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Postby Lorand » Wed 04 Aug, 2004 1:35 am

I had no problem learning MacOS, I just don't like it... It's illogical and antiergonomic. For example the home/end keys: why they take you at the first/last page of the document instead of beginning/end of a line? How can I jump to the beginning/end of a line without using the mouse or pressing repeatedly the cursor keys as in playing PakMan?
I work in QuarkXpress both on PC and Mac, but it takes much more work on Mac to achieve the same thing...
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Postby Antony » Wed 04 Aug, 2004 2:34 am

Lorand wrote:I had no problem learning MacOS, I just don't like it... It's illogical and antiergonomic. For example the home/end keys: why they take you at the first/last page of the document instead of beginning/end of a line? How can I jump to the beginning/end of a line without using the mouse or pressing repeatedly the cursor keys as in playing PakMan?
I work in QuarkXpress both on PC and Mac, but it takes much more work on Mac to achieve the same thing...
Mac OS is not illogical at all.
Mac OS just don't use the Windows version.

in standard Mac convention
To jump to the beginning / end of the line
:cmd: + left arrow : jump to beginning of the line
:cmd: + right arrow : jump to end of the line

To jump to beginning / end of the document
:cmd: + up arrow : jump to beginning of the document
:cmd: + down arrow : jump to end of the document

NOTE A number of software do not follow the Mac convention, including MS Word (for Mac), Dreamweaver (for Mac). They try to copy the exact key strokes from PC. It's a shame of those software makers.
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Postby bames53 » Wed 04 Aug, 2004 6:19 am

Lorand wrote:I had no problem learning MacOS, I just don't like it... It's illogical and antiergonomic. For example the home/end keys: why they take you at the first/last page of the document instead of beginning/end of a line? How can I jump to the beginning/end of a line without using the mouse or pressing repeatedly the cursor keys as in playing PakMan?
I work in QuarkXpress both on PC and Mac, but it takes much more work on Mac to achieve the same thing...
Are you saying that the MacOS is illogical because it doesn't work like windows? :) and is this to refute my comment that users get frustrated switching platforms and having to learn new conventions? :P

to add to the last post here are some more key combos that work basically anywhere you can type:

forward arrow = move forward one character
back arrow = move back one character
up arrow = move up one line
down arrow = move down one line
(like windows, included for completeness)

option + forward arrow = move forward one word
option + back arrow = move back one word

option + up arrow = move up one paragraph
option + down arrow = move down one paragraph

adding shift to any of the mentioned key combos will select from the current cursor position to the place the cursor ends up i.e. shift + option + forward arrow will select the next word.

this demonstrates two historic hallmarks of the Mac: Symmetry and Consistency both of which make learning easier.

Symmetry: What you learn you know that complementary things are done in symmetric ways and so learning one action in a class of tasks is nearly the same as having learned the whole class.

Consistency: everything works the same, no matter where you are. learning one app is the same as learning them all.

(post classic mac os versions have given these two qualities a beating, esp. consistency, and Windows has improved in consistency at least.)

There are enough reasons to dislike Macs, but I don't think 'it's not like Windows' is a very fair one. :)
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Postby Antony » Wed 04 Aug, 2004 6:43 am

bames53 wrote:
Lorand wrote:I had no problem learning MacOS, I just don't like it... It's illogical and antiergonomic. For example the home/end keys: why they take you at the first/last page of the document instead of beginning/end of a line? How can I jump to the beginning/end of a line without using the mouse or pressing repeatedly the cursor keys as in playing PakMan?
I work in QuarkXpress both on PC and Mac, but it takes much more work on Mac to achieve the same thing...
Are you saying that the MacOS is illogical because it doesn't work like windows? :) and is this to refute my comment that users get frustrated switching platforms and having to learn new conventions? :p

* shrug *
Also, it's called context (or contextual) click, not right-click. It was Mac brought the mouse into the user-interface, not Windows.
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Postby Lorand » Mon 11 Oct, 2004 6:42 pm

The first use of mouse with a GUI was made by Xerox back in 1973 (http://www.cedmagic.com/history/xerox-alto.html). In fact, the Mac's user-interface was copied from the Xerox Star (Apple paid 1.000.000$ for that). But during the years there were no improvements in its graphics, so the look and feel remained as in the '80s (even with that whole lot of useless fancy stuff shoved in MacOS X).
So Apple didn't invented the wheel, it only added the breaks...
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Postby Antony » Mon 11 Oct, 2004 7:53 pm

Lorand wrote:So Apple didn't invented the wheel, it only added the breaks...
Without a doubt, it was Apple they made the GUI popular.
It was Apple who spent money on advertising educating people how to use mouse...
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