Mac OS X 10.7 Lion: iCal 4.0 gets annual view, iPad appearance
Apple's iCal 4.0 in Mac OS X 10.7 Lion's second Developer Preview adopts an iPad appearance and a new annual view.
Following the footsteps of Address Book 6.0, iCal 4.0 adopts an appearance similar to the iPad Calendar, with a leather bound top and pages that appear to be ripped off from the top edge.
Apart from the novelty "leather" menu bar, the overall look and feel of the app is nearly identical to the previous iCal, apart from a new Year view, which is both new to iCal and also to both the iPad and MobileMe versions of Apple's Calendar apps.
The iPad version of Calendar uses the same brown leather look as Lion's new iCal, but more closely matches the layout and design of the MobileMe Calendar, with a quick date selector at the bottom and a List view missing from Mac OS X's iCal.
Both the iPad and MobileMe calendars present a Day view as an open book, Week and Month views as a tear off calendar pad, and a List view that depicts upcoming event in a spiral bound section next to a torn-page Day view.
Lion's iCal presents the same torn page look for every view. Also different between the MobileMe and Lion version is the To Do list, which is represented as a tear off pad next to the calendar; in Lion's iCal, the To Do list is a conventional list that doesn't quite fit into the "torn page" appearance.
Other minor changes in iCal include the renaming of calendar sharing to "publishing," to better harmonize with the "subscribe" command to access a shared calendar.
Following the footsteps of Address Book 6.0, iCal 4.0 adopts an appearance similar to the iPad Calendar, with a leather bound top and pages that appear to be ripped off from the top edge.
Apart from the novelty "leather" menu bar, the overall look and feel of the app is nearly identical to the previous iCal, apart from a new Year view, which is both new to iCal and also to both the iPad and MobileMe versions of Apple's Calendar apps.
The iPad version of Calendar uses the same brown leather look as Lion's new iCal, but more closely matches the layout and design of the MobileMe Calendar, with a quick date selector at the bottom and a List view missing from Mac OS X's iCal.
Both the iPad and MobileMe calendars present a Day view as an open book, Week and Month views as a tear off calendar pad, and a List view that depicts upcoming event in a spiral bound section next to a torn-page Day view.
Lion's iCal presents the same torn page look for every view. Also different between the MobileMe and Lion version is the To Do list, which is represented as a tear off pad next to the calendar; in Lion's iCal, the To Do list is a conventional list that doesn't quite fit into the "torn page" appearance.
Other minor changes in iCal include the renaming of calendar sharing to "publishing," to better harmonize with the "subscribe" command to access a shared calendar.
Comments
Btw, I noticed the favicon on Safari - have they got them working on DP2?
If Apple didn't fix the event/invite window, then I'd suggest they need to spend far less time on fake leather title bars and other iOS candy and focus on making the product more functional. I see a lot of resources being used on non-functional eye candy that could have been used on something useful like a better event window, better snoozing, or, dare I mention it, keeping Rosestta.
Fake leather? On a computer screen? Um, no.
I’m not a fan of mimicking real world items when it’s not necessary, but tan leather on a black and silver, or white Mac looks tacky.
At least with iCal and Addressbook this is purely aesthetic, and doesn’t affect its usability. I keep wishing Apple would dumb their Calculator app for something more useful like Soulver.
Soulver is a great example bringing the usability to a virtual tool without feeling a need for making it work like its real-world counterpart. That said, I understand the decision to bring iOS-like features that have been proven to work with users to the Mac to help pull more ‘PC’ users to the Mac platform. Let’s hope this is only a trial and that they will at lear have an option for a different design by the GM release.
I've never really liked the "wood" in GarageBand or the bookshelf on the iPad and iPhone. But perhaps I just have to get used to it.
I hope we can have a choice of using the leather "skin" or stay with the muted grays and blues of OSX.
Best
Usually I like Apple's graphics....I really like how the current OSX is rather subdued and elegant.
I've never really liked the "wood" in GarageBand or the bookshelf on the iPad and iPhone. But perhaps I just have to get used to it.
I hope we can have a choice of using the leather "skin" or stay with the muted grays and blues of OSX.
Best
Unfortunately a great preponderance of Americans dislike clean, modern esthetics. Most prefer the woody, Early American stuff from 250 years ago. I don't know if Apple uses focus groups, but the presence of wood in the various apps tells me they might have done so. I can't fathom Jonathon Ive signing off on such a thing, but guess it's not really his purview.
Rainman
I hope this is a joke, that design is embarrassingly tacky.
This has AFD written all over it...
However, it should be cleaned up on BOTH iOS and OS X.
Make them consistent across both platforms.
I think it's cute how many people have thought this is real. They plastered Apr 1 all over this... come on...
We chose to ignore the joke and turn the thread into a discussion of imitating natural materials in computer interface design. Even if the iCal thing is a spoof, the leather and wood exist in the iPad. That is not honest design IMO.
And if it is a joke it sure isn't a very good one.
I think it's cute how many people have thought this is real. They plastered Apr 1 all over this... come on...
1) Because Apple has a history of releasing betas so that they can pull on over some people on Internet a couple days later.
2) April 1 is plastered all over these sites with these svreenshots because it's a date that makes up 1/365 of the year. Tomorrow sites will plaster April 2 due to the chronological nature of time as we know it. It's funny that way.
Ugghhh....Thats okay in Full Screen view (which is why things like this look great on the iPad, which essentially becomes the app). But to have it in Windowed mode, where it clashes atrociously with other apps' consistent Window UIs is just a bad idea.
At the end of the day though, this is just plain fugly.