Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Mac OS 9

macos9.app

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

121–130 of 356 posts

Re: Mac OS 9

#121

Post by thesuperbigfrog »

s1k3s wrote: post #100
bovermyer wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Two questions: 1. Are you being serious, or are you being sarcastic? 2. If you're being serious, what about it is terrible?

I am serious, and it's all about how things are named and how the OS interacts with you. Some examples (imagine you've never used a computer before): - "file explorer" on Windows, "finder" on Mac. This is just an example of naming that I think it's just confusing to users, among many other names - a red "X" to close a program on windows, a random square with no color differentiation on the Mac - a clear view of what…

Just a reminder that Windows 98 was Microsoft's popular OS at the time and it had its own issues:

https://youtu.be/yeUyxjLhAxU

Re: Mac OS 9

#122

Post by JonathonW »

dmix wrote: post #60
slowmotarget wrote: post #10

It's a great reminder of how well MacOS 9 UI and UX were designed, and how space efficient the whole OS was on screen. Even the window handle bars were subtly shadowed, the window shadows evolved when they were collapsed. Like Windows 95 at the time, Mac OS 9 was a beautiful work of interaction design.

I love the purple color used in the "Platinum" interface theme in Mac OS 8/9, even the scrollbar is purple: https://i.imgur.com/WwFdpJH.png They even offered a crazy "Memphis" art themed option: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aSLWbFUG_ig "High-tech" wasn't very pretty either: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UBUgDnPT8Ps https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Appearance_Manage...

None of the alternate themes actually made it into a final release of Mac OS; just Platinum.

There was a fairly healthy third-party theming community, though, and the Apple-developed themes (Memphis, High-Tech, and a sketch-styled theme called Drawing Board) would still work if you got your hands on them.

Re: Mac OS 9

#123

Post by azinman2 »

slowmotarget wrote: post #10

It's a great reminder of how well MacOS 9 UI and UX were designed, and how space efficient the whole OS was on screen. Even the window handle bars were subtly shadowed, the window shadows evolved when they were collapsed. Like Windows 95 at the time, Mac OS 9 was a beautiful work of interaction design.

You say that but I’ve recently been programming an app in system 7, which isn’t totally dissimilar to 9 in UX, and I keep thinking “wow how did I ever use this.” Windows constantly occluding each other, no easy way to switch between them outside of the mouse, finder windows filled with grids that I have to scroll through, no easy way to just see the desktop, etc. Current macOS is miles ahead in usability.

Re: Mac OS 9

#125

Post by ace2358 »

dieulot wrote: post #76
dzikimarian wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Javascript/Electron - single code base for multiple desktop platforms.

Modern macOS is a significant counterexample to that claim. Most of it is janky. Zooming and dezooming the Finder is not something a 2.5 years old MacBook Air (€1200) can keep up with smoothly, for instance. Opening a Save dialog takes over 3 seconds, and expanding/collapsing the file explorer in it is comically janky.

None of this sounds right based on my experience.

Wondering which model you have? Is it fanless? I’ve never used until o got my 2022 m2 air. It’s the best computer I’ve ever used.

Before that, 10 years of Mac Pro, and they’ve all been old (2010 models) and fast.

Re: Mac OS 9

#126

Post by ezfe »

dieulot wrote: post #76
dzikimarian wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Javascript/Electron - single code base for multiple desktop platforms.

Modern macOS is a significant counterexample to that claim. Most of it is janky. Zooming and dezooming the Finder is not something a 2.5 years old MacBook Air (€1200) can keep up with smoothly, for instance. Opening a Save dialog takes over 3 seconds, and expanding/collapsing the file explorer in it is comically janky.

That's simply not true. A 2019 MacBook Air has no trouble with any of these things. If you're having trouble with these, something is seriously wrong with your computer.

Re: Mac OS 9

#127

Post by ace2358 »

chongli wrote: post #67
tambourine_man wrote: post #14

I managed to get over most of the nostalgia in my life. After a certain age, I feel it’s a bit counterproductive and not a net positive. But old Macs hit me hard and it’s something I can’t seem to build an immunity to. The aesthetics, the simplicity, the cohesion of the metaphors… so good.

That's because it's never just nostalgia. Sometimes things were better in the past. Take Google search for example. Everyone on HN knows it used to be better and that it's been getting worse every year. Of course, a lot of that was not (originally) Google's fault because spammers get more sophisticated every year, but I think Google deserves a share of the blame because they have a conflict of interest by running the…

Can’t grandma still use the old computer while we all use our new computers with new software that’s enriching our lives? I have countless instruments at my disposal in VST form, 3D software like blender, DAW to write music in, stable diffusion to help with the creative process.

Re: Mac OS 9

#128

Post by sharikous »

yamtaddle wrote: post #75
cogman10 wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And why is everything just so slow! That's what always annoys me. I have a computer that's easily 100x or 1000x more powerful than my 1995 desktop yet so many actions have noticeable lag. Like, try it, resize outlook right now (just stretch the side left and right). You'll see so much jank and jitter. How is something like that not instantaneous?

Well, you see, they've traded end-user performance for productivity. This is why it only takes a team five times as large to deliver the same functionality as a comparable program from the 1990s, and that team can make a buggier initial release in merely twice the time.

There might be something in what you are saying but it's not really like that.

The current macOS is humungous, kernel aside. There is a variety of systems running under the hood (Spotlight, fsevents, Apple Events, duet, launchd, MIGs, XPCs, caches, endless network services, launch services, anti-malware background programs, AppleID agents, diagnostics, cloud/AppleID integration, auditing, RAM compression, energy management, backups, filesystem snapshotting, COW,.... not to mention that huge OS inside the OS that is the browser) that is more than a surgeon can know about the human body.

Of course most of that is spying on you and telemetry... But you just have much more features these days and stability and security increased a lot. If that is not added value for you just work on one of those "minimal" OSes that appear from time to time. I guarantee you that you will miss a modern "bloaty" OS in no time.

Re: Mac OS 9

#129

Post by no_time »

mritchie712 wrote: post #59
dzikimarian wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Javascript/Electron - single code base for multiple desktop platforms.

Not by any means a solution to all Electron problems, but Tauri[0] is promising. 0 - https://github.com/tauri-apps/tauri

Is this any better in performance? Looks like rust bolted to a system webview (chromium in the case of Windows) instead of electron (chromium bolted to v8)

Re: Mac OS 9

#130

Post by papandada »

Not a Mac user. Figured this was a new announcement. Clicked and then remembered -- I was at a "System 7" launch as a youngster, 30+ years to get a couple version would be very, very slow.
Post reply on HN