That is called color labels, and was available in Mac OS X 10.6.8 Snow Leopard and before. See my previous post.
I don’t see anything about that in your previous posts and don’t see how that matters to what I’m saying. I want icons of different shapes so that they can be distinguished at a glance. Not to go heavy into the details, but the eye tends to group things.
Focusing directly on the Font Book icon, the Notes, Calculator, and Calendar icons all fall into peripheral association with it. They’re all angled identically and have virtually the same dimensions. Only color sets them apart. Meanwhile Automator, FaceTime, Game Center, and Messages all stand out, individually, from it (and them) because of their entirely different shapes.
I also want the ability to edit my icons again, but I guess it doesn’t matter since I won’t be getting 10.12. I’ll just update to 10.11.6 and turn off the secure whatever it is that blocks user editing of the System folder.
"Apple should directly port the iOS interface layout of Settings (above) to the Mac, leaving the old System Preferences available for existing users who prefer it,"
There's nothing wrong with OS X System Preferences: in fact, they are the epitome of good design and simplicity. All this junk about merging iOS with OS X is just that: junk --------> Steve Jobs understood this years ago, and laughed at Microsoft who were trying to convert Windows into some kind of web/i/OS, with panels, and touch screens and all sorts of iFashion nonsense. As Steve said, and wise words they were too: OS X is for people who create (remember the Chiat ad!),, while iOS is for people who consume content. Obviously, there is some blurring ... but trying to force the two things to be the same is going to be as big a disaster as Windows 8.
And I have to laugh at suggestions of running Macs on ARM: what's the point??? Who cares if it on ARM: who is going to recompile? No-one.
Marvin said: iOS's icons are neater. Forcing round or rounded rectangle icons in the Dock would improve the layout, they'd just crop existing icons inside the shape:
I’d rather have visually distinct icons. At a glance differentiation, you know? Something other than “blue circle”, “yellow circle”, etc.
Round is all the rage at Apple, except for the Watch itself.
I am not sure why the latest versions of OS X (Mavericks - El Capitan) have abandoned the one click rule. Full screen used to be one click in the upper right hand corner of just about every application. Now it takes at least 3 keystrokes. If that is the direction Apple designers are going, I don't think I am interested in the latest developments.
"Apple should directly port the iOS interface layout of Settings (above) to the Mac, leaving the old System Preferences available for existing users who prefer it,"
There's nothing wrong with OS X System Preferences: in fact, they are the epitome of good design and simplicity. All this junk about merging iOS with OS X is just that: junk --------> Steve Jobs understood this years ago, and laughed at Microsoft who were trying to convert Windows into some kind of web/i/OS, with panels, and touch screens and all sorts of iFashion nonsense. As Steve said, and wise words they were too: OS X is for people who create (remember the Chiat ad!),, while iOS is for people who consume content. Obviously, there is some blurring ... but trying to force the two things to be the same is going to be as big a disaster as Windows 8.
And I have to laugh at suggestions of running Macs on ARM: what's the point??? Who cares if it on ARM: who is going to recompile? No-one.
If do anything iOS Preferences should be more like the grid of macOS preferences if they are going to standardise. Or better still reuse the viewController from iTunes Album view and get the grid to split apart to reveal the preference pane take some of the disjointedness out of both interface styles. That would work across all three platforms (mac, pad, phone) and say iCloud if that becomes a platform.
I could only see Ax series on Mac if Apple moved to a SystemPU-ApplicationPU model instead of the current CPU-GPU model. Use the Ax as SPU to keep the mac open as a FoundationDB node and aim to have Customers data always in-sync. It would also have enough grunt to run email, iTunes and simple productivity apps like Pages, Photos. x86 then only kicks in for higher demand (or legacy) applications. Apple gets more control over the platform.
Looking forward to this! Though they did just update the MacBook so while part of me REALLY wants them to have an ARM version of the MacBook, a big part of me doubts that it's coming right away. Next year could be a possibility. There's rumours of new MacBook Pros soon, and that'd be really nice.
Once Affinity's apps are on ARM I will probably be able to say good bye to Intel without issue. I'm sure Apple will port Final Cut Pro to it soon enough, and other than that looking at the icons in my dock I could probably be an early adopter no problem. (Assuming I have the cash!) I'm guessing Apple will be able to have some amazing design once they've moved over to ARM. and if they need to they can keep selling whatever version of the MacBook Pro is available around that time for the next 3ish years like they did with the Power Mac G5. If they take the cost of Intel processors out of the Mac, they might even be able to keep similar margins while dropping their costs.
While people who virtualize are not an insignificant market. I don't think there's enough to justify keeping the Mac installed base on Intel. Though losing Apple as a customer would be a real kick in the pants to Intel. (Especially their high end market.)
I *** ABSOLUTELY TOTALLY *** disagree that that Settings on iPads is better than System Preferences on the Mac. I use both A LOT and again I can't disagree with you more. * One, you can search in System Preference and you can't in Settings. For instance, I want to change something in my network settings. I open up System Preferences and type in Network and hit enter and tahdah! it opens my network settings. You can't do this in Settings on the iPad. * Two, System Preferences is laid out in rows of similar features which you can see on the screen all at the same time. Can you see all the different Settings on the screen at the same time? No. * Three, four, five, six. I don't have time to write up all the things that drive me nuts about Settings that I like in System Preferences. The list is easily ten long and I'm still trying to think of ANYTHING that I like in Settings more than System Preferences. So far I'm coming up with Zero.
Keyboard shortcuts on the iPad. Obviously the person that wrote this article doesn't use iPads with Bluetooth keyboards of any brand but all the shortcuts that work on the iPad Pro also work on all the other iPads that accept Bluetooth keyboards which I think goes back to every version but at least back to Gen 3 Retina version. They need to keep adding more like being able to close an iOS app by doing Command-Q like on a Mac. Apple??? When are you adding this? I've wanted it for at least two years!
I hope that they don't get rid of Mac Minis. They work GREAT for low cost Mac OS X servers (I manage all kinds of Microsoft software and hardware but they have to pay me to use the ****. I ***like*** working with Mac OS X and so when I buy server hardware I go Mac Mini. They are cheap enough that you can replace them when they fail which usually takes over five years. Things aren't that time critical and I don't have enough money to buy new ones all the time. I just cram the largest hard drives I can into them and go. Big smile!!!
ARM Macs? I can see that. Actually I think Apple desperately wants to build all their own chips so it is only a matter of when, not if, they run Apple computers on their own designs.
A well-written article: well–thought through, well-reasoned, and well-argued. While I may not agree with all (or even most) of your predictions, it's heartening to see analysis done so thoughtfully and comprehensively. Thanks.
OS X is pretty good these days. There is one, and only one, thing that it needs, and that is a new file system. Everything else is more or less fine as is. Please, keep the iOS crud out of it.
iWork, on the other hand, could use the work. It's still nowhere near as good as '09 was. Grumble, grumble.
Comments
Focusing directly on the Font Book icon, the Notes, Calculator, and Calendar icons all fall into peripheral association with it. They’re all angled identically and have virtually the same dimensions. Only color sets them apart. Meanwhile Automator, FaceTime, Game Center, and Messages all stand out, individually, from it (and them) because of their entirely different shapes.
I also want the ability to edit my icons again, but I guess it doesn’t matter since I won’t be getting 10.12. I’ll just update to 10.11.6 and turn off the secure whatever it is that blocks user editing of the System folder.
There's nothing wrong with OS X System Preferences: in fact, they are the epitome of good design and simplicity.
All this junk about merging iOS with OS X is just that: junk --------> Steve Jobs understood this years ago, and laughed at Microsoft who were trying to convert Windows into some kind of web/i/OS, with panels, and touch screens and all sorts of iFashion nonsense. As Steve said, and wise words they were too: OS X is for people who create (remember the Chiat ad!),, while iOS is for people who consume content. Obviously, there is some blurring ... but trying to force the two things to be the same is going to be as big a disaster as Windows 8.
And I have to laugh at suggestions of running Macs on ARM: what's the point??? Who cares if it on ARM: who is going to recompile? No-one.
Or better still reuse the viewController from iTunes Album view and get the grid to split apart to reveal the preference pane take some of the disjointedness out of both interface styles. That would work across all three platforms (mac, pad, phone) and say iCloud if that becomes a platform.
I could only see Ax series on Mac if Apple moved to a SystemPU-ApplicationPU model instead of the current CPU-GPU model. Use the Ax as SPU to keep the mac open as a FoundationDB node and aim to have Customers data always in-sync. It would also have enough grunt to run email, iTunes and simple productivity apps like Pages, Photos. x86 then only kicks in for higher demand (or legacy) applications. Apple gets more control over the platform.
I mean, what in the FUCK are they doing over there?!
Also, round Finder icon is weird. Dunno why, but being round makes it creepy.
I *** ABSOLUTELY TOTALLY *** disagree that that Settings on iPads is better than System Preferences on the Mac. I use both A LOT and again I can't disagree with you more.
* One, you can search in System Preference and you can't in Settings. For instance, I want to change something in my network settings. I open up System Preferences and type in Network and hit enter and tahdah! it opens my network settings. You can't do this in Settings on the iPad.
* Two, System Preferences is laid out in rows of similar features which you can see on the screen all at the same time. Can you see all the different Settings on the screen at the same time? No.
* Three, four, five, six. I don't have time to write up all the things that drive me nuts about Settings that I like in System Preferences. The list is easily ten long and I'm still trying to think of ANYTHING that I like in Settings more than System Preferences. So far I'm coming up with Zero.
Keyboard shortcuts on the iPad. Obviously the person that wrote this article doesn't use iPads with Bluetooth keyboards of any brand but all the shortcuts that work on the iPad Pro also work on all the other iPads that accept Bluetooth keyboards which I think goes back to every version but at least back to Gen 3 Retina version. They need to keep adding more like being able to close an iOS app by doing Command-Q like on a Mac. Apple??? When are you adding this? I've wanted it for at least two years!
I hope that they don't get rid of Mac Minis. They work GREAT for low cost Mac OS X servers (I manage all kinds of Microsoft software and hardware but they have to pay me to use the ****. I ***like*** working with Mac OS X and so when I buy server hardware I go Mac Mini. They are cheap enough that you can replace them when they fail which usually takes over five years. Things aren't that time critical and I don't have enough money to buy new ones all the time. I just cram the largest hard drives I can into them and go. Big smile!!!
ARM Macs? I can see that. Actually I think Apple desperately wants to build all their own chips so it is only a matter of when, not if, they run Apple computers on their own designs.
I've got to get back to work.
iWork, on the other hand, could use the work. It's still nowhere near as good as '09 was. Grumble, grumble.