“Generally speaking, the idea behind Lion is simple: iOS is hugely popular, and it’s much simpler than Mac OS X, so why not pull some of the user experiences from iOS into OS X, giving that larger user base more of a reason to consider Apple’s high-priced, general purpose computers? This plan makes plenty of sense and while I can quibble with a few of the interfaces Apple has come up with in Lion, the broad strokes stuff is entirely correct. Put simply, Apple is moving this thing in exactly the right direction,” Paul Thurrott writes for Paul Thurrott’s Supersite for Windows.

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“It’s impossible to look at the iPad in particular and not immediately wish that your PC (or, in this case, Mac) exhibited some of its better bits of functionality: Faster performance, including boot time. Instant on with resume. Multi-touch gestures. Simple, full-screen user experiences. An integrated App Store, tied to an online account with liberal app install rights. Auto save, both in the OS (open windows and so on) and in each app (auto data save). And app auto-resume, so that when you close and reopen an app, it goes right back to where you were the last time,” Thurrott writes. “These are all great, high-level ideas. And Apple has made each available in Lion, along with hundreds of other changes, resulting in what is both the best version of Mac OS X yet and, for perhaps the first time ever, the first Mac OS X upgrade that is arguably more than just evolutionary.”

“I think Apple’s doing the right thing by bringing the two product lines together where it makes sense, at least from a user experience standpoint. I may not agree with each design decision, but Apple will tinker with this and get it right over time, as they always do,” Thurrott writes. “But Lion, overall, is in great shape. Where I’ve generally derided Apple for overpimping its largely evolutionary OS X updates over the years, Lion shows that there’s some life left yet in the Mac OS X side of the house. This isn’t just a collection of minor updates and refinishes. It’s a step away from the norm, finally, after a decade of steady and largely boring minor revisions. I’m excited to see where they take OS X next.”

Full “review” – Think Before You Click™ – here.

MacDailyNews Take: In the full review, Dvorak Jr. outdoes himself in the backhanded compliment department; not an easy task. Read it if you’re interested in the opinion of a highly-delusional Microsoft apologist/defender who possesses a bunch of domain names that are rapidly diminishing in value.

Related assholery:
Thurrott: ‘Overly thin-looking’ Apple CEO Steve Jobs offers up ‘tepid’ iPad 2 – March 3, 2011
Thurrott: ‘Apple just doesn’t get it when it comes to interacting with a computer’ – October 28, 2010
Thurrott: Dvorak’s right, Microsoft’s wrong, Apple’s iPad is an unnecessary over-sized iPod touch – April 26, 2010
Paul Thurrott: Steve Jobs is a tool – April 5, 2010
Big surprise: Paul Thurrott doesn’t get Apple’s iPad at all – January 28, 2010