I disagree with your comment that you can't be productive while Dashboard updates its widgets. You can activate DB simply to start the update process, and then deactivate it and continue to be productive. You'll find your widgets ready and waiting soon, having updated in the background. They're just not set to update on their own, unless you hack them individually, as you can do, e.g., with Weather, by commenting out a few lines of its Javascript code.

I agree 100% about Safari. I already noticed each point you've made since it made such a difference in my browsing experience. I used to like Safari, now I love it!

Overall, a good article. I personally agree with many of your thoughts on Tiger. I'm not all that thrilled with Dashboard. It's got a cool 'wizbang' effect when you first use it, but unless there are TRULY useful widgets for you to use, you quickly forget about it. The only widgets I really end up using are the Weather widget and the calculator. Other than that, I haven't seen much to make me use it, especially since all those widgets eat up memory. So the fewer I have displaying the better.

And Spotlight; let's just say I have a love/hate relationship with it. I like how quickly it can find items where I'm unsure of the name, but for pete's sake, finding something when you actually know what it's called is a huge step back to me. Who's idea was it to make it so many steps to do a simple filename search? Totally agree with you on that one.

Thanks for pointing out the new behavior when attempting to shutdown or restart and other users are logged in. That use to drive me batty! Glad to see they corrected it. I mean, honestly, if I'm an admin on the system, I can find a way to shut down someone else's account anyway, if I really wanted to.

There's one other thing I find to be a step backwards. Anyone try copying a folder with a large number of files in it to another location? Notice that you no longer have that disclosure triangle in the progress window to see WHAT it's actually copying?? What person at Apple decided that was no longer necessary Arrghh. Line up for the crotch kicking please! Sometimes I don't understand Apple at all. On the other hand, the cancel 'button', really the "X' box, ACTUALLY cancels a copy operation now, and quickly, unlike in Panther and previously where you ran the risk of locking up the Finder if you dared to click the cancel button.

So… overall, Tiger IS an improvement. It's just a shame they had to cancel out some of those improvements with what I see as dis-improvements.

Maybe next OS?

earthsaver, you are right.

If you invoke Dashboard, disable it, then return, your widgets are updated (of course, if you wait 30 minutes to return to Dashboard your widget data is 30 minutes old).

I have already hacked my weather widget as you mentioned but I think that is not within the comfort zone of the average OS X user. Most people will use Dashboard as is, unaware that those hacks are even possible.

Thanks,
Gary

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Anonymous wrote:
The only widgets I really end up using are the Weather widget and the calculator.

If you just want to search by filename, you can just enclose your search in quotation marks. Personally, I would have expected this to search for the whole phrase rather than just the filename, but there you go!

What's wrong with the weather widget? It's not even close to the info on Minneapolis from weather.com. It's pathetic!

Quote

Anonymous wrote:
What's wrong with the weather widget? It's not even close to the info on Minneapolis from weather.com. It's pathetic!

Tiger for me has been somewhat a hohum. It is as you say, a minor upgrade as far as things to notice on the surface. I only consider spotlight the feature I actually purchased in the upgrade and it is good. Safari is nice and fast, and lost one very annoying bug it displayed on my computer.

The major benefits for me are the ability to burn double layer disks built in, and a speedier motor. I notice that Tiger is a little snappier for me in most cases. It is compatible to new software out there. It is worth the upgrade I think, but I could have lived with Panther as well.

I agree -- almost -- Spotlight is really groundbreaking and is changing how I operate significantly. What I want is an Aggregate button to put my Spotlight selections in one place with the option of deleting the originals or just copying. This would be great for sorting out all .dmg files for example.

But the underbelly is where the action is... there are so many subtle improvements. One of the best is the new printer setup is so slick and simple and faster and foolproof and ...

ben

I find Dashboard extremely useful. For example I look up a business in the yellowpages widget. In the results area I click the little plus sign on the left and it adds the contact info to my addressbook. Then before I leave the house I syncronize my bluetooth cell phone and have the contact with me on the road.

I just with they had a white pages widget. (I'm sure it is in the works)

I also the calculator, just a click away.

My favorite stocks, just a click away.

I also have dashboard auto activate after 3 minutes of being idle. Then I can just glance from a distance to see what time it is, the weather for tomorrow etc...

Steve Stofiel
stevestofiel@mac.com (email and iChat)

somebody needs to write a 'kick in the crotch' widget for this guy. Itz might make him like dashboard better. Then again, it might wear out his F12 key.

You wrote: "Spotlight has taken a huge step backward in its ability to do easy filename searches from the Finder."

I have to disagree.

Now when I search in the Finder for "Foobar" not only do I get files with "Foobar" in the name, I also get other documents that mention "Foobar" in them or in their metadata. So I see more stuff, so what? The file named "Foobar" is still there in the results.

In those instances where I actually was correct in remembering the name of the file as "Foobar" I have to scroll through some more items to get it. But, in those instances where I was wrong and "Foobar" was not in the file name, instead of having to keep doing searches until I hit on the right name, I might get the result I wanted anyway with no more searching.

I think Spotlight is far better than the old simple "Find" that found filres when I could remember their file name.

Has anyone noticed how crappy type looks on LCD monitors in Tiger. All the edge are tinted in some unwieldy attempt at sub-pixel rendering, I think. It reminders me of the so-called "CoolType" in Acrobat...

Also the descenders of dock icon titles are STILL BEING CROPPED! This is a small thing, I grant you that. But why must this persist for more than 4 years???

This column makes my crotch hurt!! Owwww!

I promise I would change my opinion of Dashboard when that comes out. It should have a nice "doink" sound effect as well.

There should be a pop down menu of people you want to kick (Bill Gates, Rosie O'Donnell, political figures, OJ, Elmo from Sesame Street), then a hilarious animation of them crumpling over in pain after they are "doinked".

And we can suspend reality and pretend it hurts women as much to be kicked in the crotch (while I am sure it is uncomfortable, from experience, there can be no comparison.)



gary