created: 1251370839|%e %B %Y, %H:%M
tags: air apple logitech mac macbook os photoshop revolution x
Since some time I started - step-by-step - to convince myself to the Apple products. iPhone was the first thing from Apple I started to experience with (you can read about it here).
Then, some time ago, I went on a vacation. Michal gave me his no longer used MacBook (white, 2,16 GHz C2D, 2GB RAM, Intel graphic card). Now I'm using it until I'll get the MB Air. Well, Mac OS X is different from any other operating systems I was using (Windows XP, Vista, testing Windows 7, Gentoo, Ubuntu etc.), but I was surprised that it took me few minutes to get familiar with it. Everything is simple (sometimes just too simple), is working out of the box, is stable as hell and — what's the most important for me — is fast as hell. MacBook is afaik more than two years old and it's still fast as hell.
Of course it's not as fast as Michal's new MacBook Alu (comparing Photoshop CS4 start time: 30s vs ca. 5s !), but is almost powerful enough to fit my needs. Nevertheless often there's a lack of memory and processor power when I work with Inkscape, GIMP, Photoshop and Illustrator at one time, but I just can't do nothing with that.
Another thing I like in Apple computers is the way the handle color profiles. It's really a great feature, I don't have to worry that the colors look different no my external display at work and at home. It all looks the same (except MacBook built-in display, which is horrible).
Someone says that I have been caught and strangled in Jobs' death of Apple's power. Maybe it's true, I don't mind. I want to USE computers and devices, not to struggle with them to make it work. Of course, I can configure linux to work JUST AS I WANT, not how the designers wanted to do it, but it takes ages to make everything work, often sometimes is not compatible, is crashing etc. My time is precious, time is money, I cannot afford myself to spend time for unproductive things. I want to sit down, get the mouse and start working, designing, writing and so on, not browsing through the net and googling: "ubuntu ati drivers error" whole day to make this shit working properly.
The one thing I don't like in Mac OS X is the way it handles mice. The white Mighty Mouse is simply terrible. I had an impression that I move the pointer in the mud. It's better a little bit with my Logitech MX Revolution, but still it's very imprecise and lazy. I could turn the acceleration off by changing the settings from the console: defaults write .GlobalPreferences com.apple.mouse.scaling -1 but still it's far from being perfect. I wonder how most of the graphic designers, video editors etc. can be not pissed off with this lack of mouse precision. Maybe I'm doing something wrong and someone knows the solution?
My plan is to move to Apple: buy new MacBook for portability, maybe Mac Pro for work (whoah, they're fxxxxn' expensive) or an iMac. iPhone is ok, no need to change to GS now. Two ext. displays (nevertheless not from Apple) and voila. My workspace will be good enough for my needs. We'll see.
For now, Apple is ok. Not perfect, not even very good, but ok. More ok than linux.
Comments: 3, Rating: 2
created: 1248078119|%e %B %Y, %H:%M
tags:
Sorry, we've been testing RSS to Twitter, so we can easily tweet about the new posts on the official Wikidot blog: http://blog.wikidot.com
Comments: 1, Rating: 0
created: 1242082964|%e %B %Y, %H:%M
tags: application development idea iphone project wikidot work
Sometimes I regret that I don't have a developer "on my own" :) There are so many things that can be done to improve Wikidot, make using it easier, more pleasant and — what's most important — to increase its popularity.
As it has been mentioned some time ago, we want to bring new features and functionalities which will make Wikidot more social networking service, connecting co-workers, friends and people involved together in projects.
I think this is one of the most important part to do now.
I regret that sometimes I don't have the tools to realize my vision of future WD, its changes and development. There are many things to do in everyday work and much more things marked as high priority. In most of cases there is simply no time to do the things I would like to see in Wikidot service.
But what it would be? Except more socializing features I would like to improve WD interface. From UX point of view it's worse than terrible. The worst thing is that it needs A LOT of work and it means redesigning almost whole Wikidot. Well, maybe someday.
I use WD for blogging, my personal notes and to have connection with my friends about our sessions of playing in Unreal Tournament.
Since I use iPhone and since I realized how potentially big market of mobile access we need to cover, I would like to have an application for the iPhone. Well, even more than one.
iWikidot should be an app to manage whole sites, notifications, users, members and so on. I would like to have an ability to list my categories, than view the pages within category, edit them, add tags etc.
The second app I would like to have is iWikiBlog, an easy app for adding new blog posts on Wikidot. It would manage only pages within one category, blog by default. It could have the option to save a draft before publishing it.
The third app would be iWikiNotes, almost the same as this one for blogging, but for managing pages within a private category notes or with an option of making notes either public or private. It would need implementing new permissions options, but it would be worth it.
If I could have also a desktop app or widget with
sticky notes where each note is a short, simplified wiki page I would be in heaven. I could have access to my notes instantly from my computer's desktop, via web browser when using friends computer or anywhere else with my mobile phone. My girlfriend could add a shoplist on her computer to my notes and I woild instantly get notif on my iPhone and get know what to buy when going back from work :)
Sometimes I regret I'm not a programmer. I would write these solutions by myself.
