Desktops, Laptops, and iPads (Or, Trucks and Cars)

There is a lot of prognosticating about the future of Mac OS X, in the light of the stunning success of iOS that runs on iPhones and iPads. Many people are guessing that the Mac laptops and desktops (if they even survive) of the future will run something like iOS, and not OS X.

There are lots of reasons why iOS is superior to Mac OS X. iOS is immersive, focused, simple, and intuitive. There is no need of a mouse and its distancing effect (you're moving this small brick thing, which moves a cursor, which you can then use to interact with the things on the screen), as you simply press the things you want to happen. There's also this wonderful exploratory nature of iOS; manuals are largely gone, and you discover what things do and their features through play and experimentation. This is part of the joy of these devices, and why they are so personal, in that they invite you to discover them on your own, without a daunting manual or difficult system of options and inputs. You don't have to worry about breaking it, since the operating system and its files are hidden from you; you can't accidentally delete the system files or something. You can't even delete the standard iOS apps if you wanted to. Apps can be easily re-downloaded, and most all problems can be fixed by the mystical iOS reboot. The real fear is dropping it, the cost of replacing it, and the data that's on it (though with iCloud and the cloud in general, the last is greatly mitigated). iOS and especially the iPad are the computers we wanted decades ago, when they were buggy, slow, and difficult--installing a printer was a chore, setting up a machine was frustrating, and virus/malware stymied the most hopeful family member from really enjoying the WWW. So the power of iOS, and its astronomical growth, is obvious.

But I can't see OS X really going away. I'm typing this in OS X right now, with two monitors and a full keyboard at work, and I can move my eyes between multiple windows and screens. The benefits of iOS--its speed, immersive screen, size, and little weight--are also its downfall, as you really do need a separate, tactile keyboard to do serious work (as Harry McCracken discusses, with Katie Floyd and David Sparks), you can't work from multiple windows and screens simultaneously, and you can't use apps in direct conjunction with each other (such as, you can't use 1Password to fill in your address via an extension to the browser [yes, you can do this from the 1Password browser itself, but it's a bit kludgy]). It's a mono-tasking world with iOS, and that has its benefits, but do we really work one application and screen at a time? In writing and researching, I'm flipping to the internet and PDFs and notes and research in various applications. I'm moving from notes and texts to email responses. This is not as fast and fluid on iOS. Yes, you can multitask between apps on iOS, but it's still successive, not conjunctive. You have to cumbersomely send files between applications, and flip back and forth across various windows, instead of a seamless synchronicity of multiple windows and applications.

So, here's to multitasking, not in the distracting mode (where you're on facebook while writing, which never works) but in the conjunctive working mode. Here's to multiple windows and screens when it's what you need. iOS is great for travel, portability, checking in, or doing those things that are immersive and naturally monotasking, but to really get to work on the farm, you need a truck.

Outlines for Class Lectures

After reading Advice for New Faculty Members by Robert Boice, I've tried to shift to an outline for class lectures. Outlines have several advantages over a traditional, discursive manuscript. They:

  • Are easier to scan the page as you are speaking
  • Are easier to skip and rearrange material as you go
  • Reduce the tendency to simply read the lecture
  • Allow an easier interaction with the students, as points can be fleshed out and transitioned in response to student responses

An outline is not as useful if it is a new class or new material. Outlines really presume a mastery of the material, where you can simply write a topic such as "Anselm's ontological argument" and then launch right into it for 15 minutes. If you need more details as to what the ontological argument is, or are concerned you will get it right in your description, the outline tends to become more discursive  and written out, which defeats its purpose.

I've been using OmniOutliner, which is a Mac application that has a unique niche among the applications out there. It is sort of a cross between Word and Excel. It's not a high-powered fancy spreadsheet application like Excel, but it can do many of the basic functions of Excel (add, sort, and so on), and it gives terrific fine controls in terms of layout, if you want to use them. It is also super easy to use and outline with, so that it almost becomes a word processor/outliner as well.

You could use Microsoft Word for this as well, but Word is slower and more prone to crash, and you would need a separate iPad application to open the files. OmniOutliner NEVER CRASHES. Neither does Scrivener or Pages. One of my main rules of thumb is, is this software gloriously stable? Or must I save constantly and carefully close files when away, so that there isn't a crash and loss of data? This is the problem with Word – I don't and can't trust it completely. I have to lock the doors often, so to speak, to insure my changes don't disappear. Other applications such as OmniOutliner and Scrivener are rock solid, and this is what I prefer.

There is an iPad version of OmniOutliner that I will probably get at some point; right now, I simply export the outlines as plain text into my dropbox, and then I use the PlainText iPad app to read the outline on the iPad in class. This works just fine.

I formerly used Scrivener to lay out an entire class using folders and such, but OmniOutliner provides a simpler, cleaner outlining ability than Scrivener (Scrivener is terrific, but not optimized for outlining as OmniOutliner is). As a tech nerd, I had to try something different, and so I did.

Everything's a Database

It's perhaps no surprise that with the evolving complexity of our computers, app phones, and personal data, everything is becoming a database, and many of our actions now consist of querying the database (even if we don't think about it that way).

I first realized this with Evernote, but I now realize that it applies to Apple Mail, OmniFocus/Things, Gmail, Launchbar, Spotlight search on the Mac, and simplenote (just to name a few). So many of my actions consist of either adding information/files, or searching for them. I suspect it all started with Gmail, which (in my mind) was the first large-scale implementation of such an idea. When Google launched Gmail, suddenly we were freed from folders or tags, and could simply archive (at first Gmail didn't permit mail deletion, but they eventually added it). With the power of google, you could search for that email by its sender, content, title, or whatever. No longer was there a need for looking for folders, wondering how it got misfiled, or trying to remember the appropriate tag. It just worked, and you searched with whatever came to mind—fluid, natural, and easy.

With that lovely search box in some many applications and even the Mac OS, suddenly we have that power everywhere. So I'm scouring Evernote for a PDF, searching OmniFocus to see where a task is lurking, or querying my emails. With Launchbar, I'm searching my applications, bookmarks, or address book. The hard work, of course, is done on the backend where the computer has indexed all these things previously, and your search is merely searching an invisible index (again, this sort of thing is thanks to Google). But it's fast, natural, and obvious. I don't have to navigate through a home folder to a folder of babysitter contacts; I can merely type "babysitter" and up comes that list or contact.

The problem is with applications that don't operate this way. Older Course Management Systems (that shall remain unnamed) force you to do those endless clicks to burrow and get where you want, and similarly with Exchange online server and others. Instead of a more natural "let me search for it as I want," it becomes "you must accommodate to our filing system and naming conventions." I find myself growing impatient with such approaches, as they are falling behind the current standards.

Everything's a database--happy hunting!

Mac OS 10.7 Lion Disappoints, Mostly

After having played with the Mac OS for some weeks now, I have to say that most of the noticeable changes are disappointing or insignificant, especially the most highly touted features.

My main disappointments revolve around the full-screen mode. It sounded nice. Truth is, it fails miserably with dual screens, which is nearly a necessity for prosumer and professional usage; suddenly, you have two screens to work with, for making notes from one to the other, or monitoring your email while working on a project--whatever possibilities are needed. It's why those professional stock traders are always shown with 6 screens or more. Even Apple's own external monitor shows it as a feature.

With Lion, you lose the second screen completely, it simply goes to the slightly weird linen background. That's not helpful; I added the second monitor for a reason, you know. I can see that the full-screen mode would be nice with the small MacBook Air, or a laptop with a small screen, but I own neither and I'm not in that "focus on one thing and one thing only" mode often. It's also a bit of a paradoxical thing, as traditional computers (the "trucks" of computing, as Steve called them) are all about true multi-tasking, while iOS is not. It sounds good to go full-screen and "focus," but then why not just use your iPad for that? There's a potential confusion here, making this highly-touted feature a bit unimpressive. I'm not saying it's not useful; I'm saying it's rarely useful to me, and I doubt it's limited to only just me.

The full-screen disappoints on another level, which is it's ineffective for large screens and text editing. If you go full-screen with Pages, MarsEdit, OmniOutliner (take your pick), suddenly your eyes have to travel a loooong distance horizontally. That's why newspapers use columns, as you can scan fairly quickly, right-right-down, right-right-down. Now, with full-screen on a 15" or larger screen, it's right-right-right-right x 20-down. That's a lot of work, and makes me tired and achey. Text editors need smaller columns on full, horizontal screens, with the menus vertical along the side (as with the iPad in a horizontal or landscape position). Otherwise, it's tiresome work. Again, this might be fine on a small MacBook Air or something, but not on a 15" MacBook Pro or a larger external monitor.

Mission Control is also lackluster. It's cute and pretty and fast, but not as fast as ctrl-tab to cycle through open applications, or LaunchBar (or another application launcher). Mission Control also hides applications that have been minimized to the dock, which was always my frustration with Exposé. I want all my applications available to switching, even the ones I got out of my way. To use Mission Control effectively, you must not minimize applications, and do full-screen instead.. This, to me, breaks Mission Control.

Finally, I find the animations in Lion to be annoying. I really don't need emails flying upwards in Mail, or pages turning in iCal, or pop-up windows really popping up. Just do your job, please, and notify my if there is a problem, but don't distract me when all is well. Just make the email disappear, and then do a "dwoop" sound if the email failed. That's all I need, thanks.

All that said, Lion is speedy, handles my external monitor better, and features some nice under the hood changes to security and secure memory. FileVault, the drive encryption option, is much much better (supposedly, that is; I'm still scared of it, personally). I also found the AirDrop feature for exchanging files to be very simple and easy, even though it's not as heavily promoted or reviewed as the other new features in Lion. I also really like the new design to the Mail application, it's minimalist but still very powerful. ICal also syncs with Google Calendar much more smoothly and quickly.

So yes, Lion is well worth the $29 upgrade. Just don't be too dazzled by the new features. The real killer feature is yet to come: iCloud.

Used books and Project Gutenberg

Perusing a library's used book sale, I found myself torn between buying copies of older, classic texts, and also knowing that a) I wouldn't likely read them (but might), and b) they were probably online, at Project Gutenberg. So even if I found a need for them, I could get a downloadable and searchable copy online, for free.

The internet has become a vast library and storage system. Not the best versions, mind you--without scholarly corrections and footnotes. But if you've wanted to read The Mayor of Casterbridge on a casual basis, why not grab a free copy off the web? It can be transferred to an iPad or Kindle or Nook, and zoom you're off. Before, book sales were the best way to get cheap copies of books you wanted on the shelf, just in case. Now, with the internet, you have immense resources just a few links away.

Another distinguishing feature is the searchability of texts on the web. I found this quite useful in writing my dissertation on Thomas Hardy; if a passage was in my memory but not easily found, I could search for a word or two and find it quite instantly. I could also search for some interesting words, such as "cruelty" (one of Hardy's great admonishments, to avoid cruelty to all creatures), and see that it occurs so many times within a certain text. I wouldn't cite that research in my scholarly work without checking a corrected text thoroughly, but it still gives one some interesting points of research and ideas.

So, to buy books you're only vaguely interested at a used book sale, or not? I walked away with 10 books after all, since they were cheap and of possible value to me. Now I have to figure out where to store all these books, and even begin the process of weeding out some as donations to other book sales … And so the circle of life, err, books, continues, only with the internet now providing an interesting inner loop.

Scrivener 2.0: writing world

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What can't Scrivener do? It manages, counts, meta-datas, sorts, highlights, tags, summarizes, stores, syncs. If you wonder, can it do that? Then it probably can. It's the Excel spreadsheet of writing applications: it can be as simple or complex as you want it to be. You can hoist bits, highlight, spellcheck, drag and drop, set wordcount targets …

Okay, there are a few things it can't do: real page layout (but that's okay, there's lots of apps for that, from Word to Pages to Open Office), and bibliography management (ditto here, just use Bookends or EndNote or Zotero). And … that's about it. And it's stable--nary a crash yet. Plus there's a lovely full screen mode.

Amazing.