Top Secret Features
Did people really expect Steve to say "...and now for the top secret features I alluded to last August..."? When Steve said they had some top secret features I understood that to mean Apple did not want to reveal what they were working on at the current stage in Leopard's development, not that Apple had some mind-blowing advancements that would take the computing world by storm.
I hear people whining about the "Top Secret" features not getting shown, but couldn't the Back to Mac be a "top secret" feature? How about cover flow, especially when it is used with screen sharing, so you can drag a copy of a file from another computer onto yours? What about Mail being able to detect contact information and event dates that can be added to Address Book or iCal? While I wasn't overwhelmed by Steve's keynote speech, I wasn't disappointed either. I saw a lot of minor improvements that together will make looking at and using Leopard a pleasant experience.
Did anyone see anything else that appears to be run-of-the-mill, but when you take a closer look you can see it could be one of the "top secret" features?
I hear people whining about the "Top Secret" features not getting shown, but couldn't the Back to Mac be a "top secret" feature? How about cover flow, especially when it is used with screen sharing, so you can drag a copy of a file from another computer onto yours? What about Mail being able to detect contact information and event dates that can be added to Address Book or iCal? While I wasn't overwhelmed by Steve's keynote speech, I wasn't disappointed either. I saw a lot of minor improvements that together will make looking at and using Leopard a pleasant experience.
Did anyone see anything else that appears to be run-of-the-mill, but when you take a closer look you can see it could be one of the "top secret" features?
Comments
Leopard is a must have for me. Apple could add the most amazing things to it and someone would say:
"meh"
There comes a point where each person decides just how a computer is going to integrate into their life. When I see very cool technology I first marvel at the beauty but then it has to be deconstructed into clear and concise benefits.
I saw a lot of enhancements to Leopard that will make my life easier and more organized. I get more joy from Expose and a built in Dictionary than just about anything. I miss these two features when I'm in windows.
My guess is there will be another demo just prior to Apple launching Leopard. They will highlight more features but nothing major...enough to rekindle the fire and the massess will begin to upgrade. At that time it would be a great time to show off iLife and iWork
I would say it was a good thing for Apple not to show any of their competition what approach they were taking to Leopard. Not even the little things like they way an address is automatically noticed in an incoming mail etc. Not their approach to the finder, nothing, so in that sense it was good to keep things secret. I did find myself thinking where's the secret features. Nevertheless software is a subtle game, and sometimes doesn't translate to the stage properly. If Leopard gives me anything, I hope it's doesn't give me Aqua, I never loved Aqua. I would like a maximize button however, but I don't expect it, let's not get into this argument again.
There may be more features then we all are taking into account here, we'll give this one a little time to pan out. I will say this though, I like the new Finder a lot, I like the new desktop, and I like stacks, when I think about it, there's a lot of things I like about Leopard. Apple's new hardware always looks great, and will sell regardless, I just hope Apple has the damn sense to throw the new iLife and iWork in for free. Hell just go for it Apple, show your balls and go for it. $129 for all that would make any Mac users mouth water, that's what they should really want. It's time for Apple to offer a deal that no Mac user can turn down. After that I wouldn't care if every new app was Leopard only.
While not a 'must have' upgrade...
Probably not this year. But in a year or so from now the situation may be different. From what I see Leopard lives in its own realm of programmability which means that you will need to upgrade if you wish to use applications based on Leopards technologies. But this depends obviously on how fast developers jump on the train.
But the whole "top secret" thing that turned out to be relatively little (Stacks, Unified throughout, a cosmetic Dock tweak, and modestly improved Finder, with CoverFlow - top secret features they were afraid MS would copy? yeah, right) was a blatant disappointment. What was revealed simply doesn't blow Vista away. I still think Apple planned something far more ambitious, but had to cut back due to being sidelined by the Intel transition and developing OS X Mini for the iPhone.
If that's true, and Apple had to make a choice, they absolutely made the right choice -- the Intel transition was 100% the right move and I think the iPhone will capture as many or more users using "OS X" within a year as the almost 25 years it's taken for them to garner their Mac OS userbase -- which is just an extraordinary prospect. But it's still frustrating that it has to be a choice at all.