Multi-What?
Adam Shutes

I'm guess I'm quite lucky really - I have access to an excellent network connection, which meant I could tune into May's WWDC keynote, real time, in QT4. Well, there was a slight lag in speech so that you could see our Steve-o smile before the audience was completely in his pocket...

Anyhow, it was a fascinating 90 minutes for sure. OS 8.6 was released - good. They previewed Sonata (OS 9 surely?!) - better. And they briefly drew the curtains back on OS X - best.

I must admit, OS 8.6 is great. I installed it as soon as I could, and had a fiddle. Not a lot new perhaps, but it does seem faster and more stable.  OK, so all I see is less bombs, and more 'kindly' suggestions that I should restart soon. But if stability is hitting the return key, then I'll take it. 

According to the WWDC, Sonata is a big step towards  
OS X 'look and feel', yet it'll remain, at heart Mac OS. 
Down at ID software there will no doubt be much 
grinding and gnashing of teeth at this (although I guess 
they can start carbonising soon enough), but with me, 
Mac OS is fine. 
Just fine.

You see, I've picked up this reputation around my work place, my friends and relatives that I'm this crying, walking, talking, living Mac OS expert. (Well, maybe not the crying bit). I can't really object to it,  since they mean it as a compliment. 'Hey Adam', they say 'why is BLANK doing this, when I open BLANK?'. 'How the BLANK do I know!', is often my reply, until I'm coaxed to solve their dilemma by a cup of hot espresso, or the promise of a beer next time they're down at the local.

The thing is, I've been using Mac's now virtually every day since I was about 15 (now that is a frightening thought...) when we had our first Mac Plus in the family. You pick things up, and apply them to future situations - as all 'hobbyists' tend to. You remember those bizarre pieces of software, Banzai!, StuntCopter, Vaccine. You recall the strange crashes and their eventual solution. You reminisce about when you used Freehand 1.0 with that squiggle line, border thing on the splash-screen.

Experience is what most people would call it. Unpaid consultantcy is what I call it.

With each Mac OS or System release, the step between the previous and the new release has been achievable relatively quickly. System 6.08 to 7.0 was one of the bigger steps, as was 7.5 to 8.0. At each step my experience could be used as a foundation, from which I could never lose, only gain.

OS 8.6 to Sonata - what will this transition be like, I wonder? I bet you that the jump will be equivalent to 6.08 to 7.0. A big gap, but bridgeable for sure. It will still be Mac OS at heart (gnash away, ID!), so no doubt it will have the usually oddities, which I can add to my mental list of Mac caveats.

But the one which stumps me is the Sonata to Mac OSX jump.

  
If we are to judge Mac OS X by Mac OS X Server, the pot 

  containing my experience could get poured down the toilet 

right now. Apart from knowing what the Trash icon looks 

  like, I think I'd be pretty lost. My UNIX using friends

  however, would be drooling over it, or at least over the

thought of it - when they realise they had to use a mouse

they might wander off again. From what I've seen and read,

      Mac OS X Server is one amazing beast, but Mac-like on the

  surface only (I'd have gone all quiet all of a sudden).

However, Apple is not a stupid company (anymore, I hope) and knows how to avoid putting its entire user base into no-man's land. Mac OS X Client, as it will be known, is going to be Mac on top (hurrah!) but UNIX underneath, and only at a push will we ever need to actually touch the UNIX command line bits. Even so, it will be a different beast, a very different beast. The jump between Sonata and Mac OS X will be minimal on a GUI level (thanks to the intermediary Sonata), but significant  on a technical level. It's quite clear that much of the Mac experience that I've gained over the previous years will have to be binned and I'm going to have learn some new tricks. But that's good isn't it? After all, the reason us Mac-folks have been ahead of the Wintel pack is our ability to adapt and change, and think different(ly). 

It's time we trashed our Cdevs, our INITS, and other bizarre, inherited rituals. We'll move on to higher and better things, while we watch Windows 2000 users get tied up in the autoexec.bats and .ini files.

Plus ca change.

Adam "it takes a lot to impress me" Shutes
<adam@durandal.easynet.co.uk>