a SVR version it's a BSD version (though, it could be called UNIX I guess because BSD is a direct descendent of the original UNIX)...

But, that wasn't really the bigger picture... UNIX is an industrial-OS.. The swiss-army-knife of operating systems, it can (indeed) do almost anything if you can just figure out how to string it all together.....  OS-X is a replacement for the easiest-to-use desktop-class operating system...  It just has the benefit of sitting, now, on an operating system that has proven itself in the most demanding environments (and in fact, not only proven itself - but excelled at it)...   UNIX is build from the ground up to be robust - multi-user & multi-tasking, protecting applications from each other, robust virtual memory system, etc, etc, etc, etc (one could talk for days about what makes UNIX so nice...)... Additionally, UNIX has had a very long time to strengthen the operating system....  As new services are added to UNIX the core of UNIX remains mostly unchanged......  It's the same way all services are added to UNIX - consistent and reliable...

Contrast that with NT.. An operating system that still has to be able to run DOS-based (single user single-tasking, no virtual memory system, etc, etc, etc.. Basically 99.95% of the things UNIX has - DOS does not)...  The Windows approach has been to build on that platform and add functionality...  As new services are added to NT it's like every new service is a whole new exploration - exposing another nest of snakes in the NT core that need to be resolved......

So where is it today?...   In my opinion NT was built like a pyramid - only upside down....  It's wobbly and can't stand up very well.. Once you start stripping down it's exterior you realize the interior is pretty much mush......

UNIX on the other hand has it's strength in foundation, allowing other services to be added to it without screwing everything else up....  It was built the way you would expect a pyramid to be built...

Evidence of UNIX's strength is that Apple can even *CONTEMPLATE* what they are doing with OS-X....  You can take the UNIX core and build something as sophisticated as Aqua ontop of it and gain all the benefits of the reliabiltiy of UNIX...   Such a feat would be virtually impossible with NT - where would you even start?....  I guess you could go back to DOS, that's about the best I could think of.....

I could write more about this, but I'm already gettin' all misty eyed... ;-)


- Greg


[Edited by devnul on 10-10-2000 at 06:26 PM]


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## AdmiralAK (Oct 11, 2000)

WindoZe, in any form, whether it is NT or regular sUx ...
I had so many problems with them... all these runtime errors, and error of this, and error of that...
I liked LinuX but the problem was software... I did not have the time or energy to just get rid of my old mac software... MacOS X has the best of both worlds (an pretty much no errors to upset users  lol )

Now I only wish I could get online with my OS X 


I am wonderig how many traits of OpenStep were brought over to the Mac side in the OS (Hardware wise we see the Mac G4 cube as a reincarnation of the NeXT cube) ???How compatible is OS X with OpenStep ? and in general how compatible is OS X with other Uniex - faux unixen systems ??? would a simple recompile make programs for other systems work ???

And just a question to throw out, since I am a big fan of emulation, I was wondering how likely is the prospect of having people make "emulators" or "kaleidoscope" like apps that make OS X look and feel like you are on another machine ???? ( Questioning looks, and maybe compatibility here )


Admiral

PS: Devnull how old is you cube ? (NeXT)


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## devnul (Oct 11, 2000)

Admiral,

I definately like the looks and technology in the new Cube, although much smaller then the NeXT Cube (obviously) it's just as beautiful to look at (if not more)...

On the subject of emulating other environments, in UNIX it would not be very difficult at all.. However, with Aqua it might be more difficult... I'm not sure how engrained the interface is into the operating system (I'd imagine it's pretty integrated)...  But, OS-X is not really suppose to be  UNIX.. :>

My guess is that most NextStep/OpenStep stuff would port very easily to OS-X.. Also most BSD-type stuff should port very easily as well.....   Someday when I get OS-X I'll bring a bunch of my NeXT stuff over and see how it goes....

As for the age of my Cube I bought it in early 1990......  When I bought it originally all I had was the laser printer and default monitor, later I added the Dimension board and a 21" NeXT color monitor (I can't remember the model # and I'm at a client's site right now..)...  It's got the 33Mhz 040 CPU in it...

I wonder if we made it to page 5?..

- Greg


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## Pascal (Oct 11, 2000)

Apparently not.. yet ! 

(Although, obviously, this may help !)


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## p (Oct 12, 2000)

Hi guys,

Wow, what an intelligent and interesting discussion here!
As a graphic designer with some FileMaker (don't laugh!!!) developing experience, AppleScript knowledge and as someone getting involved with web design, I'm really interested in the way OS X is attempting to unite the Mac market niche with the vast galaxy of Unix. I'm really interested in learning Unix, although I realize that it takes long, very long to even be considered an elementary user (if such a category even exists for Unix)

I'm crossing over form the several other discussions I'm taking part in. I'm mostly arguing about how Apple is changing the GUI... for the worse.
'It seems really interesting to me how you guys seem uninterested in the intricate details of the Finder. On the other boards, there are really fierce discussions.

Right now, it seems like there are three groups.
One is those people who don't need to do hard labor on their Macs. These people are quite relaxed now, and they like the new GUI. They are wondering what else is good in OS X, casually comment on multitasking, and wonder when they'll be able to play DVDs.

The second group is where I belong: overworked people who take their Macs to the extreme (i.e. switching disks, locating an immense number of files of a lot of types, using a large number of applications, sometimes at the same time). We really depend on the ease of use, the good navigation features, and the intuitivity of the Mac experience, and are therefore really worried about Apple taking away a lot of the greatest GUI features like _any_ hierarchical menu, spring-loaded folders, pop-up windows, draggable application switcher, Finder windows that can be reduced to a very small size, with draggable folder icons and their title rows reflecting their contents.
We should be really vocal about these issues, because the first group isn't really interested in them, and neither is the third (I'll get to them soon). However, we are the ones who are afraid of _any_ change, and unfortunately, overworked as always, stay away from these discussions. I'm stealing time from my work, jeopardizing my company's greatest project just now...
At the same time, we are also the ones who could benefit a lot from the new OS features, being most of our apps true resource hogs (and crash-prone, too, especially considering our working habits.)

The third group is completely new to the Mac: it's the Unix geeks. Now, this platform inside a platform is very likely to result in some sort of a Mac civil war, but I believe a few "authorities" with enough wisdom will be able to make Unix geeks and Mac point-'n'-clickers unite in sweet harmony...

Both parties could learn from each other. And they should. 
As a Mac point-'n'-clicker with geeky aspirations (currently belonging to the overworked -- stop laughing NOW! -- Mac tormentors), I think OS X should be everything for everyone, or it will die. It must be good for Unix users and Mac users, or what's the point?!

Okay, that was a bit too far. Actually: it really NEEDS TO provide GUI tools for anything anybody's ever going to use. Have you ever administered a Lotus Domino server? It has an incredible number of settings, yet Lotus went through the pain and put a GUI over it. Yes, it's ugly, and not very intuitive, but once you learn it, I'm 100%-sure that it's quicker than using the command line. At the same time, I agree: a GUI put on top of a cross-platform project should only be able to do stuff that is accessible in non-platform-specific ways too, i.e. it shouldn't be able to debilitate the application.

I'd really like to use the Apache server, and if I ever decide to learn its settings, I'm sure I'll feel very smart, being able to remember those obscure settings, and can impress my friends by sitting down to a CLI and edit a text file that doesn't make sense, yet the computer understands it. Gee, I can speak computer-ese!!
But on the other hand, consider this: a GUI, with well-hinted, well-organized, clickable tabbed windows, where every setting is accessible. If you're a Unix pundit, you'll see the exact same words that you're used to, except that you don't edit them, you select them from drop-down lists. If you're "your Grandma", you open the Basic Mode, and you'll be able to access a very limited number of settings (maybe "Wizards") that explain you, with nice icons, what you can do without too much fine-tuning.
And if you're someone who wants to learn (like me), you could switch on a "tutorial mode", where I see all the Unixy gibberish, plus a plain-English explanation, and a question mark that could bring up a brief explanation.
All this hypothetical GUI would do is write to the config file, but it would do so in an organized way. Heck, I imagine even Unix pundits would occasionally say, when point-'m'-clicking away at this GUI someone will definitely write one day, "Wow, I never remember  what this setting does! So that's it!", and there, you've l;earned something about a config file by using a GUI, and you'll be able to use that knowledge the nex time you administer Apache on a Sun machine.
That's one of the benefits I think Unix geeks could gain from the Mac-Unix marriage.

As I have absolutely no Unix experience, I'm sure I've made some blunders in my discussion. But I'm wondering: does this concept make any sense to you guys? I'm really interested.

[Edited by p on 10-12-2000 at 01:27 PM]


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## devnul (Oct 12, 2000)

P,

I am extremely glad you posted a message - you are exactly the sort of person I'm trying to fight for here......

I think the reason we may seem "uninterested" in the finder is because many are UNIX folks and anything is better then what they are getting now....    Also, that from what I have seen of Aqua the UI looks very well thought out.. I'm sure there are some things that need to be done better - and they undoubtedly will be....    Don't forget that many of the features you like in MacOS's Finder were not there in the original....  (THe reason I know this is because I run MAE (Mac Application Environment) on HP-UX just for fun and it doesn't even have contextual menus)...  What you are speaking to are features - and there are some that are definately missing....

I use MacOS to run my business (accounting, contact management, email, etc..), for games, web design, and what little I know of graphics design, and as a terminal for all the UNIX systems (which we use for our projects, database servers, app servers, etc..)...  My only problem is that I can only get so many things going on it at one time....  And sometimes it crashes...  But, I'm willing to deal with that because it's very easy to recover when something does break... I also find that I am much more efficient (by a factor of 2, at least) over a Windows-based system.....

I only add this because I too want the features you want... It would be a God send if I could open up even more terminals and run even more apps...  The problem though is right now I've already got 4 21" monitors on the system - I'm not sure if OS-X will support them (or even how many more it will support)..

The ui of Aqua I think is quite good - it could certainly be improved and it undoubtedly will be....  One of the things that always *ALWAY* irritated me about the finder in MacOS is that I cannot just "minimize" a window.. I'm constantly having to go "hide everything" or hold down a key while rolling it up (or whatever it is called).. I end up with 20 or 30 little menu bars all over my screen and I've got no idea what they are...  Unfortunately, Aqua has made the problem even worse with the Dock....   I do not understand why they cannot put a text label with the icons (!!!!).. I hate icons, they should ALWAYS have a text title with them....   This frustrates me to no end - having to keep track of icons for 20 different applications and guess which one means "crop"....

I probably fall more in the 3rd group then anything else, though several years ago I recognized that MacOS had the best user interface which to me means I could get most things done more efficiently there......   Of course, having access to the UNIX system allows me to use those systems for what they are good at.. I suppose that's why I really don't need access to UNIX on OS-X.. I just want the stability....

I am glad we agree that anything that is expected to be used by an end-user needs a GUI - which is the point of this whole thread I think......  Your analysis of Apache is right on and exactly the way I think it should happen....  Well-hinted, with tabs and all that good stuff....  If I know UNIX folks (which I do - because I'm one of them) and if many of the posts here are any example -- you may not seem that for a long time to come, if at all....  The tutorial mode is a great idea, I think is a great idea....

As a prime example of just how great your idea is, one only has to turn to GoLive and the HTML database that it includes..  I constantly find myself referring to that to find out which browsers are compliant with certain tags and what options they have...  Heck, I'll even use the gui to play with it until I get it right then print it into my server-side app.....  It's a great way to work and both can definately learn a lot from each other....

- Greg

P.S. Thanks for helping us get to page 5 and for all your great comments!...


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## J5 (Oct 12, 2000)

First, Let me tell everyone about this site that I'm building, It's at http://24.161.35.35/osx/
It's gonna be a osx screenshot post,maybe even a pic-post message board? If you check out the site(there's not much there yet) send me an email and let me know of any features you think I should add.

Why did I post here instead of in a new post?


> I use MacOS to run my business (accounting, contact management, email, etc..), for games, web design, and what little I know of graphics design, and as a terminal for all the UNIX systems (which we use for our projects, database servers, app servers, etc..)... My only problem is that I can only get so many things going on it at one time.... And sometimes it crashes... But, I'm willing to deal with that because it's very easy to recover when something does break... I also find that I am much more efficient (by a factor of 2, at least) over a Windows-based system.....



check out the screenshots at my site http://24.161.35.35/osx/screenshots/
especially the two tiffs, I think you'll like what you see.
I'm going to cut them up and write some stuff and then make a webpage out of them, but let me explain real quick what they are. The ones with the orange background are from my powerbook g3 series 233 with 160 megs of ram. Notice the extreme # of apps running at once! And it was useable, aside from the poor screen response. (I have only 2megs of vram!)
My point is that I not only took the screen captures, but I resaved them as jpegs and built that html page, immediately after the screen captures, while in OSX, with everything still running! 
That's amazing!

The 2 tiffs are from my beige g3 at work. 233 also, with the same amount of ram. Open them in photoshop so you can zoom in on spots!

I can't imagine how cool this must be on a new g4!

Now, tho, On with my rants - 
I too am a graphic designer, and while I have X on my machine at work, I still spend 99% of my day in 9. It's still beta, but I figured I'd see how it well it performed in the work zone. 
Here's what I've found so far -

Startup is slow - It's a good thing it doesn't crash(as often anyway), because it would suck if it did. It takes roughly one cup of coffee to restart, with classic. 

I know, it's beta! But, alot of key commands don't work, or worse, have changed.For instance, I'm getting used to the finder window,(I have some additions I'd like to see, but later) But, when I hit apple-n for a new folder, I get a new FINDER, which appears sometimes in the very same screen location as the one where I wanted the new folder, and to make it one tiny bit more annoying, is that it opens to the very same location where you wanted to simply add a new folder, without creating any folders. It's a simple interface rule(for me anyway!) that many software makers break, -

_ If you add a new option (new finder) - you make a new command (apple-shift-n would work) for that option. You can't take an old option(new folder) and assign it a new command so that you can use the now vacant command (apple-n)
for your new option (new finder)._

Apple, can we get a really fast search box on our finder?

Anyone remember say, before sherlock, when you could hit apple-f, and start typing, then hit enter, and once the app popped up, it was already searching? That was fast. The current sherlock is extremely slow, you can't do that anymore with sherlock. I'm not saying get rid of sherlock, I say keep it, alot of folks must like it, or it wouldn't be there. I have a different idea. With the new finder, and those big icons, how about making them half their size (if they're icons, we should still be able to tell what they're for), and underneath them, put a super fast, old-school search. no more waiting for sherlock. don't even use sherlock, use the simple-finder or something. The point is to make it really easy-fast to find a file that you know you have, without having to load all the uselful(but I hardly ever use) features of sherlock. 

On the topic if multiple users(I think)-

now - users are users - we all get the same apps, etc. 

I want users, like *nix user - where the gui is at a bare minimum, and it's lightning fast. why waste cycles/ram/disk space on 32bit icons when you're a cli freak, and they look blurry behind the terminal? And on the other end, we have the graphics people(printing, design, desktop pub, etc) - and the internet people (mom, grandpa, junior). I don't think Apple will successfully be able to satisfy all of these groups of people with the same Os, if it maintains the same attributes like look and feel, simplicity/complexity of sysyem settings, software installers, etc across the board for all users. 

Here's a quote from one of the designers I work with: 

"Yeah, I think it looks cool,(osx) but I don't need all that cool looking stuff to get this work done."

I'm lost now, I just rebooted my powerbook into osx, and immediately I noticed another somehow related(i'm sure) issue:
The desktop in OSX is really messed up. When I download stuff in IE, I save it to the desktop, but it doesn't show up on the desktop. I have to poke around the Library/Desktop/ folder and find it. That's most likely gonne be difficult for the "first computer=new imac" user to figure out.Even the seasoned mac user might have trouble with that one. I'm hoping this is just a glitch in Desktop, but it's worth the mention.

I have to play with X some more now, I'll be back!

Check the screenshots!

http://24.161.35.35/osx/screenshots/
or 
http://24.161.35.35/osx/ (real soon!)


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## AdmiralAK (Oct 13, 2000)

I agree on the part of the ui..ok this is a bit abiguous 
Let me clarify, YES on text beneath the icons in the dock so you know what the hell is what (especially minimized documents and folders),
and yes that people are afraid to move into something new.
While using OS < X (any MacOS less than X ) I tried using Graigs browser, but I found it innefficient because it was an application running on top of the finder which subconciously made it look weird... I really did not want to navigate that way.
Now that I have a copy of X in my G3, I <b>prefer</b> that method because it makes much more sense.  You can go back and forward in your computer really fast and efficiently.
The "overworked" category that P is refering to should no, in my opninion, fear or avoid X because it's different but they should make it work for them.  Granted not now, since businesses can't run on betas, but when the final version comes out.  IN the mean time they can use teh beta at home and play arounf with it to learn it, just like people did when they first bought their first computer system 
(PErsonally I caused my mac many many many many many P) sad faces and corrupt system folders to understand how stuff works  )

Going for page 6 

Admiral


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## devnul (Oct 17, 2000)

Well, I can't let this discussion go away so easily.....   We aren't to page 60 yet.... ;-)

Admiral,

Of course you are right..... Experimenting with soemthing is awesome and occassionally things break.....   Hopefully, OS-X will encourage the Mac users to wanna know more about UNIX... ;-)

At any rate, has anyone heard anything about what effect (if any) any of customer feedback is having on Apple?....  I'm just curious....


- Greg

P.S. There must be *something* else to discuss about OS-X, UNIX, and/or MacOS....


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## budncal (Oct 22, 2000)

I'm surprised people are asking that the Terminal.app be turned off be default. I have never used a CLI before. Well, a long time ago I used DOS for a VERY short time (one day). After installing OS X, I played with it for a week before I discovered the Terminal.app. I opened it. realizing that it would do nothing without appropriate imput, I decided to experiment to see what it understood. My first experiments was HyperTalk (I was a HyperCard developer for many years.). No response from any HyperTalk commands. Hmmmm. Then I tried AppleScript. Nothing either. Then I tried the couple of DOS things I remembered. No response. Hmmm... I went to the store and bought "Unix for Dummies." Wow! I learned how to use the Terminal to manage the system. 

Since the Terminal doesn't do a friggin' thing without the proper shell commands, I don't see why people are so afraid consumers are going to do something dreadful with it. Like they can't do anything to their system with the AppleScript Scripter if they don't know how to use it and understand the language.

Leave the Terminal.app alone where it is. Those who take the time and trouble to learn it, will be able to use it. For everyone else without knowledge the the shell commands, it will automatically remain unuseable.


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## ericmurphy (Oct 23, 2000)

I've been using OS X pretty intensively for the past month now. I've run most of my old Classic applications as well as the Cocoa applications that ship with OS X (Mail, TextEdit, Grab, etc.), and various 3rd party Carbon and Classic applications such as Explorer, OmniWeb, Seti@Home, iCab, etc. So far I have rarely found myself in the position of HAVING to use a terminal or CLI at all. Generally application installations are as simple under OS X as any earlier flavor of Mac OS, and in many cases, all I have to do to install an app is to drag its icon into an application folder (they even work from an "Applications" folder I invented, in my Home directory).

So while having a command line interface is definitely a cool and fun thing to have, I don't think it's going to be necessary for most users. I can certainly imagine my 60-year-old mother being able to use Photoshop under OS X without needing to know that Terminal.app even exists. I think Apple has done an admirable job of making Unix tools AVAILABLE, without making them NECESSARY


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## p (Oct 24, 2000)

In general, I think OS X must have as much as possible AVAILABLE, with making as little as possible NECESSARY.


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## ruzz (Oct 24, 2000)

Been following the conversation for all of 3 hours now, reading it all.... I got bored... so... HERE I GO!

1: People have been trying to get the *nix platform used on desktop machines, many people have complained at the fact that *nix is not used on the desktop... what has Apple done? Brought a *nix based OS to the desktop of any bog standard user... complaining now ?
2. Terminal.app.  This should be installed as default in the same place as it is on the PB... Sorry to refer to Windows, but Windows installs apps like del, deltree, format, ipconfig etc as default to provide for the people who prefer to use the command line... for all these programs, there is an equiv. GUI procedure... I understand that people want Apple to do this, but because there are soooo many command for *nix, it would probably take Apple an age to write the GUI
3. Apache.  Any normal end user is not going to worry about the inner workings of Apache? I have Apache set up to share internet connections, but any normal user is not going to have to play about with installing PHP on Apache are they? Some users may not even know it is there until you say "oh, you are running Apache, how nice".  Because it is an app that is used if it is needed (much like IIS on Windows), then the GUI only has the ON/OFF function and the "here are my files"... who will need a gui to do things like configure Squid or install PHP/MySQL? People who want to do that normally are "console jockeys" anyway and are confident enough to use the cli.  The reason for the GUI on any OS is to perform many of the commands in a friendly way, KDE or GNOME by all means does not have a GUI for ALL *nix commands, so why should OSX?
4. Feedback... that is there for a reason... I know people have been using it... so have I.  Dont like something ? Have a suggestion ? By all means, let Apple know... People will differ in their opinions and that is natural.
5. MacOS X has the GUI because it is designed for the desktop user, OSX Server was designed for people to run a *server... PB has the functions to run a *server IF YOU WANT TO... the people who want to will use the CLI... this is because the kind of people who set *servers up on *nix are using the CLI anyway... want a GUI to set up your *server, install Windows NT/2000 on a PC and use that.

I have been using MacOS X since it was released and I am finding myself using the CLI more and more... the Dev Tools means I will be using the CLI even more... I was a Windows user, still am, but even in Windows, I use the CLI... I have played with *nix before, but MacOS X is actually allowing me to learn *nix if I choose to... and I choose to.

As said in an earlier post, if a user runs a program, does not know what to do with it, they will close it and maybe trash it... if they want to use the CLI, let them... if they dont, who cares... the app should be there anyway.

You cannot stop people from using the apps that they want to, and preventing terminal.app in the final release is stupid... Windows comes with COMMAND.COM (in the case of 9x and ME) and NT comes with a COMMAND.COM stylee app that functions the same... If people use it then it should be there.
People who use the CLI will be *nix savvies (or suchlike) and you cannot chage their ways.  Leave the terminal app there...

I also agree with many of the points in the previous posts, I just cannot be bothered to copy and paste em all !

Regards,
Russ...
ruzz@mac.com


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## devnul (Oct 24, 2000)

Well, I couldn't let the previous post go without comment.......  So here I go (again).. Hehehe..

You said:
"1: People have been trying to get the *nix platform used on desktop machines, many people have complained at the fact that *nix is not used on the desktop... what has Apple done?  Brought a *nix based OS to the desktop of any bog standard user... complaining now ?"

UNIX has been used on workstations for a very long time...  It also has been used in all manner of devices such as routers, etc....    Yet while using these devices (not counting workstations obviously) the user does not really need to know anything about UNIX - they are presented with an interface tailored to the application of the technology... It is a grand idea that Apple has decided to build their next leap in technology ontop of a UNIX kernel...  It's something Microsoft should have done from the beginning, now Apple can capitalize on that gross mistake....

Of course then you had to go and say:

"2. Terminal.app. This should be installed as default in the same place as it is on the PB... Sorry to refer to Windows, but Windows installs apps like del, deltree, format, ipconfig etc as default to provide for the people who prefer to use the command line... for all these programs, there is an equiv. GUI procedure... I understand that people want Apple to do this, but because there are  soooo many command for *nix, it would probably take Apple an age to write the GUI"

Well, here is the problem.. OS-X is a replacement for MacOS - *NOT* another UNIX operating system....    You wanna run UNIX on your Mac?.. Install AUX, Linux, or any of the other OS's out there that will do it.. OS-X has a *MUCH* higher level to rise to then Linux with the KDE window manager....   It *MUST* remain MacOS....   The terminal app should be an optionally installed utility (that I hope they do make available), but not installed by default...    Additionally, under no circumstances should software be released for MacOS that does not behave like MacOS applications should.... If anyone does (as I said previously) they should have to use DOS 6.2 for 24 hours for each occurence.... Otherwise, I assure you, OS-X will become just "another UNIX" (of which there are over 3,000 different version right now at last count)... And it would not be the first UNIX of choice for someone looking for a UNIX system because it carries with it the overhead of the OS-X interface.... It needs to be MacOS and if it's anything less it will be a dismal failure....

Then you said:

"3. Apache. Any normal end user is not going to worry about the inner workings of Apache?" 

------  of COURSE they will... Why would you think a MacOS user would not want to be able to configure virtual hosts, change the number of connections their server can handle, or create addition document roots for their web site?...    Apache on OS-X is *MAYBE* 5% done in my opinion, it doesn't qualify as an OS-X application - in fact it's an embarrassment right now.....   But, hopefully by the time it comes out this will be fixed...  Also, someone graciously setup a method of installing Apache with PHP and MySQL, but you still have to go to the CLI to make it work...   This is progress - but it's not MacOS - not even close...

I agree with #4, so I'll let it slide.. ;-)

However, #5 is perhaps the most intolerable comment on OS-X I have read to date:

"5. MacOS X has the GUI because it is designed for the desktop user, OSX Server was designed for people to run a *server... PB has the functions to run a *server IF YOU WANT TO... the people who want to will use the CLI... this is because the kind of people who set *servers up on *nix are using the CLI anyway... want a GUI to set up your *server, install Windows NT/2000 on a PC and use that."

MacOS Server is definately a lot different from OS-X (desktop)....   However, to suggest that Windows should have a GUI to configure stuff and OS-X should not is a completely offensive comment to the history of MacOS (which is built on a GUI interface - have you noticed that when it boots it does not even have a "text-based" boot screen?...  It's graphical with bitmapped characters..)...   OS-X has to be just as easy to use as MacOS with the benefits that come from laying it on a UNIX kernel - it has to be better then (not worse then) Windows NT/2000 when it comes to configuring services.. It needs to redefine the experience - just as it did so many years ago.....

Mind you I am not saying your thoughts are invalid or without merit - just simply that they should not apply to MacOS...  Apple is not building "another UNIX that's supposed to work on a desktop"...  We don't need another Linux, we don't need FreeBSD ported to the power PC, we don't need another UNIX workstation, we need the next generation MacOS.... Ignore that at your peril - because your customers will not....

Even as much of a UNIX-head as I am - I would never want to see the Mac completely trashed like this....   

*YOU* can go ahead and run the terminal app all you want - but as developers we should step a few feet above that and say "hey, we're targeting MacOS folks here - lets give them something that is worthy of their attention".... And I assure you suggesting to them that they should go edit configuration files like you do in UNIX is going to be an embarrassment, a complete failure, and destroy the respect that I hold for MacOS.....

Honestly, OS-X server is pretty nice, though it has crashed on me way more times then my UltraSparc - and it's clumsy to use.....  It also is slow and doesn't have anywhere near the application support of Solaris - I certainly don't hear Oracle, Sybase, or Informix rushing to get their software working on it....   

Before you murder MacOS with this outrageous agenda I would highly recommend you take a big step backwards and look at what the Mac is all about....



[Edited by devnul on 10-24-2000 at 05:03 PM]


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## p (Oct 24, 2000)

Okay, Ruzz:

You're making an assumption that people willing to configure complicated server stuff like Apache and people who swear by the CLI are necessarily the same people.
Wrong.
You think that server admins use a CLI for Apache because it's better than any GUI could ever be. You think that a GUI would be a kind of an inferior way to administer Apache, that's why there isn't really a GUI for it.
Wrong again.

CLI geeks need to get something in their minds: a GUI is designed in order to provide shortcuts for whatever would take too long in a CLI.
Try to retouch an image by a CLI: it would be possible in theory; addressing memory space for each pixel, running calculations, etc. There are people who used CLIs in the past to code PostScript fonts. Some people believe in manually coding HTML.
However, using Photoshop for retouching an image and using Fontographer to edit and create fonts are bit more effective. Also, try manually coding a 20x20 HTML table, then try a WYSIWYG HTML editor, and compare your efficiency.

But if you take a better look: even compilers have GUIs. You could very easily have a GUI for  Apache. You'd still have the exact same control, but could work way faster. 

The benefits? Speed, efficiency, comfort, elegance, help and manuals just a click away, managing pre-sets, wizards, etc (of course, I'm talking about a *good* GUI).
The drawbacks? None whatsoever. The GUI app would write into the config file, so whatever you mess up in the GUI, you could correct using the CLI if you wish to.
So, why not have a GUI for Apache?

Stop the "it's not right to have a GUI for something that serious" nonsense, and face it: open-source projects, especially *nix-based ones, have no GUIs because those projects are never finished, and nobody seems to find the time to code a decent GUI. The *nix flavors don't really favor a GUI.

Mac OS X, however, has Cocoa, ProjectBuilder and InterfaceBuilder. Creating a GUI for Apache is a no-brainer. It will be there, opening the world of Unix to a lot of open-minden Macheads (a minority, I know). They'll learn the settings, they'll eventually learn the CLI equivalents as well: OS X will teach them Apache, and as GUIs for other Unix apps appear, they will learn those as well. 

In OS X, we could create a friendly face for Unix. Too bad that die-hard Unix hackers can't let go of their CLIs. Even temporarily.


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## devnul (Oct 24, 2000)

P,

Just so you know I am definately a UNIX CLI junkie.....  At the same time though, I recognize that MacOS has a whole different set of standards to live up to.....  That's why I'm arguing so heavily against the majority of the posts I've seen on macosx.com - most of which seem to forget this principal........

That being said, your comments were right on and I couldn't agree with you more.....

It's an interesting idea that "open source projects are never finished"...   I'm going to have to think on that one a bit - I'm certainly not a psychologist but it also seems as though part of the problem is that people will use what is available... Which is why I am arguing so heavily to make terminal app an extra add-on (if even adding it at all)....


Great points - at any rate...

- Greg

P.S. When are we gonna get to page 6?...


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## ruzz (Oct 24, 2000)

When I compared OS X with NT/2000 etc it was in a server sense... where 2000 is designed to be a server system primarily, it has gui's for it's server functions.

From what I understand, MacOSX is the follow up to MacOS9, so therefore, the user is lead to believe that it is a desktop system.. Whereas, taking into account the name, OSX server is designed for server systems (i cannot comment on OSXS as I have never used it).

I understand your points about Macs and the OS they run being different, but it having a *nix core, it basically is just another *nix with Apple's grooovay interface on top.  Strip away all the Aqua and stuff, and you have a BSD based OS... which, in turn, is "another flavour of UNIX" (dont post comments saying "we know it is BSD" cos I know you know :/ )

When I commented about Apache and end users, I was referrring to the people who use their Mac for items such as document creation (Appleworks etc, which I am quite happy to see Carbonised).  From wot I understand, people buy Macs cos they are a lot more "friendly", shall we say, than PC's... this is because, i presume, people do not want the hassle of Windows etc (cos we all know how much of a b*stard Windows can be at times)... if that theory continues thru the era of MacOS X then someone will buy a mac with X preinstalled and use it for the same job, writing documents... I highly doubt someone would kit out a school computer suite with MacOSX computers just so people could configure apache :]  

I can also understand that people may want a gui for the configuration of items such as apache, but if X WAS designed for the "system admin running a corporate network", then i presume the sys admin would know unix and may find it quicker to actually configure the system thru the CLI rather than learning a new OS to find out where all the configuration options are hidden in the GUI application.  Maybe I am wrong, maybe all those people who have configured *nix servers for commercial use would prefer to ditch all their previous knowledge and learn it all again.

I see OSX as a cheap alternative to OSXS, so I AM using it as a server at the moment, but I guess that is not the primary reason for the OS... as you said, it is a replacement for previous versions of MacOS, so it is designed for the desktop, home or business user.  It has the tools available to run it as a proper server system, but many of the *nix servers I have seen run without a window manager, which means that all configuration is done thru the CLI.
If the server setup support is there as an added extra, I dont see why it should have a GUI, i know some of you may disagree, but if a user goes into the System Preferences to change an item, say, his screensaver, and is faced with thousands upon thousands of control panel items to configure things like apache, ipfw etc etc then it will be a pretty daunting experience. Also, if it was done the application route, with seperate apps to configure each service, think of the extra space needed to house all these extra programs...

Take a look at this, conversation with someone I had in light of all this... he configures and maintains several BSD servers for a corporate company...

ruzz`: if u ran a *nix server, would you want a window manager on it?
ruzz`: as in a corporate server
ruzz`: would you prefer to use previous knowledge and configure items such as apache, ipfw etc thru the CLI or would you prefer to wade thru windows of configuration options in an OS you do not know to configure it ?
madwill: NO
madwill: on bsd servers i use here, i dont add xwindows to it
ruzz`: why do you not add it ? performance increase ?
madwill: no
madwill: i dont need it
ruzz`: why dont u need it ? cos u find it quicker to use the CLI ?
madwill: i just dont need it
madwill: i do everthing from a shell anyway
ruzz`: so you configure all forms of services etc thru the CLI... ? why is that ? cos you know what you are doing ? cos it is easier/straight forward ?
madwill: any services i have running were all started and configured from a shell....especially apache

Nice note to end on...

Regards,
Russ...
ruzz@mac.com


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## devnul (Oct 24, 2000)

Ruzz:

You are comparing Mac OS-X (a desktop operating system) to a BSD system that is a server...   This is seriously flawed from the beginning...  Let me try to explain....

BSD is a high-performance server operating system, adding a window manager to it would impact performance... In the UNIX world we call that "running the system headless"... We do it on Sun, HP, SGI, etc systems all the time (it is, indeed, easier to do on a real workstation then a PC because the PC's BIOS is not very well suited for that task)....

OS-X is the next evolution of MacOS (the operating system that defines the standard-to-be-beaten in interfaces)...  Why would anyone want to run Apache on OS-X?...  Well, the answer is simple: because they can...   But, it's definately a far cry from Solaris or BSD because of the overhead placed on the operating system because it is a *DESKTOP*...  It wouldn't be my first choice, that's for sure.. But (!) on the other hand of it it could very easily be used by folks who don't know UNIX that well, yet give them all the features of UNIX...   It is just going to take people opening their minds up a little bit....

Your conversation with the individual is interesting in that it helps to clarify my point... Mac OS-X is *NOT* about running a headless UNIX server, it's about the next evolution of MacOS....

Don't turn OS-X into another UNIX operating system - we've got enough of them - and in fact NONE of them appeal to Mac users..... Indeed, that's a tall order for any operating system - but one that must be met in the next version of the operating system....

As for your argument about the complexity of control panels and stuff like that.. I disagree - that is why the Mac interface has lasted so long and is so easy to use - yet offers all the functionality of a CLI....   It's comprehensive, the tabs are explained and properly organized ,etc...

One of the problems (from a Mac perspective) is that most UNIX apps don't really have an interface to deal with.. Indeed, UNIX developers don't really seem to know how to design them.....   But going off and porting all this UNIX stuff to OS-X is foolish without the effort put into making it work the way MacOS is expected to work...  The reason: it will be lost on 95% of the MacOS market (which will not be very profitable).. Or even worse will turn OS-X into just another UNIX operating system....

Personally, I care passionately about this because I decided a long time ago that MacOS was extremely easy to use.. Just watch a novice computer user sit in front of a Mac as opposed to a UNIX or Windows system.....  It is really quite amazing to see......  Don't loose site of this - the Mac has a market because of what it *IS* and now it can have an expanded market because of what it *IS CAPABLE OF*....  But do NOT lose perspective of what it *HAS BECOME*, or you will lose both markets...  UNIX junkies won't like it because you have to use the GUI for many things, and MacOS folks won't like it because you can't use the GUI for everything....

As a developer it would be foolish to be cavalier about this subject....

- Greg


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## p (Oct 24, 2000)

So, Apple is merging two diametrically opposite extremes into one platform. Who's going to use it?

Mac users will like the new power and stability. I'm just concerned that the changes in (or rather, replacement of) the Mac GUI will turn them off... but let's be more optimistic.
Then, people who like the Mac for some subjective reason, but needing something more powerful for work will probably jump on OS X: finally, they can do some real work on the Mac!

I wonder who else Apple is targeting. Markets where ease of use and power are both required. Possibly companies that insist on having a single platform for various uses, but where high-end computers were necessarily Unix or NT boxes?

After all, Maya is coming to OS X. 

OS X will have a lot of potential... but I don't see how exactly it wants to enter new markets.

Another niche it could carve for itself is "Friendly Unix". Port a Unix app easily, after all this is Unix. Write a GUI easily, after all, Cocoa is supposed to be the easiest da*n thing to develop for. 

Apple claims to have created DTP. Now, they are "creating" desktop movies. Maybe they're after something even bigger? Desktop Thermonuclear Fusion?  Desktop Brain Surgery?

Anyway, my prediction is OS X will have three separate user bases.
70% Mac users who'd never open Terminal.app.
20% Unix gurus who'd insist on using Terminal.app in a lot of circumstances (like our friend Ruzz)
10% Cross-over, who'd realize the benefits of both approaches, and who would actually Think Different from both status quos.

Incidentally, look at how Apple wants to educate its users. How many die-hard Mac GUI idiots even *know* what a HD looks like? Now OS X icons teach them.
Notice how easily a G4 tower opens. Or a Cube! You can even open up an iMac and install memory at home.
And, of course, you have the Terminal.
Maybe Apple wants to do away with the stereotype of the "stupid Mac user"?


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## AdmiralAK (Oct 25, 2000)

Seems like this post has rejuvinated itself lol  Good thing to see.
I am one of the people who thinks that HTML coding is much better done by sitting down infront of  a simple text program or a WYSIWYG editor and coding, and I can debate the hell out of it but this is not the point of this post.
I want to disagree **sorry I cant remeber the guys name** with the person who mentiond HTML coding in his post.  The thing is that even though I do do HTML coding the brute way so to speak and not through dreamweaver or some application does not mean that I will always or 90% of the time use the CLI in my OS X machine.
There are situations when a user has to make a judgement call and decide what is faster, more efficient or maybe plainly what's more worth while to him, using a CLI or using the GUI.  This is a judgement call.  Personally I go back and forth.  Some tasks are better accomplished by running the CLI, and some are better ccomplished using a GUI implementation.  I prefer using the CLI for my Java stuff for example, but I would really despise using the CLI to edit a picture in photoshop (good example by whoever posted it   )
I think that the the people that are in the 20% and 70% in Ps post should really follow this approach.  People can debate the merits of a CLI, or a GUI, but in the end it comes down to this:
We now have an OS that has both a CLI and a GUI (something that has not existed on an Apple Platform since the Apple IIgs).  People should not just use the GUI and expect a GUI for every single UNIX command found in OS X, and people using just the CLI should not be bummed and should not b*tch about how the GUI is dragging them down and how it's better.
The 10% of the people left (from Ps post) are the wise ones that use both depending on circumstance.  I think that the Hardcore old school GUI types should leave their attitude of "I will only use my GUI so to hell  with the terminal" at the door of their nearet computer store when they go buy OS X final when it comes out, because this will get them in trouble.  They wont be as productive as that 10%.  I don't understand why people want to stagnate and not learn something new. I mean, when they first got their first mac that was new to them and they learned to use it and take advantage of it, and ever since OS 1, up to today the MacOS always sported something new in each release, and people went along and learned the new tricks, why should OS X be any different. ???

Admiral

PPC --> (Pos tPost  Considerations  ) Please, no one get offended! and #2, is OS X an actually unix branded OS, is it certified by that unix committee we were talking about in earlier posts, or are we calling it a unix because it looks and acts like one ??? and are we on page 6 yet ?????


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## ruzz (Oct 25, 2000)

> People should not just use the GUI and expect a GUI for every single UNIX command found in OS X



This is the point I was trying to get across when I said the following:



> The reason for the GUI on any OS is to perform many of the commands in a friendly way, KDE or GNOME by all means does not have a GUI for ALL *nix commands, so why should OSX?



R,
R...
ruzz@mac.com


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## p (Oct 25, 2000)

I think CLI purists will just ignore the GUI if they don't like it.
GUI purists, however, won't ignore the CLI: they will loathe it, and call an exorcist to deinstall it.

Mac users are just like that. We're stuck with them. If Apple can change their attitude somehow, that'll be a huge achievement.

I'll definitely be trying to belong to the 10%, but the 70% will make or break OS X -- and ultimately, Apple's future.

Unless, of course, OS X manages to double Apple's market share, and original Mac users will end up being a minority.


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## budncal (Oct 25, 2000)

Devnul stated:

"You are comparing Mac OS X (a desktop operating system) to a BSD system that is a server... This is seriously lfawed from the beginning... Let me try to explain...

"BSD is a high-performance server operating system, adding a window manager to it would impact performance... In the UNIX world we call that "running the system headless"... We do it on Sun, HP, SGI, etc systems all the time (it is, indeed, easier to do on a real workstation then a PC because the PC's BIOS is not very well suited for that task)...

"OS X is the next evolution of Mac OS (the operating system that defines the standard-to-be-beaten in interfaces)..."

I was recently flamed in another forum for describing OS X as Apple's variety of BSD. After reading this post, I was curious to see what, if any, was OS X's relation with BSD. I did a system installation. Upon clicking the "Options" button in the staller, I found the following options:
Base System
Essential System Software
BSD Subsystem
During installation I noticed, among the numerious messages, the following related to the acronym BSD:
"Preparing BSD Subsystem"
"Processing BSD Subsystem"
Using Sherlock, I searched for BSD on my OS X partition and found a very long list of things related to BSD, OpenBSD and NetBSD.
It appears that the version of Apache that comes with OS X is the BSD version, granted with some modifications. Same thing for Perl and Tcl. I just installed Python for OS X and noticed that the files revealed that they were BSD versions.

I noticed a new article recently that one of the lead Apple Darwin developers presenting an explanation of Darwin at a BSD conference. Apple themselves have mentioned that BSD apps can be ported to Darwin with little or no modification.

So the point is, what is Darwin anyway? Should it be seen as a new hybrid BSD with Apple technologies welded on top making it no longer headless? Should it be considered a new kind of BSD, or a BSD derivative? (Boy am I expecting some flames on this one.) 

In 1984 Apple gave a face to operating systems with its GUI. Today it seems Apple is doing that again with Unix (not that they don't already have GUIs), but I guess that should be called a head, instead of a face. I'm interested to hear from people in the know what the exact relationship is between OS X and BSD.


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## ruzz (Oct 25, 2000)

> *From Apples website* http://www.apple.com/macosx/technologies/inside.html
> *Mac OS X is Unix-savvy*
> Mac OS X supports POSIX file system semantics and NFS file sharing, as well as standard services like telnet and FTP, allowing easy operability with UNIX systems and applications. The systems kernel  the part that does the heavy lifting  is based on Mach 3.0 from Carnegie-Mellon University and FreeBSD 3.2 (derived from the University of California at Berkeleys BSD 4.4-Lite), the most highly regarded core technologies from two of the most widely acclaimed OS projects of the modern era. We also took the famous Apache web server  which runs over half the websites on the Internet  and made it friendly enough to use on your desktop for personal file sharing.
> 
> ...



How much more like BSD can ya get ?

R,
R...
ruzz@mac.com


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## AdmiralAK (Oct 25, 2000)

The way I understood it was this:
OS X is a BSD flavor however it a desktop OS, a client OS.
OS X server is a BSD flavor as well, infact OS X and OS X server have the same base, Darwin,
but OS X server isn't bogged down with the stuff that a client OS is bogged down, or concerned with.

The purpose of a server OS is different from the purpose of the client OS.

I think that is what the post was aimed at... am I correct ?


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## ruzz (Oct 26, 2000)

I quoted that point to show that OSX does SEEM to be just "another *nix"...

R,
R...
ruzz@mac.com


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## devnul (Oct 27, 2000)

Wait a minute... OS-X is *NOT* just another UNIX...

You are really seeing this from a questionable angle....  Mac OS-X is not - should not - and better not be - just another UNIX...  We can quibble over the legal definition of UNIX all year long, but UNIX as we all know is more then just a label you attach to something.. It also implies a command line interface....

Why?.. Well, let me be perfectly clear on this - I LOVE UNIX, but no UNIX vendor has had *ANY* success in penetrating the desktop market - in fact, when they attempted to do so it did nothing but hurt their bottom line.....   OS-X needs to be the next MacOS not another UNIX - I'm surprised you don't see that...  People, in general, do not want to run UNIX on their computers at home....  MacOS people *ABSOLUTELY* will not....  (of course I am referring to the interface aspects of it....)

Sure, it can have a UNIX kernel.. Sure, it can have a lot of stuff from BSD.. But, the interface - indeed the experience needs to remain absolutely pure to MacOS......

MacOS is GUI through-and-through.... Mac OS-X needs to be too....   I don't care, really, about supposed power users who are really just UNIX zealots trying to spread the UNIX interface around....  They make up maybe 10% of the Mac market... What Apple, you , and I should be concerned with are the 90% of Mac users who have purchased Macs because of what they are and who will purchase OS-X because of the benefits it provides to them........

Thinking that if Apple creates another UNIX operating system they would suddenly gain a giant leap in market share is seriously *SERIOUSLY* bad magic....   Mac users are looking at this as "another upgrade", and it better not be UNIX they are upgrading to...

To suggest that something has a UNIX kernel and BSD parts is one thing - that does NOT make it UNIX.... The reason is the interface is part of UNIX - and it's something that Mac has stayed away from for good reason.....

But, I'm not really worried about this because the bottom line is developers will wise up I think...  If you ahve 2 developers one who has a version of Apache that is appropriate for OS-X and another one that is just a ported UNIX application - which one do you think the 90% market will use?...  The market will straighten this out , I think.... And if it doesn't, then Apple has just created another version of UNIX for all the geeks to play with and that 90% market will never get past Mac OS9... 

The bottom line is if you want to run UNIX on a Mac get OS-X server but keep your command-line interface off of OS-X desktop....  Tht solves the problem wonderfully...

- Greg

[Edited by devnul on 10-27-2000 at 01:49 PM]


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## ericmurphy (Oct 27, 2000)

I agree that for OS X to become "just another Unix" would be a BAD, WRONG thing. The markets where the Macintosh is traditionally strong, e.g., print and web publishing, content generation, sound and motion picture work, etc., are populated by design professionals who will not, not, NOT use an OS that forces the use of the command line. People who spend 10 hours a day in Photoshop, or GoLive, or Freehand, or DreamWeaver, or Quark, will rebel and flee the platform if they are forced to type in commands at a blinking prompt on a blank screen or in a terminal window. 

However, I think it would be a mistake for Apple to elimate the terminal completely. It should at minimum be an optional install. I don't see a problem with having it be part of a default install, nestled in a "Utilities" folder in /Applications, next to DiskFirstAid, etc. The CLI has its uses, and should be available for those who use it.

But any company that thinks it's going to make any headway in marketshare by releasing applications that require use of the CLI is flirting with disaster. No one should ever be FORCED to use the CLI for any application or system-maintenance tool, other than possibly for server-specific tasks. Any application-specific task should ALWAYS be easily done from the GUI, the same way it's always been under the Mac OS.

I believe that the secret to the Macintosh's success has been the freedom to accomplish a task however the user chooses to do so. To force a user to use a tool he or she is not comfortable with will always be a mistake.


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## p (Oct 29, 2000)

The one and only logical location for the Terminal.app is in the Apple Extras folder on the install CD.

Yes, I agree that a large majority of Mac users will want to stay away from the command line. But I also think that this is going to be an ideal platform for _interaction_ between the two extremes, Unix and Mac OS.

The old Mac OS has its geeks, people who gleefully throw away extensions, hack around with ResEdit, even manually edit PostScript files.
They will probably want to use the Terminal sometimes. They might want to learn a thing or two about Unix. Heck, they might even want to write basic apps using Project Builder and Interface Builder, anyone with basic ANSI C knowledge can do that after studying Apple's manuals for a week or so.
OS X will make the Mac a great computer for _learning_ "real world" computer knowledge, not just staying locked high up in the ivory tower of the Mac GUI.
I think even Apple is fed up with the notion of the "stupid Mac user". But of course, I agree that all this *must* be purely optional. Nobody should ever be *advised* to touch the Terminal unless either as a last resort when something goes terribly wrong, or on a purely voluntary basis.

On the otherhand, maybe, just _maybe_ some Unix heads, determined to make the desktop market, will eventually be forced to create a GUI or two, and realize that a purpose of a GUI is not just protecting the idiots and letting them use computers, but also to _increase efficiency_.


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## Jazzy_Jay (Oct 29, 2000)

OS X opens macs users to the underworld of the Internet.  Some of you know how bad Appletalk is with over 10 machines. I have three linux boxes running as servers and macs running 'user' programs such as photoshop.  Allowing the mac users the best of both worlds is great and should not be questioned as 'this is not a mac OS'. In fact I believe that it will give mac users an advantage over the other OS's.  Now if they update the kernel, like linux... game over.

J


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## AdmiralAK (Oct 30, 2000)

Well I totally agree with the best of both worlds part but while reading
your post my brain started thinking when it his across the part where
people say "this is not macOS".... could someone define MacOS ?
By my understanding its an operating system designed by apple, produced
by apple, to run on apple made machines,  (Since A/UX is out of the picture
this is a pretty accurate hypothesis don't you agree?).

When people see that MacOS X now has UNIX underpinnings and a terminal
they are "afraid" so to speak, and I do not want anyone getting offended by this
remark.  I think that apple has made, or will make everythng that an average user
 might  need GUI driven so that people that do not want to use teh CLI will not
have to use it for anything.

Now there are hobbyinsts and experimentalists, and power users and a whole
bunch of other people that would like to use the CLI, and this is totally a user choice.
The OS now not only has it become a powerful server by having a UNIX base and all the
benefits that UNIX has accumulated over the years, but it is also a great guest, or
individual-user platform because it's stable and it has many nice things that apple
advertized that its new OS would have.

And it * does * run applications that were written for previews releases of the MacOS,
so it's not something totally new and foreign, like when you install BSD or Linux on your mac.

I think that MacOS X qualifies to be a MacOS on the basis of all of the above, sure the UI has
changed somewhat from the original MacOS, and I am sure that some people like it and some 
don't.  I am sure that people tosay use teh System 1.0 scheme of kaleidescope because they just 
don't like platinum.  You can't please everyone and because there is a market for customization
there will be shareware products to change OS Xs appearance just as there are for 
previews version of the OS.

And what about the CLI ?  Well apple wasn't alwatys GUI driven you know, and the first
GUI on the Apple IIgs did have a CLI with ProDOS for anyone that remembers, this isn't
a totally foreign concept.  The gui is there for people that want to use it.  If you think it's
useless and an eyesore, just do what I do to my "launcher" control panels (I really dont like the
launcher), just throw it away or put is somewhere you wont see it.


Sooooo, in conclusion I would like to ask what do you (The people readin this post) think
makes a MacOS a MacOS ??


Admiral


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## Pascal (Oct 30, 2000)

(I've been reading the comments but hadn't time to comment. I still don't have a lot, but I felt the urge to comment on a few things  )

*p* wrote :





> It seems really interesting to me how you guys seem uninterested in the intricate details of the Finder. On the other boards, there are really fierce discussions.


The reason, I think, we hadn't been discussing the Finder is because our focus was not *Mac OS 9 vs. Mac OS X*, but *Mac OS X vs. the Unixes*.  This is not to say that comparing both species of Mac OS is not a valid topic, only that we hadn't had this focus because of our focus on another _possible threat_ for the new Mac OS : the _the risk of losing the GUI emphasis of the Mac OS_, because of the habits of some -- welcomed nonetheless -- newcomers from the Unix world. Yes, Mac OS X is a cultural shock for us, Mac OS 9 users, but probably not as big as for the traditional Unix crowd who must now come to grip with a _radically new concept_ : the GUI is a _compulsory_ part of an application, not simply a fancy add-on.

As for the Cramer vs... I mean Mac OS vs. Mac OS aspect of the discussion, my stance is very near from that of John Siracusa on Ars Technica, so I cannot say much more at the risk of repeating what has been written better elsewhere... And John Siracusa is right on target with the point of view of the traditional Macintosh power users (*p*'s overworked crowd) : just as the current Mac OS lets you work anyway you like, the NeXT Mac OS shouldn't force everybody to work all in the same way. As *p* wrote : 





> In general, I think OS X must have as much as possible AVAILABLE, with making as little as possible NECESSARY.


 This applies as much to the presence of the Terminal.app than to the presence of an Apple menu. The adaptability of the current Mac OS is one of the reasons it has remained mainstream despite Apple's bad management. Think of the _1984_ ad to have the true feel of the Mac OS up to 9. It would be a crying shame if the woman in red would sit, from now on, with the blue crowd ! But as *devnul* said :





> Don't forget that many of the features you like in MacOS's Finder were not there in the original...


As a Mac user since 1984, I wholeheartedly agree !


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## Pascal (Oct 30, 2000)

*devnul* wrote :





> Experimenting with soemthing is awesome and occassionally things break..... Hopefully, OS-X will encourage the Mac users to wanna know more about UNIX... ;-)


This part makes me a little bit nervous. In _the Good Old Days_,  the Mac OS allowed anyone to fiddle with the OS' internals virtually risk free. Since even the system has been built in a graphical manner (go in ResEdit and see what I mean), it is easy to understand for anyone (as a side note : so easily, in fact, that some people mistakenly came to the conclusion that the OS was not powerful). This is not the case for OS X : it is a CLI OS with a GUI grafted on top. This means that it is possible to go even deeper in its bowels to modify it (probably too deep), simply by changing words here and there. The very idea of an OS refusing to boot because of a *typpo*  (we never do some of those, do we ?) makes me shiver. Just try to find that offending typo in that gigantic sea of small files... But maybe am I victim of the cultural shock I mentioned in my previous post ?


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## p (Oct 30, 2000)

I didn't like the fact that TextEdit had no border around my document (it poses legibility problems), so I  opened its Nib file with Interface Builder, and made a large enough margin for my text field. To my astonishment, I found out that TextEdit was running all along, and it didn't just refuse to crash, but _its active document windows took on the appearance I was designing, almost real-time!_

This brings up a kind of an off-topic question: is it common in operating systems to be able to open and modify the GUI of a proprietary application?
With Interface Builder, I was able to open and change the GUI of every Cocoa app I found, whether it was by Apple or Stone Design or the Omni Group.

Shouldn't developers be allowed an option to shield their nib files from espionaging eyes of all users?! Or is this just a beta-like behavior?


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## AdmiralAK (Oct 30, 2000)

I confess that I am not a Mac user since 1984 lol (if I were one I would be a child prodigy lol)
In any case, when I got my first mac at home, my Performa 635CD, I played around with the OS quite extensivelly, and
even though, as Pascal says, I played around with a GUI
I got lots of Sad Macs and my computer would not start up
( you guys must remember the Black Screen of theath with the hex values and the sad mac lol )
In any case, as devnul said experimenting is good, * BUT * it is not a sport for the faint of heart, or the people that don't like restoring their system when something goes wrong.
Sure the CLI gets you into the Bowels of the Power  Beast that is OS X, and sure you can edit, and customize your system, * BUT * again it's an *option* to do so and if you choose to do so and something bad happens you can't throw your hands up and say "It's apple's fault" because you cannot protect people from themselves, and possibly from their stupidity.  IF you choose to edit your system it's your responsibility to recover from it and not to blame your shortcomings on others.
When my Performa crashed I was bummed but I knew what went wrong and I learned a lesson, so I reinstalled my OS 7.5 on and on again.  I was bummed, but I did not blaim others for my stupidity.


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## Pascal (Oct 30, 2000)

[This is not a reply to AdmiralAK's post above...]

Oh, gosh ! I hate it when I read a post paternalistically referring to Mac users as idiots and normal users ! Mac users are graphically oriented, but not stupid because of this. Use PhotoShop for a while and then discuss how feeble the GUI is as a paradigm ! *The GUI is empowering, only it empowers the end user, not the programmer !*

Apache is a nice application that a lot of people could use safely. There is simply no justification for the voodoo required for using it fully. *One of the great lures of the Unix world is the belief that CLI equals power*. This is deceitful. Yes, GUIs can be used to shield users from the innards of an application, but it is not the best shield available. The best one is a white cursor flashing against a black background. In that context, you are free to do what you want (or so you were told), but you can only do what you know : you cannot evolve simply by interacting with the CLI because it doesnt give you any clues about what is going on or about what you could do in a particular context. You cannot _learn_ from a CLI. If you do not know a particular command or its syntax, you are stranded. (It is a good memory game, however.)

Let us contrast this situation with one of my first interactions with a Mac, in 1984 (please remember the year it happened) and with one of the first interactions I had with a PC (DOS). Back then, nowhere in the manuals were there any explanations on how to copy from one diskette to another (there were manuals in 1984, although Mac manuals were never really good). After a frustrating five minutes going through the manual and the available menus, trying to figure out how to copy a document from one diskette to another, I decided to be bullish : I dragged the icon from one diskette to the other ! (Woah !) It worked !!! I could do this because it is a graphical interface. I didnt need to know the computers parlance to cope with the machine. On the contrary, I had to ask to do the same on a PC because I had not figured the correct syntax.

Of course, figuring out a CLI is a real work, so when one has succeeded in that endeavour, one feels intelligent, knowledgeable, initiated, a member of the _Cosa Nostra_ : this is the great lure of the CLI. What this elation hides, however, is the time required to learn all this secret magic. The learning curve is steep and, when you look at it quite frankly, is pretty useless when a good GUI could have made the thing so easy.

Back to Apache (Ive got nothing against the programming team, though, Apache is only a case study !). I do not see what is in there that could not be done in a GUI. Remember : using a GUI does not mean being forbidden to use a keyboard ! It simply means using it to enter relevant info instead of using it to fight your way to access the same info.





> Maybe Apple wants to do away with the stereotype of the "stupid Mac user"?


Apples not the only one to wish this perception took the way of the dodo !

This being said, I am not against the CLI or the use of the keyboard in general. I am, however, against the puritanical approach of the die-hard CLI users. As *AdmiralAK* wrote :





> We now have an OS that has both a CLI and a GUI (something that has not existed on an Apple Platform since the Apple IIgs). People should not just use the GUI and expect a GUI for every single UNIX command found in OS X, and people using just the CLI should not be bummed and should not b*tch about how the GUI is dragging them down and how it's better.


The more ways available to the user to interact with the data, the greater the freedom the Mac OS will allow the user to have, the more popular the OS will become. There is no single better way. 





> I think CLI purists will just ignore the GUI if they don't like it. GUI purists, however, won't ignore the CLI: they will loathe it, and call an exorcist to deinstall it.


This kind of approach only gets people in wars. Let us hope Mac OS X will breed peace, not hatred ! 

<FONT SIZE=-2>And the Angels sang, as the sound of the harps came from above</FONT>



[Edited by Pascal on 10-30-2000 at 11:20 AM]


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## Pascal (Oct 30, 2000)

*ruzz * wrote :





> I quoted that point to show that OSX does SEEM to be just "another *nix"...


Personally, I understand it this way : Mac OS X is a powerful Unix that was designed not to be used as a Unix system. Its power is tamed but is there nevertheless, available if you wish to unleash it. In other words it will behave as Mac OS 10 (with all its (almost) un-crash-able niceties), unless you wish it to behave as Mac OS X (ex)

(About the Unix side of OS X : you can run OS X headless if you wish : you simply have to boot in >console mode.)

*Jazzy_Jay* wrote : 





> Allowing the mac users the best of both worlds is great and should not be questioned as 'this is not a mac OS'. In fact I believe that it will give mac users an advantage over the other OS's.


Und so sprach Zarathoustra...

*Jazzy_Jay* : what do you mean, when you write : "if they update the kernel, like linux... game over" ?

[Edited by Pascal on 10-30-2000 at 12:02 PM]


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## Jazzy_Jay (Oct 31, 2000)

I mean the darwin kernel.  linux has advanced long way because the base kernel (OS) is always being improved upon.  If Apple keeps updating the base UNIX OS then OS X will be better.


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## AdmiralAK (Nov 1, 2000)

When I had Linux I never updated teh Kernel, I only had it for a year but there were updates for it.
I took a look at how to install new kernels and I could not manage to update it (in part because my swap partiotion was misbehaving).
If apple is going to update the kernel on a regular basis they oought to provide a GUI installer
because I doubt that people will want to go into the inners of the OS to update a kernel
(Even though this might be a simple task if you ask a linux head )


Admiral


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## Jaded (Nov 1, 2000)

For some reason I stopped getting email notifications of replies to this thread. I thought it had died and I've missed all kinds of great debate!

Work is crazy right now so I won't have a lot of time to get embroiled in the discussion but did want to spew a few random thoughts.

First, this just struck me. Work IS crazy right now but I'm much more productive than I used to be, thanks to ditching OS 9 and using OS X. FWIW.

P said, a while back:

"This brings up a kind of an off-topic question: is it common in operating systems to be able to open and modify the GUI of a proprietary application? 
With Interface Builder, I was able to open and change the GUI of every Cocoa app I found, whether it was by Apple or Stone Design or the Omni Group. 

Shouldn't developers be allowed an option to shield their nib files from espionaging eyes of all users?! Or is this just a beta-like behavior? "

No, it isn't common at all, but you were equipped with the developer tools. While I see this as a great aspect of the OS, I would guess that soon enough there will be a way to obfuscate the internals of an application in much the same way that you can obfuscate a java class so it won't decompile cleanly. This is a pity to me, because I'm a fan of the Open Source model.

Next random factoid. Since I last posted here, I've chatted with 4 or 5 non-Mac users who're watching OS X closely and contemplating moving over to the platform. All of these people are now either running linux on intel, or are admin'ing *nix boxes. I think Apple's play for the web development community is going to work (they're already working on the web design community, as we all know. I state this just to emphasize the difference between design and development)

Now I'll pick on P again:

"Have you ever administered a Lotus Domino server? It has an incredible number of settings, yet Lotus went through the pain and put a GUI over it. Yes, it's ugly, and not very intuitive, but once you learn it, I'm 100%-sure that it's quicker than using the command line. "

In fact, I have been a Domino administrater, and that GUI interface drove me bug-crazy! Every time I had to do something that I hadn't done in a while, it took me longer to find the right place in the GUI to make the adjustment than it did to actually change the setting.

Compare that to a text based configuration file, like apache's (this might wrap, but in a CLI its nicely formatted and very easy to read):

Want to set the server admin address? Scan through the file and you find:

# ServerAdmin: Your address, where problems with the server should be
# e-mailed.

ServerAdmin webmaster@yourdomain.com

Now let's set the server name. Scroll a little farther down and get:


# ServerName allows you to set a host name which is sent back to clients for
# your server if it's different than the one the program would get (i.e. use
# "www" instead of the host's real name).
#
# Note: You cannot just invent host names and hope they work. The name you
# define here must be a valid DNS name for your host. If you don't understand
# this, ask your network administrator.
# If your host doesn't have a registered DNS name, enter its IP address here.
# You will have to access it by its address (e.g., http://123.45.67.89)
# anyway, and this will make redirections work in a sensible way.

ServerName http://www.yourdomain.com

and etc. 

The point I'm trying to make is, most people who use a computer are literate. Just because a configuration is text based doesn't mean it has to be arcane. And zipping (or searching) through a text file is a LOT easier than screwing around in Domino's GUI interface. Blech.

A good GUI is better than a bad text configuration file, but a good text configuration file is better than a bad GUI.

OK more fires to put out. Debate on without me!


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## ruzz (Nov 1, 2000)

http://www.daemonnews.org/200010/darwin.html

R,
R...
ruzz@mac.com


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## AdmiralAK (Nov 1, 2000)

OK not so serious but I have your attention 
I absolutely hate that my machine is named localhost in my terminal and
I use the terminal quite a lot when in OS X.
How can I name my computer ???
** in the netwoking control panel I have named my mac, but I have apple talk off since
I am not on a network is there another way ???? **


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## Jaded (Nov 1, 2000)

In Control Panel => Network => TCP/IP you'll find a HostName field. Try that. That's filled out with "localhost" by default. (I haven't tested this... I'm just guessing. *smile* )


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## p (Nov 2, 2000)

To Jaded (I'm also busy as hell, maybe you'll get back sometime):

So Domino has a bad GUI. I don't know too many people who administer it a lot, so I don't know if it has a generally "bad" perception, but even I, a GUI advocate, thought it was "bad" when I briefly looked it at a training session. Even the instructor (a Lotus partner) said that it was illogically structured.

But how about a GUI that say, reads the config file, displays it, jumps to specific locations, basically performs "search and replace"? A "config file editor" that is not unlike a word processor, but savvy to the structure of the config file?

This is just a tentative idea. This could be combined with wizards and tutorials for beginners, etc.

After all, a word processor can use a GUI too, even without formatting tools. Think BBEdit, the favorite of hackers. A word processor/text editor with a GUI can be bloated (like Word), or bad in a lot of ways, but using CLI text editors is archaic, I really don't see the advantages of doing that. Use TextEdit, and you'll get point-and-click, drag-and-drop, etc.

If Lotus based its word processor on Domino config GUI guidelines, it would have a different tab for every part of sentence, punctuation mark, and you'd need to click at the words rather than typing them. 

So, it was a bad example. Sorry.


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## Jaded (Nov 3, 2000)

It wasn't a bad example. It was a great example for me! 

"but using CLI text editors is archaic, I really don't see the advantages of doing that. "

Working on your local system, I don't see any either. Wizards at them will tell you they're faster, and they probably are for people who've memorized all the commands.

But when you start working on remote servers, especially a sick remote server (ie, your bandwith or free cpu time isn't great), it's a lot nicer to be able to ssh in and use a CLI and text editor to fix things, rather than to open some kind of remote x-windows session (all of which I've found to be very slow in the best of circumstances).

BBEdit tries to address this by essentially working on a remote file through the GUI, but it has problems working through a VPN... still, it comes close. 

Anyway, my point, weak though it was, is that long time Mac users shouldn't 'fear' the CLI as in some cases a text based configuration is quite easy to use. A good GUI interface to the same configuration would usually be better, I'll admit.

One thing I find kindof amusing, being at least partially on the outside looking in at the Mac community, is that most Mac power-users know all the hotkey commands and hardly ever USE the GUI when they can possibly avoid it.  

My (totally uninformed) guess is that if you took a Mac power user, and a Windows power user, neither of which had ever worked with a CLI, and set them to learn how to use it, the Mac user would pick it up a lot faster.

Not that there's any point to that...just an idle observation.


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## jwood (Nov 5, 2000)

It is interesting to see what people think about the CLI and GUI aspects of MacOS X, I for one really like the CLI and I find it refreshing to be able to drop into a terminal and work away.

But.

I have been very distressed lately while grabbing the latest shareware/freeware for MacOS X.

(Authors, please take no offense to what I am going to say, I'm just using pages as examples...)

To begin, remember way back when you first started using a Mac, you became familiar with the concepts of an Application, a document, a folder, a disk, fairly straightforward and understandable thoughts. To install an application you drag the application into usually the Applications folder, and thats where your applications reside. Install documentation was not necessary, everything was assumed! I always got a kick out of checking out Documentation in hybrid manuals. Windows Docs, 2 pages or more.. Mac Docs were less than half a page. (Insert CD, open Installer, Launch App)

Which brings be to my current quibble with not necessarily OSX, but developers for it.

Check out this page:
http://www.lisai.net/~hamada/Acti/MacOSX/MacOSX.html

Its a nifty screen saver for OSX! (I recommend it too! 

But, if you read on... here is the description:
"Neko.saver (a Cocoa port of 'xneko' screensaver)"
"*	Download version 0.3 of PPC binary"

Whats a PPC binary? (Yes... -I- know what it is, but...) Does the average user know what one is? As you start saying, "Mac users aren't stupid... and don't call them ignorant!", I am not doing anything of the sort. In fact I think it is amazing that we haven't had to deal with this until now. Mac users are used to a higher, more abstract level of operation, something that fits thier mind set, and they understand what the 'system' is doing.

For some reason, *nix terminology and all the technobabble that goes along with it is worming its way into Mac OSX!

Lets check out another page here, perhaps some install instructions.
http://www.classicmenu.com/

This is a program to restore the much lamented Apple Menu to Mac OSX, I don't want to turn this into an Apple Menu debate, I'm just focusing on thier install documentation.

"*	Open a terminal window in the Terminal application (located in Applications: Utilities.
*	Type cd followed by a space, then drag the folder containing the downloaded file into the terminal window and press return. 
*	Type the command tar -xzf classicmenu.tar.gz followed by return to extract the files.
*	Close the terminal window and open the newly-created Classic Menu 2.1 folder in the Finder."

Here inlies the problem. A CLI is a good quick and dirty way out of problems. It saves alot of time on the developer's side, and it is (usually) pretty logical to the person writing the docs/software. Problem is, most mac users have not seen this before, and rightly so. What happened to my Mac-like documentation, "Insert CD, Open Installer, Click Installer, Play".

I don't know where the problem lies, but there is an easy way to fix it. Now all you (myself included) CLI fans, will cry murder, but I don't think the terminal app should even be included on the main install CD. I don't want a developer (again, myself included) to ever even have the option of saying, "Ah well, pop open the terminal, that'll work..."

The minute we do that, the GUI is thrown down the toilet. Now... on the otherside, the GUI needs to be improved by leaps and bounds. If you remove the terminal, we need every user desireable (define as you will) function to be available somehow, someway through the GUI.

Now, of course not -every- command line function can be emulated, replaced, or even routed, but everything that a user would -need- (need being the important word) should be there...

Now, for those of us that like to type like so:
"perldoc perlstyle | perl -ne '($_)=m%it.d (\w+\s\w+)%;y%b%M%;print'"

Then I think I can safely say that yes, we can handle downloading a 500k Application off of Apple's site, or wherever. (The terminal app)

Most (all?) developers should have some net access, that can handle a 500k, heck even 5 meg download (a spiffy terminal app).

For the rest of us, why bother? We shouldn't need it, and if a user feels he or she wants to dabble, who's to stop them? Just download the terminal app.

The important thing is to stress to developers that the terminal is NOT a standard part of the Mac OS, and should not ever be. It can be considered a door into the bowels of the system, that some like, others don't, but it should never be expected to be there.

Yes, I am sure there will be apps, tools, whatever that are exceptions to this rule, and fit the CLI, but I for one, do not want to see the average user daunted with the task of typing out lines of cryptic stuff, just to figure out the web page had a typo on it, or they screwed up something and then have one VERY frustrated user.

Well, I think that has gone on long enough! 

Thanks for listening!

I hope OSX is all we hope it to be.


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## AdmiralAK (Nov 5, 2000)

( I wanted 2 icons on the subject line  lol ... )
Anyway to the point...

I DON'T want the terminal to be a seperate download from the OS X CD.  I WANT it to be there for me to use.  I would like to use the CLI, but I do not know much about UNIX.  I learned enough to get me around when I started programming in Java on a Sun machine.

Having said that, I DO NOT WANT SOFTWARE THAT RADICALLY DEPARTS FROM THE OLD WAY OF INSTALLING THINGS.  I want things to be simple.  Personally I have an idea what a binary is BUT I wasnt to use a GUI installer and NOT have to meddle with the CLI, just because I AM NOT a proficient user of the UNIX (or DOS) CLI.  If I were I would not have any problem for myself.
But there are other mac users out there that are even less acustomed to the CLI.
My girlfriend ( A PC person) was doing a report on Macintoshes and their OS, and her conclusion?
"SO easy that your Grandmother can use it"
DO developpers understand this concept ???  THis has been the concept of the Mac ever since its introduction.  I doubt that a granny will ever master the CLI, and what happend if she wants to install a nice little app, and the develloper has made it so that you NEED to use the CLI ?
The concept of "The mac is so easy to use" goes down the drain.
I think developpers should not expect their users to meddle with the CLI to install their apps, that
is for apps that are for consumers.  IF the apps are for devellopers, the fine, use the CLI, use the GUI, use mind control peripherals for all I care (Hint: sarcasm  )

I know it's a temptation but in the end one of two things will happen if devs use the CLI for end uers not fully educated un UNIX
1) Apple concept of ease oes down
or
2) Their apps will not be used...

a good example is me, this past weekend.  I recently aquired a 150Mhz PC (Old piece of sh*t but useful for experimentation) and so I went online to freeos.com and treid getting alternate OSs to load on it so I could try em out.  I downloaded several that were EXE files, but I stayed away from the .tgz files just because to me it posses greater trouble to download several TGZ files and try to make use of em....

That's my opinion 

ooohhh and SAVE THE TERMINAL... dont get rid of it 

Admiral

PS: Are we on page 8 yet ??


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## Jaded (Nov 6, 2000)

"Now all you (myself included) CLI fans, will cry murder, but I don't think the terminal app should even be included on the main install CD."

Although there has been no official word on this, the unofficial word (from Sal ?? who is one of the Applescript gurus at Apple, and posted this as his best guess over at the MacNN forums a while back) is that the terminal won't be part of the default installation of OS X.

People jump up and down a lot over the PB. I think Apple kind of shot itself in the foot releasing it to the general public.  People see this unfinished piece of software and assume that this is how it'll be when it ships (my prediction is that it'll ship late summer 2001). 

I'm not speaking of present company, but I've been on lists where people are screaming about how much OS X sucks because the print drivers don't work, or whatever...  hell, I saw one guy asking what kinds of e-commerce solutions people were using in OS X, and he specified NOT OS X server. This fellow wanted to run his e-commerce application on beta software!?! Sheesh


Is there a solid and dependable (free) installer package available to developers at this point?  If not, is the lack of such a tool causing some of the beta-days installation heartache? I mean, when someone ports python or something and the installation consists of untarring it, I can relate. Basically someone's just taken the source code and tweaked it a little to get it to compile under OS X PB and thrown it out there. That's cool. I'd rather have that than wait another month while they built a slick gui installer for something I'm going to run from the CLI anyway.

But stuff like replacement desktop utilities (Apple menu replacements or control strip replacements or what have you), or anything coded from the ground up to be an OS X program, you'd think a gui installer wouldn't be that much more work...


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## mkwan (Sep 16, 2002)

the two reasons I chose to buy a macintosh are Mac OS X and I am a loyal mac user...but that is beside the point of this post.  I really like how Mac OS X is setup because I have the opportunity to learn the UNIX operating system.  Knowing the power of unix/linux over Windows made me wanting to hone my baby CLI skills.  I think Apple did a great job of leaving the Command Line Interface open to people who are really proficient(or want to be) in unix.  Apple's Marketing Campaign tried very hard to hide the fact that there is a CLI available to regular PC/Mac users.

that is my opinion of today...


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## theed (Sep 16, 2002)

My opinion is that 2 year old threads should stay dead.  Ideas expressed a few posts up aren't very relevant any more to 10.2

Besides that, I think Apple has been doing a really geed job of putting a front end that is usable on a Unix style underbody while allowing full access from the CLI.

On the bad side, I think they're getting kinda linuxy with their "toss everything in the kernel" fetish.  Mach was not meant to be this.  Unix was not designed so that you could avoid all of the protection of the system by running everything in kernel space.

I think 10.1.5 was 1000 times more stable and sturdy than 9.1 with a typical installation of applications.  I have found that 10.2 seems to be about 10 times as crash/lockup prone as 10.1.5 - I understand that it's about 100 times better than 9.1 was, but I feel like we're losing ground.  All those darn speed whiners have countered the OS's tendency toward uber-stability.  I don't even want to wander into the territories of "My blue screen is prettier than your" because I don't want to know what it looks like.  Worse yet, I don't want the kernel to lock up and not even properly panic.  That doesn't help at all in troubleshooting.


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## solrac (Sep 17, 2002)

On the contrary..

I believe the move from a black and white interface to a colored interface in the upcoming system 7 will be of TREMENDOUS value to Apple's user base. Windows 3.1 is going to be out the door soon and Apple needs to stay competitive or they might lose a LOT of ground to microsoft, who I believe might end up controlling the software market entirely if things keep going the way they're going.

I know I'm only 12 years old but I'll be all grown up soon!

Look, mommy! There's no planes in the sky

uhhh.. p-poop.. poo- pooped.. my pants.... uhhhh

-Carlos-


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## toast (Sep 17, 2002)

I love my Mac Plus.


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## btoneill (Sep 17, 2002)

whats an apple computer? Better yet, whats a computer?


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## toast (Sep 17, 2002)

Who are you ? All of you ?


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## solrac (Sep 17, 2002)

toast, I disagree.

I believe that the pharaoh would be much more interested in the creation of a ROUND object for transporting things to and from the great pyramids, which are coming along quite beautifully might I add.

I believe that your quadrilateral design for a ground-mover is inefficient.

I propose going back to the round design, and .... and... the ingenious idea of connecting two rounds to a long stick, which would make the rounds turn round and round without needing slaves to pick up the rounds and carry them back to the front of the transporting thing!!

I believe I will call this.... a wheel.

Wheeeel. Wheel wheel wheel wheel. Say it a bunch of times, it's fun!! Wheel Wheel Wheel Wheel Wheel Wheel Wheel Wheel Wheel Wheel Wheel Wheel Wheel Wheel


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