Back to the Fox
I tried. I really did. But the Fox is just better in almost everything.
Apple Trackpads
I’ve always been sceptic about using any other type of pointer device besides a mouse. Whenever I had to use any kind of trackballs, mini-joysticks or track-pads I begged for a decent mouse. Even my old laptop track-pad, which I used several times for long periods, was barely usable.
However the Powerbook track-pad is rather easy to use. I often find myself using it without even noticing I forgot to connect my mouse. The scroll-with-two-fingers feature is just hyper-intuitive and it transmits an enormous sense of control (I can scroll slowly or fast without much effort).
Having said this I’m still getting a Mighty Mouse as soon as I can.
RSS Reading
I’ve been using bloglines for quite some time now. I tried several times to switch to a desktop RSS reader but kept going back to the old web based bloglines, mostly because it was easier to have my reading synchronized as I was using two computers (one at home and one at work).
My new 12” powerbook, beeing much lighter and smaller than my old laptop, follows me around more often (well, in fact always). So I decided to give desktop RSS reading one more shot. I googled for a decent RSS reader for the mac and found Vienna a simple and nice RSS reader.
What I’m liking most about using this kind of setup is that I can keep my reading up to date even when I’m webless.
To Safari or to Firefox
Since I made the switch I’m having this dilemma: Should I use the good ol’ Firefox or use the more macish Safari?
As I’m posting this I just discovered one more reason not to use Safari. Blog.com’s rich text editor doesn’t work with Safari. Still I’m forcing myself to give it a try. First because it fits much better into the OSX GUI and also because it seems to be a little bit more snappier than Firefox. So what don’t I like about it? Well in fact a number of things:
- I miss all those nice Firefox extensions. Sure there is Pimp My Safari, but it just ain’t the same thing, is it?
- I still didn’t find a way to use the address bar to perform I’m feeling lucky searches in google;
- I can’t move or edit bookmarks without entering the bookmark manager thingy;
- Some sites just don’t like Safari;
- I found a way of having Firefox’s “Search as you type” feature but it’s not as good as the original one;
- And other pet peaves that I just don’t remember right now …
Still I’m sticking with Safari for some time and give it a chance!
Eye Candy
Even though my first post about my new Powerbook wasn’t exactly a praising one, there are a good handful of things I just love in Mac OS X. One of them is the incredible amount of unobtruvise eye candy. I’ll just mention a few examples:
- Exposé - The best invention since sliced bread. Not enough to stop missing linux virtual desktops but a genuine brilliant idea (quicktime video).
- Desktop Manager - Mac OS X doesn’t come with virtual desktops by default but there are a couple of add-ons that help the common linux switcher feel right at home. Desktop Manager seems to be the best alternative so far and its transitions are just plain beautiful (quicktime video). Virtue seems to be a good alternative but unfortunately it doesn’t work in Tiger. Some things I miss are the ability to associate applications to a desktop or to have applications that show in every desktop and having different docks in each desktop.
- Genie Effect - Just another example of the extreme care apple took with the visual aspect of Mac OS X. The Genie Effect is both nice and useless
When minimizing windows they appear to be sucked into a bottle just like the genie of Aladdin. If you press shift while minimizing you can see the effect in glorious slow motion (screenshot).
The Keyboard
The keyboard is, at this moment, the most annoying feature of my new laptop. I imagine that with time I’ll get used to it.
After spending the last couple of days getting to know the beast, still using the linux box to do most of the coding, I opened a terminal window and started using vi to change a php script in another box. 5 minutes later I was wondering where in the hell was the square bracket key. There simply isn’t any key on the keyboard showing a square bracket (neither is there one showing curly brackets for that matter).
Hmm, maybe one of those strange looking keys combined with the 8 or 9 keys will do the trick. It did. For the record:
- [ = option + 8 (the option key is the one that says alt and has a strange symbol - don't ask)
- ] = option + 9
And what about curly brackets. I tried the function key, the command key (the one with an apple and a strange curved symbol), a key with an arrow and a line on top of it that I still have no idea what it’s for, i tried the ctrl key and the shift key but none seemed to work. So I started trying key combinations. After a few tries I found how to do it:
- { = shift + option + 8
- } = shift + option + 9
This was just the beggining. Some keys are in different places, some just don’t exist and some do things you don’t expect. Some even do different things depending on the app where you are using them.
The PageUp, PageDown, Home and End keys will deserve a separate post one of this days, as soon as I find out how to use them properly.
Update: Just found out what’s key having an arrow with a line on top of it. It’s another return key. But undercover (shhh!).
Switching
As the few remaining readers of this blog probably noticed, this blog has been dying a slow death. In an effort to resume writing regularly I’m going to try to post something about my experience switching to Mac OS X.
Being a Linux user for quite some time I’m having some natural difficulties in adapting to this new OS. I’m completely flabbergasted with all the eye-candy however some things still feel better
the old Linux way.
So in the next few days expect some posts about how to switch to Mac OS from a Developer/Linux user point of view.
