This is a very interesting article that was in Macworld - Sept issue.


The Splintering of OS X

Well, that's absolute bunk, starting with the claim that all new features in ML are features of iOS. Gatekeeper is an obvious one. It serves the purpose of what he's talking about (security by restricting or not restricting what can run on a Mac) without bifurcating hardware.

It's just crazy talk.

Replace "all" with "most" and it's basically spot-on in that regard.

My worry is that I'm seeing some features that are helpful in my work being eliminated in favor of appealing to a lowest-common-denominator, and that that trend will continue. Not that that's bad for an OS to do, but it should be an option, not a requirement.

I just don't see the problem. They've changed the name of a few apps, and altered the GUI a tad bit. Notification Center obviously came from iOS, but is that such a bad thing?

What could you do on OS X yesterday that you can't do today? I'm speaking of course of the iOS similarities.

As to the question of Gatekeeper and Sandboxing: those have little to do with iOS, other than the iOS App Store has proven that people prefer simple, secure, and less crash-prone apps to a wide-open app fest we've had in the past. And they aren't even really getting rid of that, just not making it the default - and only applying Sandboxing rules to apps sold on the Mac App Store.

iWork (for me) will only save to iCloud if "Documents & Data" is checked in System Preferences. Then I have to go to ICloud to Download, then move to a preferred folder.
If I uncheck it, the save dialog works as before.
Can't use both/either/or unless I'm missing something…
Dropbox is still so much mo' better.
I don't use iWork often, so it's not a problem.

Just rambling observations…

I quote myself:


Well, I can't Save As as I used to be able to (at least with Apple apps, which usually wouldn't be a problem, except ... Keynote; And at this point only Apple apps, because thankfully everyone else has avoided adopting this convention like the plague). Oddly, I cant switch resolutions from the menu bar like I used to, for instance. I have to actively disable all the social media crap that I don't really need. More stuff to actively turn off when I'm running a show (Notifications; yay!) So, yeah, stuff that's not "better" and is actually a problem in some cases ...

If the point is to evolve the OS into something that hand-holds everyone, that's fine. I would just like there to be an option to "revert" to the functions that were actually useful in previous iterations. I'm not sure I really see the zero-sum attitude of Apple software development right now.

The Save As issue, I'll agree with you, is a steaming pile of sh¡t and should be reverted back to the way it has always been - but that has little to do with iOS.

Resolution switching via the menubar was a nice touch, but for 99.999% of users, they probably never used it. Again, nothing to do with iOS.

I don't disagree with you that many of the new features in OS X are meant for amateurs or consumers less tech savvy. But that's the market Apple is in, and has been since the release of the original iMac. I don't see it as a merging of iOS into OS X, just an evolution of the existing Mac OS to be more consumer-friendly.

For those of us who do like more control, we know how to find hacks and add-on apps that will do what we want. I know it's an extra step for us, but we have the knowledge to take that step.

Yes it is or should I now say was? Until I discovered Cubby.