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OS X Operating Systems Businesses Upgrades Apple

Mac OS X 10.5.2 Update Brings Welcome Fixes 433

jetpack writes to make sure we're aware that Apple's OS X 10.5.2 update is available and that it contains plenty of improvements and fixes that users have been asking for. Macworld enumerates some of the big ones, saying that the update "shows Apple listens to users" (sometimes). A couple of the new features simply restore Tiger (10.4) capabilities that Leopard (10.5) had inexplicably withdrawn. You can now shut off the much-maligned transparency of the menu bar, and organize your Dock stacks hierarchically and display them as folders. And Apple has provided welcome access to common Time Machine functions in the menu bar.
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Mac OS X 10.5.2 Update Brings Welcome Fixes

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  • AEBS backups (Score:5, Interesting)

    by sam.thorogood ( 979334 ) on Monday February 11, 2008 @09:50PM (#22387378)
    You can't back up to drives plugged into an Airport Extreme, though, even though the much-toted Time Capsule [apple.com] will apparently be able to (In their defence, this could come with an update before the Time Capsule actually ships).
    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      by tgd ( 2822 )
      No, but at least AirDisk drives work correctly again, at a usable performance.

      10.5.2 is what 10.5 should've been in Apple didn't rush it at the expense of QA.
      • Re:AEBS backups (Score:5, Interesting)

        by jellomizer ( 103300 ) * on Tuesday February 12, 2008 @07:43AM (#22390662)
        I am not sure if you are either a New Mac User who has gotten your first Mac Within 2 years or you just tend to forget quickly...
        Every New Major version of OS X comes with a bunch glitches which they slowly but shirley fix in time. It happened in 10.1, 10.2, 10.3, 10.4 and 10.5 there are new features that pop in that people don't quite like that get adjusted, there is some odd combination that doesn't seem to work just right. and by 10.x.4 or so. things run so smoothly that you begin to forget the pain you once had, and By the time of the next version you are on 10,.x.10 or so. Where everything is rock solid. Then you get a New version 10.x+1 and it is full of these little glitches again, normally annoying but rarely a huge show stopper.
        You are under the impression that Any Software Company with deep pockets can produce a bug free system, which is wrong. I could write a complex program and debug it and check it for a huge amount of time much longer then miss a simple bug. For example I was making a type ahead dropdown box in HTML/Javascript for an intranet app. I have tested and tested it it was perfect. Then when it went to testing it came right back saying the drop down box disappeared when ever someone scrolled down. What happened when I was testing it I always used the mouse scroll wheel to scroll down the list while other people just clicked the scroll bar to drag it down and caused a lost focus on my control, causing the menu box to go away. The fix was easy but the issue was I never though of testing it that way because I do things a particular way consistently. So does Apple, and the Beta Testers... So they could have worked out all the issues they have found then on Day one of the release someone just did that one thing they never expected.
    • Re: (Score:2, Informative)

      by Muzzarelli ( 102806 )
      Tried doing an initial time machine backup to a directly connected drive, then moving the drive to the AEBS? Works for me.
    • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

      by appleguru ( 1030562 )
      You have two options... (Though only the first will help you with backing up to an airdisk)

      1) defaults write com.apple.systempreferences TMShowUnsupportedNetworkVolumes 1

      2) Buy leopard server ;-)
      • Re:AEBS backups (Score:5, Informative)

        by jchillerup ( 1140775 ) on Tuesday February 12, 2008 @03:36AM (#22389480)
        1a) Wait. 1b) When your drive is full, watch the fireworks. TMShowUnsupportedNetworkVolumes does NOT work correctly and is NOT supported (hence the "Unsupported"...)
        • Re:AEBS backups (Score:4, Informative)

          by wodgy7 ( 850851 ) on Tuesday February 12, 2008 @11:22AM (#22393162)
          You can get around this by periodically running "hdiutil compact" on the backup disk image. This reclaims deleted space properly and allows you to use TMShowUnsupportedNetworkVolumes safely.
    • Re:AEBS backups (Score:4, Informative)

      by 0100010001010011 ( 652467 ) on Monday February 11, 2008 @10:28PM (#22387686)
      I believe the functionality has been there since 10.5.

      I have an external drive hooked up to my debian box (Formatted HFS+, RW). I have it shared via SMB as smb://debian.local/TimeMachine.

      After running the command on my machine to backup to 'unauthorized' shares and enabling time machine on the drive, time machine works great.

      I hadn't planned on this when I started, but time machine knows that it's a network drive and will mount it in the background to do the backup. Even if I've rebooted, taken my computer out for a while, etc. As soon as I come back the Time Machine drive will mount and start the backup.

      The only thing 10.5.2 added was a fancy new icon for it.
  • by Anonymous Coward on Monday February 11, 2008 @09:50PM (#22387382)
    All trolls please post here please so its easier to mod us all down.
  • by Anonymous Coward
    ...the fact that it's still the evil seed of Satan Jobs?
    • Re: (Score:2, Funny)

      by MacColossus ( 932054 )
      Unfortunately no. It doesn't fix the fact the Linux kernel is the evil seed of Linus Torvalds or that Windows is the evil seed of Gates and Monkey boy Ballmer either. I guess Apple can't fix anything.
  • Sweet, no more need for a hack to stop the menubar from being transparent. Now if only they'd make the dock look like it did in 10.4...
    • granted I'd like the dock to look like it did in 10.4, but turning the glass effect off with the following 2 script lines: defaults write com.apple.dock no-glass -boolean YES killall Dock (to turn back on change YES to NO). It makes the dock be side-style while still on he bottom. If your'e lazy and have eitehr cocktail or onyx, you can do it in there with the force to side-style mode option.
    • I would just like to take this time to rub in the fact I never once had to see that transparent menu. At first I just thought that it might only be slightly transparent, and that the beta users were just exaggerating the problem, so I tried it with a checked background, and sure enough it was completely solid. The reflective doc was there in all it's shinyness, but no pixel were leaking through my menu bar. I don't if it was a PPC/Intel thing or if Apple just deemed my video card too pathetic to get the see
      • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

        by Ilgaz ( 86384 ) *

        I would just like to take this time to rub in the fact I never once had to see that transparent menu. At first I just thought that it might only be slightly transparent, and that the beta users were just exaggerating the problem, so I tried it with a checked background, and sure enough it was completely solid. The reflective doc was there in all it's shinyness, but no pixel were leaking through my menu bar. I don't if it was a PPC/Intel thing or if Apple just deemed my video card too pathetic to get the see-through goodness, by my Leopard install has had an opaque menu since the day I installed it.

        So, neener-neener :P

        It is not a thing to be happy about :) It means Leopard decided your graphics card is weak to do transparent menu opengl thing. It is same deal on my Mac Mini G4 too and guess what G4 is connected to? A Plasma HDTV.

        A logical explanation to transparent menu bar: Apple had reports of "screen burn" because of a white menu on top of the screen 24/7, decided to do it so as wallpaper changes hourly (generally on plasmas, good trick), the menu bar will change too.

        You also notice the top menu bar is dark grey, it

  • ... would it be possible for Apple to realize who their customers are and restore the ability to do two-way copying of MP3 (non-AAC, really) songs in iTunes? That got yanked a while ago, and it's an irritating functionality loss. There [macworld.com] are [scifihifi.com] alternatives [crispsofties.com] (hat tip: MacWorld [macworld.com]), but Apple's customer control tactics are almost as bad as the record companies'.
    • they have time machine to backup your whole drive now! The only supported way to put music on your iPod is thru the iTunes.. which is backed up. I agree that they could make iPods more "hacker" friendly, but it simply won't happen.
    • Wow, that took some research to figure out what in the world you were talking about.

      You do not want "two-way copying of MP3 (non-AAC, really) songs in iTunes", you are talking about bidirectional iPod syncing in iTunes. That is to say if there is a song on an iPod that is not in the iTunes Library, iTunes would copy the song from the iPod onto the computer.

      That got yanked a while ago, and it's an irritating functionality loss.

      Huh? I still have my (still functional) 2nd. Generation iPod. I have been syncing iPods with iTunes for a long time and I can assure you that "feature" was never in iTunes.

      Apple has to walk a fine line with the recording industry, and cannot do anything too blatant to piss off the record labels.

      Having my friend walk over with his 160GB iPod and give me his entire music collection, facilitated by Apple themselves? Yeah, I can see some issues with that.

      There are plenty of very capable third-party programs out there that do exactly what you are talking about (Senuti being the big one on the Mac right now). They do what you are talking about, and Apple does not get into trouble for it. I do not see the issue here.

      And please stop saying it was functionality that was dropped from iTunes. It was never there.

      • by shawnce ( 146129 ) on Monday February 11, 2008 @10:49PM (#22387854) Homepage
        You can however sync purchased songs in both directions since if music is purchased Apple knows what account it is associated with and will let you sync in both directions with authorized iTunes libraries (under the same account).

        http://www.apple.com/support/ipod/tutorials/beyondthebasics.html [apple.com]

        Copy your purchases to another computer
        1. Connect your iPod to your computer and open iTunes.
        2. Choose File > "Transfer Purchases from iPod".
        3. If you need to authorize your computer to play these purchases, select Store > "Authorize Computer".


        http://www.apple.com/itunes/sync/ipod.html [apple.com]

        Sync both ways.
        When you sync your iPod with iTunes, you do exactly that: Keep your iPod and your computer synchronized. That means anything you've purchased from the iTunes Store (even on the go from your iPod touch), your ratings, on-the-go playlists, and even bookmarks from podcasts and audiobooks all sync back to your Mac or PC.[1]

        1. Music and media not purchased from the iTunes Store sync only one way, from your computer to your iPod. To transfer non-purchased music from computer to computer, read this tutorial.

        • You can however sync purchased songs in both directions since if music is purchased

          Great - so I can sync music if I buy it from Apple* but I can't sync music I've recorded myself. Thanks Apple - that's intuitive!

          * but not play it on a generic mp3 player
          • by tlhIngan ( 30335 )

            Great - so I can sync music if I buy it from Apple* but I can't sync music I've recorded myself. Thanks Apple - that's intuitive!

            * but not play it on a generic mp3 player

            If you have a regular iPod... you go into that nice directory marked "iPod Control" then look for a folder marked "Music". Sure the filenames are messed up, but nothing a competent ID3 tag editor can't fix.

            Geez, Apple makes it "non-trivial" to copy your music back and people complain. This trick has worked since first-gen iPods! Apple doesn

      • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

        Having my friend walk over with his 160GB iPod and give me his entire music collection, facilitated by Apple themselves? Yeah, I can see some issues with that.

        As Apple have no idea whether the songs are still under copyright & what license they're under, I don't see what business Apple have in preventing you copying your data around.

        The only reason Apple impose this artificial limitation on customers is at the behest of their real customers - the RIAA, et al.
        • How to use your iPod to move your music to a new computer [apple.com]. Instructions for moving music from computer to computer. Using an iPod.

          Directions from Apple. With screenshots.

          The iPod is designed to be synced with just one computer. That is the nature of the iTunes sync component and the iPod itself. I have never heard of this bidirectional sync "optional plug-in" the original poster was referring to. Also - I have been bidirectionally syncing devices (Palm, PDAs, phones, etc.) for years now, and have supported people who have done the same. One thing I have learned? Bidirectional syncing will delete information given enough information and enough time. It will break eventually. Restore from backups, erase a device, and resync. Annoying, but it is a fact of life when doing syncing. On the other hand I have never had issues with one-way syncing. So maybe Apple just made that decision to make things easier with less support needs.

          So Apple gives clear directions for moving your music library from computer to computer, even using your iPod.

          The only reason Apple impose this artificial limitation on customers is at the behest of their real customers - the RIAA, et al.

          Yes, it is simply that black and white. A company either screws their customers or does everything for them.

          Have you no idea of balance? A company says "Hey, we can do more for our customers (and therefore sell more product) if we make these small concessions to other big companies?"

          For example - "Hey, if we include DRM on our music store, then get so big that we have enough power to push the distribution companies into allowing us to sell non-DRM music, that will be to the long-term benefit of our customer (with the benefit being that we will sell even MORE music."

          No, according to you the company should never bend slightly, and instead should never give in, even if it is to the detriment of both the company and its customers.
           
    • by goombah99 ( 560566 ) on Monday February 11, 2008 @11:04PM (#22387952)
      IN general apple tends to remove old features/ ports/ connectors when it adds replacements or equalivalents. Apple is a first mover in many areas: parallel ports? ADB, Floppy disks, ....
      Then it adds them back if there are howls.

      It's a good strategy in many ways. First, it allows one to keep the idea that there is one-primary-way-for-novices-to-do-something on most mac. When you go to another mac, it behaves the same. (e.g. Life is a box of chocolates with linux. when you sit down at someone elses terminal, focus might follow the mouse, it might auto-raise, god knows what happens when you launch emacs (xterm or text, context colored or not, etc...) Uniformity is viewed as good mac land because ultimately by not having to think too much or memorize short cuts you can just focus on getting the job done and the computer is more appliance like than tweaker box like. It's not that you can't customize a mac, it's just stupid to try in general.

      It also allows them to introduce new lower level mechanism that break old higher level mechanisms. Such as the clean/dirty file tracking used for Time Machine.

      I don't know why they deprecated your MP3 file moving. My guess however it was the opposite intent. they were trying to put in speed bumps--apples view of the best DRM seems to be to simply use invoconvience rather than prohibition when they can. I rather like that approach philosophically.

    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      by fingers1122 ( 636011 )

      There are alternatives (hat tip: MacWorld), but Apple's customer control tactics are almost as bad as the record companies'.

      I don't think that's entirely true. Apple in my view has done a fairly good job of satisfying the demands of the record companies with regard to content control while still allowing fairly simple exploits to its own content protection. Bottom line is Apple could not have struck the kind of deals they did without assuring the film/record companies that their content would be completely protected--an impossible guarantee, as Apple surely knows. But Apple has struck a good balance in keeping the big companie

  • by starglider29a ( 719559 ) on Monday February 11, 2008 @10:03PM (#22387476)
    I still double click my title bar expecting the window to vanish, leaving the title bar there, beneath my mouse, so I can say 'thanks' click click. And be back to where I was.

    We were so amazed when Windows 3.0 taught us to "minimize" and still have ***another application running*** (back when DOS was neato) that we didn't ask "ok, so, why do I have to reach to the very farthest point on the screen to get my window back?"

    Yes, Exposé might be a cool way around that, and some Vista maven may say 'aeroglass', but click-click... click-click is about as simple as it can possibly get. And no motion sickness!
    • but click-click... click-click is about as simple as it can possibly get. And no motion sickness!
      I beg to differ. Some of the window managers in Linux allow you to just roll the middle mouse when your mouse is over the title bar.
    • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

      by maczealot ( 864883 )
      Absolutely agreed. I am a huge fanboy, and even I don't give a new update this much positive spin when it has just come out.

      The third-party window shade is from Unsanity [unsanity.com] but alas does not work in 10.5

      This is one of those legacy features that you'll just have to learn to live without (i.e. use Expose) similar to having to constantly turn on "Windows classic folders" and is nothing compared to some of the BASIC OS functions that need addressing:

      - Open a folder in a listview should be one button (i.e
      • You realize that you can remap both of those shortcuts in System Preferences, right?

        I'll grant that the default screenshot shortcut seems more than a bit arbitrary, but seriously: the vast majority of users don't take screenshots so often that it should have a dedicated F key out-of-the-box.

        And with your Finder issue, you can also open a folder in list view by hitting Cmd-Down, which is (on most Mac keyboards) a whole lot easier to hit than most other individual keys on the keyboard.
      • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

        by Phroggy ( 441 )

        - Open a folder in a listview should be one button (i.e. enter, which currenty goes to rename, really??) not Command-O
        - Screenshotting needs to be waaaay easier (i.e. single key rather than shift-command-3 or whatever)

        Both of these go back DECADES.

        Do not take away my quick renaming keystroke.

        I agree that Command-O is cumbersome, but were you aware that Command-Down arrow works too? I find this easier, and it's perfectly logical if you also use Command-Up arrow frequently.

        Screenshotting isn't a single button, because there are several ways to do it. They are:

        • Cmd-Shift-3: take a snapshot of the entire screen and save it to a PNG file on the desktop
        • Cmd-Shift-Ctrl-3: take a snapshot of the entire screen and copy it to th
    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      by pizzach ( 1011925 )
      I just don't see it happening any time soon. The problem is, with Mac OS X in this state is a boon for switchers. Things are just familiar enough to get people to switch to Mac OS X without them having to grate their brains too much. During windowshade's absence, Expose has done a fairly good job filling that space in many Mac users' hearts.
    • by mccabem ( 44513 )
      Sorry, but I must take exception. DOS was never neato. Ever.


  • They didn't fix Racoon (IPsec IKE key manager). It's still busted. Worked fine in Tiger...

    • by CatOne ( 655161 )
      Busted how? I've been using racoon for VPN purposes for 4 months, and it's worked fine. So some specifics could be welcome, as it's not 100% "busted."
  • right direction (Score:3, Interesting)

    by je ne sais quoi ( 987177 ) on Monday February 11, 2008 @10:22PM (#22387634)
    Sounds like this is a step in the right direction. As soon as they remove the silly rooting behavior in column view in the finder, I'll buy leopard. Funny how one of these "features" they decided to include is keeping me from buying the OS. I run a mac shop, but I just bought an additional license for 10.4 instead of 10.5 because frankly, I don't see much worth shelling out the extra dough for in leopard. (In 10.4 you can bypass the rooting behavior by making an alias for the folder.) I know how to use rsync and cron, so I don't really need time machine.... and I'm not all that interested in the new preview view for the files. It's not like I'd delete it off a computer that I just bought, but I don't see much reason to upgrade since some of the things they did are not the behavior I want.
    • What does "rooting behavior" mean in this context? (We have a donated machine with 10.3.9 but I only do a small handful of things with it.)
      • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

        by ToastyKen ( 10169 )
        I'm assuming he means that if you put, say, your Documents folders in the Dock, and you open it in column view, you can't scroll left to its parent. The Documents folder becomes the "root" of the column view, forcing you to find your home directory somewhere else if you want to get to something else in your home directory.
      • What I mean is that when you click on a special folder (e.g., home, applications, documents, etc.) in the Finder in column view, it "roots" you to that spot and removes the horizontal scroll bar. In reality, it's just a silly thing that would require some retraining on my part (more likely, stop using column view) but I really dislike it. The reason for that because I feel like the Finder is trying to hide the upper level directories from me. I know perfectly damn well I'm at /Users/username rather than
        • Re:right direction (Score:4, Informative)

          by Spheniscus ( 25749 ) on Monday February 11, 2008 @11:22PM (#22388066)
          You can navigate to the parent folder at lest four different ways:

          1. Command-click (or right click) on the folder name in the title of the window.
          2. Press command-up (or select Go/Enclosing Folder from the menu)
          3. Turn on the Path Bar (view / show path bar)
          4. Customize the toolbar and add the path button to the toolbar

        • Add the "parent folders" button to your Finder's button bar. It's the one that looks like a down arrow with three horizontal offset lines to the left of it.

          If you end up in a rooted folder, just click it and navigate to the parent. *wham*, you get the whole path.

          A minor annoyance, and definitely not a reason to not upgrade. o.O
    • by kwerle ( 39371 )
      It is a lame workaround, but you can ctrl-click (right mouse, I guess) on the name of the folder at the top of the finder window to see all it's ancestor directories.
  • Although 10.5.2 introduced support for additional dSLRs, such as the Nikon D3 and D300, apparently there's still an issue preventing (at least some) Aperture users from viewing these cameras' RAW files. Really odd since iPhoto and Preview display them just fine now - but not Apple's "pro" app.
  • by tomRakewell ( 412572 ) on Monday February 11, 2008 @10:25PM (#22387672)
    I had just discovered the awesome 'split' feature in Tiger's Terminal about two months ago. Click on the icon in the upper right portion of the terminal window, and a bar appears. You can drag the bar to split your terminal in two. The upper portion is the scrollback, and shows your terminal history. The bottom portion is your 'live' terminal. It's awesome, and it saves me from having to open two different terminals in many cases!

    Of course, after upgrading to Leopard, this innovative feature has been removed! I couldn't believe it!

    Now I'm back to opening up two Terminal windows... :(

    • by BlacKat ( 114545 ) on Monday February 11, 2008 @10:32PM (#22387718)
      Just copy Terminal.app from Tiger and run it on Leopard.

      Trust me, it works great, especially in conjunction with Visor, which provides a "Quake like" terminal window that pops down from the top of the screen.

      • Great tip, but make sure that you don't overwrite your Leopard copy of Terminal. When you copy the Tiger version, be sure to rename it from "Terminal.app" to something else like "Terminal (Tiger).app". If you don't do this, you could potentially have issues with future patches that are released for Terminal (bug fixes, security updates, etc.) and the installer will naturally look for the Leopard version and might cause problems if the Tiger version was there instead.
    • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

      by AntEater ( 16627 )
      "Now I'm back to opening up two Terminal windows..."

      You have a couple of other options. Leopard's Terminal lets you use tabs. That's not quite as nice but it saves you some screen real estate. Another option (my favourite) is to use GNU Screen in a single terminal. This gives you multiple tabs and the ability to split the screen in two (or more) windows within the terminal and use those windows for any combination of terminal sessions you want. Ten or fifteen minutes of learning gives you an incredibly
      • by rbanffy ( 584143 )
        What I like most about screen is the ability to detach from the screen session, log on from another location and summon back whatever I was doing in the terminal before.

        Just do a screen -x and get back right where you were.
    • well, at least it does tabs. and you could use "screen" to split the terminal window if you really need to, but it won't replicate Tiger's split-window feature exactly.
    • I had just discovered the awesome 'split' feature in Tiger's Terminal about two months ago.

      Yeah, I discovered that the day that I installed leopard. The funny thing is that I almost never use that feature, and now that it's gone, I find that I need it quite frequently. There's another feature that the terminal is missing that I can't remember at this second; not a necessity, but an annoyance to not have it.

      I have a list somewhere of stuff that apple dropped the ball on that I typed up after a couple days wi
  • by jht ( 5006 ) on Monday February 11, 2008 @10:52PM (#22387870) Homepage Journal
    This is like SP1 in Windows land. Basically, 10.5 is the GM, 10.5.1 is where they fix other things that emerged in the several weeks between GM and public availability (along with a couple of critical bugs that turn up in the first few days of wider public release), and then 10.5.2 is the first release based on public feedback and issues. That's also part of why this version enables you to turn off the menubar translucency (and makes the menus themselves more opaque) - users hated it so Apple tweaked things for them.

    Windows is freakin' huge - hence the year to Vista SP1 - but Microsoft's releases also go much wider, have more hardware to test with, and have more public pre-release cycles as well. So it takes them a year to do a service pack, where Apple only takes about 3-4 months.
    • by guruevi ( 827432 )
      Well, if you have a Windows license/cd and an Intel Mac, it takes about 3 screens (5 clicks) to start your Windows install. Of course, then you're busy installing Windows for the rest of the afternoon, you'll wonder why you even started. I do not kid, I do not kid.

      I manage Mac in a professional environment. Some new dimwit hated Mac (Microsoft fanboi) and required Windows so he could play with Visual Studio. I got the box in the late morning, by noon the Mac side was totally set up for all our NFS shares an
      • by syousef ( 465911 )
        This is going to sound harsh but there's no better way to put it.

        I manage Mac in a professional environment. Some new dimwit hated Mac (Microsoft fanboi) and required Windows so he could play with Visual Studio.

        I'd re-check the definition of professional, if you're publicly calling your users dimwits. Are you sure he's just playing and that it's not just part of his job?

        Before lunch started the install of Windows XP, after lunch the Windows side was in an endless reboot loop. Apparently Windows XP doesn't l
  • by argent ( 18001 ) <(peter) (at) (slashdot.2006.taronga.com)> on Monday February 11, 2008 @11:30PM (#22388122) Homepage Journal
    * Restore the ability to have folders remember their views.
    * Run each Finder window in a separate process, so it doesn't lock everything up when one window gets busy. Particularly when hitting network shares.
    * Restore the pre OSX "staggered" icon layout option.
    * Give us an option to completely eliminate the sidebar without having to go back to "spacial" windows.
    * Move the "FTP" support from Finder to Safari, so we don't have the overhead and security issues of file-system-like operations when accessing remote high-latency servers.
    * Bring back the Shelf from NeXTSTeP.
    * Add "Cut" as well as "Copy". There's a "Cut" option in the edit menu but it's always greyed out. If there's some obscure option key that will enable this, well...
    * Make it OBVIOUS when there's an option/command click 'advanced' operation, instead of making us guess. And that goes for the rest of the software on the Mac.
    • Are there any Shelf features that are still missing from the Dock?
      • Are there any Shelf features that are still missing from the Dock?
        You mean the feature that doesn't render all of the screen real estate to the left and right of the Dock useless?
        Nor is it useful for file transfer operations.

        The dock was pretty much Windows taskbar with a trash icon and no tray.
        The shelf was useful for manipulating files.
    • by amake ( 673443 ) on Tuesday February 12, 2008 @12:16AM (#22388462) Homepage

      * Restore the ability to have folders remember their views.
      You can still make them remember views by clicking the checkbox in the View Options (Command-J) window. I agree that this is annoying.

      * Run each Finder window in a separate process, so it doesn't lock everything up when one window gets busy. Particularly when hitting network shares.
      You mean break the entire application model that Mac OS has used since forever, which is that each window is not its own process? How about just making the Finder more multithreaded, which they've been doing fairly well. I haven't had the Finder in Leopard hang on me relating to network shares.

      * Move the "FTP" support from Finder to Safari, so we don't have the overhead and security issues of file-system-like operations when accessing remote high-latency servers.
      You could just not use FTP in the Finder. There are plenty of good, free FTP clients out there, like Cyberduck. [cyberduck.ch]

      * Bring back the Shelf from NeXTSTeP.
      What? Have you ever actually used the Shelf from NeXTSTEP? I haven't, but I've never heard anyone who had anything good to say about it. I think we've moved well beyond the need for such a feature, what with Expose and all. What specific problem would you like the Shelf to solve?

      * Add "Cut" as well as "Copy". There's a "Cut" option in the edit menu but it's always greyed out. If there's some obscure option key that will enable this, well...
      You can't Cut files or folders because what you're expecting to happen (based probably on similar functionality in Windows or other systems) is fundamentally different from what Cut actually is. Cut (for text, the original and default context for this feature) erases the selection entirely and puts a copy in the pasteboard. The copy in the pasteboard is lost as soon as you copy or cut something else. "Cut for text" is also undoable. "Cut for files," on the other hand, does not erase the selection until you paste. It does not delete the selection in the pasteboard if you copy something else. It is sometimes undoable, but is rarely guaranteed to be so. It's also not obvious what happens if you Cut, then modify the selection, and then paste (which version is pasted, the old or the new?)In other words, you don't want Cut; you want a copy of the Windows feature that is inappropriately named Cut. Well, it's not there, and probably shouldn't be (since it hasn't been implemented "correctly" in any system I've seen). I know, I know, who cares about nit-picky crap like this? Well, Steve cares.
    • * Restore the ability to have folders remember their views.

      Hasn't this always been possible in Mac OS X?

      * Run each Finder window in a separate process, so it doesn't lock everything up when one window gets busy. Particularly when hitting network shares.

      100% agree. I have hated this in Puma, then hated it some more in Jaguar, continued to hate it in Panther, and now I'm still hating it in Tiger. I had read that Finder was much improved in this regard in Leopard. Is this not the case!? (I haven't been able to really try it out yet.) If not, I really think Finder should be Apple's #1 priority, and hopefully it happens before the next major release. Finder only seems to improve in very small increments, and

    • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

      by edbulldog ( 851508 )
      And while they're at it, they can return Preview the abillity to run animated gifs.
    • Bring back the Shelf from NeXTSTeP.

      The shelf was there in previous versions of Mac OS X, but turned into the sidebar.

      * Make it OBVIOUS when there's an option/command click 'advanced' operation, instead of making us guess. And that goes for the rest of the software on the Mac.

      How, exactly, do you propose doing this? Incidentally, most places where a right-click makes sense have a gearbox menu that allow you to select something and choose the option from the gearbox menu, so the presence of a gearbox menu already functions as making it obvious.

      • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

        * Make it OBVIOUS when there's an option/command click 'advanced' operation, instead of making us guess. And that goes for the rest of the software on the Mac.

        How, exactly, do you propose doing this?

        Some small visual clue - eg. a small triangle pointing down and right, which is what was used on KDE (may still be -- I haven't used KDE for a while).

        Rich.

  • Bah (Score:5, Insightful)

    by adamruck ( 638131 ) on Tuesday February 12, 2008 @12:02AM (#22388382)
    I administer an apple x server at work, and I haven't been impressed.

    I'm running ubuntu on a PC, so I can't use the server admin, or workgroup manager tools. Also, apple doesn't come with a standard VNC server, instead it uses VNC with some proprietary shit built in, so I had to install vine server to get a remote desktop. Of course, vine server sucks as well, because I can't get it to start on boot, without logging into the server with either the native server admin tools, or locally with a KVM. Oh wait, the X Serve doesn't play nice with a standard KVM. I have an extra mouse and keyboard setting in my rack just for the X Serve.

    Once you manage to get in the damn thing, if you have any sort of complicated setup at all, you simply CAN'T DO it using the server admin tool. I've usually had to bust into the config files just like any other Unix system. Take a look at the SQL section of the Server Admin tool, its a fucking joke. Also, even if you do start to do some things by hand, shit still doesn't work right.

    See one of my bug reports here.

    http://macosx.com/forums/mac-os-x-server/298314-samba-shares-hfs-extended-attributes.html [macosx.com]

    The mailing list / blog / colander stuff is also less than impressive. Why the FUCK should I have to wait 15 minutes for my changes to take affect. It this 1982 or some shit? Some changes seem to take much longer than that as well. I waited a whole day for one of my groups to show up. Why is it that the "recent changes" section of each group shows group emails, even if I turn the mailing list feature off?

    Oh yeah, last but not least, the server crashes. It responds to pings, still responds to local terminal input, but anything that requires authentication is dead in the water. So that leaves mail, netbios, ssh, server admin, work group manager, etc etc all dead. I think the LDAP server is crapping out, but I haven't been able to prove it yet. I've had to hard boot the server half a dozen times in the last two weeks.

    My last rant. WHAT THE FUCK IS WITH THE QUICK TIME UPDATES, AND THE REQUIRED RESTARTS. Jesus christ, it's like I'm working with windows NT.
    • Re: (Score:3, Interesting)

      by metallic ( 469828 )
      Also, apple doesn't come with a standard VNC server, instead it uses VNC with some proprietary shit built in, so I had to install vine server to get a remote desktop. Of course, vine server sucks as well, because I can't get it to start on boot, without logging into the server with either the native server admin tools, or locally with a KVM.

      You can get a standard VNC client to connect to the built-in VNC server that ships with OSX. It takes some very specific settings, but it can be done. I've done it us
    • Re:Bah (Score:5, Funny)

      by chrome ( 3506 ) <chrome&stupendous,net> on Tuesday February 12, 2008 @04:37AM (#22389790) Homepage Journal
      *pat* *pat*

      If its any consolation there are probably at least another 5 or 6 people who run OS X Server. And I'm sure they hate it just as much ...
  • Where's the Sarbox excuse? Apple adds new features and doesn't charge for the update? It sucks that my girlfriend has to pay 20 bucks to unlock those new features on the iPod touch she got for Christmas.
    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      by p0tat03 ( 985078 )

      It's all about revenue claim. After Apple got bit by the whole 802.11n driver thing, they've started claiming revenue for their laptops and iPhones in a staggered way - instead of all at once. This allows them to justify releasing significant new features on those platforms (as opposed to merely bug fixes).

      My guess is that Apple never intended to release those new apps for the iTouch, and was caught off guard by all of the backlash and bad press... Unfortunately for them iPod revenue is probably claimed i

  • As someone pointed somewhere else (sorry, I have several Mac things, since I'm a new Mac user), there is an Graphics Update update after you upgrade the system. Just in case, open the software update again and check if there is something new.

  • leopard broke SMB server mounts (when tiger worked fine).

    sure hope this is fixed - its a deal breaker for adopting leopard.

    2cents
    j

  • What's included? (Score:4, Informative)

    by djupedal ( 584558 ) on Tuesday February 12, 2008 @01:33AM (#22388892)
    What's included?

    This update delivers several improvements for both PowerPC- and Intel-based Macs (as well as improvements provided in the Mac OS X 10.5.1 update.)

    Active Directory

    * Addresses issues which could hinder or prevent binding Mac OS X 10.5.x clients to Active Directory domains.

    AirPort

    * Improves connection reliability and stability
    * Includes 802.1X improvements.
    * Resolves certain kernel panics.

    Back to my Mac

    * Adds support for more third-party routers, as detailed in this article.

    Dashboard

    * Improves performance of certain Apple Dashboard widgets (such as Dictionary).
    * Addresses an issue in which Dashboard widgets may no longer be accessible after switching to or from an account that has Parental Controls enabled.

    Dock

    * Updates Stacks with a List view option, a Folder view option, and an updated background for Grid view.

    Desktop

    * Addresses legibility issues with the menu bar with an option to turn off transparency in Desktop & Screen Saver preferences.
    * Adjusts menus to be slightly-less translucent overall.

    iCal

    * Improves iCal so that it accurately reflects responses to recurring meetings.
    * Addresses an issue in which a meeting may remain on the calendar after being cancelled.
    * Addresses stability issues related to .Mac syncing of iCal calendars.
    * Resolves an intermittent issue in which editing an event with attendees would cause the event to shrink and not register that the event was updated.

    iChat

    * Addresses an issue with simultaneously-logged in accounts in which iChat sounds generated from one account might be heard in another account.
    * Fixes an issue in which iChat idle time is affected by Time Machine backups.
    * Improves connectivity when running iChat behind a router that doesn't preserve ports.
    * Enables logged chats from previous versions of iChat to open faster and more reliably.
    * Addresses an issue with text chats in which users may be unable to receive messages from the sender.
    * Addresses an issue that may prevent rejoining an AIM chat room without reopening iChat.
    * Addresses video chat compatibility issues with AIM 6 and third-party routers.
    * Fixes an issue with case-sensitivity of AIM handles.

    iSync

    * Adds support for Samsung D600E and D900i phones.

    Finder

    * Addresses an issue in which Finder could unexpectedly quit when displaying folder contents in Column view.
    * Addresses an issue in which Finder could unexpectedly quit when accessing Users and Groups in a Get Info pane.
    * Resolves an issue that prevented setting permissions on a folder alias.
    * Resolves an issue in which the Eject command could write to a disc in the optical drive.
    * Fixes an issue in which the scroll bar might disappear when deleting a file within a folder that includes files that are out of view.
    * Fixes an issue in the Sharing & Permissions section of Get Info windows, in which the gear icon appears to be gray/disabled after authentication.
    * Addresses an issue in which the Show Icon Preview preference might not be not sa
  • by nickovs ( 115935 ) on Tuesday February 12, 2008 @05:32AM (#22390010)
    Incidentally, 10.5.2 does contain drivers for both the USB Ethernet dongle available for the MacBook Air and also the USB-connected SuperDrive. The ethernet dongle works just fine (plugging it in prompts you to open the System Preferences to configure the new Ethernet port) but the SuperDrive does not. It seems that the SuperDrive device driver gets loaded but chooses not to fire up the rest of the Mass Storage device stack :-(

Solutions are obvious if one only has the optical power to observe them over the horizon. -- K.A. Arsdall

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