I hate HATE how Aperture hogs all of my resources every time I close it. I have plenty of speed and ram on my macpro, so why does Aperture need all of it?

I also hate that CS2 doesn’t work properly on my macpro. But maybe that’s an Adobe whine.

William,

Thank you for your response and subsequent insights, it (and they) help with my frustration. Regarding the Dreamweaver / Flash issue with the keys, I’ll acknowledge after reading your post that it’s up to me (and other users, should they share the concern) to report to Adobe and tell them to get on board with complying to Apple’s HIGs.

Much appreciated.

I agree with the oft-voiced complaint about iCal - why can’t alarms be set to default-on? Really, there are so many small wtf? inabilities in iCal… like why, on god’s green earth, can’t you delete an event with a key command?

Being able to sync (easily) between two computers using an iPod or other small removable drive instead of .mac would be great. In fact, I feel like there must be a way to do this that I just haven’t figured out.

@Broen:

The problem here is that you have a different understanding of “appropriate End functionality” than Apple Inc. does. according to Apple, Home and End are not supposed to move the insertion point, but rather scroll the window all the way to the top and bottom respectively (Page Up and Down behave the same way, but scroll just a page at a time). All of the apps that follow Apple’s HIGs work this way (this includes Textmate, Safari, and Terminal — the reason they appeared to do nothing is because you must have been scrolled to bottom of the document already). If you want to move the insertion point, that is where the {,Cmd,Opt}-arrow keys come into play (although, it seems that no one does Cmd-{left,right} arrow right, which should move to the end of the line, then on the next press, move to the end of the next line, and so on). The apps that behave differently (Dreamweaver, Entourage) do so because they chose to not follow the guidelines.

Now then… there’s the issue of Cmd-{left,right} arrow not working in Terminal/iTerm. The reason for this is due to the nature of the applications themselves, which is to mimic the behavior of various terminals. These terminals that they are emulating likely don’t have keybindings for things like Cmd-{left,right} arrow, and the app designers decided to not add those bindings for one reason or another — probably because the various shells have different keybindings for this functionality (usually ctrl-a and ctrl-e) that people used to working in those shells would be accustomed to, and so they reserved it for some other use (e.g. iTerm uses them for switching between tabs).

Martin: You can almost get what you want by setting the view options for all windows in icon view to “Show Icon Preview” and then push the icon size slider up to 128 pixels. You can do this on a per-window basis too if you want; Finder should remember your window preferences if you close and reopen the window when it’s in the state you want. I agree this should be better. It should be smart enough to know image files from other files etc. Hopefully the new quickview in Leopard will fix this.

Guns: I completely agree about the Enter key …

Paully: I agree about the iCal sharing. The only workaraound I managed was to symlink the iCal folder in the Shared user folder so that multiple users can share and edit the same calendars (so it’s all calendars or no calendars. Still, it has worked OK for me as each user can just switch off the calendars they don’t want)

I wish Address Book would allow multiple users on the same computer to share an address book but retain their own “Me Card”. Surely it’s very common for multiple users of a single comuter to have shared friends or family (or business contacts) I can set this up with .Mac as a subscription, but the users who subscribe to my address book can’t use autofill in Mail so it is not a very useful database. The symlink won’t work with Address Book as it doesn’t like it when it is edited by more than one user.

Both iCal and Address Book (and Safari bookmarks) should allow users to access and edit a shared database and their own private data. Even my seven year old DECT home phone can have a shared phone book for the network and a per-handset private phonebook.

It seems that a lot of the whines here do have fixes but I’m sure most would agree they shouldn’t need fixes or the solutions should be more obvious (better documented). Many of the whines though, are real flaws with no apparent solution (mounted volumes in Finder being disconnected etc.)

I’m in regarding the snooze options in iCal. I’d need “tomorrow same time”, “tomorrow at XX:XX”, etc. To cut a long story short, I would like to see user-configurable snoozes (is that a word?).

my 2 cents Erik

Consistent functionality of the HOME and END keys. At least on the notebook models. I’m a coder, designer, writer, and general user. I have a MacBook. I find that in whatever program that I am using at the moment, my HOME and END keys function differently, and I have to use different key combinations to get what I want.

Present-tense narrative ensues: I’m in Dreamweaver, writing a line of code. I hit Function-Right Arrow (end). The cursor moves to the end of the line. “Appropriate END functionality!” I exclaim. Command-Right Arrow moves the cursor to the end of the current word.

I’m in Flash, using the ActionScript editor panel, writing a line of code. I hit Function-Right Arrow. Nothing happens. I hit Command-Right Arrow and I am moved to the end of the line.

I’m in Entourage, writing an email. “Eek!” some readers of this post exclaim. I hit Function-Right Arrow and I am moved to the end of the line. Command-Right Arrow moves the cursor to the end of the current word.

I am in TextEdit, writing some words to help make my point in this present-tense narrative. I hit Function-Right Arrow. Nothing happens. I hit Command-Right Arrow and I am moved to the end of the line.

I’m in Safari, entering a URL. I hit Function-Right Arrow and nothing happens. Alas, Command-Right Arrow gives me the proper END key functionality.

I’m in iTerm (Terminal replacement), writing some savvy command-line instructions. Function-Right Arrow moves me to the end of the line. Command-Right Arrow does nothing.

I’m in Terminal, neither Function-Right Arrow or Command-Right arrow do anything a ‘tall.

The schizophrenia of my HOME and END keys may have lasting effects.

Biggest gripe is the Mail.app.

Emails just don’t get downloaded.

Had to switch back to Entourage…uuuurg….resource hungry beast, but at least I know every email I’m sent will be received.

A couple of whines:

1. Grab a list of files in either icon of list view. If the files are numbered with a number in them like CES8001.psd, CES8002.psd etc double click on them to open them in photoshop and the files are opened in some random order. If you do this in column view it opens them in the right order.

2. Listining to a podcast on my Ipod — not finished with it yet but I’ve arrived at work so I take my Ipod to its dock in my office then I have to used Itunes to find the same Podcast to listen to Oh — it is a TWIT episode so I don’t finish listening to it at work either so I take my Ipod back to the car to finish on the trip home — I have to refind the Podcast again to continue listening to it. Can’t a true round-trip Ipod to Itunes to Ipod happen?

1) I find managing window sizes a real pain. Why doesn’t the maximize button just fill the screen? I spend way too time going to that lower-right-hand corner to drag out windows. (I think apps like Write Room and Scrivener are showing us how wonderful full-screen interfaces can be.)

2) The Mac OS has always been preoccupied with renaming files. Why should the “enter” key rename a file rather than open it? In a dialogue box, we hit “enter” to open a file, so the behavior is already partially established. I open twenty files for every one I rename, yet rename get the easy shortcut.

3) Why do we have universal volume control and volume controls within apps? Why not just one? Maybe there’s a reason for this, I dunno…

I’d love to hear an elaboration on what exactly is wrong with the Finder and what to do about it.

This is a great post, not just because you can get your gripes out, but because many times people post answers to them.

ok. i’ve got a handful of whines:

1. NTFS. i was shocked (SHOCKED i say) to learn that osx doesn’t write to ntfs drives. i got the beta version of vm ware and had an external drive for my images. the drive was fat 32, but there is a 4g file size limit. mac format obviously isn’t compatible when in windows vm’s, and NTFS doesn’t work from the mac. that’s lame. with all their talk about “playing nice” with pc’s, that borders on false advertising. if you’ve got an xp machine and a mac, what drive format can you share?

2. why doesn’t apple just write a “translator” for windows apps? something like rosetta for windows. why can’t i just buy a windows app and load it on my mac and have it run? i wouldn’t even care if it runs slow. i’ve tried cross over, but its buggy. and rebooting is a pain. vm ware is the best answer so far, but think about it. how many more macs would they sell if they could just run the friggin software? i only want to run access.

3. i’ve had several macs. laptops, desktops, imacs, etc. i’m a mac evangelist, i love them. but they are slow. i don’t know why. i’ve maxed out the memory, i buy the newest fastest processors. they’re just slow. i can build a pc that absolutely screams. it responds to a click almost before i’ve clicked. and it is especially true in photoshop, which is a good segway into my next whine.

4. adobe & apple. i really wish they would get out of this pissing contest and release ub apps already. photoshop is really slow, illustrator always “unexpectedly quits,” (regardless of version, hardware or os) now they bought macromedia. not a fan of adobe.

5. i’m surprised apple hasn’t released a tablet yet. its so intuitive, it seems right up their alley.

6. front row hangs up or crashes all the time. when it works, it’s painfully slow. big disappointment.

7. this is minor, but i’ve always felt the photo size in address book was really small.

8. on my mbp, the mute button is funky. ill hit the mute button, and the screen icon will flash up showing that it’s muted, but then the sound will keep going. weird.

9. 3g memory limit on my mbp. seems arbitrary and an odd size.

10. ok. i like itunes, and as a big music guy, i don’t mind buying, owning, and storing all my music. but for movies and tv shows… i gotta tell you, i don’t want to own them. i just want to watch it once and move on. i really think the “napster” approach of a monthly fee and access to everything is much more in line with market demand. otherwise, i’d have to setup a server farm and raid arrays in my garage to hold all the movies and tv shows i feel compelled to save since i paid so much for them. the bottom line is, it’s not cheaper than cable/tivo. in fact, it’s much more expensive, and i only want a few shows. so why do it?

11. i wish iphoto would store a “recipe” or “formula” for edits, rather than creating a whole new file. you can only edit once, then you’re working off a jpg. that sucks. i’d like to be able to always work off the raw image. plus it makes storage a real issue, which becomes even more of a pain because then you need some kind of library manager software to store an additional or backup library somewhere other than your laptop hd.

12. i’ve tried not to repeat anyone, but i have to reiterate the comment about how apple help sucks! it only explains what should happen. it never addresses what to do when something doesn’t work.

13. this is minor too, but i like cmd-tab. use it a lot. but if i’ve minimized the safari window (to the dock) and i cmd-tab to safari, the window doesn’t restore. in fact, nothing restores. duh.

to wrap this up on a positive note, for all of these whines and gripes, there is almost always a heroic do-gooder who writes a cheap or free piece of software to fix it, such as pathfinder, quicksilver, alarm clock, moneydance, transmit, google earth, flip4mac, sketchup, menushade, smultron, aqua data studio, open office, vlc, etc. these fine people rarely get the attention/respect they deserve for making our mac experience what it is. apple deserves credit, but not all of it.

Not true, you can copy and paste files in the Finder. (At least in Tiger.) Only cutting files to the clipboard isn’t enabled by default, unlike in Windows.

Er, the keyboard cable isn’t long enough. Another few cm’s please Steve!

illovich: “if most of the codecs we’re talking about are free on the net, how would their inclusion into quicktime be a cost Apple had to pass on to consumers?” Because Apple would have to aquire the distribution rights from a company that gives away the freeware codec in order to make money. (When you download it from their site, they get to pitch their for-pay products to you.)

David Marsden: “why isn’t it i can’t turn off the monitor?” I like the cockney ranting! Maybe this helps: Set your screen saver to “blank screen” and set a hot key or hot corner to turn it on. It’ll still be 15 minutes until the monitor actually turns off, but at least it’s dark and doesn’t bother you.

• .DS_Store
• Weakness in Finder.app (Unable to hit delete button to send to the trash, cannot use apple-x to cut when editing a file name, hitting enter with a filename makes you edit a filename etc etc)
• The number of times when I open the lid on a sleeping mac and it won’t come back to life or when it does and I enter my password to get passed the screensaver it goes back to sleep.
• 1 gig of RAM seemed fine on my G4 Powerbook but is not fine on my Macbook Pro
• Inability to edit meetings in iCal that were sent to me from others. I would like to be able to add notes and stuff.
• Safari needs extensions and incremental search like Firefox. (Without needing SIMBL)
• Mail.app doesn’t use Maildir or mbox format.

.DS_Store and then the inability of software to recognize it/back it up right or ignore it.

The lack of Calendar and Mail integration to email people to invite them to something and easily schedule it (if there is, it’s one well hidden feature)

This isn’t a whine, but a suggestion: if keynote allowed an interface for grouping slides like playlists in iTunes, including sorting by various tags, it would be the best presentation software evar. Like a lot of academics, I put together talks consisting of different subgroups of a huge group of slides. It would be so great to be able to manage slides in playlists.

This is an iTunes gripe, so I guess it’s not Mac-specific, but: Why can’t I have different settings for different podcasts? I want every episode of 43F, plus the unplayed episodes of This American Life, but only the last two days worth of NPR’s Story of the Day. Given the way different podcasts are completely different (some are two minutes, some are three hours; some come out four times a day, some once a week; some are audio, some are video), why does Apple force me to treat them all the same way?

While I share the common frustration with the Finder, the killer for me is when ppp loses a modem (or bluetooth modem) connection and is permanently disconnecting. The only cure is a %^* reboot!

Arrrggggghhhhhhh!

In reply to Chris about Spotlight: You don’t have to scroll down and press enter on your common Spotlight searches. To do it all totally keyboard: Command + Space opens spotlight .. type iTunes .. Command + Enter launches the top hit (which will always be right if it’s a common one.) Even better (but a tricky subtlety if you don’t understand it), if you cursor down to something then Command + Enter, you’ll open it’s containing folder.

I launch stuff this way all the time. I never use the evil dock.

So, my gripes: #1 is obviously the Dock. Evil. Hate it. It wastes far too much screen real-estate, and when it’s hidden it’s too difficult to use, but still consumes a whole side of your screen for much accidental revealing comedy. :| I’d love to be able to half-hide the damn thing. I could recognise all the icons from only their top half. Maybe even 2/3 hide it. In the mean time I can just use Dragthing and use Tinker Tool to hide the dock at the top of the screen.

2 is the Finder. Yes, someone making the big decisions is really holding this baby back. Why isn’t it more stable? Sure, it doesn’t often crash/relaunch, but it does it far more than my WinXP box. Why doesn’t it translate to foreign filesystem naming conventions better? What’s with that damn column view? (hate it) Why doesn’t it flush it’s cache to USB drives at least periodically? (I saved that file 15 minutes ago ..why should I lose it all when the keyboard got yanked out?)

3 two buttons and and a goddamn scroll-wheel! Is that so tricky to do? Have you not seen the massive size of the single button on those laptops? It’s just begging to be split in two ..context menu’s are important in OS-X. The two-finger scroll-wheeling on the trackpads is genius, so what about the real mice on desktops? I love the apple mouse, but I’m getting wrist strain pointing at scroll-bars/arrows all the time. Every Mac we get we end up putting a Microsoft mouse on. Surely I’m not the only one who feels wrong about that. (And yes, I’ve tried the Mighty Mouse .. bought one for my Mac Mini .. the nipple is just too small for accurate scroll-wheeling, and my secondary clicks occasionally get called as primary clicks coz I was resting fingers too hard on the LHS of the mouse .. often the resulting action was bad .. I just had to give it up.)

Nathan: “I’d love to be able to half-hide the [Dock].” Err, make it tiny instead? Why do you use it at all if you hate it so much? (Sometimes you have to minimize windows, but for app launching there’s Quicksilver [I’ve ripped all icons off my dock, it only shows running apps — aah, much better] and for app/windows switching there are the keyboard shortcuts.)

Ok I’m not sure this will get seen… or if it’s been mentioned…

I hate how when windows pop open in Mac, the immediately take focus… why is this a problem? Say I’m in Adium typing a message to somone, and while I’m doing that somone requests to be authorized and added to my list…. well if I happen to hit the spacebar at the wrong time… denied, and I have NO idea who it was that was requesting the invite.

Same thing with iCal popups sometimes… there are other examples, but it happens so much it drives me batty… sometimes I have no idea what the window that popped up was about.

Nex: “Why do you use it at all if you hate it so much.” Desktop Support is my job, and I’m regularly setting up Macs using the standard image we have. Of course, a plain finder is used on this MacOS image. With my own Mac, I prefer to use a minimum of tools that take the place of finder elements. Makes it easier to stay familiar with what I have to support. I do use Dragthing and Tinkertool, (and am considering Quicksilver) but would be happier not to have to.

Also I may not like the dock, but it does have it’s uses. Would be nice to see at a glance what is running. And tiny icons isn’t a good solution from a Fitt’s Law perspective: wider targets are much easier to hit, and won’t take up so much valuable screen real-estate. A half-hidden dock is the only reasonable solution I can think of there ..it’s either that or a Windows-like icon+test taskbar like thing. (ugh) :)

Oops .. sorry, that should be “icon + text” ;) ..So, my other biggest gripe about the finder: goddamn random order when dragging multiple files. Select a whole bunch of mp3’s and drag them into iTunes: the result? Bloody scrambled file-order. Same goes for copying: often can’t be sure the files will go there. Yet, if you drag a folder full of files, the files within are treated in order. This wasn’t the way it was in OS9, in fact there was rather sophisticated control of the order depending on how you selected them.

Never heard a decent explanation as to why this was. It seriously bugs the hell out of me. But I must investigate the mention I heard of this not being the case in column view. (Shame I hate the column view.) :)

Apple Wireless Bluetooth keyboard. £50 it cost me, and I bloody HATE it. The cheap IBM (yes IBM not IBM-Clone) keyboards I use at work are much better, and they’re easier to type quickly and accurately on. The Apple keyboard feels it’s filled with Marmite or something. Theres so much resistance at first and there’s no consistency in pressure required between the keys nor between key presses on the SAME key. I’m mis-typing so much that I’m wearing out the backspace key.

Plus, why on earth can you not use wireless keyboards to modify boot options? Like holding down option to select a boot drive. You have to use a USB keyboard (at least on my Mac Mini G4) for this.

My biggest whine is that my mac whines at ME. First it was the dreaded MacBook Pro processor whine, now it’s the “display whine.” Changing the diaplay brightness fixes this, but, well, I liked my brightness exactly where it was Mr. MBP, so shut the hell up! The Genius Bar is happy to send it in for me…but honestly, what’s more annoying, my computer whining, or being without my computer for a week or more?

Grr.

I’m a little annoyed that it’s so picky about RAM (two 3rd party RAM sticks refused to play with Apple’s RAM), but 2 GB is sooo nice that I’ve forgiven it.

This doesn’t have anything to do with software or functions, but rather Apple’s really dumb sales policies with regards to higher education. This weekend I needed to buy a copy of OSX and needed it immediately. No problem. Check the Apple Store for Educators. $69. Cool. That’s almost half off. So I go to the AppleStore here is Las Vegas (you know, the ones owned and operated by Apple, Inc.). I have my education ID with me and tell the sales person when she starts to ring it up. She says there is no discount for software. Hmmm. Talk to manager. Nope. No educational pricing on software, even Apple software. So what do I do. Pay full price for OSX ($129). Then I order a copy from the AppleStore at $69. When it comes it I will return that unopened copy to the AppleStore and get my $129 back.

How stupid is that? I understand not offering discounts on other manufacturer’s software, but this is Apple software sold by Apple, Inc. at an AppleStore. Even worse is that I can get the educational discount on hardware in the AppleStore. dumb, dumb, dumb.

Our MacBook has the worst battery ever. It would always report 11% even with a full charge. We srest the battery according to the instructions on Apple’s website and all was well until one day it wouldn’t even recognize the battery. Now we have to get the battery replaced which i s a pain because we have to take it in to an authorized repair shop. Bummer.

~xsforis

No way to easily move a file as in Windows by copy and paste.

1) Secure empty trash always makes my computer go into indefinite pinwheel purgatory.

2) My Airport is no match for the local spanish evangelical radio station, despite many countless of life hours lost on trying new settings and on hold with the new at&t. Switching to a new wireless router that was much cheaper solved the problem of slow speeds.

3) I am ashamed to use my white iBook in public because (even though I am a very clean person who does not eat while computing) I have gross looking permanent smudge marks on either side of the track pad where I rest my hands. Makes me look like Pigpen when I’m really NOT, I swear. I have tried many things to try to remove these smudges with no luck. Any tips welcome!