logo Sign In

MAC or PC — Page 3

Author
Time

Tyrphanax said:

Ah yeah that’s it, then. The thing is that if I’m using a specific program, I’m probably going to keep it maximized since I’m likely working on/reading/whatevering something I want to see all of.

In other cases, as a lifetime PC user, I’ve gotten so used to going it the Windows Way™ that when I started using that Mac at work it it took me a minute to figure out where the File Menu was. It just boils down to what you’re used to, really.

Maximizers. . . .

Author
Time
 (Edited)

I’ve got multiple monitors, man. One gets the thing I’m working on or the game I’m playing and the others get other windows and things I don’t need to focus on. Things like explorer or whatever never get maximized, but if I’m using Office or Photoshop or Maya or whatever, I want to focus on that.

If I had ten small windows open on my main monitor, I’d lose my mind. Too much clutter.

Also I meant to add that I use hotkeys for just about everything they hide in those upper menus anyway.

Keep Circulating the Tapes.

END OF LINE

(It hasn’t happened yet)

Author
Time

But didn’t you say that everyone fullscreens their windows anyways? So docked to the application is exactly the same as docked to top in 90% of the cases.
And even if you have multiple windows on the screen at the same time, it makes much more sense to me to look at the top of the application, since when all menubars are at the top, you first need to check which one is active before you use the menubar.

Ceci n’est pas une signature.

Author
Time

Tyrphanax said:

I’ve got multiple monitors, man. One gets the thing I’m working on or the game I’m playing and the others get other windows and things I don’t need to focus on. Things like explorer or whatever never get maximized, but if I’m using Office or Photoshop or Maya or whatever, I want to focus on that.

If I had ten small windows open on my main monitor, I’d lose my mind. Too much clutter.

Also I meant to add that I use hotkeys for just about everything they hide in those upper menus anyway.

Reasonable.

Author
Time

Frank your Majesty said:

But didn’t you say that everyone fullscreens their windows anyways? So docked to the application is exactly the same as docked to top in 90% of the cases.
And even if you have multiple windows on the screen at the same time, it makes much more sense to me to look at the top of the application, since when all menubars are at the top, you first need to check which one is active before you use the menubar.

The application name is in the menubar.

Author
Time
 (Edited)

Frank your Majesty said:

But didn’t you say that everyone fullscreens their windows anyways? So docked to the application is exactly the same as docked to top in 90% of the cases.
And even if you have multiple windows on the screen at the same time, it makes much more sense to me to look at the top of the application, since when all menubars are at the top, you first need to check which one is active before you use the menubar.

Ah yeah! I’d forgotten this.

Since you can have the Photoshop toolbars up around the edges of your screen but work on something else in the middle, I don’t know how many times I went to click what I thought was the “Photoshop” menu but was actually “Finder” or whatever other window I was just in. Very annoying.

yhwx said:

Frank your Majesty said:

But didn’t you say that everyone fullscreens their windows anyways? So docked to the application is exactly the same as docked to top in 90% of the cases.
And even if you have multiple windows on the screen at the same time, it makes much more sense to me to look at the top of the application, since when all menubars are at the top, you first need to check which one is active before you use the menubar.

The application name is in the menubar.

It is, yes, but it’s far more intuitive (for me at least) to just know that the menu bar will be for the window I have on top than to stop and make sure I’m clicking the right thing.

Keep Circulating the Tapes.

END OF LINE

(It hasn’t happened yet)

Author
Time
 (Edited)

Double post.

I need to go to bed.

Keep Circulating the Tapes.

END OF LINE

(It hasn’t happened yet)

Author
Time

Tyrphanax said:

Frank your Majesty said:

But didn’t you say that everyone fullscreens their windows anyways? So docked to the application is exactly the same as docked to top in 90% of the cases.
And even if you have multiple windows on the screen at the same time, it makes much more sense to me to look at the top of the application, since when all menubars are at the top, you first need to check which one is active before you use the menubar.

Ah yeah! I’d forgotten this.

Since you can have the Photoshop toolbars up around the edges of your screen but work on something else in the middle, I don’t know how many times I went to click what I thought was the “Photoshop” menu but was actually “Finder” or whatever other window I was just in. Very annoying.

yhwx said:

Frank your Majesty said:

But didn’t you say that everyone fullscreens their windows anyways? So docked to the application is exactly the same as docked to top in 90% of the cases.
And even if you have multiple windows on the screen at the same time, it makes much more sense to me to look at the top of the application, since when all menubars are at the top, you first need to check which one is active before you use the menubar.

The application name is in the menubar.

It is, yes, but it’s far more intuitive (for me at least) to just know that the menu bar will be for the window I have on top than to stop and make sure I’m clicking the right thing.

I think we’re coming down to a ergonomics vs. “intuitive” argument.

I come down on the side of ergonomics.

Author
Time

I didn’t find it very ergonomic!

It was still happening six months after I started using a Mac and I’ve never had that issue on PC.

If it was more obvious which window was in focus when you have a bunch of non-maximized screens open without having to stop and read some text, I might be temped to call it user-friendly.

Keep Circulating the Tapes.

END OF LINE

(It hasn’t happened yet)

Author
Time

yhwx said:

Frank your Majesty said:

But didn’t you say that everyone fullscreens their windows anyways? So docked to the application is exactly the same as docked to top in 90% of the cases.
And even if you have multiple windows on the screen at the same time, it makes much more sense to me to look at the top of the application, since when all menubars are at the top, you first need to check which one is active before you use the menubar.

The application name is in the menubar.

Yeah, but let’s assume you have two windows, one on the right half, one on the left. You’re working in the left window, now you want to use the menu from the right one.
In Windows, you simply move your mouse to the right window and click on the menubar, when using a mac, you first need to move to the right, activate that window, then move back to the top left where the menubar is. Seems unnecessarily complicated to me.

Ceci n’est pas une signature.

Author
Time

Tyrphanax said:

I didn’t find it very ergonomic!

It was still happening six months after I started using a Mac and I’ve never had that issue on PC.

If it was more obvious which window was in focus when you have a bunch of non-maximized screens open without having to stop and read some text, I might be temped to call it user-friendly.

Active window titlebars are darker than inactive window titlebars.

Author
Time
 (Edited)

Frank your Majesty said:

yhwx said:

Frank your Majesty said:

But didn’t you say that everyone fullscreens their windows anyways? So docked to the application is exactly the same as docked to top in 90% of the cases.
And even if you have multiple windows on the screen at the same time, it makes much more sense to me to look at the top of the application, since when all menubars are at the top, you first need to check which one is active before you use the menubar.

The application name is in the menubar.

Yeah, but let’s assume you have two windows, one on the right half, one on the left. You’re working in the left window, now you want to use the menu from the right one.
In Windows, you simply move your mouse to the right window and click on the menubar, when using a mac, you first need to move to the right, activate that window, then move back to the top left where the menubar is. Seems unnecessarily complicated to me.

I have been there.

yhwx said:

Tyrphanax said:

I didn’t find it very ergonomic!

It was still happening six months after I started using a Mac and I’ve never had that issue on PC.

If it was more obvious which window was in focus when you have a bunch of non-maximized screens open without having to stop and read some text, I might be temped to call it user-friendly.

Active window titlebars are darker than inactive window titlebars.

When you’re on autopilot and thinking about other things, it’s often not obvious.

My workflow was a lot of times “Move file from A to B, try to open menu for A, open menu for B, sigh with annoyance, click on A, open A menu”

It’s not a great design in my view. I can see how wanting to have a single, context-sensitive menu bar makes sense, but in my experience it’s not better than having a separate menu bar in each window. It’s still an extra click on a Mac either way, like Frank said.

Keep Circulating the Tapes.

END OF LINE

(It hasn’t happened yet)

Author
Time

Tyrphanax said:

Frank your Majesty said:

yhwx said:

Frank your Majesty said:

But didn’t you say that everyone fullscreens their windows anyways? So docked to the application is exactly the same as docked to top in 90% of the cases.
And even if you have multiple windows on the screen at the same time, it makes much more sense to me to look at the top of the application, since when all menubars are at the top, you first need to check which one is active before you use the menubar.

The application name is in the menubar.

Yeah, but let’s assume you have two windows, one on the right half, one on the left. You’re working in the left window, now you want to use the menu from the right one.
In Windows, you simply move your mouse to the right window and click on the menubar, when using a mac, you first need to move to the right, activate that window, then move back to the top left where the menubar is. Seems unnecessarily complicated to me.

I have been there.

yhwx said:

Tyrphanax said:

I didn’t find it very ergonomic!

It was still happening six months after I started using a Mac and I’ve never had that issue on PC.

If it was more obvious which window was in focus when you have a bunch of non-maximized screens open without having to stop and read some text, I might be temped to call it user-friendly.

Active window titlebars are darker than inactive window titlebars.

When you’re on autopilot and thinking about other things, it’s often not obvious.

My workflow was a lot of times “Move file from A to B, try to open menu for A, open menu for B, sigh with annoyance, click on A, open A menu”

I think we’ve beaten this horse to death by now.


One of my favorite things about OS X is autosave. No more constantly pressing ⌘S!

Author
Time

What does it autosave?

Keep Circulating the Tapes.

END OF LINE

(It hasn’t happened yet)

Author
Time
 (Edited)

Very concise. I’ll read that when my eyes aren’t blurry.

Keep Circulating the Tapes.

END OF LINE

(It hasn’t happened yet)

Author
Time

I think I’ll skip those, thanks.

Macsimizers…

Keep Circulating the Tapes.

END OF LINE

(It hasn’t happened yet)

Author
Time
 (Edited)

yhwx said:

Bingowings said:

In the early naughties I would have said Apple was worth the extra cost. My 2002 laptop still works fine. But now I would suggest Linux for coding and Chromebooks for general use. I had to get a laptop with windows installed about a month ago to run course software. It’s a brand new top of the range machine and it’s running windows 10 and the bugger takes forever to get it’s buggy ass into gear. Modern Apple build quality is terrible and overpriced. A hackintosh solution might work with some people but to be honest Chrome or Linux is the answer for most user types.

Whenever this topic comes up, all the Linux people come out of the woodwork to suggest Linux. But in reality, there’s not that much to suggest it. User interface and compatibly are worse, the
applications aren’t there. So there just isn’t enough to make the switch, which could be pretty costly.

I think that the computer that most people will be using in the future will not be one like how we think of computers today. There are three main problems with the GUI paradigm of today:

  • Management of files
    People don’t know how the filesystem works. And when I say filesystem, I mean the hierarchy of files on a disk. Folders, files, saving, etc. This is why I think auto-save in OS X is a great feature. Managing files in a traditional desktop system is burdensome to most users. This is why something like the Chromebook or iPad is better for people.
  • Management of windows
    Most people just full screen them anyway. A full window management system is not required.
  • General hard-to-use-ness
    The traditional GUI has built up so much UI debt that it’s hard and/or bad to remove it. So, to get rid of all this debt, you need to build a whole new system that doesn’t have all the hang ups of the traditional PC. For example, when people update their PCs/Macs, they are always very cautious when doing so. Updating an iOS device is done so almost carelessly. So, needles UI debt should be no more.

This is why I’m betting on the iPad for the future of computing. Capital F, Capital C. It removes all of this UI debt in what I see is the best way possible. It’s finally a computer for the rest of us.

Anything you can do on a PC or Mac you can do just as well on a Linux machine with hardly any worries about viruses or malware and with lightning fast speed. It runs on any kind of machine (cheap second hand laptops go like a bomb) and it’s free and won’t spam you for updates you don’t want.
It comes in loads of different styles and shapes and can be made to look whatever way you please.

For your casual net user, office app user etc chromebook is the thing.
Particularly if like my mum your finger tips don’t work so you can’t use a fondle pad.

Author
Time

Bingowings said:

yhwx said:

Bingowings said:

In the early naughties I would have said Apple was worth the extra cost. My 2002 laptop still works fine. But now I would suggest Linux for coding and Chromebooks for general use. I had to get a laptop with windows installed about a month ago to run course software. It’s a brand new top of the range machine and it’s running windows 10 and the bugger takes forever to get it’s buggy ass into gear. Modern Apple build quality is terrible and overpriced. A hackintosh solution might work with some people but to be honest Chrome or Linux is the answer for most user types.

Whenever this topic comes up, all the Linux people come out of the woodwork to suggest Linux. But in reality, there’s not that much to suggest it. User interface and compatibly are worse, the
applications aren’t there. So there just isn’t enough to make the switch, which could be pretty costly.

I think that the computer that most people will be using in the future will not be one like how we think of computers today. There are three main problems with the GUI paradigm of today:

  • Management of files
    People don’t know how the filesystem works. And when I say filesystem, I mean the hierarchy of files on a disk. Folders, files, saving, etc. This is why I think auto-save in OS X is a great feature. Managing files in a traditional desktop system is burdensome to most users. This is why something like the Chromebook or iPad is better for people.
  • Management of windows
    Most people just full screen them anyway. A full window management system is not required.
  • General hard-to-use-ness
    The traditional GUI has built up so much UI debt that it’s hard and/or bad to remove it. So, to get rid of all this debt, you need to build a whole new system that doesn’t have all the hang ups of the traditional PC. For example, when people update their PCs/Macs, they are always very cautious when doing so. Updating an iOS device is done so almost carelessly. So, needles UI debt should be no more.

This is why I’m betting on the iPad for the future of computing. Capital F, Capital C. It removes all of this UI debt in what I see is the best way possible. It’s finally a computer for the rest of us.

Anything you can do on a PC or Mac you can do just as well on a Linux machine with hardly any worries about viruses or malware and with lightning fast speed. It runs on any kind of machine (cheap second hand laptops go like a bomb) and it’s free and won’t spam you for updates you don’t want.
It comes in loads of different styles and shapes and can be made to look whatever way you please.

It seems that you’re advertising Linux the higher end of the software market. That market includes people like programmers, video and audio editors, photographers, etc. For these types of people, Linux just doesn’t have the applications for that. And even if it did, those people are most likely already know the Mac/Windows programs that they use and it would be a huge burden if they switch. Money and time could be lost.

For your casual net user, office app user etc chromebook is the thing.
Particularly if like my mum your finger tips don’t work so you can’t use a fondle pad.

I do agree that in the future, simpler devices like iPads and Chromebooks will be used more often than traditions PCs as we see them today.

Author
Time

DominicCobb said:

For me, I don’t see any need to learn how to tinker with my computer. It’s not really going to help me in my future employment. If my computer breaks down, I have friends and the internet to help me. I don’t know the ins and outs but I still need a computer for a great many things, and Macs do all those things efficiently. There’s not much more I could ask for.

I agree with this. Just think about all of the things that we use each day. I don’t understand all of the mechanics behind a sink, or a phone, but I use them anyway. As long as there are professionals who understand, it won’t be a problem.

The Person in Question

Author
Time

moviefreakedmind said:

DominicCobb said:

For me, I don’t see any need to learn how to tinker with my computer. It’s not really going to help me in my future employment. If my computer breaks down, I have friends and the internet to help me. I don’t know the ins and outs but I still need a computer for a great many things, and Macs do all those things efficiently. There’s not much more I could ask for.

I agree with this. Just think about all of the things that we use each day. I don’t understand all of the mechanics behind a sink, or a phone, but I use them anyway. As long as there are professionals who understand, it won’t be a problem.

If you’re on this site, there’s at least one thing you care about the minutiæ of. 😉

There’s things like this in everybody’s life, weather it be cooking, computers, cars, anything.

Author
Time

Linux has applications for just about anything. What are you looking for?