Tiger

fjdouse

fjdouse

UNIX - Live Free or Die
Catharsis is good for the soul, when we bottle up gripes they grow and then all manner of problems can arise, so I'm going to vent my rage..
..this IS a rant, feel free to ignore it or disagree or join in.

Am I the only one who is disappointed by Tiger?

It seems like so much was promised but never delivered, or at least, not delivered to the kind of quality I expect from Apple.

Widgets seem to be the only thing worthwhile, I'd really like to run some kind of system monitor on my mini, you know, CPU, memory et al. but everything I've tried seems to slow the system down more than anything else! Don't even get me started on how poorly widgets were implemented in 10.4! I would have written them off if it wasn't for the fact that a system update to 10.4.2 made them more usable.

Downloading, apps or widgets in Safari seems almost exploitable, I've not explored this, but I don't like the fact that Safari knows I'm downloading an application, worse still, it wants to install widgets automatically, what if the widget was malicious? Am I being paranoid?

Mail. To me, Apple have taken my plate of caviar and replaced it with a shyte sandwich (to quote someone I encountered online), the new Mail app is crap. Looks ok but feels really awkward, no visual indicator of activity, unless one uses the Activity viewer which is crap in itself. There is a heap of empty space on the toolbar, or whatever you want to call that empty space with the odd-looking buttons. Yes there is mail enhancer and some other crack to make it look like before, BUT WHY should we have to do all that?

Crashes, I'm getting far more crashes under Tiger than Panther, I've not got quantifiable figures to quote but I'm spending more time dealing with problems than before, apps which just crash, performance problems requiring me to get agressive with things like Onyx or TCC or worse still that frakkin spinning ball, my nemesis, which has spun for upto 15mins a go before I literally rip the power cord out the back of the Mac while screaming holy hell.

Oh Apple, thanks for the latest round of updates, I don't know what you did but my peppy little mini ran like a slow old dog after I'd updated. Even tinkering with TCC hasn't got things back as they were. I'll write the new sluggishness off as a 'feature' shall I?

Where the is the look and feel going? I can't figure it out, plasticy aqua and brushed metal is fine, but now the smooth plastic-like appearance of Mail adds a third look-n-feel which is getting really inconsistent. Now, last night, you know what I did? I updated to iTunes 5, lovely I must admit, I can finally get rid of those stupidly useless podcasts but we now have a fourth look-n-feel? So, Apple, what are you guys doing? My system is looking more and more like a poorly co-ordinated Linux setup!

I don't know how others feel, but I am really disappointed on the whole, maybe I gave in to Apple's corporate jibber, which I'm not usually prone to, but I expected something better than Panther and with the exception of widgets (coz I've made some cool Dalek widgets ;-) ) I think Apple have dropped the ball and the product -as it sits on my hard drive right now-, feels disjointed and just isn't as nice as I'd hoped. If I could, I'd get my money back and go back to Panther. Sure, I could do this and that, install this hack or that to fix various problems - BUT I shouldn't have to, this is why I moved from Linux to OSX, so I could leave that way of working behind.

Anyone else vexed? I dunno about here, but I've spoken to a few people in the real world who are equally as unimpressed by Tiger as I am.
 
Phew! Lemme answer some of the points... :)

fjdouse said:
Am I the only one who is disappointed by Tiger?
Click to expand...
Guess not. Lots of threads about it to be found all over the forum...

fjdouse said:
Downloading, apps or widgets in Safari seems almost exploitable, I've not explored this, but I don't like the fact that Safari knows I'm downloading an application, worse still, it wants to install widgets automatically, what if the widget was malicious? Am I being paranoid?
Click to expand...
Well: The concern was there at the beginning, but the problem was solved over time - and very well solved, I think. Is your system updated to the newest version where you can put the widgets in a testbed before installing?

fjdouse said:
Crashes, I'm getting far more crashes under Tiger than Panther, I've not got quantifiable figures to quote but I'm spending more time dealing with problems than before, apps which just crash, performance problems requiring me to get agressive with things like Onyx or TCC or worse still that frakkin spinning ball, my nemesis, which has spun for upto 15mins a go before I literally rip the power cord out the back of the Mac while screaming holy hell.
Click to expand...
Well, you _have_ to keep in mind that you're comparing the very _end_ of refinement of Panther with early updates of Tiger...

I agree totally with you on Mail's and iTunes' look with you. I REALLY hope that Apple gets its act together at least with Leopard - although they'd better get it back together MUCH earlier and finally find a way to get consistency back!
 
The inconsistency thing is something I would expect in the open source desktop environments like GNOME and KDE on open source operating systems. But this is Apple, and they NEED to really do something about the inconsistencies. Most of us are used to the GUI consistency from the pre-OS X days. Personally I find this indecision to use one theme unacceptable. It takes away from the Macintosh Experience, IMO, and presents a poor example of what an well-designed OS should look like.
 
Ah, words of wisdom from a fellow UNIXer, you're right, I'd allow it to slip on KDE or GNOME, but this is a paid-for product, not flippin cheap either and a critical part of the Mac user experience is the consistancy and predictablilty of use of the GUI. Take the red close button on the top-left of apps, sometimes it closes the window, sometimes it closes the app itself - WHY, DAMMIT?

Fryke ol' chap, you're right about comparing the final Panther with an early Tiger, but if Apple cannot release the first Tiger to be at least AS GOOD as the final Panther, then, frankly, they are not doing their job right and ARE letting us down. I expect Tiger 10.4 to be everything 10.3.9 was PLUS more. Perhaps they should focus a bit more on the software, which is obviously slipping, rather than bloody music players. I am not sure about this 'testbed' Fryke, can you describe it for me? ;-)

I must say, I DO like the new iTunes interface, perhaps (I HOPE) it's a taste of things to come, but I shouldn't have to BUY something like Shapeshifter to make everything look consistant right now. For Gods sake Apple! Just put a damn theme manager in, if can't make up your mind on how things should look - devolve the power to users.
 
I just installed it on an iMac 600 MHz running Jaguar 10.2.8 and it looks great. It also feels snappy to me.

As for teh theme manager, I hear ya. Man I've been wishing for that for years now even with Mac OS 9. Yes, the Appearance Manager was there, but it didn't "theme" like it was supposed to. What I find funny is that Apple prevented a lot of people (back in the Kaleidoscope days) to fiddle with the Mac OS theme and now they can't decide on which one to use. And this is worse because WE CAN'T FIX IT PROPERLY!

As you mentioned fjdouse, Steve Jobs needs to get back on track with the Mac. I'm starting to think that many of these changes that have taken place are a way to move Apple away from the Mac and into something else. Remember that originally Jobs was against the Mac, while Woz and others were for it. Jobs tried to push for the Lisa and a continuation of the Apple line (non-Mac that is) but when he noticed that it was a failed venture, he jumped ship and supported that Macintosh all the way. Sometimes I lose respect for him only because of things like this. It's a shame that Woz was the one that always got the shaft even though he had the greatest ideas around. :rolleyes:
 
fjdouse said:
Downloading, apps or widgets in Safari seems almost exploitable, I've not explored this, but I don't like the fact that Safari knows I'm downloading an application, worse still, it wants to install widgets automatically, what if the widget was malicious? Am I being paranoid?
Click to expand...
No, you're not being paranoid. The good news is that you can just turn it off. In Safari's preferences, uncheck the "open 'safe' files after downloading" (don't those quotes around the word safe just give you so much confidence? ;) ). This has actually been a big gaping hole since before Tiger. The good news is every time an exploit is discovered, Apple is reasonably quick to fix it. The bad news is exploits keep being found again and again. The widget vulnerability was just the latest. There were at least a couple that affected Panther, too.

The whole "open 'safe' files after downloading" option should go. It's a downright Microsoftian feature. It's just a disaster waiting to happen. I've said that since day 1, and I've been proven right time after time. Thankfully the malware writers don't seem to care to exploit these things.


I agree with you completely about the appearance issue. Read my rants in the iTunes 5 thread for my detailed opinions on that matter.


Overall, I'm very disappointed in Tiger. True, you can say it's unfair to compare the "young" Tiger to the "mature" Panther, but....Panther was pretty good from the start. There were issues, yes, but I could still recommend it wholeheartedly. I still can't recommend Tiger to Panther users. Spotlight was implemented half-assedly, and that was the BIG new feature.

Stability has been fine for me, but performance has been downright painful. I've kind of just gotten used to the fact that everything's so slow and that the beach ball (we really need a better name for that thing, cuz it's like no beach ball I've ever seen!) is a regular part of my life now.

If I weren't a developer, I would have downgraded after a few days with Tiger. But as a developer, I really like to be on the edge. So I make do.

Honestly, every move Apple's made lately has made me think more and more of ditching the Mac altogether. I just wish there were something better I could turn to......
 
That "testbed" (I probably used some weird term in my mind that didn't really exist?) is the widget installer. If you double-click a widget in the Finder or Safari wants to install it to the Dashboard directly, you can now - in 10.4.2 and 10.4.3 - run the widget inside the widget installer, without letting the widget have access to the Terminal stuff etc.
 
Yes it does that.

To add, I'm now a breath away from reinstalling my Mac back to Panther, I really think Tiger is pure sh*t. It runs like a dog on my mini, I'm furious with how poorly my Mac now performs, after installing a few apps and loading in some extra Garageband loops, the system is virtually unusable, it takes forever to startup and all the repairing and fixing utils in the world isn't helping.

I WANT MY MONEY BACK
 
i agree with you. i disappointed with myself for not being content with panther. the hype got me. i don't like tigers features, or their implementation - spotlight is half a job, and not nearly system wide. smart folders are just too slow and clucky to be useful, they need to be far more fundamental. the way it searches is poor, offering no context to which file it is you want (say i have 5 versions of a song with the same title?), and there seems to be no consistency in even search areas! (the spotlight icon, top right; the "show all" window; the Finder apple+f and the open dialogue box, all differ)

dashboard is slow, and as it has been pointed out, too slow (it takes less time to find the real calculator and open it then to go into dashboard and add the calculator) to really benefit anything. it was always designed to be a distraction. and where is Quartz 2d extreme?

mail, i don't use, as i have http mail; ichat, i don't use because the world still uses msn. the slideshow is really difficult when more than 10 images are loaded...

but... with all of that... i have gotten so used to spotlight, i am totally sure i couldn't go back. i've tried. i look up at the old apple menu logo, and dispair at going backwards. damn apple. this is a poor version.
 
I been reading what everyone has been saying here and its made me curious. Do you guys think that perhaps it would have been best if Tiger never released? That way Apple could have kept on working on it all the way to the time Vista was about to come out. It probably be faster, more features, a set theme through out all apps, perhaps a theme changer (I'd love that), ect ect.

I'm just wondering all this because sure enough Vista is on its way. We wont know for sure just how improved it'll be till its here but, would be kinda nice to think Apple has something in the works that'll be a nice step forward for us around that time. I just get to thinking if Apple had kept Tiger in development, how much bigger it could have been, and well more satisfying.
 
tbh, i think even vista looks more unified than macos at the moment, everything seems bitty since tiger. expecially with dashboard and spotlight. two extra features that seem like add-ons, not a flowing pool of tools and functions. like a car with a cd player on the dashboard compared to one with a cd changer built in.

i do have an idea though - a theme selector - it would apply to ALL apps, system wide: you choose whether you want aqua, bushed steel, unified etc. and all would change accordingly.
 
Now, I didn't upgrade from Panther when Tiger first came out. I was thinking of upgrading, but my productivity is perfectly satisfactory with Panther. It sounds like you guys wouldn't suggest upgrading at this point... What do you think? I know it'll get better with time, but I'm happy.
 
I think this thread raises some very valid points, points I hope Apple will take the time to consider and take on board for Leopard.

Overall Tiger is a much better operating system to me than Panther. It feels faster and cleaner. Thats _not_ to say that I have a lot of things bugging me.

fjdouse raises some extremely valid points that I totally agree with. The actual _look_ of Tiger is driving me insane. The _only_ look I like is the unified title bar/toolbar look with large icons without text, simple as that. The fact that we have so many UI's over every application, from Safari/Finder's brushed metal, to the _ugly_ new Mail, to the _extremely_ ugly iTunes to the more decent unified title bar/toolbar look. This needs to change _now_. I like consistency. This isn't a beta to see what looks good where. It's a fact that brushed metal is hated, so get rid of it.

With windows, I don't like the way inactive windows look anymore. Back in the Puma days an inactive window would have its title bar partly transparent, making the active window to me much more visible. After looking at some screenshots of Vista, I've noticed that inactive windows are transparent and the contents _behind_ this window seem blurry/frosty. I really like this feature and I think Apple should employ something similar.

On the subject of Dashboard, I don't find it terribly useful. The only widgets I use are Weather, Calculator and occasionally Dictionary/Thesaurus. That being said, it's nice to have the calculator one button press away.

Themes has always come up in the past, but it doesn't really bother me. I just want some consistency between apps, the brushed metal gone, the Mail look gone, and unified toolbar look in all my apps.

PS. Fix the damn minimized window badging too! The app icons on minimized windows always look like they're a 16x16 image resized to a 48x48 or something.
 
Wow, I was unaware the system was so buggy. But then, I up-graded to Tiger two weeks ago from system 7.5 which I had been using for the last 11 years. Nor was I aware of any of the Tiger hype.

I guess it depends upon your perspective, really. Sure I've endured a crash since I've had it but holy smokes, compared to what I've been using I feel like I was just promoted from ship's galley to the bridge of the Enterprise.

I'm sure I'll be spoiled eventually but for now I'm enjoying the ride.
 
Oh believe me, the gap between System 7.5 and Tiger is about as big as Earth to Pluto. If you want a bigger shock, go back to 7.5 after you've used Tiger for a few months :p
 
brownelkspeaks said:
Wow, I was unaware the system was so buggy. But then, I up-graded to Tiger two weeks ago from system 7.5 which I had been using for the last 11 years. Nor was I aware of any of the Tiger hype.

I guess it depends upon your perspective, really. Sure I've endured a crash since I've had it but holy smokes, compared to what I've been using I feel like I was just promoted from ship's galley to the bridge of the Enterprise.

I'm sure I'll be spoiled eventually but for now I'm enjoying the ride.
Click to expand...

Wow! Talk about holding out! ::ha::

Well, although I still have my qualms about the inconsistency of the interface, I have to say that my iMac G5 running 10.4.2 is running quite well and has been rock solid since I bought it. Of course, 10.4 was already installed on this Mac so it probably doesn't count. Maybe once I upgrade to 10.5, eh?? Then I'll be back whining about how it didn't upgrade properly. But then again, I always like to install from scratch on my desktops. :D
 
Veljo,
Enjoyed reading your comments, I am probably in the minority when I say I really like brushed metal, in fact, everyone I've spoken to in the 'real' world likes it too. More brushed metal for me! Get rid of the cheap, tacky plastic! It does seem like Apple are just using commercial products to beta-test ideas, this is disgusting. You wanna use MY Mac to beta test, fine - but don't bloody well charge ME for the inconvenience! THEN tell me I'm getting something better than I had before!

To me, I really feel disappointed by Apple and overall, I'm disappointed a bit by the switch back to Mac. There, I've said it. I never thought I would. The only thing which makes it worthwhile is iLife, it makes many tasks easy and pleasant, as do many Mac applications. I liked Panther, it ran well on my mini and was a joy to use, Tiger is patchy at best. One day it can boot up like lightning, the desktop can appear and it's ready to go, other times it will boot and the desktop appears but another 30 secs elapse before anything is usable because something is still chugging away.. what? where? why? Finder doesn't feel as I think it should, it feels slow, I cannot quantify that and I cannot give an example which is consistantly repeatable.

Consistancy is the word here. There seems to be a lack of it.

I may be wrong but it feels like Apple are far more interested in tempting spoilt brats of the 'iWhatever generation' with more and more and MORE F***ING music players than computers. Yup, another player doing EXACTLY the same job as the previous model, another player to be added to the growing signature lines of the click-kiddies, another player to cast into the drawer with the others within 3 months. Apple, what are you? Because I REALLY do not know. Get your priorities in order. Perhaps the company should split into two or something, one to play it's little music empire games and one to get on with the business of making decent computers. At the moment it feels like a half-arsed effort with the Mac, "Yeah, we'll just palm them off with this crap until we can sell them PCs, erm, I mean Intel Macs, they're so stupid they won't know the difference. Anyway, let's concentrate on something more fun, another music player!"

Apple, you are falling out of favour with me.


Rant over. :)
 
nixgeek said:
As you mentioned fjdouse, Steve Jobs needs to get back on track with the Mac. I'm starting to think that many of these changes that have taken place are a way to move Apple away from the Mac and into something else. Remember that originally Jobs was against the Mac, while Woz and others were for it. Jobs tried to push for the Lisa and a continuation of the Apple line (non-Mac that is) but when he noticed that it was a failed venture, he jumped ship and supported that Macintosh all the way. Sometimes I lose respect for him only because of things like this. It's a shame that Woz was the one that always got the shaft even though he had the greatest ideas around. :rolleyes:
Click to expand...


So what is the difference in Lisa from Mac? has anyone here seen it?
 
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