Re: I want to be convinced; convince me.

brian wrote:
"TheLetterK" <theletterk@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message news:d6UHe.7161$pp.5391@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

brian wrote:

"TheLetterK" <theletterk@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message news:mzTHe.7147$pp.5598@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx


brian wrote:


"Scott Meyers" <Usenet@xxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message news:MPG.1d599d32b43009789897e8@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx



Several people I know like Macs. A lot. I use Windows. I don't like it a
lot. (Parse that either way -- both work.) I want to want to move to a
Mac, but I'm having trouble convincing myself to do it. Today I visited an
Apple store for the 2nd or 3rd time to talk about getting a mini to add to
my Windows network, and for the 2nd or 3rd time I came away with less
enthusiasm for the Mac than before I went there. However, I worry that the
people who work there aren't terribly well versed in the products they
sell, because they often can't answer my questions. I'm hoping that
perhaps people in this newsgroup can help me out.

I need a reason to move to a Mac. The reasons I hear most frequently have
to do with the stability of the Mac OS and how it's generally not a target
of viruses and other malware. I don't find these convincing, because
Windows 2000 has been very stable for me for many years, and between virus
and spam filtering by my ISP and me, I have had no problems with viruses
and malware for the same period of time. (One might argue that with a Mac
I wouldn't have had to set up virus and spam filtering, but I've already
set it up and it works well, so not having to set it up on the Mac is not a
persuasive argument.) Also, I find it hard to view the lack of negatives
as a positive. That is, telling me that the Mac doesn't have the problems
of Windows strikes me as a hollow argument. I need something more
compelling than "the Mac sucks less." Can somebody please offer something?
Like Mulder, I want to believe.

For as long as I can remember -- at least 20 years -- I've been using an OS
where, when the mouse moves to a new window, that window gets the focus.
Getting out of that habit would be very hard and very unpleasant. The Mac
"genius"


Your expectations were out of wack, not the genius' skills. Usenet is far more capable of answering your question. Google "window focus osx" for a good discussion. The general consensus seems to be "not worth it."

But you could always strip off OSX and run X windows... ah, you mention that below.




I talked to today at the Apple store did not know how to implement
this behavior under Tiger, though he did try mightily. I would appreciate
it if somebody would assure me that there is some simple way to have the
focus follow the mouse, so that when I move the mouse into a new window and
start typing, the text will go into the window where the mouse is instead
of into some other window. Eschewing the normal UI and running an X window
manager that behaves the way I want it to doesn't sound like it qualifies
as "easy," but I'm willing to listen.


Well, again, I think your expectations are a bit skewed. If you want an SUV you should buy an SUV rather than trying to jack up a Honda Civic. Sorry for the dreaded car analogy.

So anyway, you should expect changes. If you go into it saying, "I can't drop 20 year old habits" then the answer is pretty clear. The Apple interface has always seemed clumsier than Windows to me. About the only place Windows annoys me in zooming around is the alt-tab shortcut with many windows.

I dunno. Maybe I'm not experienced enough with the mac, but using every shortcut key possible, the UI still feels clumsy. There's some redundancy that could be eliminated (at the cost of having to remember meta keys or ... ADDING A SECOND MOUSE BUTTON!)




If I were to get a mini, it would be part of a network with an XP Pro SP2
machine and a Win2K machine, and I'd want it to be able to see the files on
the Windows disks (some are NTFS, some are FAT32) and the Windows disks to
be able to see its files. I got ambiguous information from the Apple
genius, whereby he assured me that this was doable, then launched into a
description of how I'd have to run special software on the Windows boxes to
make it happen. (I don't remember the name of the software -- some free
download with a french name.) Can somebody please assure me that a mixed
Windows-Mac network will work seamlessly and that giving everybody in the
network access to everything will be easy, automatic, and straightforward?


OSX 10.3 + Samba was an awful time sink. It took more trying to get it to work properly than getting usable functionality out of it. Compare it to, say, WINE for Linux as far as productivity goes.

I'd say you've got a network problem. Works fine here.


Works fine with Solaris, Linux and BSD. OSX has been a good network citizen since 10.0. And I have a bridge in Brooklyn to sell you. :)

But, like I said, I haven't used 10.4 with Samba yet. It's a "fool me once" kind of lesson. I bought 10.0 specifically for the hopes of seemless integration. I bought 10.1 hoping they fixed it. They didn't. I skipped 10.3.

Samba support in OS 10.1 was exactly like it was in every other *nix--manual installation. If you were having problems with Samba in OS 10.1, it's your own fault.



First, you're not acknowldging the difference between a Samba server deamon and a Samba client. OSX only requires the client for successful bi-directional file sharing.

Second, common distributions of UNIX ship with samba. I don't know what led you to say they don't.
I don't know of many that force you to install Samba (client *or* server). Usually it's an option. I can't think of a Linux distro that does, FreeBSD sure as hell doesn't, Solaris doesn't, and I can't speak for any others.

You probably meant to say most distributions aren't installed with Samba in rc.local (or equiv) or the Samba deamon isn't configured for file sharing. That's pretty much common sense.
I've always found myself installing Samba packages on GNU/Linux and FreeBSD--mostly because distros typically don't include Samba as anything but an *option*.


Third, OSX 10.1 comes with the Samba client already installed AND configured (hint: there is no configuration required).
Does it? I seem to recall installing Samba on 10.1. But that was a long time ago, and I might be thinking of a different system.

In addition, I'm pretty sure OSX 10.1 comes with the daemon installed too. Go look at the "Welcome to OSX 10.1" guide on apple.com if you need further help. It shows in plain simple words that you can connect to Windows systems. That's SAMBA! Welcome to OSX, there's what you missed.
10.1 had very limited SMB support. I assumed you meant "actually transferring files".


FINALLY, the Samba client doesn't work on OSX 10.1. (This is my original point, by the way. But you're burying it in misinformation.) 
The hell it doesn't.

http://xamba.sourceforge.net/sambax/index.shtml


Granted, it probably works in simplistic cases, like peer sharing to a workgroup stand alone system running say Windows XP.

It didn't work for a host of other cases. 20% functionality isn't good enough. Don't become a developer if you don't see the point. 
It's as compatible as any other box using Samba.



It's a lesson in customizing too. I know that people have pinned down better Samba builds and gotten them to work on early versions. I'd hate to think what happened once Apple got its act together and proved the marketing people correct.

So far they-ve been spot-on for me. My iBook and iMac both (running OS 10.3 still) network seamlessly, and have done so OOTB.



I haven't tried with 10.4 yet.  I'm kind of sick of it to be honest.

But there are plenty of proven file transfer techniques besides Samba that should work fine. SFTP, FTP, and NFS should work no problem.

So should SMB, via Samba. Works fine for most people.


macosxhints has plenty of Samba related articles, for those few ghost people who aren't really experiencing any issues with it of course.

Most of those seem to be people looking to do some pretty bizarre things. Certainly not the "I'd like to transfer files on my home network" crowd.


You're saying people should be restricted to plain jane functionality.
Where did I say this? The OP did state that this was what he wanted, however.


Windows 95, 98, XP, 2000, and 2003 all have their different takes on what a workgroup is, what a domain is, how to connect using net use, etc. You're saying for all users who use blah with domains blah, Samba works fine. For all others, it's their own fault.
Nice way to put words in otehr people's mouth. I don't recall ever saying anything of the such--please quote it.


Do you work in marketing? ;-) 


.

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