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Hacking Quartz
Posted by
michael
on Tue Jul 06, 2004 02:39 PM
from the seven-on-mohs-hardness-scale dept.
from the seven-on-mohs-hardness-scale dept.
Exposed writes "Meaty interview with Rich Wareham who is known to Linux users for his libdvdnav library which is used by Xine and other linux players. On OS X he created Desktop Manager, the GPL solution for VirtualDesktops on the Mac. Highlights are secret APIs in OS X for VirtualDesktops, who steals GPL source and why beginner programmers are at a disadvantage now."
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Good (not bad) article (interview) (Score:4, Interesting)
Regardless, I found the content to be very interesting, particularly the fact that Desktop Manager is the guy's first Mac application.
Re:Good (not bad) article (interview) (Score:5, Funny)
Programmers THINK parenthetically. If you see parentheses nested three or more layers deep, you can be sure the text was authored by a code jockey. And the parentheses always match, ensuring the article will compile properly.
If you see programmer text that occasionally uses a semicolon to mark the end of a sentence instead of a period, you can make some educated guesses about the programmer's favorite language.
You may occasionally see crayon scribbled text with line numbers, as penned by a larva geek.
Parent
Re:Good (not bad) article (interview) (Score:5, Interesting)
Just to clear this up, I didn't add anything to his remarks in any way, I did however format what was in parantheses in italics, simply because that's how I like to read (with something in italics being the continuation of a thought, and italics helps me jump out of it and back to the main thread). Whether or not that is the correct thing to do is something I'll have to be educated on.
This is part of a larger series of chats I'm doing with people whose work/projects I find interesting, or topics I feel deserve some thought... and its obviously a case of a soup chef being given a piece of filet mignon and doing the best he can with it.
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Re:Good (not bad) article (interview) (Score:4, Informative)
It's not. Italic type is used to indicate emphasis, or to set off things like the titles of books or the names of ships. Sure, there's room for style, but just arbitrarily italicizing everything in parentheses is a great way to confuse and frustrate your readers.
So long as I'm being all rude and bitching at you for no good reason, next time it might be cool if you went through and got rid of the "ichatisms" like "IMHO" and "WTF." Expanding those acronyms would have made the interview a lot easier on the reader. If you look at a "real" interview (if you'll pardon the expression) you'll see that the author didn't transcribe every um and ah. It's part of the writer's job to take the interviewee's words and polish them into complete sentences so the prose doesn't get in the way of the ideas.
Okay, I'll quit being a pedantic little shit now. For the time being.
Parent
Re:Good (not bad) article (interview) (Score:4, Informative)
(On the subject, bolding is for keywords, headings &c. more than emphasis; whereas italicisation is only really noticeable when you're in the vicinity, bolding is visible pretty much anywhere on the page, drawing your attention to it. Avoid bold for emphasis.)
((Even more tangentially, anyone who has the capacity to use italics but still uses underlining for anything except for links will be hung, drawn and quartered when I'm ruler of the world.))
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For a second (no pun intended) there... (Score:5, Funny)
Desktop Manager is Amazing (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Desktop Manager is Amazing (Score:5, Insightful)
Good
Does that mean that it's good code? Absolutely. But not startlingly good code, since most of the heavy lifting was done by the OS itself (Apple uses similar transitions for switching between multiple users, for example - which would lead me to belive that had Apple done this they would have used something visually distinctive for the desktop switch, come to think of it).
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Re:Desktop Manager is Amazing (Score:4, Interesting)
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Re:Desktop Manager is Amazing (Score:5, Informative)
Not theoretical [www.ocs.cz].
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Wrong quartz... (Score:4, Funny)
Undocumented API calls (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Undocumented API calls (Score:5, Insightful)
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This is only worrying (Score:5, Interesting)
This isn't quite like the Windows situation for two reasons.
One, the problem in Windows is mostly that MS's hidden APIs are for (1) very important and basic things and (2) used extensively by MS's in-house apps.
Two, Apple's been very good not just about keeping competitors on a level API playing field with Apple's apps, they've been very good about actually moving functionality OUT of Apple's inhouse apps and into public APIs. Witness searchlight services, or CoreGraphics. These were functionalities in Apple inhouse apps that Apple decided would be useful to other people, so they sucked it into the OS and made a public API for it...
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Re:This is only worrying (Score:5, Interesting)
Well, they don't, not really. There are two sets of calls he was talking about. There are the calls related to organizing the window hierarchy and splitting it. Nobody uses those calls. They may--this could be completely wrong, because I have done zero reading on the subject--date back to NEXTSTEP. Lots of little things in Cocoa do.
The other set is related to the rotating-cube transition. Only one process calls that code.
So these aren't pieces of code that are widely reused within Apple's programs.
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Re:Undocumented API calls (Score:5, Informative)
Quartz actually can do a whole load of other things using undocumented APIs besides this virtual desktop stuff. It's also possible to rotate windows, shrink them, and zoom them up - I have an application that does this. However those that have investigated the APIs that allow these wild things to happen have found that they're not exactly complete.
Apple has of course been challenged about these APIs, and they remain consistent: you shouldn't use these APIs. They are undocumented because they are likely to change in the future. When the API is complete they will be documented, but not before then.
It's quite possible that all of these APIs (handling virtual desktops, rotation, and scaling) will be documented for 10.4 (Tiger).
One example of this is the shadow effect that Mac OS X supports on windows and other graphics. It's been there since 10.0, but it wasn't publically documented (although some people discovered its API). Apple only used this API for shadowing windows and menus. An official API for shadows was introduced in 10.3 which is more fully featured and easier to use than the old unofficial API. Indeed there's two official APIs now for shadows - one for low level Quartz calls, and a high-level API for AppKit.
Of course what Apple really should do is make sure that these new experimental APIs simply aren't present in the shipping OS. Apple themselves don't use them, so why leave them around?
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Re:Undocumented API calls (Score:5, Insightful)
Well, I couldn't help but whip my thang out here. I also apologize in advance for my patent pending Bullshit Theory of the Day
Anyway. The API's for Quartz, and what you can do with the UI for the system is documented. Pick up some of the dog books from O'Reilly (Which, while I'm on the subject, where did the dog come from anyway. I mean .... it may not have been exactly public knowledge, but OS X has always been a cat.) Everything you need to know about how to do proper manipulation is there. All black and white.
The problem enters the equation when developers poke around and find things that Apple didn't mean for them to find. Ergo the undocumented hooks this guy is using. Now, while I will agree there is a bit of coolness about being able to locate something and then add it into your own code so you can just make a simple call and use it like you wrote it yourself, there is a problem with it. A guy in an earlier post complained about it not working with Jaguar. Most likely, it won't work with Tiger either.
You see, you have to understand that Apple, even though they are a big corporation out to make money off of both you and your grandmother, isn't specifically trying to hide something that you can use to write cool software to get your grandmother to buy a brand new G5. They want you to write something your grandmother will feel compelled to spend $2000 on a brand new Mac to use.
Here comes the but....
But the internal developers deep within the bowels of Apple are slaving day and night to make The Next Cool Thing (TM) that everyone will have to have in the newest version of OS X. These features are extremely fluid, sometimes disappearing completely in a simple increment upgrade within the same major version of the Cat. Because those same developers might have tried to create something too cool and have opened a hole somewhere else. They are undocumented because they might be gone tomorrow, or might change how they are called, or might become a butterfly all by the next major revision when they become concrete.
You see, when they solidify and become concrete, then documents are written, then become published API's with which to write code against. I mean, I don't know about you, but I wouldn't want to write code against an API, documented or not, that I knew wasn't standard yet and would most likely change tomorrow.
But this is all just the opinion of one old man.
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Big Brick Walls (Score:5, Insightful)
Amen.
It required at least 300+ lines of Visual C++ to get a black screen and almost 150 lines of C++ to get SDL to throw up a black screen.
What the hell is going on here?!?! I know a lot of things need to be set up, resolution, sound, etc. But most people were happy with the default options they were given on those old computers. They made Elitle out of it for christs sake.
So how come I can't start a gaming project with a simple
Setup_SDL(SDL_STANDARD_OPTIONS);
Is it too much to ask?
Re:Big Brick Walls (Score:5, Interesting)
SDL is a beautiful, compact API that's also nicely extensible (eg. SDL_image [libsdl.org], SDL_mixer [libsdl.org], SDL_net [libsdl.org], smpeg, etc.). There's no *way* you need 150 lines of code to do interesting things with SDL.
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Hacking Quartz and Mach directly? (Score:4, Insightful)
How is this giving Apple's consumer applications an advantage? What this shows is where Apple has optimized security and performance within the WindowServer and its functionality of Expose in conjunction with the Dock.
This has nothing to do with Apple utilizing a secret API for all its consumer applications like Final Cut Pro, etc to put it one leg up on the competition.
This has everything to do with strictly improving the performance of the Operating System and core functionality that all applications may benefit from by the fact they are written for OS X. There isn't a Core Graphics for third parties and a Core Graphics for in-house. Get real folks.
I had some helpful tips on this... (Score:4, Funny)
PCB$5%
Steals GPL source??? (Score:5, Interesting)
Where is this in the article? I read the whole thing, then went back and searched for every occurrence of "steal" (zero results) and "GPL". The only part that mentions Virtual Desktops is that CodeTek can't use the Desktop Manager source in their closed source app because it's GPLed. The relevant section is:
"I still get some emails accusing me of being petty and small minded for GPL-ing Desktop Manager since CodeTek can't easily use my code. That is silly since they are quite capable of re-implementing Desktop Manager in a far better way using my techniques. I haven't tried (nor could I probably) claim control over how people use the APIs I discovered."
Nowhere does this claim that Virtual Desktops is using, let alone stealing, anything from his source. Unless I missed something here, I fail to see how such a statement is anything more than libel.
Re:Steals GPL source??? (Score:5, Informative)
First, the poster mentions: on OS X he created Desktop Manager, the GPL solution for VirtualDesktops
So, you see, the poster is using "VirtualDesktops" as a name for "virtual desktop technology," not as "VirtualDesktop Lite/Pro, the product from the company CodeTek."
Second, the list at the end is suppose to be read this way:
Highlights are:
- secret APIs in OS X for [virtual desktop technology]
- who [is it that] steals GPL source [?]
- why beginner programmers are at a disadvantage now
Thus, it's just a list of interesting items from the interview; it isn't supposed to be read "blah blah blah CodeTek, who steals".
Finally, the answer to the second "highlight" -- is indeed in the article posed as:
You mentioned all of your code being released as GPL, and much of it isn't throw-away stuff. Do you ever worry or wonder about it being 'lifted' and incorporated into proprietary software?
So, yep, it's in there: "lifted" instead of "steals." Interesting answer from Rich, too.
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Re:Steals GPL source??? (Score:4, Informative)
"Interestingly CodeTek uses this exact same bit of code for their latest VirtualDesktop program."
Seems pretty clear to me.
Perhaps you should read it again, in context this time:
"To allow DM to modify windows I had to use a little bit of code by Jon Rentzsch which allowed me to stick a bit of DM inside the Dock process (see later question). This bit of code communicates with the main app and performs much of the magic you see.
Interestingly CodeTek uses this exact same bit of code for their latest VirtualDesktop program."
The "exact same bit of code" referenced is obviously the Jon Rentzsch code, which you can find here [rentzsch.com]. As you'll note from the site, it's released under a BSD license which can be incorporated into closed source projects. Since the article summary referenced "who steals GPL code" this doesn't even apply, now does it?
How's that astroturf feeling?
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Somewhere in the middle (Score:5, Informative)
"The level of effort is much harder now for a kid to get into programming - PC's used to ship with Basic manuals and you could write code to draw a spaceship in ten lines of code, but now you have to learn the Win32 API + Directx to get a black triangle on the screen."
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Visual Basic is not bundled and manualed (Score:5, Interesting)
Even OS X, which does at least ship with developer tools in every box really makes no mention of them.
The thing about computers before was that it was super easy to just write ten lines of code and have something happen. Now you have to hunt down an IDE or an editor, and chances are you're writing a lot more than ten lines even for Hello World! The computers now have (as he said) a much higher barrier to entry of manipulation, though of course you can do a million times more if you do break that barrier - so I'd say the only hope is that the rewards of crossing that barrier are enough to lure people over.
I agree with him that this is a real problem, far fewer people are exposed to the manipulation of computers at a young age and instead computers are treated as black boxes, not to be touched. Cars are headed the same way to some extent but there already was a much more powerful and widespread culture built up around people and engines, so it's a lot harder for that to vanish. I wish that more people would be able to think of computers as more like cars and less like toasters.
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Not PHYSICAL (Score:4, Insightful)
But think people, think like a ten year old!! You don't even know you want to program - and nowhere in the docs that come bundled with your shiny new computer (Windows or Mac) does it mention that tools to do so are bunlded with the computer (Mac) or that it is easy. On the Mac the development tools are not even in Applications, but under
And then once you're starting, you have to know about editors and compilers and IDE's and so forth to do all the things people are proposing. There's nothing truly basic to guide you through the first few steps of what is going on.
If I'm wrong then I would LOVE for all of the parents who are not programmers themselves and have kids that are picking up programming spontaeously to tell me how things are working out. But instead you have me, who has no kids, hypothizing a probem with kids being able to pick up programming easily, and a bunch of people who have obviosuly been programming for years and ALSO seem to have no kids, stating it's not the case and programming is super easy to get into. Our problem is we know to much, and have lost site of what you have to know even to get to the point where we can enter that eight line Java/C#/Applescript/PHP/Perl/Haskel/Ruby/Python program!
Yes it's all very easy once you choose a path and get started, and easy to dabble in multiple languages. But it's still harder than it used to be to go from the "I don't know what a program is" to "hey I just ran my first program" than it sused to be.
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Re:Somewhere in the middle (Score:5, Informative)
I think it is far easier for young people to get started these days and they have access to far more powerful tools and OS than the beginners of the past. I didn't get a Unix machine (NeXT) until I was 20, we have 5 year olds using it on a Mac now. The barrier to entry is far lower now than it ever was and it will continue to be.
The real problem is that there are far more people who know programming that you have to compete against for jobs...
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Re:Somewhere in the middle (Score:5, Insightful)
I don't know, it may be that the market for "programmers" is poor, but that doesn't mean there isn't a need for a higher level of computer literacy in the general population. If you're someone in another specialty (e.g., you're mainly a biologist) and have some programming skills, then there's probably a lot of people that will be very happy to have you around.
That's all true, it's amazing that these days you can get such high-powered hardware so cheaply, and run entire operating systems entirely from code that you can tinker with.
On the other hand, even the lowest-end machine has so many other distractions on it now--games, email, etc. The basic interpreter was sometimes the only fun thing that came with the cheap home computers of the 80's--the only way to get a game might be to spend money on a cartridge or type one in from a magazine--whereas now you have to dig a little and look up documentation elsewhere to find a programming environment for your new PC.
--Bruce Fields
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I'd like to rephrase that as... (Score:5, Insightful)
I programmed my C64 with "state-of-the-art" GFX (320x240x16 color, woot), SFX/music (think PC squeaker-like), most else was limited by memory/CPU constraints. In retrospect maybe my AI and gameplay wasn't quite up to par, but I was very close at least.
One thing is to get a person started - which is hard enough, true, but it's also takes a lot more before you feel you're doing something that feels "cool". Something you could compare to everything that's out there and in some small, limited way be better than. Because once you've done that, you begin to believe you can do it in every other way as well.
Kjella
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Re:Somewhere in the middle (Score:4, Interesting)
With XCode and InterfaceBuilder (the IDE tools that ship with MacOS X) I can whip up a text editor with support for rich text (fonts, formatting, colors, embedded images, etc) in under 20 lines of code (half of which are written for me), and a few minutes.
I would say that it has become far easier to get complex things done in programming, and for a lot of tasks the entry level has gone down, but of course our expectations have increased enormously.
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Imagine you are ten years old (Score:5, Insightful)
You are perfectly right that Basic was really a scripting language. But try to imagine you are ten years old.
PHP is very easy to download. But how do you hear of it? How do you even know what it is to download? Even as a professional programmer I would have said to use PHP for web apps but not to learn programming with.
Also, what were you trying to program for? When I was a kid I did not really program just for the sake of programming. I perhaps wrote a small utlity that did some calculation I was interested in. My cousin did fractal generation. I might type in a game from a magazine and decide I wanted to improve on it.
So now you have a kid not knowing here to start, because there is not central starting place. Then you have the will of the kid to even figure out where to start, the barrier of having enough interest to create something he cannot just download.
Perhaps things like Mindstorms are taking the place of traditional programming. I'm not really sure. But it does seem like a kid could not be led into programming as much by accident anymore, he would definatley have to seek it out. And that will always eliminate some people from the path, that might otherwise have liked programming quite a bit. Obviously people do still learn programming now, where are the sixteen-year olds and how did they pick up programming? That's what I'd like to know.
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Re:Or not... (Score:4, Interesting)
Actually, I would have said that Perl (and Perl/Tk for creating GUIs) is the equivalent BASIC these days. Simple, straightforward, free and cross-platform
YMMV, of course
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Re:Why it wasn't put in already (Score:5, Insightful)
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Many people feel Expose serves well enough (Score:5, Interesting)
I think Apple has just not focused any energy on an "Apple Way" to manipulate virtual desktops. It's a tricky UI problem and probably the work needed to keep programs in different rooms is too "virtual" for many people. Note that he did state Apple made changes that were seemingly very favorable to the writing of DesktopManager, so it would seem the folks at Apple are at least nuturing the concept - and if they ever do include such a program I don't think you'll see any sour grapes from this guy as he is already giving it away.
I did like his idea for "Window Wells" (even though I think that was the interviewers term) a lot, so instead of virtual desktops being really virtual you have "clumps" of windows on screen (which are your virtual desktops) that you can click on like small expose'ed windows to expand the desktop. I'm still not sure of the best way to get windows in or out of these desktops.
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Re:Many people feel Expose serves well enough (Score:5, Interesting)
It would be much less efficient for me to collect all the files
I need using Expose. I tend to use Expose as a cute way to switch between say 5 Safari windows. It would be hideous trying to organize 50 windows with it.
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Think for me apps have replaced that need (Score:5, Interesting)
For project sets, I generally tend to close open windows nad have project related Finder windows open - threating them sort of like rooms. Since it's so quick just to open a document and not have to think if the program is open or not, having an icon in Finder is almost as good as a live window.
Even when I was using virtual desktops more heavily I was using programs like Emacs (actually I still use Emacs very heavily) where having 200 files open was as easy as two.
I'm not saying your pattern of working is any better or worse than any other, evryone thinks in different ways - I'm just trying to explain how people can be OK with no virtual desktops and still using working on a lot of projects at once.
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Re:Many people feel Expose serves well enough (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re:Many people feel Expose serves well enough (Score:5, Interesting)
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Re:Why it wasn't put in already (Score:5, Informative)
My PROBLEM is that i dont want to mess around finding my apps. Expose is simply too slow to use, i cannot find everything with a single click.
On my Gnome workstation i have 11 virtual desktops, one for each server i'm maintaining, plus some for mail, comms and web. I know that by pressing CTRL + i instantly move to a desktop with all my windows positioned they way I want them. Desktop Manager does the same for me on OS X
My problem with Expose is that I'm not trying to find ONE application, but a whole bunch. I dont want to find "Word" or "Netscape". I want to find everything "Mailserver-related", "Primary Nameserver-related" etc. Simply put, i want to find more than one window/application, expose cant do that, Desktop Manager does.
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Re:Why it wasn't put in already (Score:4, Informative)
WHAT? THIS IS EXACTLY WHAT EXPOSE DOES -- SHOW/HIDE EVERYTHING WITH ONE CLICK.
F7: Find all windows for one app.
F8: Find all non-hidden, non minimized windows.
F9: Show desktop (Pushes all windows off to the sides).
One click for each. Hold down the button and you get mouse over selection, otherwise it's mouse click selection. You can remap the keys as is convenient (I map Expose All to the middle mouse button). And what's best -- all of your windows continue to update while Exposed. Damn useful. It means if I have Safari open full screen, and want to change the mp3 playing in iTunes in full screen, i press and hold the middle mouse button, mouse over itunes, let the button go. To get back to Safari, I do the same. This to me is the best aspects of click-to-highlight, mouse-over to highlight, virtual desktops and single desktops while utilizing existing hardware to perform new functionality.
What you're talking about -- granularly assigning arbitrary windows to a particular desktop set across applications -- is something new that expose can't do, this I'll grant you. It's also a very specific use. Most people's jobs are task oriented, not server oriented. Therefore, it makes sense for the desktop to be task oriented, to work with EVERYTHING you're doing, rather than spaces of work. And it also makes sense that a third party application which offers you a solution for your needs would be valuable.
But the default? I dunno about that. Most people don't want two desktops, let alone an arbitrary number of them. I *can* say that if Apple were to offer us a fourth programmable Expose button, one that would group arbitrary application windows visibility and placement, I'd definitely toy with it. But I imagine most of what I'd use that functionality for is already covered by the dashboard.
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Re:Why it wasn't put in already (Score:5, Informative)
It's rather useful, I think, when switching between mail, a web browser, and a few finder windows. It's less useful when one is trying to use multiple xterms, for say, writing a fink package. (one for constructing patches, one for writing the
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Re:Why it wasn't put in already (Score:5, Insightful)
What you're talking about -- granularly assigning arbitrary windows to a particular desktop set across application
You say that's what it does... but then you go on to admit it's not what he's trying to do. We can dance around the issue all you want, but what he's saying is that Expose doesn't help him with his workloads. His workloads are what he needs to do. Sure, he's not typical, but that just means Apple's solution doesn't work for him. He exists. Get over it.
This guy says he needs 11 desktops... that's probably dozens of windows, a lot of them are probably terminal windows, which look almost identical when they're zoomed out enough. Even with a 30" Apple Cinema Display, can you imagine how hard it would be to find the one he wants?
The Apple way of doing things doesn't scale well past the moderately used desktop system (eg, a significant but limited number of concurrent tasks). The OS can handle it easily, but the interface can't. In cases where you can do more with a Mac, it usually means using 3rd party software like this virtual desktop thing, or falling back on stuff that's available on any UNIX machine.
That's not a knock against Apple. They have the API for multiple desktops, and I'll bet they don't publish it just so they don't have to maintain the API eternally, and make their unit tests even bigger than they are. They have all the UNIX tools because they know sometimes people will need to fall back on something with no GUI front end. That makes everyone's life a lot easier, including mine.
Apple gives people enough so they can sort themselves out if the shiny happy GUI isn't good enough. Learn from them.
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Re:Not such a good app (Score:4, Interesting)
Granted, no, this is 'not your dad's desktop manager' in the sense that you're used to in X, but it's still a far cry improvement from not having it at all, and if you look at the sources, his readme's, and heck, just this interview, he has some interesting improvements coming down the pipe.
But if you want to cry instability, let's hear it:
What's your hardware specs?
What OS?
What version of Desktop Manager?
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Re:Not such a good app (Score:4, Informative)
I usually use GNU/Linux on my iBook, which is one of the later G3 models, or a G3 800MHz 12.1". The OS i was using at the time was Mac OS X 10.3 booted from a 1GB partition i use when i want to muck around with OSX, as for the version, i dont remember nor am in a position to check, this was about 3 months ago though, and was the latest version at that time.
Now, dont get me wrong, in it's core concept this is an okey app, however the implementation is somewhat bad.
1. When you use the windowlist-in-macbar ( the file-edit.. thing at the top of the screen ( danm my mac-jargon knowlage is outdated )) it frequently underflows under other menus when you have a small screen, such as in my iBook. Of course this it not in all applications but it happens when you open certain apps that spawn lots of these menus not to mention having the iChat menu and others up there.
2. It crashed, and often, when this happened all windows were gathered in one desktop on top of each other, nothing you couldnt solve with Exposé but still a frequent annoyance which eventually led to me uninstalling it.
3. To top it all off you got a "You are about to shut Desktop Manager off, this will gather your windows inn one desktop yadayadayada yes/no" message when the computer shut down, this in itself was not such an annoyance, just something that added to problem nr. 2.
Don't get me wrong, i just said it was unstable at the time, it is however a great concept. I use this feature on my GNU/Linux desktop every day so it's not like i'm unused to the concept, however at the time i tested it it was at least on my machine way too unstable to be of any good use, so i just went back to Exposé. However i wish the author the best of luck in future development and hope that by the next time i test it will actually work as desired, plust it had some neat ( if useless ) transition effects.
Cheers.
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Re:Virtual desktops (Score:5, Insightful)
There's a weird Apple mentality at work here. I'm not Apple bashing, it's just that the reasons are ones that most on /. won't really identify with.
Apple likes to control their product; they don't want the interface very customizable. They'll allow little tweaks, and they'll allow people to make 3rd party products that can do... whatever. But this is the issue from the point of view of Apple: look around at linux desktops. Heck, just find some screenshots online somewhere- they all look different. Both KDE and Gnome are very customizable. Great. But a lot of users are going to find it confusing. Here's an example:
If I tell you I'm running Linux with a gui, and I want to reboot, can you tell me, without looking over my shoulder, where, spacially, on my interface, I need to go? Even if I tell you "I'm using Gnome" or "I'm using KDE", can you then tell me where the 'Log-out' or 'Reboot' button is? No- because it's very customizable, any button could be anywhere.
This means that the user's understanding of where things are and how the interface operates is not necessarily portable from one installation of Linux to another, even if you're using the same window manager on the same distribution. So what you need to understand about Apple's design philosophy is this: they don't like that. They want it so, if you're using their software, with no complicated tweaks or 3rd party hacks, everything will look pretty much the same, act pretty much the same, and be in pretty much the same place.
Virtual desktops would be fine with Apple, if they liked virtual desktops enough to use it with the standard interface, but they don't. It's not that they mind virtual desktops, but Apple doesn't want to add in extra options that will change the interface and confuse many users, unless it's necessary. They'd rather, instead, come up with another interface design feature that, they believe, will be as powerful as virtual desktops, but less confusing to users (like Expose). And if you want virtual desktops, their are 3rd party implimentations available.
So, there's your difference between the Terminal and Virtual desktops. One is an application (of sorts) than can be run within the current standard Apple interface (Terminal), and the other actually changes the behavior of and the user interaction with the interface.
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Choice (Score:5, Insightful)
Now, in general, we tend to think of choice as a Good Thing(tm). But it's not always so -- e.g. when choice means incompatibility, confusion, fragmentation, duplicated effort.
For example, here in the UK we have (basically) just one mobile phone system: GSM. That terrible restriction on our liberties means that mobile phones can work on all networks, and there's coverage almost everywhere. Result: mobiles are cheap, and just about everyone has one. In the US, so I gather, there's the wonderful free choice of GSM, CDMA, and goodness knows what else. Result: expensive phones, no coverage, lots of vendor lock-in, and mobiles are less popular. Lack of choice can be a good thing.
The computing world is surprisingly close in terms of interfaces, APIs, and protocols.
It's less so in terms of GUI features, admittedly, but some of the same economies of scale apply. However, I think Apple's principle here is that if a feature is done right, then people won't need alternatives.
Far better to have one option that works right, than ten competing alternatives, none of which does the job properly. Easier to learn, easier to document, easier to code to, easier to administer, easier to support.
Now, in this particular case, I do miss virtual desktops in OS X. (Codetek's is just too slow with the number of windows I have, and I can't use Desktop Manager in my 10.2...) I don't think Apple have come up with a better solution to the problem it solves. But I'm right behind most of Apple's other decisions. Simplicity and elegance are underrated virtues.
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Hardly insightful, more like casual dismissial (Score:5, Interesting)
If Apple were about "One Way", you would not have the nice integration between the finder and Terminal. You can stick to the Finder to find documents or manipulate files - or you can just use the Terminal, or you can use a hybrid of the two and drag files into the Termainl from the finder and get a full path expanded for you in the middle of some command.
Note in the article that he mentions Apple made some API changes which were very favorible to Desktop Manager. They could have switched stuff around to crush him like a bug. But they instead made changes that helped - does that sound like a company bent on the "One Way" to do everything?
As I've said before I really think Apple and virtual desktops is not so much an issue that they do not want it, as they have not invested the mental energy to solve the UI problem of the user maintenience of virtusl desktops - moving windows between, making sure the right windows wind up in the right desktops, etc. If anything I think virtual desktops will arise in OS X through an evolution of Expose, though in the end it may not be quite virtual desktops as we know them today.
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Re:Difficulties for beginning programmers (Score:4, Insightful)
Hell, the first program I 'wrote' on my Commodore PET was something that made a rocket fly up the screen over and over. It was very simple. You could accomplish the same these days on any machine by downloading gcc and writing a C program of frankly a very similar length and nature.
I don't actually remember my PET or my BBC Micro running ICQ or browsing the web, or doing any of these things that people seem to think they can just pick up a compiler and throw together in a few days.
Stuff has got more complicated, and people expect more features and UI. But to complain that it's hard to get started is just not true.
Hell, with the GUI toolkits around now, it's actually way easier to do some of these cool things. Think back to the early days of GUI programming. From my own experience, programming RISC OS GUI apps was horribly complex and difficult to get going with. On the other hand, I remember how cool I thought it was when I realised that the OS did stuff like those handy edit boxes for you - you didn't have to do anything!
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Re:Secret APIs? (Score:4, Informative)
I believe these API's in this case are secret because they are still in flux and not ready to be used. They probably still have bugs and memory leaks in them.
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