A question for the Mac folks

[vakkotaur]

I've been using linux on one of jmaynard's old laptops for a while and I generally like it, but there are a few things that could be a bit easier, such as getting wireless to work fully. One way out of that would to go to a newer machine, and that's possible as Jay has a Mac laptop that he isn't using. That brings with it a different problem: Steve "do it my way only" Jobs rigid user interface design, as far as I can tell.

I was with a few folks visiting an Apple store today and I tried to change the user interface on one of the display machines. There were two settings that pretty much did nothing. One changed a few blue highlights to be gray highlights. The other did the same thing for different highlights. Nothing I could find let me change the retina-searing white-hot default application background to something more tolerable, nor could I change the color of the type. ANY type. I asked the person who had come over to help our group and evidently the question had never come up before. "I'm sure there must be a way." But if there was, it was not revealed to me.

Jay did mention some means of switching everything to be a negative, but that's not what I want. It's like the UI designer figured "Oh, they want it different, well, this IS. So there. Now go away." Alright then, maybe UI sanity has to be set on a case-by-case, application-by-application basis. I looked at Safari. If there's anything that lets me change more than typeface sizes that isn't, "Go write your own CSS page, kid." I have yet to discover it.

For a system that seems to get so much right, this seems a rather jarring omission. I don't think I'm asking for that much to have a user interface that isn't only a choice between eyestrain and eyesore. So, is there some way to get a Mac, one using OS X, to do what I want it do, or does using a Mac mean being tied down in Jobsian interface bondage?

Comments

I use both.

[invader-tak-1.livejournal.com]

One, which Linux are you running? I"m running Ubuntu 7.10 "Just out" and the wireless support is excellent. Running on a Dell Inspiron 6000. A few wireless chipsets have weak support, and failing that there is always NDIS wrapper.

And in OS X, System-personal-appearance didn't do it for you? Have you considered just toggling down the screen brightness? You can do it easily from the keyboard.

There seems to be apps available for it, though I LIKE aqua I've never tried. Wait a few Leopard is out tomorrow and you may find its a bit easier on the eyes, "I've run it already, it seems a little less glare prone"

Just one example.

http://www.macupdate.com/info.php/id/13335

People keep telling me Stevo locks up the user experience and I just don't see it, I use a lot of alternate apps and such for a lot of things I do. "MInd you I detest iTunes and only use it to load my pod"

An annoyance of mine

[yakko.livejournal.com]

Why should I pay $20 to enable preferences that should've come with the OS?

I've used MacOS X since 10.1 and have simply put up with the sea of whiteness. The instant I can change the colors, for free, it'll no longer be white. O:o)

One reason I've stuck with Steve's "I know what you want better than you do" creation is that, well, he doesn't know better, and I do have the power to change the most important things over his (theoretical) objections. I'm sure a tiny piece of Steve would die just a little each time I fired up any app which uses X11, for example.

Re: I use both.

[vakkotaur.livejournal.com]

On the old laptop I use Wolvix, a Slackware variant. I've found that only Slackware and its variants seem to be lean enough not to bog the old machine time hopelessly. I've tried Ubuntu and where it works, it works very, very well. When I want to change something where it doesn't work quite right, I find it does a marvelous job of getting in my way and preventing me from making a fix. Maybe I'm just not psyched into the Debian/Ubuntu way of doing things.

No, it didn't. All that's there is the two effectively useless settings I mentioned. "Appearance" changes slider colors and that was about it. If that can do more, the means of making it do remain well hidden. It's not simply screen brightness. I could wear sunglasses if that's all it was.

Jobs has a history of trying to lock things down, even from the Apple ][ days (when Wozniak thankfully could veto "We only need two slots, nobody will have more than a modem and a printer.") and since I haven't found a/the control(s) to do the UI tweaks that can be done on every other graphic interface I've encountered (CDE, KDE, icewm, fluxbox, XFCE, Windows back to 3.0, and I think even OS/2 3.0) it's easy to assume that there is a Jobsian influence going on. The existence of a tool like ShapeShifter gives me some hope, but here I agree with yakko: Why should I have to pay extra for something that should have been there in the first place?

Some themes for the above mentioned Mac utility

[invader-tak-1.livejournal.com]

http://interfacelift.com/themes-mac/

[yakko.livejournal.com]

I don't use Safari because I've come to like some of the add-ons for Firefox (noscript is the most important of these -- per-site Javascript permissions!)

I believe Opera has a current version which works on MacOS X.

One weird thing you have to do when using a different browser is to open Safari and go into the preferences to change the default browser to your browser. That should be in System Prefs, not in Safari Prefs.

[invader-tak-1.livejournal.com]

that wasn't just for the browser, it was for the os, THats what it appeared to say anyway.


For Browsers Shiira has been promising.

[invader-tak-1.livejournal.com]

http://shiira.jp/en.php


Shirra browser, not my default but very stable. "free"

[vakkotaur.livejournal.com]

There is a Mac version of Opera, which does track with the other versions and, I hope, can simply use the same config files I've been using on Linux. That would eliminate most of the browser issues. I did install Opera on my account on my folks' Mac mini, although I didn't have a chance to try to use my Linux config files on it.

There was one difference I did find jarring. On Linux, if I closed the last open tab, the browser stayed put. On OS X if I closed the last open tab, the browser minimized, which I found annoying. I am assuming that's an OS X thing and that all "ready" or "idle" applications minimize like that. I know I'd be annoyed by that, but I could deal with it. It'd probably be like switching from a manual to automatic transmission vehicle: Hopefully there'd be enough other cues of differences that I could switch from one to the other with too much difficulty. Otherwise it'd be like going for the clutch and hitting a super-wide brake pedal and lurching at every stop.

I do find myself wondering about a tabbed text editor - one that can have sane color settings (preferably black background by default!) that would be a reasonable equivalent to TextPad (one of the few pieces of 'shareware' I considered to be worth the money to register) or NEdit. I expect there is one, but after a few years of Linux where free does tend to be "as in beer" I'm not in the "throw money at the problem" mindset. Nor do I ever intend to be.

[altivo.livejournal.com]

Macintosh has never really been a "have it your way" system. As you point out, their attitude is "Our way is the ONLY way."

[invader-tak-1.livejournal.com]

You should like leopard then I just finished installing it, much easier on the eyes than the super white Aqua of Tiger

[yakko.livejournal.com]

While I haven't installed Leopard yet, I bought it today and played with it in the store. My assertion that there should be settings for some things, like the Dock "Running" indicator, are still more valid than ever, I see.

Dock's "running" indicator for each app that's running has changed from the black arrow to a bluish LED-type indicator. The contrast with the grey backing of the Dock is poor and I wish I could change it. It's a little thing, just like the color scheme (which I still can't change much, just like before).

We'll see what third parties come up with to solve these issues. :o)