Mac OS X for the Stupid? [Archive]

DrJonesAC2

01-23-2003, 05:41 PM

I have been doing tech support for Mac's for a little while now. (not gonna tell ya where, you all would probably kill me) Anyway, I have come up with a possible solution to the worlds computing problems. Mac OS for the stupid, and Linux for the rest of us. I have come to love the Mac for it's simplicity. It's very easy to use and it's UNIX based. What a great way to introduce folks to the wonderful world of Linux. This way we could watch our loved ones, who are not as technically savvy as ourselves, actually enjoy thier computing experience!

Personally, I love my linux box. I just recently gave windows the boot. I even got Flash MX to run under wine (Which was the big thing holding me back from making the conversion). I think that Mac and the Linux community could be good friends. They are already on thier way, Safari is based on Konquerer code, and Mac just posted a beta for X11.

Anyway I am flying off on a tangent. I want to know what the Linux folks think of Mac OS X and if there could be some friendly relationship there.

Have fun and dont flame me.:D

Timothy L. Miller

01-23-2003, 06:03 PM

I used it for a while. Pretty. But for being based, down the line, on *BSD, I really have to say I didn't like it. They've done the "windows" thing to *BSD...hidden the command line behind so much prettiness that it's impossible to find. I don't mind some eye candy, as long as I can also keep my simple utility. And with OS-X, I just felt cheated.

Penrich

01-23-2003, 06:06 PM

So, are you saying that you NEVER have to answer any calls? ;)

The only problems I have with my OS X imac are when my Son plays his OS 9 games - it doesn't seem to handle switching perfectly, and some need a full reboot into 9 to work at all. Still - at least it has that much retro-compatability built in. If we could get OS X native games for a 3 year old (has to be Mickey Mouse or Dinosaurs...) I'd be totally happy!

firemoth

01-23-2003, 06:13 PM

Originally posted by Timothy L. Miller
I used it for a while. Pretty. But for being based, down the line, on *BSD, I really have to say I didn't like it. They've done the "windows" thing to *BSD...hidden the command line behind so much prettiness that it's impossible to find. I don't mind some eye candy, as long as I can also keep my simple utility. And with OS-X, I just felt cheated.

Go to the hard drive, applications, utilities,terminal. There ya go.

DrJonesAC2

01-23-2003, 06:14 PM

but I'm talking from a total newbie point of view. Ya know, my first computer type of thing. Most folks don't even want to know what the command line is. I think that mac is the box for them. At least at first....

DrJonesAC2

01-23-2003, 06:16 PM

No I do have to answer the overflow :mad:

CMonster

01-23-2003, 06:24 PM

Having seen what OS-X can do for video and audio editing in a professional setting, I would characterize OS-X as being "for the SMART" as well as the dumb.

-the smart, you know, artists and producers who actually want to get work done.

Penrich

01-23-2003, 06:31 PM

Originally posted by firemoth
Go to the hard drive, applications, utilities,terminal. There ya go. The just drag it to the dock - ready for next time.

Plus, install fink, and have apt-get access to over 2000 ported unix packages. (a "for the smart" thing)

Dun'kalis

01-23-2003, 07:05 PM

We have some Macs at school, for video editing, and they all run OS 9. I've never used OS X, but it has to be better than the load of pony loaf known as OS 9.

DrJonesAC2

01-23-2003, 07:23 PM

I have used OS 9 and I have to agree, it reallly blows the big one. Still, for some reason, it reamains easier and more configurable thatn windows...go figure!

But what I really want to know , is OS X a good starter system for the true computing newbies out there?

oakleys

01-23-2003, 08:23 PM

To me, OSX is like a sexy blond--with no personality. Sure, she looks great and the equipment is right, but the dynamics are awful. I like my women *****y, with an attitude--I find Linux on PC's to be somewhat like that...sometimes frustrating, but guaranteed to please.

Did I forget to mention that blonds are high maintenance? Oh yeah, $1800 for the essentials (damn, where did it all go?), I'm ready to throw her back into the pond....

Wouldn't it be nice if OSX had the development packages installed out of the box? Then you could start developing as soon as you boot. Maybe I'm Mac stupid, but I almost downloaded gcc from sourceforge before I found the packages buried somewhere in ../utilities/*#%/~^./&*(/. Nice documentation Apple...:rolleyes:

And how about the fact that you don't get vim? vi...who uses vi? WTF?

The networking interface is very kludgy. Anybody care to explain how to get a GUI nfs folder? (this ought to be good). I'm having the time of my life using the mount_nfs command on the Mac and having to modify my *NIX /etc/exports to "insecure" mode to get the shell version to work. Why can't OSX just use a secure port for nfs? Nice.

I get the feeling that Apple never really desired all this porting from *NIX, just the stability. I mean, it's sort of a pain in the *** to get things tweaked right.

The csh can smd.

"My name is oakleys, and if I could do it all over again, I would have gotten another PC."

DrJonesAC2

01-23-2003, 08:31 PM

I like the input and to tell you the truth I fell the same way. But what computing newbie is going to care about NFS partitions. They can plug into any windows network right out of the box! Dev tools are a little useless for newbies as well.
If you were to go looking for an OS for your girlfriend that you didnt have to maintain or help her with very much. Which would you choose?
I hope I get an answer before this gets buried :confused:

bosox79

01-23-2003, 08:53 PM

Originally posted by DrJonesAC2
I like the input and to tell you the truth I fell the same way. But what computing newbie is going to care about NFS partitions. They can plug into any windows network right out of the box! Dev tools are a little useless for newbies as well.
If you were to go looking for an OS for your girlfriend that you didnt have to maintain or help her with very much. Which would you choose?
I hope I get an answer before this gets buried :confused:

One of the biggest problems with newbies using a mac IMHO is the price difference & in my neck of the woods there is not an apple store within 30 miles of my house. I think windows & mac OS X are about the safe as far as ease of use from a newbie POV & when it comes down to it . when people ask me to recommended a system that is easy to use & offers the most bang for the buck I have to recommended a PC, Because of price & the ability to upgraded hardware for a small amount of money. ( I know IMacs are not that expensive but they are hard to upgrade. I would love to see a port of OS to the X86 platform. Don't get me wrong I like Apple I used to do Tech support for them & I would love to have a Titanium PowerBook but I Don't have the $$ windows 2000/xp are not that much more difficult to use then a mac OS @ least from an end users POV Now the support end may be a different story:D

oakleys

01-23-2003, 08:57 PM

Oh, I agree. The old lady has the Mac already.

To answer your original question as clearly as I can having a solid foundation of Linux experience and moderate experience with Macs is to say that I don't see a fully cooperative effort on Apple's side to implement many of the well-known features of a standard Linux build. Therefore, I don't expect the learning curve for the Linux user picking up the mac to become much less aggrivating than it is today.

tonimontanna

01-23-2003, 09:11 PM

OS X is great! Apple really made huge strides in terms of upgrading their OS. Apple is not targeting people like us on the board in terms of their OS. OS X is great for the end user. Too bad they did not port their OS over to the Intel/AMD side. Apple is moving in the right direction. It has taken them some time to make this move. Apple will continue to help GLP applications with their efforts. They have to.

Prophet621

01-23-2003, 09:33 PM

I'm tech support for my companies branch and we have a few macs running OS9. Now I don't know how much of a difference between that and OSX but I can't even describe how much I hate those systems. Constant problems, ugly, severely limited, and all around worthless, they rarely ever get used but somthing is constantly going wrong with them. I don't even like to look at them let alone have to use it and try to figure out what I'm doing and fix it. They have been down for almost 4 days now, I'm in no hurry to get to them, and no one if pushing for me to get to them. Abominations they are.

How is OSX any different? Someone said huge strides between 9 and X.. based on what I know about 9.. huge strides don't even come close to what needs to be done to make that a decent OS. I can't find a single good thing to say about those systems we have at work.

Another grip is when I try to right click on things. Then get the urge to rip the mouse out for only having one big stupid bulky button. I know, it's a personal thing but I like having a second button and a WHEEL. Do they have 2 button mouses for macs? If they do I'm buying one before I touch that thing again.

CMonster

01-24-2003, 05:00 AM

KarrottoP

01-24-2003, 05:11 AM

Yes, I am using a 3 button mouse on my OSX machine myself. not to mention I beleive 8x handles a 3 button mouse really well.

The latest encarnation of OSX (jaguar) is amazing in its own right. The graphics are all you could possibly want for a machine and it dosen't bog anything down now that they have got the graphics acceleration down. Here are my thoughts

1. Its great that they don't install the dev tools off the bat because if you don't know what they are you should not install them. Novice users should not have root access!!

2. Once you get the dev tools installed your newbie machine becomes a great *nix machine as well, and its fast. Sure you have to get apples hardware, but its some of the best hardware available, you get what you pay for.

DrJonesAC2

01-24-2003, 08:32 AM

It appears the opinoins are generally "over bang for the buck". From what I have heard from my Mac friends, the hardware is upgradeable just like a PC. Yes you do need to get apple hardware, but there is no reason you can't evolve your G3 to a G4 from what I have heard. Hard drives, RAM and other peripherals are totally swappable. You basicly come down to Motherboard CPU and the case. Same thing right?
The reason I started this post is becuase I want to start my kids on computers, and if I can help them live in a windows free world I will do it. The thing is I don't think a five year old is going to be interested in the command line. I suppose I could just set them up a linux box without root access and maintain the system myself. This is what I will probably do because, like the rest of you, I don't have the dough for a mac. But, also like so many of you out there, I constantly get asked by people which system to buy. I think for those folks the Mac is the easiest. It works right out of the box and they wont be calling me to get it fixed!

KarrottoP

01-24-2003, 10:23 PM

for a little side bar here, if you would get your children a mac, application management is really nice in OSX, you can really lock down the machine well if you want, and there is no(install app to local directory) if you don't want there to be so you don't have to worry about your kids connecting to limewire and downloaded Pam and Tommy Lee. I would get an imac for kids, definately the way to go, not (as) upgradable as the towers, but they are great computers, My family computer is a mac (and yes, my family and I have different computers)(3 of which are mine!)

oakleys

01-24-2003, 11:15 PM

Its great that they don't install the dev tools off the bat because if you don't know what they are you should not install them.
I respectfully disagree for a few reasons. First of all, these packages are already installed on the disk out of the box, they just need to be built. It doesn't make much sense to me that they're not prebuilt. It's like buying a car with a deluxe sound system only to find that you have to install the fuse before you can use it. And as I mentioned (eariler in the thread), this package isn't that easy to find (read: fuse is under the rear floormat) Second, you have to know what you're doing to actually wreak havoc with the dev kit. It isn't like some 6 year old will click on the wrong button in gcc ;) and fry something. Third, having a dev kit (with good documentation) installed on the machine = making better computer users (see Linux). Last, there's plenty of stuff installed that most people don't know how to use, there wouldn't be much there at all otherwise.

Novice users should not have root access!!
I agree, but you can't say that OSX follows the traditional UNIX model in regards to administration and privacy when sudo is enabled by default! Huge can of worms--particularly on a network. Sure, you can lock down the user accounts to nil on the mac to prevent users from gaining root access, but (in the long run) that equates to much more work for the administrator.

chatins

01-25-2003, 01:58 AM

I cant wait until apple makes the switch to pc hardware. They have a secret group of 11 engineers that keep compitibility with an unknown pc hardware spec at all times. All changes to the OS must be run by this group first. Spoooky!!!!

retoon

01-25-2003, 02:16 AM

IMHO, it is not wise to ease the children into Linux. Simply create the linux boxes, and show them all of the fun aesthetic things in it. Like video games, and where to click to type papers, and to play music on cds. If you show them, they won't find it difficult to use. I have a theory (someone could have had it before me but I thought it up on my own) that if you start a child off on Linux, they won't see it as difficult. The reason so many people think that linux is difficult, is because they are used to running windows, and don't like the change. The kids won't care. Show them tux racer, and they will love it. Along side that, you will save alot of money.

Penrich

01-25-2003, 02:24 AM

Originally posted by Prophet621
Another grip is when I try to right click on things. Then get the urge to rip the mouse out for only having one big stupid bulky button. I know, it's a personal thing but I like having a second button and a WHEEL. Do they have 2 button mouses for macs? If they do I'm buying one before I touch that thing again.
Just rip an optical wheel USB mouse from your PC and stick it in the USB slot on the side of the keyboard. Plug and Play! [Least, thats what i did about 1 minute into using my new imac. I only kept the 1 button cos its actually good for my kid].

Penrich

01-25-2003, 02:26 AM

Originally posted by chatins
I cant wait until apple makes the switch to pc hardware. They have a secret group of 11 engineers that keep compitibility with an unknown pc hardware spec at all times. All changes to the OS must be run by this group first. Spoooky!!!! Do you actually have any evidence for this group of 11? From what I've heard, porting OS X to i386 would kill off Apple for good.

Penrich

01-25-2003, 02:35 AM

Originally posted by oakleys
I respectfully disagree for a few reasons. First of all, these packages are already installed on the disk out of the box, they just need to be built. It doesn't make much sense to me that they're not prebuilt. It's like buying a car with a deluxe sound system only to find that you have to install the fuse before you can use it. And as I mentioned (eariler in the thread), this package isn't that easy to find (read: fuse is under the rear floormat) Second, you have to know what you're doing to actually wreak havoc with the dev kit. It isn't like some 6 year old will click on the wrong button in gcc ;) and fry something. Third, having a dev kit (with good documentation) installed on the machine = making better computer users (see Linux). Last, there's plenty of stuff installed that most people don't know how to use, there wouldn't be much there at all otherwise.

I agree, but you can't say that OSX follows the traditional UNIX model in regards to administration and privacy when sudo is enabled by default! Huge can of worms--particularly on a network. Sure, you can lock down the user accounts to nil on the mac to prevent users from gaining root access, but (in the long run) that equates to much more work for the administrator.
On my imac, I had to install the dev tools from an extra CD. I had heard to look for it, and it wasn't hard to find.

To install you do need to have an admin password, so it is not a wide open root environment. You can activate root-mode (can't remember the official term) if you do a lot of console stuff.

Also, imacs are not easily upgradable - due to their funky shape. I haven't really looked into it, but if you dive too deep, you void all sorts of warranties.

KarrottoP

01-25-2003, 03:36 AM

you should see how warantee voided my ibook is!!

Apple does have OSX running stable on x86 architecture, they are doing this because of two reasons, they can for one, thats just how apple is. And because Motorolla is pooping out on the processors, If motorolla fails to increase speed, then IBM has a Power4 processor that is next in line, all else fails, you guessed it OSX on intel hardware. Anyone that is an actual apple user, will tell you that OSX is a fun OS to use, It is nice to look at, it runs on hardware that is fast enough to sport all the gui toys and with the inclusion of darwin at its core, it is a great unix wannabe as well, keep in mind darwin is darwin, not bsd, not linux, not unix, and if you respect that then you will be happy with the os

retoon

01-27-2003, 03:44 PM

What are the diffrent versions, or releases of OSX. I heard that 10.1 wasn't as resource efficient as 10.2. Then there is the word jaguar falling into place here. What is the difference between OSX, OS10.1, OS10.2, Jaguar?

Penrich

01-27-2003, 04:42 PM

Originally posted by retoon
What are the diffrent versions, or releases of OSX. I heard that 10.1 wasn't as resource efficient as 10.2. Then there is the word jaguar falling into place here. What is the difference between OSX, OS10.1, OS10.2, Jaguar?
Jaguar is the code name for 10.2. http://www.apple.com/macosx/
Current version = 10.2.3. 10.2 appears to have been a major upgrade from 10.1, hence they charge for it, but my mac came with Jaguar, so I'm not sure what 10.1 was like.

EDIT Jaguar has "over 150 new features" (http://www.apple.com/macosx/jaguar/)

thread_killer

01-27-2003, 09:10 PM

I owned nothing but apples from 82 - 98. I had a two hour meeting with apple today to look at putting some I-books and an AirPort in. Of course, the first thing I asked the guy was "How Unix-y is this Unix 'based' Jaguar OS?" He went clickity clickity clickity, and there was a beautiful little shell opened up for me. I asked him if the AirPort was DSSS or FHSS and he suddenly had a little respect for me...... We spent the next couple of hours having a good old time ripping OS X up. I wouldn't want to spend the money for myself, but it sure is nice for the (l)users I support. I'm way hesitant about putting a "real" *nix on the desktop, but I'd feel pretty good letting them have Jaguar. I saw the OS nine VM work pretty well in OS X, and he honestly explained the short-commings to me. I doubt that I will ever replace the 6000 WinBlows machines on the network with nothing but Macs, but I sure might send a few that way. I was really quite impressed with where Apple has gone in five years.

My $.02

Penrich

01-28-2003, 12:24 AM

Originally posted by iKarrottoP
you should see how warantee voided my ibook is!!
Judging by you title, I can believe you :) Any photos?

Tempus77

01-28-2003, 01:04 AM

i've been using macs for quite a few years now, but never owned one myself........until recently when a friend bought me a G4 powerbook as a gift with OS X 10.2 installed............i must say jaguar's really awesome compared to previous version of mac oses...........and the titanium casing and styling of the powerbook.......mmmm....*drooling*........:p

hlrguy

01-28-2003, 01:16 AM

Originally posted by DrJonesAC2
Anyway I am flying off on a tangent. I want to know what the Linux folks think of Mac OS X and if there could be some friendly relationship there.

I use Linux and Solaris. Don't have a Mac, however, if anyone comes to me for a recommendation (which they do), these are the choices.

1) They are local and I can install it, configure it, get it working for them (the way it would come from the factory) AND they will read the manuals, I install Linux.

2) If they can't use a mouse yet without a tutorial or are far away and can afford one (i.e. I am not there it install and set up Linux), then I recommend Mac.

If none of the above are true, i.e. they can't afford one and don't know that when I say press return, I mean enter, I don't recommend anything. I won't. I will never support another person running M$ again. If I recommend it, I feel oibligated, and for such an easy to use OS, it sure takes a lot of maintenance/repair.

I have always liked Macs, and the new 17" powerbook, would love to get one. Will I, only if the company needs me to travel again. Being Unix based is now more the reason to like it and recommend it.

hlrguy