When I bought my new car last year there was a car salesman at one dealership who only seemed concerned with what other options I was looking at.  He tried to tell me that I shouldn’t buy an Audi because they’re unreliable.  And so were BMWs.  His friend had one and a wheel fell off.  The engines “explode” sometimes he said. 

And you know what?  Maybe he really did have a friend who had a wheel fall off somehow, maybe he left a dealership or a mechanic and they’d forgotten to properly reattach one of them.  I know he didn’t like it when I mentioned I’d heard a similar story years ago from a friend with the brand of car he was trying to sell me.  I also know there were a tiny handful of people who did have problems with the old BMW M3 engines breaking on them (“exploding” being a technically correct, but incredibly misleading characterization).  Years ago I saw a website devoted entirely to people who’d experienced the problem.  There were about 60 of them, who all posted various pictured of their damaged engines for all to see.

There’s also a site like that for TTs.  And one for Mercedes SLs.

The thing is, he was never going to convince me that Audis were “unreliable” since I’d already owned 3 of them – each of which worked magnificently, and the ownership experience was always a great one.  Of course, I never miss any scheduled maintenance and always have any warning lights checked out immediately, which I’m sure greatly reduced the chances I’d have a problem.  He told me, “Well you must be lucky.”  I nearly told him to shove it.

What I really wanted to know when I went there was why I should buy the car he was trying to sell me.  Not why the other ones I told him I liked were bad choices.  It’s strange, but John Hodgeman is starting to remind me of that guy, which is funny because he plays the role of the PC.  But he’s really the only one of the two that even talks in the ads anymore, and he’s always going on about problems “he” has running Vista that I have never seen on any of my machines.

Just like that salesman, these ads are having the opposite of the intended effect on me.  You see, I’m planning to buy a new laptop in the next month or two.  I was waiting to hear what Apple is going to release.  But Dell’s recent announcements have had me start to seriously consider their new machines, like the new Latitude models – and I’ve seen some really nice lightweight Lenovo models recently as well.  So I’ve been torn… do I replace my trusty Macbook with another Mac?  Or do I save money and get a better system from Dell or Lenovo?

Watching these latest Mac ads is actually pushing me even more toward the latter.

As I read the initial details about Apple’s “Snow Leopard” release (ostensibly called OS X 10.6), I got to thinking… What do they mean that they’ve taken the focus away from new features?

From Apple.com:

Taking a break from adding new features, Snow Leopard — scheduled to ship in about a year — builds on Leopard’s enormous innovations by delivering a new generation of core software technologies that will streamline Mac OS X, enhance its performance, and set new standards for quality.

One word was striking to me, not for its presence, but for its absence.  That word is “security.”  A few years ago Microsoft was more or less caught with its pants down when it came to the wild world of the web.  But a couple years after Windows XP was released, Microsoft “got religion” on security and made some deep changes.  Those culminated in the release of XP SP2 – which consisted of a top-to-bottom review of the XP code and a major security-focused overhaul of its code.  It’s been said many times that certain high-level Windows execs thought XP SP2 should have been an entire OS release instead of a service pack.  That’s how big the changes were.  But who would ship a new OS with basically zero new features?  Well, now we know.

That has me wondering… why is Apple taking the focus off of new features for 10.6.  Especially when Leopard wasn’t exactly brimming with new hotness.  I think there are three reasons:

1) iPhone.  Jobs has shown a great ability to focus the entirety of Apple on a “north star” and drive toward it full-steam-ahead.  That’s what the iPhone is doing now, and to great effect.  However, this is not without cost.  Apple’s focus on the iPhone has left it with fewer resources to devote to other projects, particularly when it comes to software development.  Thus I have a feeling the crew working on OS X these days is a good deal smaller than the group that worked on Panther and Tiger.

2) Embedded devices.  Apple says they’re going to slim-down OS X in 10.6.  That makes sense, especially when you consider their affinity for flash-based devices.  If we’re going to see a Mac sub-tablet / super-sized iPhone device, this will be the OS for it.  It’s also likely a way to leverage some of those iPhone-focused resources in order to ship a version of OS X timed to counter Windows 7.

3) Security.  Apple’s PC marketshare is growing.  This is great for them, but only if they can hold onto it.  An onslaught of security nightmares, like those suffered by Windows XP a few years ago, would be disasterous.  They can’t afford to risk it.  Apple knows that they won’t be spared by attackers for much longer, not when their market is growing.  The untested nature of its software (untested by the “hacker” community) and its increasing prevalence on machines will make it a very tempting target soon enough.

So why is number 3 so important?  Because Apple can’t keep claiming that gaping holes in their software aren’t important.  They have an opportunity to have their XP SP2 without having their MS.Blaster / Code Red / Slasher / etc.  They can do something now to prevent malware from becoming as rampant on Macs as it was on Windows XP systems.  If they aren’t doing this, they’re being foolish, and they’ll get little sympathy from those who keep telling them to get their act together.

So how much time does Apple have left to figure this out?  I think not long.  Heck, the first shots may already have been fired.

1)  That post, and its title, are mainly about the outrageous ways in which people are jumping to Apple’s defense… not Apple’s action itself.

2)  If your argument is that user’s read the dialog and can uncheck the Safari box if they don’t want it, you are delusional.

Consider the recent report that 24% of internet users can’t find Google.  Now think about this from that user’s perspective.  They see a dialog that says, very clearly, “Select the items you want to update.”  Do you really think those users are going to know what Safari is?  Do you think they’re going to know that they don’t already have it installed?

I bet you way more than 24% don’t even know what “Quicktime” is.  I can promise you my sister, her roommates, and my mom all don’t.  They sure as heck don’t know what Safari is.  If they see it in that list, they are going to assume it is something they already have.  Probably something that came with their computer. 

If they’re “good” users, they will know that keeping their software up-to-date is important, so they’ll choose to update everything they possibly can because they don’t want their computers to be hacked, and we keep telling them that the best way to do that is to keep their systems up-to-date.  Apple is manipulating that to their advantage.  That’s exactly what John Lilly, CEO of Mozilla, said yesterday.  He is right.

You can argue that it’s their software, and they can do with it as they please.  I will agree with you, actually.  However, just because I believe they can do this, and support their right to, doesn’t mean I have to like it.  I think it’s a shitty practice, and if we don’t make a big deal about it right now, it’s only going to get worse.

In response, lots of Apple fans have jumped to their defense.  They say that users read the dialog before clicking “update.”  They say users will welcome their new Apple overlords.  They say it’s okay because ”Microsoft is worse” – they make me reboot after installing updates!

Some nutjobs are even saying that Apple distributing new software through the updater is the “cost” of using their product – akin to ads in Messenger or fees for anti-virus software.  I don’t remember signing up for that cost when I bought my iPhone.  That same wacko makes a bunch of other outrageous claims about how it is a glorious achievement that Apple is assimilating your Windows machine without asking first.  You should read it, if only for the comedic value.

I think the disconnect here is simple. It’s just like the disagreement that arose over Apple’s font rendering when they first released Safari to Windows. And that is:

People like the way things work on their Windows PCs. They don’t want one app to have different, blurrier font rendering. They don’t want Apple installing apps on their machines without consent.

Apple and their fans don’t understand this, because they believe they are partaking in some sort of “holy crusade” and “bringing the light of Apple to the underprivileged in Windows land.” It’s an absurd mindset, but that hasn’t stopped them having it. They just can’t understand why Windows user’s wouldn’t welcome Apple’s software and UI.

They’re like the borg, “Why wouldn’t you want to be assimilated – we bring perfection!”

Maybe not, but close enough.  Anything that leads to users unintentionally taking an action is a flawed UI.  That could mean this is a design flaw – but Apple doesn’t make those =)  Besides, the intent is obvious – to get more people to install Safari whether they want it or not.  Rationalize it all you want, but you can’t deny the game they’re playing.Is it working?I’m a software developer, and probably one of the most generally computer savvy people I know. I got very used to clicking “Update” button on the Apple Software Update dialog so that it would keep iTunes and Quicktime up-to-date (along with the BootCamp software on my Macbook).I came very close to installing Safari by accident because of this, and would not at all be surprised to see lots of others clicking it without looking.

The right thing for Apple to do here would have been:

1) Don’t check it by default. You’ve gotten people trained to click “Update” since you don’t have an automatic update system, and now you’re abusing that.
2) The text in the dialog is inaccurate. It says “Select the items you want to update” – but Safari isn’t software on my computer, so how can I update it?

I had Safari installed on one of my machines to try it out when they released it. So it was normal for the updater to want to update it there.  Then when it popped up in the list on a different machine I was confused, and thought I had mixed up which machine I’d installed it on months ago. But I had not. They were trying to trick me.

Oh sorry, they were trying to “show me the light.”

Update:

I just posted a follow-up to this entry.

Like the Japanese car in the Dearborn auto plant parking lot, Macs and iPhones must create problems for switchers working at Apple competitors as well as companies with a PC-or-die IT policy.

He then goes on to link to this very blog!

However, Microsoft appears to be okay with at least one of its employees running Vista on a MacBook in the office. Blogger Chris Pirillo pointed to Brandon Paddock, a self-described geek who works on search technology at Microsoft (but not in the Microsoft Mac Business Unit, where it’s okay to show up with Mac hardware and software, or at least it is at the “SVC,” the Silicon Valley Campus in Mountain View, Calif.).

It’s true, I’m a Microsoft developer (on Windows no less) with a Macbook.  And an iPhone!  I’m also rather fond of both of them.

I’m not the only one, either.  I see as many iPhones as Blackjacks these days, maybe more.  It’s really an awesome device and it doesn’t surprise me at all that geekier folk would pick one up.

I also wasn’t the first on the shell team with a Macbook.  My friend David used to be an SDET on the team, but is now a PM.  His primary machine is a first-gen black Macbook.  I’m pretty sure I’ve seen at least one Macbook Pro in a nearby office, and my boss has an iMac at home.

Many of them are like me, and run Vista pretty much exclusively on them.  I know some didn’t even keep the OS X partition around when they installed it.  It’s neat to play with once in a while (and the VMware Fusion and Parallels stuff is getting really impressive), but not terribly useful for practical purposes, especially if your life revolves around building a competing OS.

If you do run OS X, you can even get it on our network, although some things like getting on the WiFi take a fair bit of extra work.  Luckily there’s an IT help page that walks you through it.

But as I said, in my case it’s pretty much a PC.  A stylish, well-put-together PC.  I even recently put a Vista orb sticker on top covering the backlit Apple logo (which likes to shine through while it’s running, creating an eerie, ghostly effect).  Not because anyone ever cared that I carried a Mac around, but because I’m very proud of the team I work on and what we do there.  And it fits perfectly =)

If I haven’t mentioned it before, I love working at Microsoft.  I love that I can carry a Macbook around to every meeting and have others think nothing of it.  I love that others on the team are willing to look at, use, and sometimes even live with our main competitor’s product.  I think it’s important to know what “the other side” is doing, and to understand what users are talking about when they make comparisons.  I think it’s also important that we respect the great things they’re doing down there, and strive to do better if we see some area where they’ve got an edge on us.

Little tidbit on that note:  One day a friend of mine on the team printed off a couple dozen screenshots of Leopard, showing off various tasks the user can do in OS X, and hung them on one of our hallways.  Across from it are pictures of the same tasks in that incredibly well-kept secret of a project that we’re working on.  There are post-it notes and markers next to each wall where passersby leave comments / questions.

I wonder if any hallways in Cupertino have something like that?

Another interesting announcement is that Windows Live will be offering a new serivce which reportedly offers 4GB of storage to Silverlight developers to host applications and media (videos, etc).  Joshua Allen’s post seems to suggest that this is a Windows Live Platform initiative.  That could be big, and I can’t wait to see how it comes together.

More:

WebWare keynote coverage
Channel 9 video on the cross-platform CLR
Silverlight.net

Oh, and sound works better now (for some reason, lots of system sounds frequently wouldn’t play on the old driver), as do the idle timers for sleep / screensaver.

It seems like they’ve fixed all the rough edges, except for one thing. For some reason, whenever the Macbook comes out of sleep, it chooses a random state for the NumLock key – but the light on the key itself doesn’t light if it decides to be on. This means that 50% of the time I end up typing an invalid password (because the right half the keyboard becomes a number pad).

All in all, that’s a pretty darn minor gripe compared to the plethora of issues that my Toshiba laptop had.

Bootcamp 1.2 with Vista support

What’s more, I still believe his response to my initial e-mail was uncalled for, and that his suggestion that I should apologize to him is rather absurd. However, I’ve been wrong before. So rather than arguing any further, I’ll simply the share the e-mails in question and let you decide who overreacted.

From: Brandon Paddock
Sent: Wednesday, March 21, 2007 1:34 PM,
Subject: Question about Apple TV article (error?)

Hi there,

I’m curious about this quote from your Apple TV article.

“But the comparable Xbox costs 50% more than Apple TV, is much larger and stores only half as much material.”

Where does the 50% number come from? I would think the Xbox 360 with equivalent functionality would be the Core System, which is priced identically to the Apple TV box ($299). I say equivalent functionality because as far as I’m aware, the Apple TV doesn’t yet store anything on its hard drive, and its primary purpose is to stream data from an iTunes-equipped PC. As a bonus, the 360 can be equipped with a hard drive at a later date (possibly a much larger one) and play games and DVDs.

However, more concerning is that the 50% number doesn’t even make sense for the most expensive Xbox 360 system, which is priced at $399 (thus a 30% number would make more sense, or you could just be clear and say $399). Thus I have to believe the 50% number to be in error. If not, I’d be interested in a clarification of where it came from.

Thanks,
Brandon Paddock

http://brandonlive.com

From: Walt Mossberg
Sent: Wednesday, March 21, 2007 1:42 PM
To: Brandon Paddock
Cc: Katherine Boehret
Subject: Re: Question about Apple TV article (error?)

Boy, you really have to read more carefully before accusing people of error. The $299 Apple TV has a 40 GB hard disk and can sync with any Mac or Windows computer, storing the media from those computers, PLUS stream from five more Mac or Windows computers and stream directly from the internet.

Next time, READ the article before emailing.

Walt

Walt insists he read my message “word-for-word” before responding. Doesn’t look that way to me, though.

As I was reading it, this line jumped out at me:

But the comparable Xbox costs 50% more than Apple TV, is much larger and stores only half as much material.

50% more? Where did they get 50%? The Apple TV is $299, and the most expensive Xbox 360 is $399. By my admittedly hasty calculation, that appears to be about 30% more, not 50. Curious about the origin of this figure, I clicked the “Email” link at the bottom of the page and politely inquired about it. I concluded my message, “Thus I have to believe the 50% number to be in error. If not, I’d be interested in a clarification of where it came from.”

I also suggested that a comparison between the Apple TV and the equally priced Xbox 360 model might be more appropriate than they had suggested – as the main functionality of the Apple TV doesn’t make use of its 40GB hard drive, making it of questionable advantage with the current software. Surely the Xbox’s ability to play games and DVDs (plus support any resolution including old TVs and the top-end 1080p) could help balance out that largely ethereal advantage.

I received a response within 10 minutes from Mossberg himself, which normally I’d find to be quite impressive. Unfortunately, what I got was an unprofessional flame mail that didn’t address my concern. Instead, it very rudely suggested that I was too uninformed to comment on the Apple TV. He said that if I thought there was an error, it was because I didn’t read the article “carefully” enough. He concluded his message saying, “Next time, READ the article before emailing.”

Perhaps Walt should take his own advice and READ his e-mail before flaming a concerned reader. Even if the error wasn’t in plain sight, his response was uncalled for. Who knows, maybe he’s just having a bad day. That still doesn’t excuse such an unprofessional response from someone of his supposed journalistic integrity. Walt, you need to chill out. Maybe someone needs a vacation?

• Searching remote Leopard clients and server shares
• Full support for file permissions and ACLs
• Expanded “Recent Items” functionality
• Advanced search with a much more robust query syntax
• Use Spotlight as an application launcher (a sort of “Start Menu” if you will)
• Preview results and files without opening them

Those are all really great features!  I just can’t put my finger on it, but for some reason I feel like I’ve seen them before.

If you’re running Vista on a MacBook, you might be aware that installing the Apple Trackpad driver will let you scroll with the trackpad and let you right-click by holding two fingers on the trackpad and clicking the button (sadly there’s still no “tap” support, but hopefully that will come soon).  You might also be aware that if you install the driver, it fails after resuming from sleep or hibernation, meaning you have no mouse input until you reboot or go into device manager and restart the driver.

Well, neither of those options was going to work for me, so here’s my solution.  By the way, this assumes you have your machine set to be locked when it goes to sleep.

1. Download DevCon.exe (free from Microsoft.com)
2. Save it somewhere (I put it in Program Files\DevCon, but it shouldn’t matter where).
3. Open the Task Scheduler (type “task” into the start menu to find it quickly).
4. Click “Create Task” and give it a name (like “Fix stupid Apple driver”)
5. Choose a user to run the task – should be a member of the machine’s Administrators group.
6. Check the box that says “Run with highest privileges”
7. Select the option to “Run whether user is logged on or not”
8. Go to the Triggers tab and click New…
9. Select “On Workstation Unlock” from the drop-down and click OK.
10. Go to the Actions tab and click New…
11. Point it at wherever you saved Devcon.exe
12. In the “Add Arguments” field, type:  restart USB\VID_05AC&PID_021A&MI_01
13. The above string was one of the two Hardware IDs listed for my Apple Trackpad device (NOT the filter device).  It’s possible yours might vary, so check in Device Manager to make sure it’s the same, especially if this one doesn’t work.
14. Go to the Conditions tab and uncheck the box that says “Start the task only if the computer is on AC power”
15. Click OK and verify the password for the account you chose for the task to run under.

Now test it out by putting your machine to sleep and waking it up.  After unlocking it, you should find that your mouse works instantly!  Huzzah!

I’m still not 100% committed to keeping it, as I told myself when I bought it that I could take it back if I decide it’s not worth it.  But so far it’s proving itself to be a really great little PC. 

Today at Macworld (which suspiciously lacked anything new about, well, Macs), Apple announced that this summer they’ll be offering the iPhone, a slick looking device that is likely to be the best blend of music player, cell phone, and PDA that we’ve seen so far.

But apparently no one at Apple has bought a cell phone since 2004.

That’s right… apparently the iPhone uses, and no I’m not joking… EDGE.  That’s right, your iPhone might as well be a dial-up modem.  Not ~800kbps like I’ve been getting from EVDO for over a year and a half, or the faster EVDO Rev A stuff rolling out now.  Definitely not the ~1mbps HSDPA / UMTS speed like all the fancy new Cingular smartphones.   Just good old 80-110kbps EDGE, a worse connection than I had on my Treo 600 in 2003.

Lame.  Really lame.  Right now I’m thinking about replacing my PPC-6700 with a BlackJack.  Nothing announced today has made me even have a second thought about that.

Looks like Michael Gartenberg agrees.

Second one is my favorite.