I can agree with bloated (although it seems pretty lightweight compared to anything that Microsoft comes up with). Maybe it's because my linux box has 384 MB of RAM, so I'm never swapping, but I have never had an occasion to call it sluggish.
Think about the benefits. Who's going to use these apps? Do you really think 'artists' and Joe User is going to have a ball working with GIMP or OpenOffice or any other app that runs uner XFree?
<hr></blockquote>
The point is to extend marketshare past the traditional user base of artists. "Joe User" is probably not going to jump in a UNIX command line, or buy an Xserve either, but Apple has already spent alot of time and resources developing products and features to cater to more technical users.
[quote]
They're ugly, slower, less powerful, less intuitive. They don't look like Mac apps, and I think typical Mac users would see it as a big turn-off.
<hr></blockquote>
Ugly? The window manager is responsible for providing much of the "look and feel" for X11 apps. XDarwin developers have been slow to develop a "native" window manager (a WM that integrates with Aqua). This would make X11 apps look much more like Aqua apps (OroborosX does not cut it).
Slow? As opposed to Aqua? Right now, X11 (excluding XDarwin) is much faster than Aqua. XDarwin is slow because of the way it was ported (e.g no hardware acceleration, and XDarwin double buffers the screen although Aqua already performs double buffering).
Furthermore, Aqua and X11 are not mutually exclusive windowing systems. Artists can still enjoy Aqua apps even if Apple provides X11 with OS X (but not installed by default).
[quote]Originally posted by Eugene:
Oh, but we stand to gain all these UNIX users, right? Wrong. We've already gained these UNIX users. The OCF (my former student org) is a testament to that. 5 UNIX junkies have purchased iBooks and PowerBooks. They don't NEED XFree installed by default. They can do it by themselves.[/QB]<hr></blockquote>
First, with marketshare hovering at 3%, Apple is still having trouble gaining *any* users, much less the majority of UNIX users.
Second, installing X is not the biggest problem. The problem is that X11 (XDarwin) *sucks* on OS X. XDarwin is a hacked together port of XFree86 on OS X. If Apple got involved, hopefully XDarwin would improve to the point that we could actually use it.
[quote]
X Windows is what I would consider a "rude" GUI. That is as far as I can tell it will "ignore" user events, like mouse clicks, until it gets around to it. The Mac OS, the old one, was the other way around. Even the mouse down event could hold up the entire show if not programmed right.
<hr></blockquote>
On the contrary, I think OS 9 is much "ruder", because it is a nonpreemptive multitasking OS. So, as you mentioned, a single application can hang the whole system if programmed improperly. This makes OS 9 inappropriate for running mission critical applications like a database or a web server. However, on the flip side, many OS 9 applications (like VPC) feel snappier, because they can "hoard" the processor if necessary (which I consider rude), and the operating system is not wasting as many cycles scheduling processes and "context switching". As Amorph pointed out, eventually the hardware will catch up. Then, the disadvantages of preemptive multitasking will be forgotten and the benefits will become more apparent.
Furthermore, X11 is no "ruder" than any other modern windowing system. Like Windows GDI and Aqua, X11 queues events for applications until the application has finished processing all other events. If applications are not handling events fast enough, well, this is the application's fault.
I would like to see Apple provide an X11 release to support those Mac OS X users that want to run Unix applications alongside their Mac OS X applications. There are some Unix apps that will probably never get ported natively to Mac OS X. Synopsys DC shell and Cadence NC-Verilog, to name two significant apps used for hardware design. (XEmacs is also essential to get the verilog editing modes.) I installed X on my Mac and it works okay. I also use VNC, which I find faster from home through VPN to a VNC server running on a Solaris box than redirecting the DISPLAY from the Solaris box back to my Mac. But I have probably spent a lot more time with Unix than the average Mac user. If Apple were to provide an X11 release then that should imply it was regressed with all the other Apple system software components before each new OS release. It might also lead to some performance tuning.
<strong>You will never see the X Window System as part of the default (or even optional) Mac OS X retail install. Technically speaking, X is a patchwork hunk of junk. However, yes a number of *nix apps run on X -- but that is entirely irrelevant to Apple's target market.</strong><hr></blockquote>
Could this be true? Was moki actually wrong about something? Time will tell.
<strong>I agree with moki, but that's partly because I never want to see developers shipping X11 apps and calling them OS X apps.</strong><hr></blockquote>
Duh, they won't. They'll call them what they are: UNIX apps
Apple could always include their X11 implementation on the Developer Tools CD. That makes sense: Anyone who's going to use OS X as a full-on UNIX will install that CD - to get gcc, if nothing else - but since it's still an optional install favored by a self-selecting crowd, it will keep X11 out of the mass-market version, greatly reducing the appeal of using X11 as an excuse to not rebuild the interface in Aqua.
After installing Apple's X11, I did a little comparison between it and XDarwin.
Running Mozilla in XDarwin is quite slow on my 600 MHz iBook. There wouldn't appear to be any 2D acceleration.
Running Mozilla using Apple's X11 was quite fast as it is using the quartz engine to accelerate it. The most amazing part is that resizing an X11 Mozilla window is smoother and faster than resizing an OSX Mozilla window on my machine.
I'd have to check and make sure I'm comparing like versions. Perhaps someone could try this test out and see which seems better on their system?
Comments
That's hardly a problem in my experience.
Unless of course X crashes
<strong>
X11 is practically legendary for being bloated and sluggish (as well as a gratuitously complex, graceless hack...).
[ 07-07-2002: Message edited by: Amorph ]</strong><hr></blockquote>
I can agree with bloated (although it seems pretty lightweight compared to anything that Microsoft comes up with). Maybe it's because my linux box has 384 MB of RAM, so I'm never swapping, but I have never had an occasion to call it sluggish.
Brian
Think about the benefits. Who's going to use these apps? Do you really think 'artists' and Joe User is going to have a ball working with GIMP or OpenOffice or any other app that runs uner XFree?
<hr></blockquote>
The point is to extend marketshare past the traditional user base of artists. "Joe User" is probably not going to jump in a UNIX command line, or buy an Xserve either, but Apple has already spent alot of time and resources developing products and features to cater to more technical users.
[quote]
They're ugly, slower, less powerful, less intuitive. They don't look like Mac apps, and I think typical Mac users would see it as a big turn-off.
<hr></blockquote>
Ugly? The window manager is responsible for providing much of the "look and feel" for X11 apps. XDarwin developers have been slow to develop a "native" window manager (a WM that integrates with Aqua). This would make X11 apps look much more like Aqua apps (OroborosX does not cut it).
Slow? As opposed to Aqua? Right now, X11 (excluding XDarwin) is much faster than Aqua. XDarwin is slow because of the way it was ported (e.g no hardware acceleration, and XDarwin double buffers the screen although Aqua already performs double buffering).
Furthermore, Aqua and X11 are not mutually exclusive windowing systems. Artists can still enjoy Aqua apps even if Apple provides X11 with OS X (but not installed by default).
[quote]Originally posted by Eugene:
Oh, but we stand to gain all these UNIX users, right? Wrong. We've already gained these UNIX users. The OCF (my former student org) is a testament to that. 5 UNIX junkies have purchased iBooks and PowerBooks. They don't NEED XFree installed by default. They can do it by themselves.[/QB]<hr></blockquote>
First, with marketshare hovering at 3%, Apple is still having trouble gaining *any* users, much less the majority of UNIX users.
Second, installing X is not the biggest problem. The problem is that X11 (XDarwin) *sucks* on OS X. XDarwin is a hacked together port of XFree86 on OS X. If Apple got involved, hopefully XDarwin would improve to the point that we could actually use it.
[quote]
X Windows is what I would consider a "rude" GUI. That is as far as I can tell it will "ignore" user events, like mouse clicks, until it gets around to it. The Mac OS, the old one, was the other way around. Even the mouse down event could hold up the entire show if not programmed right.
<hr></blockquote>
On the contrary, I think OS 9 is much "ruder", because it is a nonpreemptive multitasking OS. So, as you mentioned, a single application can hang the whole system if programmed improperly. This makes OS 9 inappropriate for running mission critical applications like a database or a web server. However, on the flip side, many OS 9 applications (like VPC) feel snappier, because they can "hoard" the processor if necessary (which I consider rude), and the operating system is not wasting as many cycles scheduling processes and "context switching". As Amorph pointed out, eventually the hardware will catch up. Then, the disadvantages of preemptive multitasking will be forgotten and the benefits will become more apparent.
Furthermore, X11 is no "ruder" than any other modern windowing system. Like Windows GDI and Aqua, X11 queues events for applications until the application has finished processing all other events. If applications are not handling events fast enough, well, this is the application's fault.
[ 07-08-2002: Message edited by: Brian J. ]</p>
<strong>You will never see the X Window System as part of the default (or even optional) Mac OS X retail install. Technically speaking, X is a patchwork hunk of junk. However, yes a number of *nix apps run on X -- but that is entirely irrelevant to Apple's target market.</strong><hr></blockquote>
Could this be true? Was moki actually wrong about something? Time will tell.
<strong>I agree with moki, but that's partly because I never want to see developers shipping X11 apps and calling them OS X apps.</strong><hr></blockquote>
Duh, they won't. They'll call them what they are: UNIX apps
Apple could always include their X11 implementation on the Developer Tools CD. That makes sense: Anyone who's going to use OS X as a full-on UNIX will install that CD - to get gcc, if nothing else - but since it's still an optional install favored by a self-selecting crowd, it will keep X11 out of the mass-market version, greatly reducing the appeal of using X11 as an excuse to not rebuild the interface in Aqua.
After installing Apple's X11, I did a little comparison between it and XDarwin.
Running Mozilla in XDarwin is quite slow on my 600 MHz iBook. There wouldn't appear to be any 2D acceleration.
Running Mozilla using Apple's X11 was quite fast as it is using the quartz engine to accelerate it. The most amazing part is that resizing an X11 Mozilla window is smoother and faster than resizing an OSX Mozilla window on my machine.
I'd have to check and make sure I'm comparing like versions. Perhaps someone could try this test out and see which seems better on their system?
:gloat:
Barto