I’ve only recently got hold of Mac OS X 10.5 (Leopard). For the most part the many gripes and grievances have already been voiced by those far more capable than I. I had resigned myself to not saying anything about Leopard thinking I really had nothing new to contribute under the sun. I was happy with just badgering joen with all the new wonders and inundating him with screenshots of this or that new whiz-bang feature. Now, I just can’t bear it any longer.

Spaces

Let us begin with Spaces. There have been numerous gripes about Spaces particularly along the lines of, it doesn’t work the way I want it to work. You can find examples of this at Betalogue, Daring Fireball, Sun BabelFish, and Dribin. These are all bright folk, bright folk with far too much time on their hands, like me.

They all seem to be infuriated that Spaces does not do one thing or another that it never claimed it would do. Dribin even says,

In short, Spaces seems designed for app partitioning, not task partitioning.

Correct, Dave. Only, that’s not what he wants. He and many others want Magic. By Magic I am referring to mystical powers that make things happen with no explanations for mere mortals.

Now, obviously, I’m of an opposite view to the above mentioned gentlemen. I like Spaces just fine. It works just as I had expected it too. Do I want Spaces to do more? Sure, I suppose. Do I expect it one day will? Absolutely. Does that mean it is horribly broken today? No.

I would like my car to fly of its own accord. That my car sits there perpetually flightless does not mean it is broken.

I in no way want it to seem that I think these other fellows are wrong or lump-headed or anything of the sort. I do think their perception of the issue is off and that calling something broken for not having a feature you demand it have is wrong and sends a ridiculous message.

Mail & iCal

Here we have the exact same issue. I don’t really have any links for you on this one but that’s mostly because the damning comments I’ve seen have not yet been perfectly collated for me to link to. It would seem that both Mail and iCal are horribly broken. I’m talking, “make kitties cry” broken.

Mail

The last year and more has seen the rise of David Allen’s GTD. There are scores of applications for both the Mac and PC that cater to this list-making culture of Thing-Doers. Many, it would seem, expected Apple to make GTD really work in Mail 3.0. This is something, that from my experience watching the GTD culture, no one has yet done.

I watched Steve Jobs demo the new features of Mail (Notes & To-Dos). I do not believe he once mentioned the phrase GTD. What I expected of Mail was that I’d have notes and I’d be able to make to-dos that I could then merrily check off as I completed them. That’s precisely what I received, wonder of wonders.

iCal

Now, iCal, from my understanding over the last 5 or so years has always been either completely broken or the best thing since sliced bread. Depending on who you ask iCal either makes Angels sing or infects one’s soul with rot. For me? I enter in an event, I check on an event. That’s about the extent of it.

My Gripes?

Me? A gripe about Leopard? Sure. It makes me a little nutty that the global spell-checker flags words that are defined in the built-in New Oxford American Dictionary. Then, I remember that Joen doesn’t have a global spell checker or a built-in dictionary and I feel much better about it all.

I did a little think just there and I’m having a hard time coming up with something else that really bugs me.

OK, wait, I know, I wish I could right click items in a Stack. That’s all.