Anyone else here in the post-PC era?

Your loss. Or is it a case of willful ignorance.Synopsis: You have mischaracterized me and I have demonstrated to you how much you have mischaracterized me.Disagreement on your part would require that you go back and actually read the post that you have previously ignored.PSMost of the definitions for that on urban dictionary say that it indicates the stupidity or laziness of the respondant.Edited by dwise1, : PS

Excuse me, but that was well over a year ago and I wasn't taking any fracking notes! I was under the gun to produce immediate results and what the computer was doing made absolutely no fracking sense. And having been burned, I have not tried working with any other Macs. Remember the definition of insanity? Trying the same thing over and over again and expecting different results. Well, I'm not crazy so I'm not about to try that again!Other problems was trying to figure out iTunes. Since I had ripped some CDs of ripped music (ie, no links to album data), I needed to go in and change those tracks' info. I had a helluva time discovering how to do that. I also had a problem with duplicate tracks, but iTunes would refuse to allow me to delete the extra ones. Did I ever solve that problem? I don't know, since it's been well over a year since I tried, but at the very least I checked only one of the duplicates to be sync'd into my iPod. I probably should resync again soon, since the iPod has started mixing up songs with album covers and transferring songs over from other playlists. Which, guess what, is exactly what I have been telling you all along: Apple software is for those who do not know anything about computers and frustratingly difficult for those who do. Hello???? Why don't you just simply admit that you agree with me and stop this topic arc? The mind boggles. Compilers and development systems. C, C++ C#, perl, etc. Files. Working directly with files outside of and independent of any particular application. My co-worker whose wife uses a Mac (that little cube, so I'm not sure whether it's OS9 or OSX) has informed me that the file system is ber-weird, no directory structure and each file is tied directly to a specific application.IOW, the Mac presents itself as a much more closed and restrictive environment than Windows (which itself is much too restrictive for the Linux folk). I do a lot of things with files at the lower level. I do not believe that Mac would allow that.Now true, OSX could be a different story. It has BSD Unix as its kernel. I was even tempted when I heard that. However ... . Has BSD been able to keep up with Linux? Would those other compilers and development systems I need be available to BSD ... or rather, with the form of BSD that OSX runs? And wouldn't I need to do absolutely everything I'd want to do from the command line of a shell? OSX is beginning to not look like such a good deal, especially running on an over-priced under-powered machine whose other features are of dubious worth.All those things that I am doubtful of being able to do on a Mac, I am able to do and routinely do on a PC.Quod erat demonstrandum. (QED)Uh, that means "point has just been proven", in case you didn't know (I myself had to look it up when I first encountered it; it's a formal logic acronym). Uh, to start with, the iPad (lumping both versions together here mainly for grammatical reasons) was indeed one of the devices in question as per the OP (Message 1), so this topic is indeed about iPads, albeit not exclusively so.Second, what I have said has been true to the best of my recollection. I have made absolutely no knowingly false statements.Furthermore, you have agreed with me on the fundamental point that Apple software makes sense to those who know nothing about computers, but not to those who do. Well, you haven't explicitly said that you agree with me, but you keep saying the same thing that I've been saying all along.And it is very true that I have had very few good experiences with Apple software and mostly bad ones. Nor am I alone in that. My co-worker whose wife has a Mac, who also finds not only the Mac OS itself (question is open as per 9 or X) difficult and counter-intuitive to work with, but also had very similar problems with iTunes as my own. And my friend, a long-time tech writer by profession, who inherited a Mac from her brother (in the nice way; he's still living and simply gave it to her), tried it out, and didn't want anything more to do with it finding her Windows laptop to be much better and much more capable to work with.Ich bin doch nicht allein!OK, I asked this of Huntard, so now I ask it of you. What is superior about the Mac? Let's face it, we already know that the iPad cannot hold a candle to either the Mac or the PC, so I'm not even going to lump it in here and I believe that you would agree. What is the big selling point for the Mac? If you were to attempt to proselytize a PC user over to the Mac, how would you do it? What does the Mac do better than the PC does?Obviously, "user friendly" and "more intuitive" won't fly, because we have both already established that that only applies to those who don't know anything about computers. IOW, what is it about the Mac that would make it more attractive to someone who knows about computers?I've already shown you mine. You gonna show me yours?Tit for Tat. It's the winning zero-sum game (sorry, that computer experiment is not in Wikipedia).

Oh wow! I just realized that you had realized how completely off the mark you were about XP Search. So that's why you completely ignored my response!

Won't break it? Nobody ever expects the any key!Bwa-ha-ha-ha!Edited by dwise1, : No reason given.Edited by dwise1, : unable to display a GIFEdited by dwise1, : finally got img to work, hopefully

QED back to you.The vast majority of computer users neither know much about computers, nor do they care. They just want to get things done.For them, Macs are a logical choice.Computer geeks have never liked Macs, but since they are such a small part (although a noisy one) of the population, they think their opinions matter.

here you go

And you have also completely summarized the sogenannte "creation/evolution controversy." The vast majority of the people are nearly completely ignorant of science.For the ignorant, creationism is a logical choice.Science geeks have never liked creationism, but since they are such a small part (although a noisy one) of the population, they think their opinions matter.

I normally reside back in the north-western corner of the building, far away from the south-side "mahogony row", so I am normally rather sheltered. Marketing. They are truly an entirely different breed. And alien. We rarely mingle, except over the coffee pot.Marketing might want to satisfy all possible customers, but different customers need different things, only some of which we can actually satisfy. However, I did witness the performance of Google Earth on the iPad, so I did indeed "try the stuff out" even though it was not my own fingers fondling the surface of the display. Google Earth did not do the job! And yet ... can we realistically expect my niece to have been totally and completely aware of every single piece of software on her iPad and also be completely aware of every single feature and option on every single piece of software on her iPad? Are you completely aware of every single piece of software on your smart phone? I very much doubt it. Do you take photos on your phone? Do you know whether your photos contain the location where it was taken? Again, are you completely aware of every single piece of software on your smart phone?FWIW, on an Android phone, select "Videos". Therein press the Menu key and press the icon which is three horizontal bars. Select "All Photos". Hit Menu. There should be a menu option for displaying the map location of the photo. I have disabled that feature for obvious security reasons, so I don't see it at present.Are you truly aware of what's running on your device? Can you pass judgement on others so easily? How many others of us are "gaping open security holes"?

Hi DWise1,We're roughly the same age. One impulse I find increasingly hard to resist is deciding that an innovation or new use of technology that is different from what I'm used to, be it smart phones or tablets or Windows 7, is stupid. It's a very typical old-guy syndrome. You seem to be completely surrendering to the impulse.Had we grown up with the currently available technologies they would just seem like the normal way of doing things, and many of us would probably mistakenly come to believe that they were the best way to go, blissfully unaware that in another 30 or 40 years we'll be complaining that air displays, thumbnail computers and Windows 24 are stupid.--Percy

I've had my iPad for a few days now and it's the best 479 I've spent in ages. I barely touch me laptop now. I can even watch TV on the loo, and stuff.

Try a Skype video call. You can walk around the house and talk, go outside and show 'em the garden, etc, etc.--Percy

Just don't do it while on the loo... (Terrible image comes to mind)

So, your idea of a different "phone" is a different size of iPhone? Plus, I asked for phones, not MP3 players or tablet computers. If you want me to also add devices that come stock with Android or are capable of running Android easily, then I fear Apple will look even worse. I'm neither a fanboy nor a detractor. I just see the limitations that apple has placed on their customers. "Sickly Steve Jobs" yes. It was an off the cuff comment about a guy. Sue me. No...it's actually not. However, recently more companies are locking down boot-loaders. Like I said in conjunction with this bit you quoted: my Incredible is as open as open gets. I can put whatever I want on it as long as the independent dev made the ROM for it. Not so for my newer, more powerful Droid X (Motorola). Nope. Wrong again. The only major headlines I see about a technology company suing competitors on a daily basis is Apple. They are suing Samsung based on [i]sketches[/]....fucking sketches!

Ctrl-I for "Get Info." Or you could right-click and choose the same option. Command-I on the Mac (all keyboard shortcuts on the Mac are Command-key based.)An easy mnemonic for that is because you wanted to change the info, you needed to get it. Hence, Get Info. Boy, fuck Apple for making that so hard to remember, right? Menu option: "Show Duplicates." Then click the track and press "Delete" on your keyboard.Truly, another completely counter-intuitive violation of established interface guidelines, or something.I'm sorry to make fun, Dwise, but the way that you continue to describe activities that are stupendously obvious and require only a single keystroke as counter-intuitive mysteries that took you hours to solve really is funny. You've made it apparent that there's nothing at all uniquely unintuitive about Apple software, you just have an ideosyncratic set of expectations about how software and interfaces should perform that are about thirty years out of date. Your experience as a programmer in the 60's and 70's just has no relevance, in fact it's the reason that modern computers are largely beyond your grasp. You keep expecting computers to treat you like a programmer, but since 1984 or so, it's been the goal of manufacturers to produce computers that treat you like a person. No, it's just frustrating for you. I'm a programmer, too, Dwise, though of a more modern bend: I can sling code in Java and Python, still remember Scheme from my college days, once wrote a custom content management system in PHP (though it wasn't very good, since I couldn't get at the database I had to store everything in flat files), and though I prefer the order of a good Object Oriented programming environment I'm not above getting down and dirty in the registers with C bitwise operators, like when I'm writing code for my ATMega328.And I just don't have any of the problems you have. It never takes me more than a minute to figure out how to work things on a consumer electronics device. I mean, how mysterious could this possibly be even to someone like you:Guess what it turns on. All of which are the same on the Mac as on the PC. That is completely untrue. The Mac filesystem is not tied to any application, and the default save folder for all applications in the Mac OS is "Documents", which is exactly what you would expect it would be. This is a bizarre complaint since it's not even close to true. The Mac encourages it. You want to work in a terminal? Open "Terminal", an application so fiendishly and counter-intuitively located in the "Applications" folder, by default. Boom, full bash shell for your 70's-style enjoyment.Where's the bash shell on a PC? Oh, that's right - I have to use DOS, or maybe it's not quite DOS anymore since Windows moved to a kernel that isn't DOS-based. So what is it, exactly? Window's "Command" terminal, which is really just an emulator, decides to emulate a filesystem and environment that nobody has any other purpose for? Right, that makes a lot of sense.Is that what you think of as "intuitive"? Isn't that just another example of familiarity, not intuitiveness? You know how to use the fake-DOS terminal on a PC, so you just expect all computers and devices to have fake-DOS terminals instead of the robust Linux-like terminals on Apple devices? Very considerate of you (I did actually know what it meant.) The issue here is that you've not proven the point you think you've proven - you've proven mine. Macs aren't lacking anything in the "intuitive" department, they're just different than what you're used to on the PC.And that's fine! Again, it's a major pain in the ass to learn a new workflow and toolchain. There'd better be a damn good payoff at the end if you're going to be made to do that. And there's not in this instance. But that's not an excuse for saying things that aren't true. Apple software usually makes sense to both kinds of people, just not you. And making sense to people who know nothing about computers is the exact definition of "intuitive" in this context. I'll give you a list in no particular order, and understand that it's not a list meant to make you switch - which I don't care if you do - but just a list where, if I was going to spend the money on a computer anyway, these are the "Pros" that would make me lean Mac:*Mac OS is BSD-based, with full bash terminal support, more stable than Windows, equivalent native software support for all major software packages and open-source, and almost no history of viruses or malware.*Macs can run Windows, but PC's can run MacOS. That means the Mac hardware platform has access to software. (The first thing I do on any new Mac is drop a copy of Windows on a second drive partition, just in case.)*The hardware has a better design and fit and finish, particularly the laptops. While they're frequently slightly underpowered at the same price-point, the power-per-weight ratio is usually much greater. That matters if you're going to be taking it places, and what's the point of a laptop if you never take it anywhere?*Intuitive and polished interface. This is true for the iOS devices, as well.*All the games I want to play are available for that platform.*Better gamma. I've tried to adjust the gamma on my PC to match but it just doesn't ever look the same.*It doesn't have Windows' idiosyncratic notions about networking terms and concepts, and it handles multiple network interfaces in a much more intuitive way.*Windows thinks of things as drives, when really what you're interested in is volumes, like on the Mac. Why does my SD card slot have an icon when there's no SD card inside? Why does my DVD drive get a drive letter when there's no DVD? Like, what am I going to do with my DVD drive except put disks in it and interact with them? And why have "drive letters" in the first place on a system that hasn't been DOS-based for over a decade?*Legitimate UNIX-style filetrees all the way down to the filesystem. Windows' idiosyncratic frontslash-based file descriptors are a pain in programming and it's never clear when the environment is going to switch that over for you. And what about when I'm remotely grabbing a file from a remote Windows filesystem via Samba URL? Front slashes or back? Who the fuck knows?*Safari doesn't suck, unlike Internet Explorer. The first and only time I open IE on a new Windows install is to download Firefox or Chrome. I do that anyway on the Mac, too, but Safari's ok to use. It's no Firefox but at least it's not a welcome invitation to malware.*Bonjour actually works pretty well, that is to say that it works completely without you thinking about it, your network shares and networkable devices just automagically show up to each other. Windows file sharing continues to be a nightmare. "Ok, I've shared my folder on PC A, now let me go over to PC B and.... uh, where is PC A, exactly?" "Network Neighborhood" and "Workgroups" have never, ever worked. Why would I want to proselytize a PC user over to the Mac? What a waste of time. 90% of what people do is in web browsers, anyway. I'd maybe take the effort to "proselytize" someone over to Chrome instead of Internet Explorer, if I was going to have to be the guy to fix their computer when IE broke it.To tell the truth I've always kind of looked down on Apple fanboys who felt like they had to stick up for Apple on the internet. If I'd known that it's because they have to deal with an incredible torrent of total bullshit from people like yourself, I would have had more sympathy for them.Anyway, sorry I wrote you a whole book.

Speaking of PC weirdness, while I was posting this a YouTube video I had running in the background just crashed my display driver.Never had that happen on a Mac, just sayin'.