Annoying things about the mac...

[clymbon]

OK, I know macs are supposed to excel at "ease of use", and in general I think they succeed at that. But sometimes I think the darn things are just trying too hard for "ease of use" and instead wind up being just plain annoying.

Here are a couple of pet peeves.

One is that there's no way to tell a powerbook not to go to sleep (or whatever mac calls it) when you close the lid. I did some googling to find out how to do it, and in the end all I could find was "you're not supposed to work that way". Hard to explain to apple types that there's really no reason the darn thing can't keep playing my music with the lid closed - it's just that apple decided not to give me a way to tell it to do that. I guess it would make it too complicated for a simple human like me to have to deal with messy details like that...

Here's one that's *really* bad. I have a wireless LAN in my house with WEP encryption and a hex key. Had trouble getting my niece's mac to connect to it. Some googling turned up the fact that you have to put a dollar sign in front of the key to indicate that it's hex. WTF?!?! That's supposed to be "ease of use"? How about just giving me a configuration screen that allows me to select WEP shared key, with key entered in hex? Oh, no, that wouldn't be "ease of use" because users aren't supposed to have to enter details like that. So, sorry - no way to specify that stuff - unless you know the magic trick of putting a dollar sign in front of the key.

Sometimes, macs are JUST PLAIN ANNOYING!

[bendrucker]

I would like to address a couple of issues in your rant...

I don't know about the PowerBook specifically, but I do know that new macs can operate with the lid closed, assuming an external monitor, keyboard, and mouse are connected. Without these devices, the laptop is useless. There is no way to hear the speakers, since they will be muffled by the screen. I don't see how it is possible to have the laptop working on a task but neither have the lid open or external peripherals connected.

I've connected to many WEP networks, and have always used the passphrase used to generate the hex key. That works flawlessly and is the solution Apple assumes 99% of its users will use. While the $ sign is somewhat strange, Apple didn't just make this up $, 0x, and 0X all signal the beginning of a hex string. Most manufacturers omit this symbol. Apple probably should too, and I suggest you email them and request that it be changed. Also, why use WEP in the first place. It has been proven that a skilled hacker can crack WEP passwords in well under an hour depending on the password length and regular people with freely available software can crack it in a few hours if they're within range. WPA2 is the current wireless standard, and I highly recommend that you use that rather than WEP.

[philbowell]

For a PowerBook or any new MacBook, Pro or otherwise, to work in clamshell mode you need an external display an keyboard/mouse. How are you supposed to operate the Mac without it? External speakers would be needed to hear music as well.

This Apple knowledge base article will explain how.

Regarding WEP. I agree with BaseBallBoy. It's an old outdated in-secure technology, you should switch to WPA2 or use the passphrase which is what I've done in the past.

[clymbon]

You guys are making my point! Macs are easy to use... as long as you use them the way you're "supposed to".

I'm amazed that people have difficulty with the concept of a laptop operating with its lid closed, without being hooked up to an external monitor and keyboard. Here are things I do all the time with my laptop, none of which require a screen or keyboard: operate it as a web or file server; leave it working on some long-running task; log in and work on it remotely over the network, leave it playing music (through external speakers). On my windows machine, I can configure what I want it to do when I close the lid. Go to sleep, shut down, or just keep running normally. On a mac - no, sorry, that would be too complicated, I guess. Have to go consult some "tech note" because I'm doing something a normal user isn't supposed to do. Aaargh!

Regarding WEP, come on guys! Yes, I know it's obsolete and easily broken. It just so happens I have an OLD wireless router that doesn't support WPA. I don't really worry about it being broken - that's low on my list of computer security worries. And I don't know the ASCII passphrase, if I ever had one, so unless somebody has an algorithm to translate from a hex key to an ascii passphrase, I HAVE to enter it in hex, because that's the way I created it on the router. Again, should be no big deal. But I can just imagine the thinking that went into the design of the user interface for the wireless card: Should we have an "advanced options" button that brings up a menu that allows the user to click on things like "WEP", "Shared Key", and have an option to enter the key in either ASCII or HEX? Hmmm... no, users shouldn't have to know about things like that - too complicated. Much better ease of use if we just force the user to enter the key as a passphrase. Aaargh! Ease of use trumps funtionality again!

Now don't get your knickers in a twist! My post was pretty much a troll to see what reaction I would get. Don't get me wrong. I love macs. They are great machines, and I would recommend them, especially for non-tech-savvy users. But come on, admit it - sometimes the "ease of use" comes at the expense of not being able to make the damn thing do what you want it to do.

Am I right, or am I right?

Who has more examples of these little annoyances that crop up in what are otherwise great designs?



p.s. While we're on the topic, I see some of this type of thinking creeping into one of my favorite Linux distributions - Ubuntu. Much better ease of use than some other distributions (some of which are really horrible) but to some extent at the expense of flexibility. Sometimes you want to just say, "Yeah, I know it's supposed to be plug-and-play, but it isn't working right, so let me configure it manually!"

[bendrucker]

I see how it would be useful if you are using it as some type of server. In that case, you may want to try this extension. Again, not sure why Apple doesn't include this by default even though it is rarely useful.

I don't find ease of use gets in the way of productivity. If you are doing weird things with your mac (like using a laptop as a server), third parties fill in the gaps Apple feels are too unimportant. However, I would have to agree that Apple should fix these weird things that would only take a few lines of code to fix.

Best example of an Apple UI annoyance? The menubar. Holding command will let you reorder Apple's icons and specially crafted 3rd party ones, but not other third party icons. Apple should just force the developers to make their menubar icons movable in 10.6.

[mattchu1]

Clymbon makes a good point about defending the mac os on whatever charge. Right. It's the best machine by a few lazy light years but even at the cutting edge there's some annoying little things. Wouldn't change to windows over them though.

[JeremyK]

I totally agree with clymbon

Windows gives you an option if you'd like it to standby when you close it. This has previously saved my laptop.
Once I was updating Windows and it was taking so long! So I set it so I could close the lid and move it. I left my closed laptop running on a desk and because it was near-ish christmas - most of that family that you never want to see (the ones that break everything) came over and sure enough - a basketball got thrown at my laptop.

If the screen had been open, it would have broken the LCD and I would had to replace it.

There are a few little things that are also annoying. Like that you HAVE to install Windows to run Windows stuff. Why doesnt Apple just make OS X be able to read .exe and .dll files. Solve everything!

[bendrucker]

Apple can't make OS X run .exe and .dll files. Then it would be Windows. If OS X could run them, it would have to integrate Windows components, thereby ruining OS X by making it a hybrid of Windows and OS X, susceptible to Windows viruses, the BSOD, and all the other headaches of Windows.

[JeremyK]

Uh... That explains it.

Can you buy something that can convert .exe files to the mac equivelent (what is it? .dmg?) without making it Macrosoft vOSta X

[bendrucker]

No. There's no such thing as "converting" Windows applications into Mac apps without rewriting all the code. That being said, Crossover for Mac might help you.

Windows Applications Seamlessly Integrated on Mac OS X - CrossOver Mac - CodeWeavers