(no subject)

[lostcarpark]

This from Apple's email newsletter:

Want a fast way to switch from one open application to another?
Mac OS X version 10.3 "Panther" makes it as easy as typing Command-Tab.

Now, I can't remember if the Alt-Tab shortcut was in Windows 1.0 in 1986, but it was certainly in Windows 2.0 in 1988 and every version since, so it's only taken Apple fifteen years to figure out that this is a good thing. But then it took them to System 7 to catch on to running multiple applications, and OSX to figure out preemptive multitasking.

Yes, Apple have come up with some great ideas, but let's not forget that they steal ideas too.

Comments

[lproven.livejournal.com]

[Saddened and a little annoyed]

James, don't criticise what you don't know.

Firstly, MacOS X has had Cmd-Tab switching for years. It was in 10.2 and I think in 10.1 and 10.0 as well. Certainly the Dock did it with the mouse in those.

Secondly, what they're getting at is the USER-switching facility, which makes the entire desktop with all open apps rotate, as if a face on a 3D cube, out of sight, to another complete user session, with a totally different set of apps. This is more akin to XP's Fast User Switching.

That's the only thing new in 10.3.

All you're attacking is a poor ad copywriter.

[lostcarpark.livejournal.com]

Mia culpa!

Okay, I may have missed the mark on this one. As I said, I have nothing against Apple copying good ideas from other systems. And I have nothing against them using the same shortcut as Windows - why make users have to remember different shortcuts on different systems. But some Mac users will go on at length about how Windows is just a poor copy of the Mac. While there are plenty of Mac features I'd like to see in Windows, there are also plenty of Windows features I'd like to see on the Mac. I'm very happy that Apple provide one of the few alternatives to Windows, and some day I would like to own a Mac, though it's unlikely to ever be my main computer. Most of all, I wish Mac fanatics would accept that not everyone is going to buy Apple, and that both systems have their advantages and disadvantages, and that it's good to have a choice.

But the poor ad copyrighter did set himself up pretty good.

[lproven.livejournal.com]

I've read up on this now and I overreacted badly. Sorry, James; you didn't deserve that.

For the reference and to keep it straight: the modern Mac keyboard has Control, Alt (Option) and Command (Apple) keys. Command is for hotkeys to tell it to do something, Option modifies another key's action, and Ctrl is for PC compatibility. (Though since Opt=Alt, they could have just used Cmd=Ctrl).

Right. Cmd-Tab does task switching in 10.2 and I think it did in MacOS 9 as well. It didn't work in 10.1 and before, I believe, and so there was a little free addin called LiteSwitch. This makes Cmd-Tab pop up a box in the middle of the screen with the icons of all running apps, and repeated presses cycles through them. Just like Windows since about NT4.

In 10.3, Apple has copied this and built it in. In 10.2, the keystroke works, but the only visual clue is the icons in the Dock highlighting.

It's not much of a feature, but it's helpful. In general, though, Exposé is much more useful, and Windows so far has nothing remotely equivalent to that.

But yes, it's copied from Windows. It's trivial, so why not? Fast User Switching is also copied from XP, and for some users, is VERY handy. It's not triggered by Cmd-Tab, though, but by a new menu on the right-hand end of the menubar.