Ze Olde Mac vs. PC thread

QUOTE (forza_schumi @ Dec 23 2008, 12:16 AM)

couldnt resist : LOL.
anyway, i wanted to resist from taking part in this discussion, but

Interesting fact, can you get me a citation on that ?

CODE

http://www.apple.com/pr/library/2004/mar/01shake.html

QUOTE (KC @ Dec 23 2008, 02:23 AM)

adroit,

do you write code and develop on both Mac and Windows?

Not if you're talking professionally! But, I do use my mac from home, transfer data from the office network, and then code out solutions using my Mac! A windows machine wouldn't have helped me in that case, specially not out of the box! I do a lot of scripting though.

For personal use, I tried my hands at coding some software for some problems I had with my Windows machine, but gave up eventually as it was very difficult for me to integrate my C++ knowledge with the amount of C# coding example out there!

Since I moved to the Mac, I have written a couple of Mac applications for my personal use, one of which my colleagues at office found useful to automate a major part of their work. The second one, is in direct competition with a paid utility! I am seeing if I can evolve it to become a serious threat to it! Will keep you guys posted if I ever decide to do that (and find the time!)

By the way, I work for a semi-conductor company which has a very big software group too! Systems, SoCs, etc. But, I am a hardware design engineer. Hence, the love for the way Apple has brought the best of Embedded design to it's consumer products!

QUOTE (dude @ Dec 23 2008, 03:00 AM)

This thread is growing interesting with every post

Welcome Back! I was actually missing a reply to this thread; maybe this could be the reason why I buy a Mac in the future

Do let me know before you get it! I just might want to fix up some sort of commission with Jobs for that purchase!

QUOTE (dude @ Dec 23 2008, 03:00 AM)

Oh, that was your point. But then again, a Mac is just another variant of BSD which is a variant of Unix. Guess a mac just provides more eye candy for Linux fans than a plain old Ubuntu machine with Gnome.

Yes, that, plus the fact that they try to work with the hardware companies to get software support as well as compatibility which has not been completely successful in the Linux domain, unfortunately! About eye-candy, look up Baghira for Linux. It really is a great set of utilities to make your Linux interface look like a Mac! But of course, this "just another variant of BSD" can be downloaded as "Darwin OS" from Apple's web-site. It would be minus the eye-candy, and maybe some Linux "freak" might want to try it out!

QUOTE (dude @ Dec 23 2008, 03:00 AM)

I am not sure what this suggests. That Apple had a great OS in the beginning are are dumbing it down to make it more usable? Also IMHO even things like your Zune must have gone through extensive prototyping, not sure what Apple does different here except perhaps market their products a bit differently. I personally think that iPOD is an expensive gadget for its features, maybe it is just that aluminum look that sells.

No Sir, they aren't dumbing down the OS! They just accepted the fact that in order to be able to survive and sell, they need to make people comfortable in using them! They acknowledged that the Windows PCs far out-number them, and in order to make the users more comfortable about "switching", they made sure things don't change a lot on the interface, for the switchers, but at the same time, didn't compromise on their own standards, a part of which is the "Apple Human Interface Guidelines" that professional application designers for the Mac are expected to follow, which gives the OS a consistent look and feel! Hence, almost all the keyboard short-cuts, menus, context-menus, toolbar-customizations, etc, work the same as each other, irrespective of the application to which they belong! You don't hunt for stuff!
When they designed their desktop-search feature, spotlight, they made sure it was of the highest grade! Hence, even Google doesn't offer a desktop-search engine for the Mac! They accept this fact and offer only some utilities to make the experience of using Google's products on the Mac, more seamless! For instance, I can look for my Picasa pictures straight from the spotlight search in-built into my Mac!
About the extensive prototyping, every company does that, but Apple goes a little nuts about it! They don't flood the market with 10 products, all looking at the same market share, and with only a couple of differentiating features! They pick the best (by their judgement), and go all out in getting the hardware accessory makers, the software designers, and even the Hollywood Studios (in case of the iTunes rental issue) to toe the same line, while Windows users have to download a "Zune jukebox" because their own WMP is not compatible for use with it!
Also, the brushed aluminum look is not unique to the iPOD! Look up the latest "unibody" Macbooks and the now-old iMac line! [The unibody construction method might be of interest to many engineers! It's a single piece of aluminum carved into Macbook chassis'!] The reason, to me, why the iPOD sells a lot is because of the seamless integration with iTunes, which offers nearly everything under the sun, and without the studios being able to charge differential prices for different songs! Every song costs the same! You have a choice not to buy the whole album, etc! And, of course, the iPOD Touch 2.0 has been hailed as a truly ubiquitous computing device due to it's internet-capabilities as well as the quality of gaming possible on the device! And, not just possible, all the major gaming majors like EA have been providing an iPOD Touch/iPhone compatible version for a lot of their games now! [Why do I sense that you will switch to the dark side as soon as EA starts releasing titles for Mac at the same time as Windows! ]

QUOTE (dude @ Dec 23 2008, 03:00 AM)

Hmmm, in an industry where it is difficult for people to know what direction things will go (see Bluray vs HDDVD) it is surprising to see Jobs actually 'predicting' multi core computing which has been there once since 3 years is it? Of course Multiprocessors had been there before that but I would have been surprised if anyone thought about making a personal computing (read Mac too) system using that for mass markets.

Apple has not only been predicting, they have been guiding the market too! When the world was stuck with Serial ports, they head-started the USB revolution! Then, there was the Firewire thing, which all professional cameras today use! They go out of their way to give their consumers the latest and greatest that technology has to offer! Multi-core computing for consumers has been out only for the last 3 years or so! But, as a semi-conductor designer myself, I know that these things began in the labs a lot of time before that! When Apple released the Macbook Air in the beginning of this year, they were the ones to get Intel to cut the footprint of their mobile processor by half in order to save space in the Macbook Air! They were the first to market with it! And now, the others are following suit and buying the same thing! The latest "switch-able" GPUs in the unibody Macbook Pros were also developed in collaboration by NVIDIA, with Apple! Look-up the feature! If Macs had more games you'd go out and buy a Macbook Pro probably today! But again, the designers (graphics, SFX, etc) are already doing that! You can actually toggle between the dedicated GPU and the integrated one (both from NVIDIA) without re-booting! [You have to logout today, but they're working on it!] I work on a similar chip (it's a graphics accelerator) and I find this ability truly remarkable!

QUOTE (dude @ Dec 23 2008, 03:00 AM)

Better or not, I look at the price/feature or performance factor before settling on anything. I may get a supercomputer for 1 Million but then the factor is too skewed for me to go for that.

Precisely my point!
You don't need to spend a million any more! Snow Leopard is planned to incorporate "Grand Central" which is supposed to finally make programming for multi-cpu machines easier, which has truly not happened in any space! Mac OS X does it's own handling of applications such that the multi-core option in the CPU is utilized! But, most Windows software simply doesn't utilize the option! Companies like Adobe had to really fight it out with the present resources to make it work for their CS suite! Tomorrow, me and you would be able to do it without a team of programmers dedicated to this cause, courtesy Apple!
About the price-point thing! Please do configure a Dell on their web-site and let me know! I know you won't have a lot of the features like the switchable GPU on the Dell, but do make it the same config as far as possible. Of course, do consider the physical aspects too, like ignoring the chunky and ugly Inspirons! [Apologies to Inspiron users, but they do look and weigh like a brick!]

Responses (23/12/08)

Forza_schumi:

QUOTE
In the meanwhile, I got to know a little more about Apple from a colleague who is an ex-Apple employee! wink.gif So, now I know a little from the horse's mouth, and will write down a part of it! [I am not supposed to disclose most of the things, hence, you have no choice but to accept my reasoning for them! smile.gif]

couldnt resist : LOL.

anyway, i wanted to resist from taking part in this discussion, but

QUOTE
Do you know that Macs are not just featured as the computers of choice for the stars in the Hollywood movies, but are actually the most commonly used hardware for production and post-production, including mixing as well as for creation of special effects!

Interesting fact, can you get me a citation on that ?

KC:

adroit,

do you write code and develop on both Mac and Windows?

Dude:

This thread is growing interesting with every post

QUOTE (adroit_91 @ Dec 22 2008, 02:17 PM)
Hi, was on travel for a while, hence, couldn't update the thread!

Welcome Back! I was actually missing a reply to this thread; maybe this could be the reason why I buy a Mac in the future

QUOTE (adroit_91 @ Dec 22 2008, 02:17 PM)
Also, I don't understand your point about a Linux user switching from Mac to Linux! ...

Oh, that was your point. But then again, a Mac is just another variant of BSD which is a variant of Unix. Guess a mac just provides more eye candy for Linux fans than a plain old Ubuntu machine with Gnome.

QUOTE (adroit_91 @ Dec 22 2008, 02:17 PM)
Now, from someone else's account:
There have been many decisions on adopting standards, and creating some, post Jobs' return. Hence, the adoption of MP3s, x86, 3G for the iPhone and Windows compatibility, because what 80% of the people in the world use, becomes a standard unto itself! Before that, it wasn't like that, and although they developed upto 2-3 different OSes, none of them matched the technology from Next that Jobs brought along with him! ...

I am not sure what this suggests. That Apple had a great OS in the beginning are are dumbing it down to make it more usable? Also IMHO even things like your Zune must have gone through extensive prototyping, not sure what Apple does different here except perhaps market their products a bit differently. I personally think that iPod is an expensive gadget for its features, maybe it is just that aluminum look that sells.

QUOTE (adroit_91 @ Dec 22 2008, 02:17 PM)
... Do you know that Macs are not just featured as the computers of choice for the stars in the Hollywood movies, but are actually the most commonly used hardware for production and post-production, including mixing as well as for creation of special effects! Do you know why? Because, with Next, Jobs had developed technology which was supposed to make use of multi-core and multi-processor designs, and not get overwhelmed by them...

Hmmm, in an industry where it is difficult for people to know what direction things will go (see Bluray vs HDDVD) it is surprising to see Jobs actually 'predicting' multi core computing which has been there once since 3 years is it? Of course Multiprocessors had been there before that but I would have been surprised if anyone thought about making a personal computing (read Mac too) system using that for mass markets.

QUOTE (adroit_91 @ Dec 22 2008, 02:17 PM)
I will spend my life driving a Maruti or a Hyundai, and upgrade to Honda maybe once! But, in the words of my own colleague, who is definitely not a Mac bigot:
"I can afford a Mac but I can’t afford a BMW...or I would buy one of those, too. It’s just a better product."

Better or not, I look at the price/feature or performance factor before settling on anything. I may get a supercomputer for 1 Million but then the factor is too skewed for me to go for that.

Rooney:

Alright. Some of the points being made in the thread completely go over my head for the time being. But I would like to make one very significant observation.

Apple sells you Hardware + Software. And charges you MASSIVEly for that.

MSFT offers you only software. Same for Linux. At way way way less cost or free. One can buy the hardware at his/her own convenience.

So, how can we compare both the packages ? Apple gives you the entire suite which works together and burns a hole in your pocket whereas others are only providing you a certain fraction of it (i.e.S/W) at little cost or free.

And yes, did anyone mention the real cost of iPhone. Its massively high. (Don't count 200$ for USA as real cost..add the subscription plan and for India, was it 799$ ? )

So, tbh, if I have to spend that much money, I would do it on some FREAK hardware and run my fav Linux on it (WITH MacOS theme if I am such a fan of its looks) at much lesser cost than a Mac. And by freak, I mean REAL freak.

Cliffs : Mac is a great product but the cost at which we get it is not justified in my opinion. There are amazing alternatives at lesser cost.

From the horse's mouth

Hi, was on travel for a while, hence, couldn't update the thread!

In the meanwhile, I got to know a little more about Apple from a colleague who is an ex-Apple employee! So, now I know a little from the horse's mouth, and will write down a part of it! [I am not supposed to disclose most of the things, hence, you have no choice but to accept my reasoning for them! ]

Alright, first things first, "Yes", I accept that gaming on a Mac is virtually non-existent except for the GNU-Chess, which seems to be the game that is the most "current" in development! Let's now talk about everything else, shall we?

Also, I don't understand your point about a Linux user switching from Mac to Linux! The Mac OS X is a full blown BSD-based kernel in itself! You don't need to install Linux on it separately unless you're exclusively developing something for some particular flavor of UNIX! There's the 100% POSIX compliance as well as native X11 support, apart from the availability of all sorts of compilers. interpreters, etc which are the staple of the UNIX world!

Now, from someone else's account:
There have been many decisions on adopting standards, and creating some, post Jobs' return. Hence, the adoption of MP3s, x86, 3G for the iPhone and Windows compatibility, because what 80% of the people in the world use, becomes a standard unto itself! Before that, it wasn't like that, and although they developed upto 2-3 different OSes, none of them matched the technology from Next that Jobs brought along with him! Every product that is made is not shipped! The first iPods and the iPhones were chosen from 3-4 different prototypes, which were developed parallely but independently! The best one was picked and the rest dumped in the quest of "perfection"! This, to me is good enough reason to command a premium for their products! Prototyping is frozen at stages till things are perfected, for example, even the shade of black to be used on a particular product was argued upon for ~6 months!

Now, coming to the cost of innovation! You may or may not already know that Apple has a significant share in the birth of ARM! They were the ones to start the PDA revolution with the Newton. In case you look it up, even though they were the dark days at Apple, they had managed to make something that failed simply because it was way ahead of it's time! Imagine, a PDA with hand-writing recognition in the earlier part of the 1990s! Do you know that Macs are not just featured as the computers of choice for the stars in the Hollywood movies, but are actually the most commonly used hardware for production and post-production, including mixing as well as for creation of special effects! Do you know why? Because, with Next, Jobs had developed technology which was supposed to make use of multi-core and multi-processor designs, and not get overwhelmed by them. Today's Mac OS X is not an off-shoot of patching and maintaining compatibility with an OS designed for a 4-bit chip way back in the 80s! (Read: MS-DOS) Even though Vista was virtually a write from scratch (what else were they doing for 5 years!!), it has not met expectations, and Windows 7 is already in the works! But, a new Mac user today gets an OS designed with mainframes and super-computation in mind, despite the fact that the same OS can be trimmed to run something as nimble as the iPhone! That, to me, exemplifies scalability in architecture as well as shows the amount of thinking that goes into every product that Apple makes!

I will spend my life driving a Maruti or a Hyundai, and upgrade to Honda maybe once! But, in the words of my own colleague, who is definitely not a Mac bigot:
"I can afford a Mac but I can’t afford a BMW...or I would buy one of those, too. It’s just a better product."


PS: RoI = Return on Investment
Mostly games + little bit of everything else = Windows [I choose a dedicated platform like the PS3/XBOX to play games rather than a PC, by the way!]
Few games + everything else under the sun = Mac!
Next version of the Apple Mac OS X, 10.6, Snow Leopard, is going to be completely compatible with Microsoft Exchange! Also, the iPhone could (the last time I heard) VPN into our office's network too! And many people use Macbook Pros as their business machines! Hence, the enterprise share is also coming. For such a small share, the expectation would be very high and not even small glitches would be forgotten! I am waiting for the day when I start designing on Macs!

Dude's measured response (continued...)

I think I get your point of view and I believe things can be interpreted in a different way all the time. For instance, about the hardware; is it just that Apple offers a limited range of cards based on profitability or because redesigning the hardware would cost money?

Also contrary to your view, I see more Linux users using Mac as more Mac users converting to Linux/ exploring new platforms instead of the de-facto Mac OS. When you buy a PC/Mac you are either going for Windows or OSX. Installing Linux is usually secondary in deciding this. Some uber-geek with a passion for a Mac might disagree with me and say he bought a Mac just for running *nix but us mere mortals do weigh these issues of Windows vs OSX.

Yup we can only speculate about why boot camp came around and I gave my reason which I believed to be correct. But everyone has his opinions regarding this.

Drivers/Standardization is dependent both on the platform and the developer. If CISCO doesn't have a 64 bit version, it is not necessarily MSFT's fault. They have a version of VPN for 64 bit Vista which is standards compatible but of course to get something extra you have to program it. Availability of drivers is better with the 32 bit Windows at least, but drivers are not as easy to cross-compile as general purpose software. Of course if you had started writing a new driver it is not difficult (look up WDDM etc) but Windows has a baggage of drivers written 5 or more years ago which need to be supported since some corporates have 1000 printers which use that driver. Going for an absolute new kernel like Apple did is a gamble and it works with a smaller user base. But larger user base coupled with enterprise customers is a difficult thing to handle.

I am not too sure of the language mixing thing as I have not done it myself but that is a feature which is an extra and is not expected out of each and every compiler. If your compiler generates incorrect or sub-optimal code I would consider that compiler to be a failure and not because it missed out on a particular developer's pet feature.

Regarding the superuser thing, if you don't do anything stupid (read surf websites and download a free viewer) while logged in as admin in Windows, you will be safe without any protection. However many people don't consider that simple things like autoplay can cause their system to be infected. Hence MSFT has advocated (IMHO) an approach of install an antivirus or you will suffer. If you did the same in Linux or OSX while logged in as root, I believe the OS would happily get infected.

I don't understand your argument about less RoI for virus creators.

Regarding the antitrust case I was referring to MSFT vs Netscape and Real not the MSFT tax.

The feature is easily implementable and works out of the box; I am not sure why developers don't use it, maybe it would look too odd for people used to no spell checking in text boxes, I dont know.

I never said that Windows was better, it has its share of flaws (blue screens anyone, Vista is slow). But my comment was simply that Windows allowed me to use my PC for all purposes that I wanted to instead of forcing me to run a virtual machine/dual boot for things like games.

My response

Just to start with, Firefox 3 works great here on my Mac, but on my office RHEL4 machine, it requires too many dependencies to be installed, which of course no admin would allow me to! Hence, the dislike for Firefox 3! No offence meant!

For schumi, I completely respect your decision not to "engage with me"! I thought I had tried my best not to bash Microsoft, and definitely did not try to peeve you guys! Although, discussions at the same level use English, and not the !#@$@# variety of language! But, anyway... [PS: Windows XP free from MSDNAA doesn't make it a free software either!]

Quote:
A Unique Apple Reseller
Terra Soft, an Apple Authorized OEM VAR (Value Added Reseller) has been granted a unique license to install Yellow Dog Linux on Apple computers and maintain full Apple hardware warranty for home, commercial, education, and government customers.

I guess that does away with the "insecurity" point. Since I don't work for Apple, I can only speak from my point of view!

About the customization:
I agree that you might not want to be constricted in choice of components or companies, but, since they either pick the finest that there is in the market at that time (DDR3 RAM + Nvidia's 9400M GPU this time I think) for the Macbook Pro's and literally whatever you want for the Mac Pro, I think your wishes are mostly taken care of! Plus, I too agree to the fact that they make most of their own hardware, and stick to certain preferred vendors for reasons of profitability as well as making their designer's lives easier. For the consumer, this means that once he has made his pick, things just work! By the way, they have always guided customers better than others in getting after-market upgrades to things like the HDD and the RAM. I guess no other part is user-upgrade-able in most other laptops too!

Well, since you are a CS graduate, I shouldn't have assumed that you are one of those people who find some new computer system hard to grasp for the first time! [Nothing to do with your proficiency at using it once comfortable enough!] Alright, on this one, you'll have to let me know what you didn't find intuitive! I started using my machine without a manual, and almost the moment I took it home! The only weird thing was the one-button mouse, but I don't really feel the need for it anymore! I like the uniformity in keyboard shortcuts too! Not to mention that Expose makes Window management (the user kind) a cake-walk! Please elaborate on what you found amiss, but maybe I am wrong too!

I agree that gaming at this moment is not at all a big thing on the Mac! Maybe Steve acknowledged that in a short and rare lapse in his "Steve-ness", and admitted they needed Boot Camp for games! But, do look up Cider or "Crossover Games for Mac" for playing Windows games on a Mac. Honestly, with market share, games will come too, but right now, they are a small insignificant number for the games industry to target! By the way, I play NFS Carbon and AoE3 on the rare occasion on my notebook, and to my friend's admission (who is a game-phile), it runs better than on his Windows desktop! The fact that I have newer hardware should be negated by the fact that the game is a straight port using Cider instead of being designed "For a Mac"! Since it's a discussion and not a war, I will not use words such as "concede"!

The fact that more Linux users are using Macs comes from observations that can't probably be proved. In the last couple of years, Linux developers' conferences have seen a growing number of Macs being used, and the last time around it was observed that they are close to over-taking Windows machines. Since it was an observation, I will not look around for 10 www links to prove what is just a hypothesis! I believe you were not asking me to prove that Leopard is 100% POSIX compliant, or for that matter that the Mac interface is gorgeous!

About Boot Camp (since no one knows why they did it, we can only speculate):
When I bought this machine, I was also feeling good about being able to install Windows if something didn't work or didn't have a Mac alternate! But, trust me, I have never since given it a thought! None of my colleagues who use Macs in the office too have done anything like that! They boot only into OS X! I have never felt the need to install some sort of virtualization software either, but yes, I agree that before I bought the machine, I had some solace in knowing that the possibility existed to install Windows if things didn't go right! It's just my point of view!

Standardization:
My friend with a 64-bit HP laptop (with Vista Ultimate Professional Blah! Blah! Edition 64-bit installed) has had issues with getting certain hardware to work, as he had to wait for drivers to be launched even nearly a couple of years after the launch of the OS! Also, he doesn't have something as rudimentary as a CISCO VPN Client supported or even hack-able on his system! Maybe that shows how complex it is to program something as important as a driver (the VPN Client too is almost a driver!) for this OS where the difference is only in 32-bit to 64-bit. On a Mac, at least till Leopard, you can write code once, and target 32-bit or 64-bit machines, PPC or x86 architecture, all at once! Maybe this is because the free Xcode is so powerful, but it is also because Apple was far-sighted in it's development! I don't install any drivers for my phone's camera profile or my point-and-shoot camera or my uncle's SLR. He was pretty adamant on finding and downloading the driver from the internet first, then install and reboot the machine to use it for his SLR! But, I was able to convince him to plug it in, and thank God it played right away! If I buy an Apple keyboard (wireless), I can use it even with my Nokia N95! The Apple Webkit has been around for quite a while now. Although it is based on KHTML, it is fast enough and modular enough to be adopted for phones (Nokia S60 browser, iPhone), Mac OS X or Windows' Safari, Google Chrome, and a million other places for ubiquitous computation where people are trying to use it for the browsing experience. I think that speaks volumes about the coding practices of Apple and their "giving back" to the community! And, the example of the keyboard must help you understand the need for standardization! Let me know if I wasn't convincing enough.

I am not saying that the Mac is technically superior to anything! Any OEM could manufacture a machine with similar capability! But, the industrial design, the interface, the seamless functioning of the hardware with the software and many instances of attention to detail make it a more pleasant experience. For instance, when I plug in my headphones, my machine recalls the last volume I used for the speaker port! That means that I have never been greeted with a blast from my headphones! It's the smaller things in life that matter more!

About the virus thing:
1. Like I talked about the Pakistani situation. Let me only say that if I were a Pakistani, I would give a limb to be able to live in India, simply for the safety! Or for that matter, I would go to Norway. Patriotism is one thing, but I have never been a great fan of nationalism! [ Here, I equate it with the love for one's OS!] I guess that answers your comment on the lower RoI for virus-creators for the Mac.
2. Since I live in Norway (have a Mac), yes, I do login only as administrator, and for most purposes, unless the software explicitly doesn't ask me to login as root, I work more openly compared to on a Windows system, where I wouldn't dare run as an administrator (there's no root there, right?) with or without any anti-virus, etc! [A friend of mine, from Norway, is not in the habit of locking his house as they keep the keys hanging next to the door itself!]

About the VS comment. I was only answering "schumi" who pasted a conversation from the internet which said that I belonged to a category of people who knew jack-s*** about computers and was incapable of cross-compiling!

About the Express edition environment, the joke to me was that you can't even mix code! I was big on C++ when their Betas for the express editions came out, and wanted to use C# too, but couldn't, because it would allow me to re-use my C++ code along-side! In case it is not the case right now, I take my words back, and call VS a joke! They should at the very least give out their command line tools for free and charge only for the IDE!!

Sir, Windows Mail is not identical to Apple Mail in any way! Exchange Mail accounts (another horrible implementation from MSFT!) are not supported in Windows Mail, but I use them on Apple Mail. I can directly add phone numbers (auto-detected), addresses, email addresses to my "Address Book". I can add to-dos, alarms, etc right from my Mail.app (Mac nomenclature for .exe) which is auto-detected from the text of emails! I don't even need to select it, copy it and then open iCal (calendar app) to add it! I just need to say "yes" and it is done! They even removed Webdav from Windows Mail! Why remove something that was implemented before!

And, anti-trust laws were meant to stop monopolies. Do you know that there is a MSFT tax to be paid if the Dells and the HPs decide to offer users a Linux version of their systems? These kind of moves made people cry foul and sue Microsoft for a lot many things! Apple gives back to the OSS community in more ways than one. It gives you a lot of software pre-installed, but that's part of the whole machine that you buy, and they don't come with the OS itself! If I buy the next version of the OS, I will not get the next generation of productivity software like iLife for free! Hence, no anti-trust!

You say that .NET 3 has a similar feature, but, what if it was easily implementable, why would the developers not want to do it fails me! On a Mac, if you set up a keyboard short-cut (you can set up custom keyboard shortcuts system-wide!), you can be sure that it will work uniformly, across almost all applications, Apple or non-Apple!

See, every OS has it's pros and cons, and I am not saying that Apple is perfect! For instance, although the white iPOD is the more famous one, I chose the black one! But, the Macs are another thing altogether. To me the system has a lot more pros than cons, and that has out-weighed the premium I had to pay for it! What I have found is that a lot of attention to detail costs only little more maybe, on the manufacturer's part, but for the user, it translates into a lot more bang for the buck.

Questions and comments are always welcome. I might need to do some research and look for some add-ons to my own system as a result, but only if the expression is dignified! There's no point in bashing each other, and I appreciate you ("dude") for that!

Dude's measured response

I am shortening the quotes if you all don't mind

QUOTE (adroit_91 @ Dec 17 2008, 12:40 PM)
Apple not being a commoditized brand means, ... (Anyone who says that Apple doesn't allow you to customize your system, has definitely not been introduced to the Mac Pro!)

Agreed that Apple provides some choices but is that really comparable to what you get in a PC arena? Plus I do not need anyone to dictate me the components/companies and configuration I should go for.

QUOTE (adroit_91 @ Dec 17 2008, 12:40 PM)
I've been using computers since 1st grade, ... [I guess you'd agree that I know more than "Jack s***" about computers!]

Never said otherwise

QUOTE (adroit_91 @ Dec 17 2008, 12:40 PM)
To start with, a new OS does take some time getting used to, ... Maybe there was no one around to show you the way the first time around!

For using something in and out everyday, one needs a system that fulfills all his computing needs and not just a subset of those. Windows achieves that for me easily. Plus why should I need anyone to show me around an OS? No one ever did that to me even with the humble MS DOS and being a Computer Science graduate I should be able to decide the extent of usability of the system myself!

QUOTE (adroit_91 @ Dec 17 2008, 12:40 PM)
Maybe many of you will understand that the "uber-geeks" are mostly *nix users. This is a well-known fact that although they can install their flavour of the penguin on a Windows machine as well, as long as they have the money, they choose a Mac as their portable of choice, at least! This is not because of the styling-details (maybe partly so!), but because, for one, the Mac OS X is 100% POSIX compliant, and hence, the "Command Prompt" is not a home-brew crippled utility for disaster-recovery, but the omni-powerful xterm that linux-gurus crave for when they want to get things done! Hence the saying, "It was too difficult to make Windows reliable and safe, so they made UNIX beautiful!" [I hope you get which flavour we're talkin about!]

Really, can you substantiate or prove your argument?

QUOTE (adroit_91 @ Dec 17 2008, 12:40 PM)
Also, "dude", I'm not a company spokesperson, but since Linux doesn't require Boot-Camp to install on a Mac, I suspect Apple, while opening up it's hardware to all sorts of users, found out that the Windows community would be crippled because of lack of standardization in terms of drivers, etc, and hence, the need to provide potential Windows users with the Boot-camp utility. It probably wasn't insecurity!

LOL (seriously I cannot believe this argument). If that were so, why did Apple wait so long (Windows has been around for a loooong time and certainly it wasn't technically impossible if Apple wanted to do it earlier!). In fact people started making their own hacks for installing Windows as soon that they found out Apple is using x86 chips and before the official bootcamp was released. Now this has to speak something about why people would be so interested in moving away from a platform for which they had paid a huge premium; was it lacking something?

QUOTE (adroit_91 @ Dec 17 2008, 12:40 PM)
Just to add, Apple fell and fell and fell in the 90s, and not like "dude" said, rose under the iMessiah! Jobs had been fired from his company during that period! Look it up for one of the greatest Phoenix(rise-from-the-ashes)-stories of modern times!

Ahem, though it doesn't bolster the argument why I wouldn't ever use a Mac for an everyday computer, I believe shareholders can be pretty finicky about anything and everything. See Yahoo for instance. One day they will treat the CEO as a pariah and next day they will bring him back. I agree that Jobs does a better job (pun unintended) at marketing aluminum finish stuff than any one else but that doesn't translate into a technologically superior product.

QUOTE (adroit_91 @ Dec 17 2008, 12:40 PM)
For "schumi":
1. Yes, I can't get over the fact that I don't have to keep running an anti-virus all the time on my machine!...

We all know that there are not many viruses for the Mac because the return on creating a virus for a Windows machine is far greater. That aside, if you run Windows in a non-admin mode you won't be affected by viruses at all. Do you run the computer logged in as root in Linux or Mac? Then why do it for Windows?

QUOTE
2. Microsoft Visual Studio is paid, and may I add, mighty expensive! Before you point out, the Express Editions of the Visual Suite of languages is a joke for serious developers! While Apple provides you Xcode development environment for free even for download! [You don't need to purchase a new Mac for that either!] To add to that, I have never heard of "cross-compilation" inside Microsoft Visual Studio, but, since Xcode relies upon GCC and similar compilers, it is quite easy to set up cross-compilations for *nix as well as Windows. At best, you can say, what Apple allows you to do for free, Microsoft charges money for, although I suspect it is not very easy to do on Windows, at the very least!

Talking about VS is offtopic but no one forces you to use it, Use GCC or any other compiler if u wish. IMHO Express edition is more than enough for people who do not require more collaboration and testing features. Could you elaborate on the Joke part?

QUOTE
And, just for the sake of mentioning, I do the following things on my Mac "out-of-the-box"...

See this is what got MSFT into the antitrust lawsuit to begin with; bundling software for free and leaving no incentive to buy other ones. Of course, you cannot do the same to Apple seeing the marketshare that they have. You can still use the bundles software for accomplishing basic stuff as in the Mac plus or Minus a few features. For instance Windows Mail is almost identical in functionality to Apple Mail.

QUOTE
By the way, though I am no Steve-worshipper, I don't understand the problem you have with the people who are! If it's fine to say "Cricket is my religion, Sachin is my God!", I guess the same applies here. Cults are formed by only for things/people/phenomenon that belong to the extremes! And, rest assures, Apple doesn't belong to the abyss!

Amen to that.

QUOTE
PS: Thanks Apple for correcting my spelling mistakes throughout this looooong "Fast-Reply"! [This happens inside virtually every application that you run on Leopard at least.]

Score 1 for Apple then? It is upto the developer to incorporate such features and enable them for the user. .NET 3.0 has a similar feature for underlining the wrong words a la Word but how many developers working in .NET enable it?

Schumi's response

Ok, you are really taking this to another level, i must admit i didn't read all of it.

The part where you mention you know jackshit about computers showed me who i am dealing with and i resign , wow, such humility ! You really should realize that discussions happen when you consider yourself at same level as others. Please leave this particular lesser mortal alone , none of us asked for your life history and credentials and i shall not list mine (figure out why !) . Wow, your OS has spell check, must have been pretty hard to code

, i wish not to engage with you.

P.S. I get Microsoft visual studio professional for free being a part of MSDNAA . and i can keep it even after i pass out from college: o !

The last one was in response to:

I'd said:

Let's start with: "Hail Steve"!! [Not Jobs, but Wozniak, the real Engineer behind the PC revolution! When did it exactly become Macs vs. the PC!! ]

Dude "dude" [get another nick please, it's a problem addressing you here! ], I understand that Apple "seems" to be charging a premium on it's computers, but, let me assure you, once you own one, you will never regret it! Just for a comparison, pick a similar spec'd Sony Vaio or something from Toshiba. It is a known fact that Apple doesn't even enter the "commodity" segment, i.e., the consumer space where the margins are incredibly low! Request you to start another thread with this Mac and PC discussion, and I promise [] that I will try to answer any questions/doubts on Apple computers w.r.t. the "PC", or otherwise! Let's leave this thread alone for the real reason it was opened!

By the way, I suggest everyone move to "Webkit" (sorry, Apple again!), as it is the fastest browser on the planet, and because of it's not being on a very large install base, it is not targetted by hackers either! Firefox, of course, can be used just as well, as long as you don't "upgrade" to the version 3!

Dude said:

Woz was the guy who got the short end of the stick and Jobs (for all technical purposes) was the man responsible for Apple's rise in the 90s. (and also being worshipped as a new age iMessiah).

I fail to understand how Apple not being in the 'commodity computing' market helps a guy like you and me! Perhaps there is some thrill in being an Apple wannabe and getting oohed and aahed by people (no attack directed against anyone in particular, except those who think that oooh so white iPod and anything that starts with a lower case i makes me so hip and so techno savvy) that makes up for that.

I tried (and I really mean TRIED) using a Mac (out of all the hype) and found it to be too limiting. Games are obviously one of the things, but seeing Apple lose confidence in its own OS and allowing people to boot into Windows just shows how insecure the company is about its new 'technologically superior' system (just my opinion about the insecurity thing, maybe the company isn't ) and that too after years of maintaining a no x86 allowed architecture!

Schumi said:

Nicely put !

My 2 cents, Apple is an over-expensive brand, even people with Apple notebooks agree, the only good thing is that you get a 2nd look if you carry an Apple Macbook.

Then you have the Apple fanboys, people whose only purpose in life is to worship apple, apple products and buy anything Apple makes. (No offence meant to anyone )

Also adding to the spice, got this off the internet : (Warning 15+ content, there might be some expletives)

Apple frequently runs "clever" ads. Although they've made a ton of them, all the ads boil down to how Windows has viruses and crashes all the time. Apple also have an enormous, cult-like fanbase that like to remind us of these things every five seconds. Apple fanboys are generally smug, annoying, and arrogant, despite the fact that most of them don't know jack shit about computers.
Apple Fanboy: "M$ is teh sux0r! Apple pwns!"

Windows User: "Windows has a wide selection of software and games, and a huge developer community."

Apple Fanboy: "BUT IT CRASHES AND HAS VIRUSES LOL"

Windows User: "My OS hasn't crashed since I had Windows Xp. And AVG is a free program that keeps my computer secure."

Apple Fanboy: "BUT WINDOZE SUXX!"

Windows User: "Would you care to tell me about your Mac? I hear it doesn't have many tools for software developers, which are important for my work."

Apple Fanboy: "lolololol but windows sucks!!!11"

Windows User: "Did you know that a great amount of Apple software is made with Microsoft Visual C++?"

Apple Fanboy: "omg wth is C++, windows just sux so much LOLOL?"

Why use Mac?

Apple not being a commoditized brand means, you're sure about what you're buying. Students (coming to gamers in a while) buy the Macbooks (Black/White doesn't matter!), Pros buy Macbook Pros (at least you agree it is the epitome of industrial design!), and for the rest of the junta, who just need to "consume" media (not my words!), their's the Air. If you need a desktop, life is a lot simpler, 20", 24" or the God-of-all-desktops, the Mac Pro (Anyone who says that Apple doesn't allow you to customize your system, has definitely not been introduced to the Mac Pro!)

I've been using computers since 1st grade, which would've been around 1990! Of course, the initiation ceremony was the "Bad command or filename" (if you've used MS-DOS, you might remember it!) And, by now, I have used the whole gamut of things, from MS-DOS to Windows Vista, Solaris 7 to 10 and RHEL 3 to 5. I trust that gives my views some credence if I speak of my personal experience with computers. Oh yes, I forgot that the Symbian (S60) is by no means a lesser OS, if you start to get into it's intricacies! [I guess you'd agree that I know more than "Jack s***" about computers!]

To start with, a new OS does take some time getting used to, and unless you use it exclusively day in and day out, it can remain elusive to some people! Since I have tried quite a range of operating systems, and all in a "production" environment, I found Mac OS X to be the most intuitive! Since "dude" mentions that he "tried" and failed, I would like to know anything in particular that he finds most useful on a Windows and was counter-intuitive on a Mac. Maybe there was no one around to show you the way the first time around!

Maybe many of you will understand that the "uber-geeks" are mostly *nix users. This is a well-known fact that although they can install their flavour of the penguin on a Windows machine as well, as long as they have the money, they choose a Mac as their portable of choice, at least! This is not because of the styling-details (maybe partly so!), but because, for one, the Mac OS X is 100% POSIX compliant, and hence, the "Command Prompt" is not a home-brew crippled utility for disaster-recovery, but the omni-powerful xterm that linux-gurus crave for when they want to get things done! Hence the saying, "It was too difficult to make Windows reliable and safe, so they made UNIX beautiful!" [I hope you get which flavour we're talkin about!]

Also, "dude", I'm not a company spokesperson, but since Linux doesn't require Boot-Camp to install on a Mac, I suspect Apple, while opening up it's hardware to all sorts of users, found out that the Windows community would be crippled because of lack of standardization in terms of drivers, etc, and hence, the need to provide potential Windows users with the Boot-camp utility. It probably wasn't insecurity!

Just to add, Apple fell and fell and fell in the 90s, and not like "dude" said, rose under the iMessiah! Jobs had been fired from his company during that period! Look it up for one of the greatest Phoenix(rise-from-the-ashes)-stories of modern times!

For "schumi":
1. Yes, I can't get over the fact that I don't have to keep running an anti-virus all the time on my machine! In fact I have none installed! And, I am officially allowed to VPN on to my company's network, while Windows users without a complete set of "anti-terror" paraphernalia provided by the company, are prohibited from even trying to connect! Now, you would trust a company where data security and IT systems uptime is of paramount importance, with their judgement, right? Plus, the amount of money I paid for the processor and the RAM, are all coming to my use, and not like Pakistan's budget, all going into "defence"!

2. Microsoft Visual Studio is paid, and may I add, mighty expensive! Before you point out, the Express Editions of the Visual Suite of languages is a joke for serious developers! While Apple provides you Xcode development environment for free even for download! [You don't need to purchase a new Mac for that either!] To add to that, I have never heard of "cross-compilation" inside Microsoft Visual Studio, but, since Xcode relies upon GCC and similar compilers, it is quite easy to set up cross-compilations for *nix as well as Windows. At best, you can say, what Apple allows you to do for free, Microsoft charges money for, although I suspect it is not very easy to do on Windows, at the very least!

And, just for the sake of mentioning, I do the following things on my Mac "out-of-the-box", without a single software extra being installed from anywhere else, freeware or otherwise (except those utilities provided by Apple):
1. Stream music to my N95 (yes, I agree that the iPhone isn't a serious smartphone yet. See, no fan-boy! )
2. Host my own web-site on the in-built Apache server on my Mac
3. Remote login via SSH from my office desktop, or better still, VNC into my machine to use it with the full GUI! [I don't yet VPN into it, although that is possible too]
4. Chat with MSN, Yahoo! and Gtalk users with iChat (Oh, how I hate that small "i" in front of everything, as opposed to the whole damn "Microsoft" or "Windows" before every piece of software ever written, not even counting the "Home Edition", "Professional Edition", "Mohalla Edition" as suffix!)
5. With iPhoto, iMovie, etc, I don't need Photoshop or even GIMP till I need to do some really professional job! Since iPhoto takes plugins, which nearly every one with a little bit of coding knowledge can make, you might not need to pay a lot for some small things you need as add-ons, instead of the whole suite!)
6. Used Garageband (see, no "i"!) to create a little bit of my own music! Some of my colleagues run their own band and use the same software to create music. A studio that is intuitive, and free!
7. "Fast-format" any report for my office-work into HTML, etc using iWeb.
8. Run the computer without re-starting for weeks at a stretch! The damn thing simply doesn't slow down, leave alone crash!
9. Watch movies with upto 3 other people without everyone having to squint to see the image from different angles! (Yes, the screen isn't just gorgeous, it has a wider viewing angle than most "commoditized" notebooks!)
10. Back-lit keyboard and ambient light sensing screen brightness control means that day or night, I can use the computer the way I want to!
11. Sync with most major cell-phones, data like Contacts, Calendars, etc, without a full "PC Suite" kind of application!
12. And, just like the "Prancing Horse", the "3-pointed star" or the "Big M", the "glowing Apple" is very much a sign that this computer will be a pleasure to use! [I just love seeing it glow-in-the-dark!]

By the way, though I am no Steve-worshipper, I don't understand the problem you have with the people who are! If it's fine to say "Cricket is my religion, Sachin is my God!", I guess the same applies here. Cults are formed by only for things/people/phenomenon that belong to the extremes! And, rest assures, Apple doesn't belong to the abyss!

PS: Thanks Apple for correcting my spelling mistakes throughout this looooong "Fast-Reply"! [This happens inside virtually every application that you run on Leopard at least.]

How to kill time?

There is something about time that has made people exaggerate its value! They say, time is money! I say, if that was true, I'd probably feature on the next Forbes's list of Top 10 richest people around. Why? Simply because time is all that I have got. Well, let me explain...
When you enrol for an Engineering degree, apart from the exclusive appellatives like geek, nerd and weirdo, what you bargain for is a hell lot of time 2 do nothing. Some ill-headed people might have used it to "invent" gravity or maybe hypothesize our great simian inheritance. Now, come on, couldn't so much precious rocket fuel have been saved had it not been for Mr. Newton! May the heavens forgive those who try the over-burden the world which is already dying under the weight of a never ending list of laws; and am not yet referring to Jude Law.
So, what have we got? Time, and loads of it! As they say, "Something has to be done about it"! Therefore, I decided that my time, henceforth, would be divided into units of time! Everyday, a couple of units, go into looking for hidden clues about where Osama could be hiding! Why, precious little of any thing else has been on newsprints around the world since 9/11! I hope to either crack the $50m pot offered as reward sum day, or join John Nash. They say genius hides behind a mask of weirdness; I say weirdness is the first step to genius! Some day, maybe, the Nobel Prize will come my way... Just maybe!
By the way, soccer has some thing about it! Now, where did soccer come up from, suddenly? Have patience, I'll explain. The world over, mankind (no, not the womenfolk, just the men) has been referred to as a bunch of overgrown boys. Lesser mortals who could never actually fathom what could be so exciting about guzzling down beer by the barrels over a period of about 90 minutes watching 22 people running after a ball, which they try to kick away, into something of a net, as soon as they get it! Well, neither do we understand u women folk, but, did we ever chuck u out? Therefore, peace prevails, n people like me who have yet to feel the need for a beer or two to let their feelings flow; we can eat, sleep, talk, walk and not 2 mention, actually "play" soccer for hours on end. Here go another 4 units of my time.
People spend a lifetime looking for someone who reacts the way they want them to, speak exactly what one wants to hear and then shut up when asked to do so, without creating a fuss. Sum1 who can humour u all day and all night! Well, didn't sum wisecrack refer to the greatest invention of the past century as the IDIOT BOX! I'm still looking for that person so that I can sue him for insulting my partner, if I may refer to it by that name, which expends nearly for more units of my time!
Well, of the rest of the units, two go to the gym. U know even leisure has its own fitness level requirements! Den, every Engg worth his salt (deliberately avoiding "her", coz the sex-ratio in tech school can put even India's census results 2 shame), should b straining "his" eyes over the PC for atleast four units of time.
Den there r the necessities of life that u spend another unit on. The rest 9? I need to sleep, don't I? Yes, despite whatever my writing makes u feel, I am from the same planet as u, so, it all totals 24 units...
Well, I got to prepare my acceptance speech for the Oscar for the most devout follower, if not the Nobel Prize. So, adios!