<strong>It just makes the icons disappear and reappear as if I was clicking the widget without holding down the command key. Shift-Alt click brings up the Customize Toolbar option but that's about it...</strong><hr></blockquote>Remember, we're talking about the cocoa toolbar in apps like System Preferences, Mail, OmniWeb, Chimera, and Preview. It sounds like you're tring it in the Finder. Is that correct?
[quote] Remember, we're talking about the cocoa toolbar in apps like System Preferences, Mail, OmniWeb, Chimera, and Preview. It sounds like you're tring it in the Finder. Is that correct? <hr></blockquote>
Correct - and it works in the app toolbars you've described... but I'm puzzled: the finder isn't cocoa??
Amorph is correct. The Mac OS X Finder has always been Carbon. Carbon still does not have a proper implementation of the toolbar. What the Finder has is a (poorly done) hack. Only in 10.2 does it finally accept control-clicks like real Cocoa toolbars do. Personally, I was surprised that it still has that hideuos window-changing effect when you choose to customize the toolbar. Yeecch.
Note: I'm not saying I think the Finder should be rewritten in Cocoa (because lots of other people do seem to think this). I'm just saying that, well, it could still use some improvements.
I'm not sure if everyone has a full history on Mr. Every here. It is important to note that until quite recently he was a very vocal evangelist for the mac cause. Not simply one of the "macs are better" type of evangelist, but one that examined the core features of the OS, GUI, and API frameworks. When a non-mac user offers criticism, everyone is quick to dismiss their comments as dumb or un-neccesary. (At least, in these forums). David is most certainly a Mac user, along with almost all other platforms. 1/3 of the posts on this topic had a "He's nuts, he doesn't know what he's talking about.....although I agree with him on quite a few points," sort of tone to them. The other 1/3 have a sort of "yeah, yeah, yeah....we know it sucks, they're working on it.....jeez be patient!" . If you aren't familiar with Every's work pre-iGeek, you should give it a look:
I'm not sure if everyone has a full history on Mr. Every here. It is important to note that until quite recently he was a very vocal evangelist for the mac cause. Not simply one of the "macs are better" type of evangelist, but one that examined the core features of the OS, GUI, and API frameworks.</strong>
Well... he's controversial because he knows enough to be a good source of info, but the Mac OS Classic and PPC blinders were on most of the time. In other words, being evangelistic is fine, but being evangelistic with questionable knowledge can be caustic. Witness:
I was the auther of the article he was criticising. Perhaps I don't know what evangelism means, but I'll leave it up to the reader to determine who was right.
My philosophy with the dock is to keep my most used items in there. Everything else can get shoved into a psuedo-Applemenu, a folder that sits next to my trash in the dock.
I have only 15 apps in the dock. Everything else, I put an alias of inside of some organized folders (Internet, Graphics, etc.) in that Dock folder.
I also organize my dock icons according to use (system, email, browsers, chat apps, misc internet, design.)
I find it keeps me very organized and efficient with the Dock.</strong><hr></blockquote>
I do the same thing. Honestly, it constantly surprises me how many Mac users don't understand how to use the dock. They try to put every single App in the dock, then whine about clutter. They whine about the Apple Menu in OS X, without realizing that you can make your own "Apple Menu" in the dock by filling a folder with aliases. IMO this method is better than the apple menu because you can stuff the folder with ONLY the aliases you desire, and not deal with all the clutter that was present in OS 9's apple menu.
Ultimately, it seems that the one's who whine the most about OS X are the same one's who seem to have a problem letting go of their old ways of doing things. OS X is certainly DIFFERENT from Mac OS, and many users who are afraid of learning new things confuse "different" as being inferior. What they fail to realize is that after learning the new ways of doing things, in the case of OS X they are more often than not better than the old ways.
One of the things I enjoy about OS X is that it feels like the first time I ever used a Mac. I remember sitting down at one of the original Macintoshes and learning the OS by "exploring" the GUI on my own. The logical layout of the OS was amazing to me after using PCs. Now, with OS X I get the same feeling of exploring and discovering how Aqua is put together, and it's very refreshing to use a GUI that was built fresh with modern features in mind. Everything is orgainized far, far better than the Mac OS (remember the CHOOSER? WTF was that all about? It was like a trash heap for all the networking and printing features that were developed AFTER the Mac OS was designed).
So when it comes to "bitch-lists" like the one starting this thread, I just roll my eyes and move on, because invariably these lists are the product of some old fart who's forgotten how to learn and adapt to new ways of doing things. These old bags are so set in their ways that they can't see or admit that a new method may be more efficient or logical, instead they pout and whine that they will have to do something NEW and risk learning something new.
<strong>IMO this method is better than the apple menu because you can stuff the folder with ONLY the aliases you desire, and not deal with all the clutter that was present in OS 9's apple menu.</strong><hr></blockquote> <img src="graemlins/bugeye.gif" border="0" alt="[Skeptical]" /> Um, the only things *required* in the OS9 Apple Menu are the "About this Mac" item and the single divider beneath it. You consider that a lot of clutter?
I'm not defending the old ways; I just think your argument is a bit flawed.
But I think you can make the argument that it was cluttered by default, not by user action. Changing the menu was easy enough though -- once you figured out how (there should have been a menu item to do this).
IMO, the biggest argument against the old Apple menu is what they did to replace it. As part of the new menubar layout, the new Apple menu is a lot more cohesive and logical.
Anyway, here are my critiques of the Dock:
1. Limited drag-and-drop support. works for dropping files on applications, but it should work with folders and pop-ups too.
2. No easy user-definable way to differentiate among some icons. I'm not sure what can be done about URL icons and such, but the best justification for color choices (aka, "labels") would be to tell the difference between what are otherwise identical folder icons. This would vastly improve the Dock and open people's eyes to just how flexible it can/could be. another option is something along the lines of those custom folder icon shareware apps, but that might be too complex?
3. I think the Dock should be configurable like toolbars are, follow the same behavior. Add separators, spaces, flexible spaces, a bunch of default/provided icons, etc. All done via a sheet-like dialog in the way toolbars can be configured. This would be more consistent, and would provide a lot more flexibility and personalization possible. Want the dock to stretch across the edge of the screen? Add some flexible spaces to it.
4. I'm not totally convinced of this idea, but add the minimize-in-place feature and make the Dock icons "magnetic" like how a lot of third parties make their utility windows (e.g., Photoshop). Allow those windows to remember their previous minimized state. Dunno, it starts to get complicated.
The dock would appear a lot more useful if more software made use of badges, Dock menus. Seems like a lot of developers are catching on though. Hey, I was shocked to see Adobe added a progress bar in their PS Elements icon!
Here's one for the switchers, and I know i'll be raked over the coals for this one: get rid of the Happy Mac icon for the Finder. Make the icon more indicative of, oh, say, a Finder.
At the risk of being mauled to death, I'm going to disagree with The Dawg (and a lot of the "Dave's only whining" crowd) on this one.
Desktop Publishing is my business, so my Mac is the most important tool in my arsenal, not simply a hobby or something I use to surf messageboards or listen to MP3's.
I haven't yet switched to OS X. I can't afford a lot of downtime or not being able to know what I'm going to lose in the switch.
Articles like Every's help people like me to know exactly what's missing and what will change when I switch over. I personally find the article interesting. Even before the article, my feelings were that the next major rev will bring a new filesystem and metadata, which will require a clean install. I think my business will wait for that.
Just to be perfectly clear: We're not living in the past. The Mac made it possible for me to strike out on my own, and we'll remain on Mac and eventually upgrade to OS X.
Articles like this help, not hinder the move to OS X.
(P.S. Our hesitance to move has nothing to do with Quark. Long Live InDesign! But even diehards have to admit, even something as basic as scanning just came to OS X .)
1. Limited drag-and-drop support. works for dropping files on applications, but it should work with folders and pop-ups too.
<hr></blockquote>
What are you talking about? We can drop files into folders[In the dock] just fine in jaguar.
Put a folder next to the trash, select a bunch of files and drop it onto the highlighted[greyed] folder and it's in there.
I think you mean it can't access the sub folders which is more of a safe guard because it can cause a lot of bad habits and misplacements.
Perhaps a good amount of people don't have the time or like to do this but just get icons... I mean real 128bit pictural icons. I don't have anything remotely looking like an generic folder on my dock. I think people can find something to suit their tastes.
Thus I can never make a mistake on where I'm dropping stuff.
He may be whining, but on the otehr hand for a lot of users time is money and the dont have a lot of time to learn the new system.
A buddy of mine is a wedding photographer and he recently picked up a PowerMac so that he could do Video and make DVDs of weddings as well (for the record he did not switch fully, he has five PCs still). His partner decided to try and swtich over as well and bought a PowerBook 667. His main complaint was speed. He sold it again before I could really talk to him but when I asked him what he thought was slow about it he said the following:
"I can process photos faster on my windows machine"
Fair enough, this guy owns and operates one of the premiere wedding photography companies in the city, time is money. But on the other hand, he only had the powerbook for a few weeks, and he has been using Windows since god knows when.
He knows Windows in and out, he knows how to make the system do what he wants exactly how he wants. He gave the mac a few weeks. While I am not naive enough to say that Mac OS is for everyone, I do not think that he or a lot of people have given it a fair chance, and this wholly applies to OS 9 Power Users as well.
In a perfect world, OS X would be an upgrade from OS 9, but it isnt, it is a switch. It is like going from GoLive to Dreamweaver. They do things somewhat similarly, but I dont have the time to learn a whole new app just because it might be better, especially when I have been using GoLive since god knows when, and PageMill before that.
Anyway, while I sympathise with some of the complaints (I miss tabbed windows, folders in the dock are not the same and the second part of spring loaded folders) I really dont. There is such a thing as a weekend. Try out the new system in your spare time and make the switch when you are used to it.
Honestly, it constantly surprises me how many Mac users don't understand how to use the dock. They try to put every single App in the dock, then whine about clutter. They whine about the Apple Menu in OS X, without realizing that you can make your own "Apple Menu" in the dock by filling a folder with aliases.</strong>
Hehe... I only have 2 apps in my dock, CPU Monitor and Net Moniter (and hopefully a swap moniter in the future). For launching apps and stuff, there is <a href="http://www.versiontracker.com/moreinfo.fcgi?id=2409&db=mac"; target="_blank">LaunchBar.app</a>, a very nicely implemented keyboard launcher if there ever was one.
Yes, it's true. The Dock does not equal the Apple Menu, and should never be used as so. I am still waiting for Apple to implement the Finder shelf and dock like the NeXT Shelf. Things would be a little bit more comfortable after that.
Why can't we have an option to turn on Multiple Docks? Then we could put our Apps in one, Disks in another, and maybe, just maybe, one could be just for documents.
<strong>I think you mean it can't access the sub folders which is more of a safe guard because it can cause a lot of bad habits and misplacements.</strong><hr></blockquote>
Whoops. That's just what I mean -- sub-folder drag-n-drop.
[quote]Perhaps Virtual Desktops could be implemented?<hr></blockquote>
I dunno if it's just me, but when I started to use OSX, I got the impression that it didn't want me to use the desktop. I've been using the Finder window with column view and I dont have a single thing on my desktop. I dont know if anyone else has gotten this feeling.
Well, there's a Desktop folder in your home directory, so it's not as if it's hugely inaccesible... That said, I'm one of those people who keeps the Desktop clear all the time anyway: I think the most I've ever had was four folders and four storage media on it, but only because I was in the midst of a rather complicated project under OS 9...
<strong>But I think you can make the argument that it was cluttered by default, not by user action. Changing the menu was easy enough though -- once you figured out how (there should have been a menu item to do this).
IMO, the biggest argument against the old Apple menu is what they did to replace it. As part of the new menubar layout, the new Apple menu is a lot more cohesive and logical.
Anyway, here are my critiques of the Dock:
1. Limited drag-and-drop support. works for dropping files on applications, but it should work with folders and pop-ups too.
2. No easy user-definable way to differentiate among some icons. I'm not sure what can be done about URL icons and such, but the best justification for color choices (aka, "labels") would be to tell the difference between what are otherwise identical folder icons. This would vastly improve the Dock and open people's eyes to just how flexible it can/could be. another option is something along the lines of those custom folder icon shareware apps, but that might be too complex?
3. I think the Dock should be configurable like toolbars are, follow the same behavior. Add separators, spaces, flexible spaces, a bunch of default/provided icons, etc. All done via a sheet-like dialog in the way toolbars can be configured. This would be more consistent, and would provide a lot more flexibility and personalization possible. Want the dock to stretch across the edge of the screen? Add some flexible spaces to it.
4. I'm not totally convinced of this idea, but add the minimize-in-place feature and make the Dock icons "magnetic" like how a lot of third parties make their utility windows (e.g., Photoshop). Allow those windows to remember their previous minimized state. Dunno, it starts to get complicated.
The dock would appear a lot more useful if more software made use of badges, Dock menus. Seems like a lot of developers are catching on though. Hey, I was shocked to see Adobe added a progress bar in their PS Elements icon!
Here's one for the switchers, and I know i'll be raked over the coals for this one: get rid of the Happy Mac icon for the Finder. Make the icon more indicative of, oh, say, a Finder.</strong><hr></blockquote>
These are good points, and it would make the Dock much better if they were implemented. Although for 2, you can use custom icons, but that's too advanced for most users.
I think Apple needs a "dock" utility that would help the user make "apple menus" in the dock by creating folders filled with aliases. This utility could offer some custom icons, and it would make the dock much more usable for those who haven't figured out how to use aliases yet. I don't mean a "dock wizard", but an actual utility that would build and manage dock folders filled with aliases.
Also, the drag and drop feature is a must, it should work like a spring-loaded folder.
Comments
<strong>It just makes the icons disappear and reappear as if I was clicking the widget without holding down the command key. Shift-Alt click brings up the Customize Toolbar option but that's about it...</strong><hr></blockquote>Remember, we're talking about the cocoa toolbar in apps like System Preferences, Mail, OmniWeb, Chimera, and Preview. It sounds like you're tring it in the Finder. Is that correct?
Ford M.C. needs to include a horse with their automobiles.
Barto
Correct - and it works in the app toolbars you've described... but I'm puzzled: the finder isn't cocoa??
<strong>
Correct - and it works in the app toolbars you've described... but I'm puzzled: the finder isn't cocoa??</strong><hr></blockquote>
No, the Finder is Carbon. And it's always been Carbon.
Unfortunately, toolbars are one of the remaining areas where Cocoa and Carbon aren't quite seeing eye to eye...
Note: I'm not saying I think the Finder should be rewritten in Cocoa (because lots of other people do seem to think this). I'm just saying that, well, it could still use some improvements.
<a href="http://www.mackido.com"; target="_blank">Mackido</a>
I'm not sure if everyone has a full history on Mr. Every here. It is important to note that until quite recently he was a very vocal evangelist for the mac cause. Not simply one of the "macs are better" type of evangelist, but one that examined the core features of the OS, GUI, and API frameworks.</strong>
Well... he's controversial because he knows enough to be a good source of info, but the Mac OS Classic and PPC blinders were on most of the time. In other words, being evangelistic is fine, but being evangelistic with questionable knowledge can be caustic. Witness:
<a href="http://www.mackido.com/Press/TechResponseStateOfPPC1.html"; target="_blank"> MacObserver - State of PPC 1</a>
I was the auther of the article he was criticising. Perhaps I don't know what evangelism means, but I'll leave it up to the reader to determine who was right.
<strong>
My philosophy with the dock is to keep my most used items in there. Everything else can get shoved into a psuedo-Applemenu, a folder that sits next to my trash in the dock.
I have only 15 apps in the dock. Everything else, I put an alias of inside of some organized folders (Internet, Graphics, etc.) in that Dock folder.
I also organize my dock icons according to use (system, email, browsers, chat apps, misc internet, design.)
I find it keeps me very organized and efficient with the Dock.</strong><hr></blockquote>
I do the same thing. Honestly, it constantly surprises me how many Mac users don't understand how to use the dock. They try to put every single App in the dock, then whine about clutter. They whine about the Apple Menu in OS X, without realizing that you can make your own "Apple Menu" in the dock by filling a folder with aliases. IMO this method is better than the apple menu because you can stuff the folder with ONLY the aliases you desire, and not deal with all the clutter that was present in OS 9's apple menu.
Ultimately, it seems that the one's who whine the most about OS X are the same one's who seem to have a problem letting go of their old ways of doing things. OS X is certainly DIFFERENT from Mac OS, and many users who are afraid of learning new things confuse "different" as being inferior. What they fail to realize is that after learning the new ways of doing things, in the case of OS X they are more often than not better than the old ways.
One of the things I enjoy about OS X is that it feels like the first time I ever used a Mac. I remember sitting down at one of the original Macintoshes and learning the OS by "exploring" the GUI on my own. The logical layout of the OS was amazing to me after using PCs. Now, with OS X I get the same feeling of exploring and discovering how Aqua is put together, and it's very refreshing to use a GUI that was built fresh with modern features in mind. Everything is orgainized far, far better than the Mac OS (remember the CHOOSER? WTF was that all about? It was like a trash heap for all the networking and printing features that were developed AFTER the Mac OS was designed).
So when it comes to "bitch-lists" like the one starting this thread, I just roll my eyes and move on, because invariably these lists are the product of some old fart who's forgotten how to learn and adapt to new ways of doing things. These old bags are so set in their ways that they can't see or admit that a new method may be more efficient or logical, instead they pout and whine that they will have to do something NEW and risk learning something new.
<strong>IMO this method is better than the apple menu because you can stuff the folder with ONLY the aliases you desire, and not deal with all the clutter that was present in OS 9's apple menu.</strong><hr></blockquote> <img src="graemlins/bugeye.gif" border="0" alt="[Skeptical]" /> Um, the only things *required* in the OS9 Apple Menu are the "About this Mac" item and the single divider beneath it. You consider that a lot of clutter?
I'm not defending the old ways; I just think your argument is a bit flawed.
IMO, the biggest argument against the old Apple menu is what they did to replace it. As part of the new menubar layout, the new Apple menu is a lot more cohesive and logical.
Anyway, here are my critiques of the Dock:
1. Limited drag-and-drop support. works for dropping files on applications, but it should work with folders and pop-ups too.
2. No easy user-definable way to differentiate among some icons. I'm not sure what can be done about URL icons and such, but the best justification for color choices (aka, "labels") would be to tell the difference between what are otherwise identical folder icons. This would vastly improve the Dock and open people's eyes to just how flexible it can/could be. another option is something along the lines of those custom folder icon shareware apps, but that might be too complex?
3. I think the Dock should be configurable like toolbars are, follow the same behavior. Add separators, spaces, flexible spaces, a bunch of default/provided icons, etc. All done via a sheet-like dialog in the way toolbars can be configured. This would be more consistent, and would provide a lot more flexibility and personalization possible. Want the dock to stretch across the edge of the screen? Add some flexible spaces to it.
4. I'm not totally convinced of this idea, but add the minimize-in-place feature and make the Dock icons "magnetic" like how a lot of third parties make their utility windows (e.g., Photoshop). Allow those windows to remember their previous minimized state. Dunno, it starts to get complicated.
The dock would appear a lot more useful if more software made use of badges, Dock menus. Seems like a lot of developers are catching on though. Hey, I was shocked to see Adobe added a progress bar in their PS Elements icon!
Here's one for the switchers, and I know i'll be raked over the coals for this one: get rid of the Happy Mac icon for the Finder. Make the icon more indicative of, oh, say, a Finder.
Desktop Publishing is my business, so my Mac is the most important tool in my arsenal, not simply a hobby or something I use to surf messageboards or listen to MP3's.
I haven't yet switched to OS X. I can't afford a lot of downtime or not being able to know what I'm going to lose in the switch.
Articles like Every's help people like me to know exactly what's missing and what will change when I switch over. I personally find the article interesting. Even before the article, my feelings were that the next major rev will bring a new filesystem and metadata, which will require a clean install. I think my business will wait for that.
Just to be perfectly clear: We're not living in the past. The Mac made it possible for me to strike out on my own, and we'll remain on Mac and eventually upgrade to OS X.
Articles like this help, not hinder the move to OS X.
(P.S. Our hesitance to move has nothing to do with Quark. Long Live InDesign! But even diehards have to admit, even something as basic as scanning just came to OS X .)
[ 09-24-2002: Message edited by: Frank777 ]</p>
1. Limited drag-and-drop support. works for dropping files on applications, but it should work with folders and pop-ups too.
<hr></blockquote>
What are you talking about? We can drop files into folders[In the dock] just fine in jaguar.
Put a folder next to the trash, select a bunch of files and drop it onto the highlighted[greyed] folder and it's in there.
I think you mean it can't access the sub folders which is more of a safe guard because it can cause a lot of bad habits and misplacements.
Perhaps a good amount of people don't have the time or like to do this but just get icons... I mean real 128bit pictural icons. I don't have anything remotely looking like an generic folder on my dock. I think people can find something to suit their tastes.
Thus I can never make a mistake on where I'm dropping stuff.
~Kuku
[ 09-24-2002: Message edited by: Kuku ]</p>
A buddy of mine is a wedding photographer and he recently picked up a PowerMac so that he could do Video and make DVDs of weddings as well (for the record he did not switch fully, he has five PCs still). His partner decided to try and swtich over as well and bought a PowerBook 667. His main complaint was speed. He sold it again before I could really talk to him but when I asked him what he thought was slow about it he said the following:
"I can process photos faster on my windows machine"
Fair enough, this guy owns and operates one of the premiere wedding photography companies in the city, time is money. But on the other hand, he only had the powerbook for a few weeks, and he has been using Windows since god knows when.
He knows Windows in and out, he knows how to make the system do what he wants exactly how he wants. He gave the mac a few weeks. While I am not naive enough to say that Mac OS is for everyone, I do not think that he or a lot of people have given it a fair chance, and this wholly applies to OS 9 Power Users as well.
In a perfect world, OS X would be an upgrade from OS 9, but it isnt, it is a switch. It is like going from GoLive to Dreamweaver. They do things somewhat similarly, but I dont have the time to learn a whole new app just because it might be better, especially when I have been using GoLive since god knows when, and PageMill before that.
Anyway, while I sympathise with some of the complaints (I miss tabbed windows, folders in the dock are not the same and the second part of spring loaded folders) I really dont. There is such a thing as a weekend. Try out the new system in your spare time and make the switch when you are used to it.
--PB
Honestly, it constantly surprises me how many Mac users don't understand how to use the dock. They try to put every single App in the dock, then whine about clutter. They whine about the Apple Menu in OS X, without realizing that you can make your own "Apple Menu" in the dock by filling a folder with aliases.</strong>
Hehe... I only have 2 apps in my dock, CPU Monitor and Net Moniter (and hopefully a swap moniter in the future). For launching apps and stuff, there is <a href="http://www.versiontracker.com/moreinfo.fcgi?id=2409&db=mac"; target="_blank">LaunchBar.app</a>, a very nicely implemented keyboard launcher if there ever was one.
Yes, it's true. The Dock does not equal the Apple Menu, and should never be used as so. I am still waiting for Apple to implement the Finder shelf and dock like the NeXT Shelf. Things would be a little bit more comfortable after that.
Why can't we have an option to turn on Multiple Docks? Then we could put our Apps in one, Disks in another, and maybe, just maybe, one could be just for documents.
<strong>I think you mean it can't access the sub folders which is more of a safe guard because it can cause a lot of bad habits and misplacements.</strong><hr></blockquote>
Whoops. That's just what I mean -- sub-folder drag-n-drop.
I dunno if it's just me, but when I started to use OSX, I got the impression that it didn't want me to use the desktop. I've been using the Finder window with column view and I dont have a single thing on my desktop. I dont know if anyone else has gotten this feeling.
<strong>But I think you can make the argument that it was cluttered by default, not by user action. Changing the menu was easy enough though -- once you figured out how (there should have been a menu item to do this).
IMO, the biggest argument against the old Apple menu is what they did to replace it. As part of the new menubar layout, the new Apple menu is a lot more cohesive and logical.
Anyway, here are my critiques of the Dock:
1. Limited drag-and-drop support. works for dropping files on applications, but it should work with folders and pop-ups too.
2. No easy user-definable way to differentiate among some icons. I'm not sure what can be done about URL icons and such, but the best justification for color choices (aka, "labels") would be to tell the difference between what are otherwise identical folder icons. This would vastly improve the Dock and open people's eyes to just how flexible it can/could be. another option is something along the lines of those custom folder icon shareware apps, but that might be too complex?
3. I think the Dock should be configurable like toolbars are, follow the same behavior. Add separators, spaces, flexible spaces, a bunch of default/provided icons, etc. All done via a sheet-like dialog in the way toolbars can be configured. This would be more consistent, and would provide a lot more flexibility and personalization possible. Want the dock to stretch across the edge of the screen? Add some flexible spaces to it.
4. I'm not totally convinced of this idea, but add the minimize-in-place feature and make the Dock icons "magnetic" like how a lot of third parties make their utility windows (e.g., Photoshop). Allow those windows to remember their previous minimized state. Dunno, it starts to get complicated.
The dock would appear a lot more useful if more software made use of badges, Dock menus. Seems like a lot of developers are catching on though. Hey, I was shocked to see Adobe added a progress bar in their PS Elements icon!
Here's one for the switchers, and I know i'll be raked over the coals for this one: get rid of the Happy Mac icon for the Finder. Make the icon more indicative of, oh, say, a Finder.</strong><hr></blockquote>
These are good points, and it would make the Dock much better if they were implemented. Although for 2, you can use custom icons, but that's too advanced for most users.
I think Apple needs a "dock" utility that would help the user make "apple menus" in the dock by creating folders filled with aliases. This utility could offer some custom icons, and it would make the dock much more usable for those who haven't figured out how to use aliases yet. I don't mean a "dock wizard", but an actual utility that would build and manage dock folders filled with aliases.
Also, the drag and drop feature is a must, it should work like a spring-loaded folder.