You know when you crank the resolution up on your montior and your text and icons shrink to the size of a gnat? Well rez independence would allow you to scale the user interface of the OS back up so that your icons/text will be at a decent size.
To elaborate, the current solution most people do is downgrade the resolution on the displays which is really bad, expecially an LCD. If you ever run an LCD at something other than it's native (or native/2) res., you'll notice interpolation and blurry text. Resolution independence will allow Grandma to run her LCD at full, native 1600x1200 and still be able to read everything.
It's the difference between zooming into a photo in iPhoto and zooming into a PDF in Preview.
In iPhoto, even though it's smoothing things for you, it gets chunky pretty fast. A photo is just a bunch of dots.
In Preview, with a PDF, it *always* stays smooth and crisp. A PDF file is a bunch of instructions on how to draw the objects, at whatever scale is needed, so it always matches up to your display (or printer, or whatever) perfectly.
Right now, we have a bunch of dots for our UI. Resolution independence makes it like a PDF - you can zoom in as much as you want, and it still looks crisp.
Just to add something else about Res Independence. By pressing Apple/Command + J, you can resize the icons up to a 128x128 px size. This is how it will work, but on the whole OS - menus, windows, text size and everything else. And just like with the icons, it'll stay looking gorgeous and not at all pixelated, like changing the resolution of the screen.
hmurchison: Resolution Independence did make the cut... it is in the API's. It just does not have a GUI yet, and this is because Apple wants people to develop for it, but knows that there is no reason to bring it out yet. When a reason happens, Apple will be ready.
Watch the WWDC webcast about the Graphics layers, they are very specific about why this was done.
PB: Those two are in 10.4, they are just not in the marketing. How do you explain the former to most people, and the latter is for developer's only: users will get the benefits but will never know how things were implemented.
Wait, so are you saying that Apple has fully implemented a resolution-independent GUI in OS X, but just decided to turn the feature off for public consumption? Why? Is it because Apple are afraid nobody would buy their relatively low resolution displays? This is just crazy-I've seen high resolution LCDs and the clarity is amazing - it would be perfect for Aqua! Plus Apple will need a resolution independent GUI if they are ever to equip smaller sized displays with HD resolution.
Wait, so are you saying that Apple has fully implemented a resolution-independent GUI in OS X, but just decided to turn the feature off for public consumption? Why? Is it because Apple are afraid nobody would buy their relatively low resolution displays? This is just crazy-I've seen high resolution LCDs and the clarity is amazing - it would be perfect for Aqua! Plus Apple will need a resolution independent GUI if they are ever to equip smaller sized displays with HD resolution.
Try and read the post again. Resolution independent support is in there, but it won't be turned on until developers have made their apps ready for a resolution independent GUI.
It you really want it, install the Dev tools and turn it on.
I suspect Java 1.5 and OpenGL 2.0 will be either 'when they're ready' or 10.4.1. The latter particularly surprises me, but I understand there were some issues with programmable shaders as defined in OGL2 and how Apple implemented them in CoreImage... methinks they're looking at a merging on the back end to save on development costs later.
Java 1.5 is a separate download and was always intended as such.
Wait, so are you saying that Apple has fully implemented a resolution-independent GUI in OS X, but just decided to turn the feature off for public consumption? Why? Is it because Apple are afraid nobody would buy their relatively low resolution displays? This is just crazy-I've seen high resolution LCDs and the clarity is amazing - it would be perfect for Aqua! Plus Apple will need a resolution independent GUI if they are ever to equip smaller sized displays with HD resolution.
Go watch the streaming videos on Apple's website. It has a nice section on why 3rd party apps are not ready for resolution independence (and Classic and most Carbon will never be). In addition, we don't really have a need for resolution independence now... some people might use it, but the need is not there yet. The need will happen when we start to go to 300 pixels per inch (^2) and this will probably first happen with digital ink or OLED devices.
Apple is prepping for it, and the way they have done it everyone can get ready, and it will be easy for a future .x upgrade to add the GUI.
So did Quartz 2D Extreme make it into Tiger? The official site makes no mention of it as far as I can tell. It does however mention Quartz Extreme which surfaced as early as Jaguar. Perhaps this technology (Q2DE) has been disabled in the GM and will be added with an 10.4.x release? Either way, the handy-man should be able to enable it from the developer tools, assuming that the code is still there only dormant. Any thoughts?
So did Quartz 2D Extreme make it into Tiger? The official site makes no mention of it as far as I can tell. It does however mention Quartz Extreme which surfaced as early as Jaguar. Perhaps this technology (Q2DE) has been disabled in the GM and will be added with an 10.4.x release? Either way, the handy-man should be able to enable it from the developer tools, assuming that the code is still there only dormant. Any thoughts?
So did Quartz 2D Extreme make it into Tiger? Any thoughts?
It's there in mine. It was turned on too. I don't see any reason to disable it, as it finally brings "TEH SNAPPY®" to window resizing, unless the app itself has to do a lot of redrawing as the window resizes. QT Player now has full active live window resizing, very very responsive.
Resolution independence is in there - it's just that apps will have to have controls to set their menu fonts, etc. before it will be useful. For now, for example, you can set the resolution to 2x with the dev tool Quartz Debug, and relaunch Safari, but there is no way to tell Safari to reduce the font size of the menus so they are huge.
Go watch the streaming videos on Apple's website. It has a nice section on why 3rd party apps are not ready for resolution independence (and Classic and most Carbon will never be).
Please excuse, but I do not have the time to skip through all the movies. Could you be so kind and elaborate on the reasons?
Quote:
Originally posted by Karl Kuehn
In addition, we don't really have a need for resolution independence now... some people might use it, but the need is not there yet. The need will happen when we start to go to 300 pixels per inch (^2) and this will probably first happen with digital ink or OLED devices.
This is kind of an hen/egg situation: noone needs it as long as high-res screens are not widely spread, but they will not see market penetration as long as there are no provision to comfortably use them.
Anyway, back on topic. It seems that the information concerning Quartz 2D Extreme is a little confusing. JLL says it is turned off by default. lundy says it works on his machine and gives a very noticeable boost in 2D operations. Just in my mind it does not make sense to disable by default such a feature. On the other hand, this explains why Apple is mum on the subject. Is there some problem that needs to be resolved before Apple turns it on by default?
Comments
Originally posted by hmurchison
You know when you crank the resolution up on your montior and your text and icons shrink to the size of a gnat? Well rez independence would allow you to scale the user interface of the OS back up so that your icons/text will be at a decent size.
To elaborate, the current solution most people do is downgrade the resolution on the displays which is really bad, expecially an LCD. If you ever run an LCD at something other than it's native (or native/2) res., you'll notice interpolation and blurry text. Resolution independence will allow Grandma to run her LCD at full, native 1600x1200 and still be able to read everything.
In iPhoto, even though it's smoothing things for you, it gets chunky pretty fast. A photo is just a bunch of dots.
In Preview, with a PDF, it *always* stays smooth and crisp. A PDF file is a bunch of instructions on how to draw the objects, at whatever scale is needed, so it always matches up to your display (or printer, or whatever) perfectly.
Right now, we have a bunch of dots for our UI. Resolution independence makes it like a PDF - you can zoom in as much as you want, and it still looks crisp.
Originally posted by Karl Kuehn
hmurchison: Resolution Independence did make the cut... it is in the API's. It just does not have a GUI yet, and this is because Apple wants people to develop for it, but knows that there is no reason to bring it out yet. When a reason happens, Apple will be ready.
Watch the WWDC webcast about the Graphics layers, they are very specific about why this was done.
PB: Those two are in 10.4, they are just not in the marketing. How do you explain the former to most people, and the latter is for developer's only: users will get the benefits but will never know how things were implemented.
Wait, so are you saying that Apple has fully implemented a resolution-independent GUI in OS X, but just decided to turn the feature off for public consumption? Why? Is it because Apple are afraid nobody would buy their relatively low resolution displays? This is just crazy-I've seen high resolution LCDs and the clarity is amazing - it would be perfect for Aqua! Plus Apple will need a resolution independent GUI if they are ever to equip smaller sized displays with HD resolution.
Originally posted by Junkyard Dawg
Wait, so are you saying that Apple has fully implemented a resolution-independent GUI in OS X, but just decided to turn the feature off for public consumption? Why? Is it because Apple are afraid nobody would buy their relatively low resolution displays? This is just crazy-I've seen high resolution LCDs and the clarity is amazing - it would be perfect for Aqua! Plus Apple will need a resolution independent GUI if they are ever to equip smaller sized displays with HD resolution.
Try and read the post again. Resolution independent support is in there, but it won't be turned on until developers have made their apps ready for a resolution independent GUI.
It you really want it, install the Dev tools and turn it on.
Originally posted by Kickaha
I suspect Java 1.5 and OpenGL 2.0 will be either 'when they're ready' or 10.4.1. The latter particularly surprises me, but I understand there were some issues with programmable shaders as defined in OGL2 and how Apple implemented them in CoreImage... methinks they're looking at a merging on the back end to save on development costs later.
Java 1.5 is a separate download and was always intended as such.
Originally posted by JLL
Java 1.5 is a separate download and was always intended as such.
yup, afaik it is available through adc for tiger developers, so i guess it will be released shortly after tiger.
Originally posted by Junkyard Dawg
Wait, so are you saying that Apple has fully implemented a resolution-independent GUI in OS X, but just decided to turn the feature off for public consumption? Why? Is it because Apple are afraid nobody would buy their relatively low resolution displays? This is just crazy-I've seen high resolution LCDs and the clarity is amazing - it would be perfect for Aqua! Plus Apple will need a resolution independent GUI if they are ever to equip smaller sized displays with HD resolution.
Go watch the streaming videos on Apple's website. It has a nice section on why 3rd party apps are not ready for resolution independence (and Classic and most Carbon will never be). In addition, we don't really have a need for resolution independence now... some people might use it, but the need is not there yet. The need will happen when we start to go to 300 pixels per inch (^2) and this will probably first happen with digital ink or OLED devices.
Apple is prepping for it, and the way they have done it everyone can get ready, and it will be easy for a future .x upgrade to add the GUI.
Just curious.
Originally posted by Gavriel
So did Quartz 2D Extreme make it into Tiger? The official site makes no mention of it as far as I can tell. It does however mention Quartz Extreme which surfaced as early as Jaguar. Perhaps this technology (Q2DE) has been disabled in the GM and will be added with an 10.4.x release? Either way, the handy-man should be able to enable it from the developer tools, assuming that the code is still there only dormant. Any thoughts?
It's turned off by default in GM.
Oh kineticon! Where for art thou with an OS X implementation?
Originally posted by Gavriel
So did Quartz 2D Extreme make it into Tiger? Any thoughts?
It's there in mine. It was turned on too. I don't see any reason to disable it, as it finally brings "TEH SNAPPY®" to window resizing, unless the app itself has to do a lot of redrawing as the window resizes. QT Player now has full active live window resizing, very very responsive.
Resolution independence is in there - it's just that apps will have to have controls to set their menu fonts, etc. before it will be useful. For now, for example, you can set the resolution to 2x with the dev tool Quartz Debug, and relaunch Safari, but there is no way to tell Safari to reduce the font size of the menus so they are huge.
I guess some folks are NEVER going to be happy
Originally posted by Karl Kuehn
Go watch the streaming videos on Apple's website. It has a nice section on why 3rd party apps are not ready for resolution independence (and Classic and most Carbon will never be).
Please excuse, but I do not have the time to skip through all the movies. Could you be so kind and elaborate on the reasons?
Originally posted by Karl Kuehn
In addition, we don't really have a need for resolution independence now... some people might use it, but the need is not there yet. The need will happen when we start to go to 300 pixels per inch (^2) and this will probably first happen with digital ink or OLED devices.
This is kind of an hen/egg situation: noone needs it as long as high-res screens are not widely spread, but they will not see market penetration as long as there are no provision to comfortably use them.
Originally posted by BuonRotto
IIRC, nope.
Strange enough, isn't it?
Btw, i had to do some funny research
what "IIRC" suppose to mean, actually.
Originally posted by Vox Barbara
what "IIRC" suppose to mean, actually.
If I Remember Correctly?
Anyway, back on topic. It seems that the information concerning Quartz 2D Extreme is a little confusing. JLL says it is turned off by default. lundy says it works on his machine and gives a very noticeable boost in 2D operations. Just in my mind it does not make sense to disable by default such a feature. On the other hand, this explains why Apple is mum on the subject. Is there some problem that needs to be resolved before Apple turns it on by default?