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If It Ain’t X…
Microsoft To The Rescue?
Before I get into this week's topic, I want to give a quick shout out to all of you who graced my virtual inbox with letters of sympathy/support/commiseration after reading my previous column about my TiBook shopping experience. I apparently didn't just touch a nerve, it seems I grabbed the nerve, stretched it all the way across the room, and let it snap back like so many rubber bands. I don't think I let anyone's message fall through the cracks unanswered, but please accept my apologies if that happened to you. And to all my new "friends," whom, judging from their creative use of profanity I would venture to guess vehemently disagreed with my point of view, I'd like to extend a hearty round of thanks for engaging me in such witty repartee. However, I doubt those readers in question are likely to be with us this week, so let's just move on.
I'm not sure if the commercial that seems to constantly run through my head is shown in everybody's area, but it certainly gets my vote for one of the more annoying ads I've seen in quite a while. The commercial I'm thinking of is the one put out there by what I am assuming is an association of egg farmers, and it features the insipid little ditty which goes, "If it ain't eggs, it ain't breakfast. I love eggs." I seem to recall plenty of meals I've eaten which I thought could be classified as breakfast; however, since they didn't directly involve eggs (usually cereal or bagels), I guess I must have been mistaken. After all, if it ain't eggs, it ain't breakfast. Anyway, whatever agency is responsible for the ad is ultimately doing their job pretty well, since the song they've come up with is not only floating through my brain so much that a full frontal lobotomy would seem to be the only solution, but I'm also giving their client(s) some free publicity by talking about it here. In any event, I need to thank whoever wrote the "If it ain't eggs" song (who is probably also the guilty party in a another annoying egg campaign, "the incredible edible egg"), since the jingle was the inspiration for this week's column. I assure you, I'll eventually explain why, so just bear with me.
Now, as some of you already know, I just recently came back to the Mac platform after spending a few years over on the Dark Side. What drew me back wasn't Apple's sleek new approach to hardware, nor was it a nostalgic longing for the classic Mac OS. It wasn't even me being sick and tired of all the monopolistic doo-doo Microsoft tries to shove down the industry's collective throat. The reason I wanted to come back to the Mac was (and still is) OS X. At long last, my excuse to switch back: an updated Mac OS look and feel sitting on top of a Unix core that offered all the speed and stability Apple has been promising to deliver to us Macheads since the first George Bush was president. Now that's for me!
Well, March 24th came and went, and I watched from afar as the early adopters ran out and got their spankin' new copies of OS X. I also watched from afar through the months that followed, as it became pretty clear that a majority of those same early adopters weren't getting a whole lot of work done in X. Judging from the number of complaints, it seems that stability and speed were two of the major culprits, as well as a dearth of big-time software apps. Don't get me wrong; OS X represents something of a software boon for Mac users and developers, as a ton of *nix apps suddenly began popping up for use by a whole new audience. However, the success or failure of an operating system can largely depend on how many of the major software players ultimately embrace it. Just look at Be, which now "Be" nothing more than a Palm afterthought, despite all the hype, promise, and user and critical kudos. No major developers ever ported their software to Be, so buh-bye Be. As for the Mac, I wasn't even using OS X before the release of 10.1, and even I was frustrated at the non-announcements and general blasé attitudes of the Adobes and Macromedias of the world. They were all over XP while it was still in pre-beta and known as Whistler, but all you could get was a definite maybe about OS X support.
OK, switching gears a bit, OS X 10.1 comes out, and it was finally time to make my move. If you happened to read my ravings in a previous installment, I couldn't be any happier with OS X so far. In fact, I don't have any desire to ever boot into OS 9 again. Ever. Ever. Did I mention ever? Because every time I do, I am reminded of why I abandoned the Mac a few years back. What an old, bloated, buggy, and unacceptably unstable piece of garbage the Classic Mac OS is. Three crashes or more a day is no way to try and get work done. In fact, I would rather use Windows 2000 than Mac OS 9 on a daily basis, because one thing I've come to appreciate is that stability is far more important to me than the interface. You can probably get used to a bad interface (eventually), but crash after crash is something you can't, or shouldn't, even consider getting used to. Windows 2000 is far from perfect, but at least I could go weeks without needing to reboot, or even crashing an application, for that matter. How many of you can honestly say that about OS 9?
So when OS X 10.1 finally was released after what was essentially a six month second public beta, it was as close to an "Eureka!" moment as you could hope for. Finally, the interface I never wanted to give up with the all-important stability that made it possible for me to come back. Speed, stability, performance, elegance, and power: we finally had it all. And that's where that damned egg slogan comes into play. Change "eggs" to "X," and there you go. As much as the egg slogan annoys me, the modified version has become my personal mantra: If it ain't X, it ain't the Mac. I don't want Classic apps, I want native X apps. I want to get to the point where I can remove any trace of Classic from my hard drive and bid a final good riddance to a beloved, but about-ten-years-past-its-prime, operating system.
However, there's one more piece to the puzzle. Apple may have finally provided a solid foundation to build from, but it's now up to the developers to give OS X a real future. Fortunately, I have a sneaking suspicion that we just might be further along than six o'clock in Steve's old twelve-hour to transition analogy. 10.1 seems to be the catalyst that is allowing things to speed up exponentially. We finally heard something from Adobe, and they said, "OK, here's Illustrator X, and we'll have the rest to you within six months." Beyond Freehand X, Macromedia is eerily silent these days, but at least they've shown a willingness to bring an application over. But as much as Adobe, Macromedia, and other developers like Quark have something to say about the future of OS X, there is one player that may have the most to say, maybe even more than Apple itself: Microsoft.
Last week's release of Office v.X may turn out to be the biggest shot in the arm that OS X might ever get. Photoshop for X could be as big or bigger, but Office's release on OS X is no slouch. I have no idea how they did it, but over time Microsoft's Mac BU has made the Evil Empire more or less respectable in Mac circles, and Mac Office's compatibility with their Windows counterparts have helped make the Mac a little more respectable in Windows circles. Now add in Microsoft's hearty support for X with a native release of Office, and Apple's newest OS just gained a whole lot o' credibility. Man, who would ever had thought that Bill G's Big Brother-esque appearance at Steve Jobs' 1997 Macworld Boston keynote would lead to where we are today, with Office being the most anticipated OS X software release to date? Buy hey, I'm all for it. If Office's presence on X makes other developers stand up and take notice, then it's a very good thing for the Mac community.
Some may say I'm being impatient, that I need to wait for the native apps like everyone else. But if Gordon Gecko taught us anything, it's that greed is good. Greed works. The more users demand native software, and demand it now, then developers eventually might have to listen. So go ahead, bug the software makers. Ask for OS X support, ask for it now, and ask for it often.
Because if it ain't X...
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