In the very recent past, including today, Apple has worked very hard to drastically lessen the need for Microsoft products on the Mac OS X platform. AppleWorks will read and write Word and Excel files. OS X Mail eliminates the need for Outlook Express or Entourage. Now, Apple’s Keynote kills off PowerPoint on the Mac. Who needs Microsoft Office now? As if anybody really ever did, but that’s another story. Perceived need versus actual need…
The default browser for the Macintosh is now Safari. By tomorrow night, Safari will own approximately 95% of the Macintosh OS X browser market. And, let me tell you, after one hour with it, Microsoft can kiss my ass, too. Let the war begin again!
Not that I’ve used MS IE for more than a minute in the past year (Chimera), but Safari is faster than any browser I’ve ever used on a Mac OS X machine. Period.
Along with FireWire2, Airport Extreme, the world’s first 17″ laptop, integrated Bluetooth, etc., why would anybody choose a Windows clunker now? Perceived need versus actual need, I guess.
SteveJack is a long-time Macintosh user, web designer, multimedia producer and a regular
contributor to the MacDailyNews Opinion section.
I totally AGREE. THE mac Rules! Peroid!
This keynote speech lacked the release of a good G4 Tower… Something that I was hoping for. But I totally agree… Microsoft better start kissing some A$% now in order to save them self some time later one
Damn! I agree 100%!
95%!? Slow down there. As we saw in the keynote, OS X still has some ways to go to saturate the current Mac user base. (People are still using OS X 8 and 9)!!
Is Safari good? Absolutely. But it is only a native, best of breed browser. Keynote is really a crucial piece of software that few will take notice of to start. Apple is making a silent stab into the corporate arena with it. Businesses live and breath on presentations.
Screed
I downloaded Safari and have use it a bit, so far today. I have found a few problems so far, which I have reported to Apple. First, it wouldn’t let me log into Hotmail (is Apple or MS saying something here?), telling me I need to have Javascript enabled (it was!). Second, I could find no good way to import bookmarks from Chimera, which has been my default browser. Finally, and this is surprizing for a browser from Apple, the Keychain isn’t enabled. One of the things I really like about Chimera is that it is integrated with the Keychain.
i am one of the 75% of macusers who still boot in os9 as my music apps still havent made the switch in they are very stable in os9 and i have a lot invested in hardware and software and i dont want to buy the same software twice its not my fault the programs are not in osx yet, so i have to wait and i cant by a new mac cause it wont let me boot in to 9 sort of a catch 22. that said i think i will wait for a dual 970 this fall by that time all the audio apps will be out in on their second non beta revisions. also one good thing is a stealth midi driver that lets me use my old exspensive midi box and soundcard drivers for my audiowerk2 card i am waiting for drivers to my yamaha dspfactory card now, hello Yamaha the worlds biggest music company support your products are you listening.
so i use osx 75%of the time even though its slower then 9 on my old system, my nine is stable and dosnt crash anymore then the kernal panics on 10 (i may have a bad memory chip in my 600 g4 upgraded beige g3 i here osx is more sensative to that}
I use 9 for music and other programs that wont run in classic. please dont blame me for keeping apple back as i will be all osx this fall with a new dual.
I tried Safari today and am staying with OmniWeb for the time being. I like the options for opening multiple windows better. My 2 euros
Just spent an hour with Safari – I’m a Chimera user. I’m suprised that Safari does not use tabs. Once you’ve used them it is very hard to work without them. The button to pop back to the top of some url trail is nice, but I can create a more meaningful trail in Chimera with tabs. And on my tiBook 800mhz, Safari seems marginally slower than Chimera. Then it crashed. Is a beta. I hope Apple does another beta or a release integrating tabs. At this point I’m not persuaded to change.
I live and breathe Flash. Flash playback, for some inexplicable reason, is beyond sloooooooooow in Safari. Fastest on Chimera, but Chimera likes to drop frames and doesn’t always redraw images properly. When it works, its gorgeous on Chimera though. So why am I still using IE? Because IE is still the most trouble free browser for me all around. Less trouble with CSS, Frames, Javascript, and Flash. Maybe not quite as fast, but best ALL-AROUND. Chimera is sooo close to making that no longer true though, and with nighly updates, I suspect IE will soon be gathering dust on my Mac. I will keep an eye on Safari, and we’ll see what happens next.
Apple finally is getting its train back on the track with Safari. Safari is really fast – even on a 300 mhz G3.
I still need Windows from time to time for Microsoft streaming that won’t work on my Mac’s. I’m getting close to actually purchasing a windows machine for the Microsoft stuff that won’t work on Virtual PC.
My stand alone PC will have email removed or not set up. No PC viruses to receive and transmit. I’ll only use a browser on it when I’m compelled out of no other options. And only use the windows machine when I absolutely require it.
Why complicate life? Use a Mac…. They’re so simple and sweet!
Opps, forgot to mention, my Wallstreet is toast with today’s announcement. I’ll be getting the world’s smallest, fastest portable in two weeks. Eat your heart out PC noclusers!
Screed got it right, Keynote is the sleeper app here. It completes the circle of Microsoft Avoidance.
All that we need is a word and excel replacement and MS is out
Safari killed a lot of my main users folder so don’t option click stacks of images for concurrent download,
ed
Keynote is awesome, but until they put up a decent project management tool, there is still some reliance on MS. Not that MS bothered to update the damn thing for Mac over the years.
As for IE on OSX – take your crippleware and ram it.
M$ must be pissed…I am unable to login to Hotmail with Safari.
It will be interesting to see what their excuse is and just how long it will be before they “fix” the problem. I hope they do not blame Apple…come on, it is just a web page not a damn cypher lock! This is what open standards are for and why they need to be followed. How petty!
If Bill Gates made roads, would he only allow M$ cars on his highway?
I am so F*&King; excited I do not know what to do. Damn I got to get me a new machine now. Got to Rob Peter to buy a New G4. Where is my 9?
Hooray for Apple lets get the M$ Off the Macs. Now we have to explain to people U do not need M$ to compute. I down with it!
First, it wouldn’t let me log into Hotmail (is Apple or MS saying something here?), telling me I need to have Javascript enabled (it was!). This statement coming from DaveF. Let me tell you right off the bat, you are absolutely WRONG in stating that the browser will not let you log on to Hotmail. I checked my Hotmail account along with my wife’s and it seemed to work right. Go figure.
Hotmail is now working with Safari…
I just had to keep reloading and it eventually “took” (no Javascript error message).
In response to the firt message – If you have not used IE for more than a minute in the past year how can you proclaim safari is the fastest ever? By you not using it at all just tells me you just hate MS and will jump at any alternative presented. I, like many of us, hate MS too – this does not stop me from using their products. Apple is in many ways as bad as MS, its just that they have shot themselves in the foot so many times people feel sorry for them.
Anyway, I have been playing around with Safari and its impressive for a first offering but its not going to replace IE as my default browser. I look forward to improvements in it in the future.
Safari is terrific, but it has problems with https behind corporate firewalls (at least mine), and https works fine in IE, so I’m pretty sure it’s a Safari issue. Keynote makes me drool, but the killer App for me is Final Cut Express. $999 was just too much for me to shell out (especially with the money it was going to take to get significant hard drive space for video work). But $299, that’s doable.
I’m just deeply impressed by the commitment Apple is showing on the software side of things…
So you think old Billy boy really gives a shit about 95% of less than 5% of the market? Yep, I’ll take the 90% of the 95% and laugh you all the way to your extinction.
I dumped IE a while back. I like some of it’s features (Autofill) but others irritate my tits off. It’s also very slow on my G4667. I have been using Chimera for a while and have got to really like it. Today I used Safari all day and since I don’t need a browser for critical work (Shock, Horror – I just visit web sites with it!) it’s been perfect for me. It’s the only browser in my dock. For a Beta I think it’s good work and hopefully tabbed browsing, Auto-Fill and a few other features will be included by the time it hits 1.0. I HATE the name though – Very cheesy. Speed wise it is really good on my machine, although some sites are a little slow due to stuff not working right. It doesn’t render the .Mac pages that well for me (bits missing here and there) which seems odd since it would be assumed that this is the first place they would start….! Interestingly using Duality 4 and Milk 1.5 I saw no interface oddities at all – It looks great. I find myself wondering why Sub-menus in the address bar took this long to arrive in a Mac broswer- The Bookmark organisation just runs roughshod over anything else out there for me. I honestly don’t understand how anyone can use OmniWeb – I hear so much about it’s speed, compatibility and standards compliance yet whenever I have used it, it has been slow, rendered pages badly and took an age to fire up. iCab is all but gone for me as is Opera (which I was stupid enough to pay for in the vain hope it would help bring the final X version along faster). IE does offer the best compliance (to a non HTML geek like me, anyway) but it’s got too much wrong with it. Chimera was great – no doubt about it. Netscape – Oh please!
I really hope Safari does the business the way we all want it to. No more M$ reliance for surfing! All we need now is an full Office replacement and an Access compatible DB – That should just take a few hours work, right?
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PowerPoint has always been one of the weakest presentation packages, IMHO. I’ve used a number of them, and PowerPoint had fewer features than just about all of them and a stupid interface to boot. So why is it the most-used presenter? Network effect.
PowerPoint is on every PC that runs Office, and so all the PC users know they can interchange the files, and none of them have to think about or spend any extra money for any other presenting software. As long as Windows dominates the desktop/laptop, then PowerPoint will own presentations, no matter how bad it is or how good its competition is.
Keynote was developed (I’d guess) because Steve wouldn’t tolerate dealing with PowerPoint (can’t blame him). But as for Appleworks/Keynote threatening Office? Ha. As if.
Is it just me, or has anybody else experienced speed gains on Chimera after installing Safari (PB G3 bronze keyboard) ?
Keynote killing powerpoint? haha thats funny! Thats like your uncle bob opening up a cheap restaurant and saying he is going to topple mcdonalds. reality check time! Its so funny to listen to people praising these untested new apps saying they are going to kick ass blah blah blah and immediately replace other apps (such as powerpoint) which are worldwide standards. I’m convinced that most of the people posting these messages work for apple.