MacOS X 10.1 and 10.2

  MacOS X is the newest OS from Apple.  It is a BSD UNIX like OS, it uses the Hurd Mach micro kernel with a BSD compatibly layer.  It comes with many standard UNIX utilities and even includes gcc out of the box!  However, it uses a proprietary window manager that is called "Aqua" and is NOT X11 compatible.  As a consumer OS, MacOS X is quite impressive, however, most long time UNIX type people will probably find MacOS X confusing.
  I finally bought an Apple PowerMac since MacOS X is UNIX based.  I love UNIX and thought "wow", finally a major consumer OS is UNIX based!  I can now run commercial applications as well as my favorite Open Source programs on a UNIX based computer!  However, I was sort of disappointed.  MacOS X is nice, but it just doesn't "feel" like a real UNIX system.  I suppose that I am biased since I have over 15 years of experience administering "real" UNIX systems (SunOS, Solaris, HPUX, IRIX, and Linux) and expected more...  I am especially disappointed that MacOS's "Aqua" window manager is not X11 based.  X11 is one of the major strengths of UNIX, with X11 you send the display of one computer to ANY other UNIX computer!  With MacOS X this is not possible.
  This is a rambling list of my observations of MacOS X as delivered by Apple.  Many of the problems that I will mention can be overcome by adding additional Open Source packages (X11 [XDarwin], and libc.a come to mind immediately).  These notes are from the point of view of a long time UNIX user (my primary home computer is a Sun SunBlade).  Maybe someone at Apple will read this and fix most of these problems.
  I think that Apple's "Switch" campaign may be ok for Winbloze users, but I don't understand all of the Linux/Slashdot users going gaga over MacOS X.....

What I have: A PowerMac "Quick Silver".  2x1Ghz G4 CPUs, 640M of RAM (I added the extra 128M RAM)

Pros:

• UNIX like consumer OS
• The included programs iMovie, iDVD, and iTunes are very cool
• Can run many "main stream" programs like Adobe PhotoShop and M$ Office
• Has the gcc C and C++ compilers
• Can compile some Open Source programs, if you have installed the Open Source X11 package (XDarwin)

• Extremely expensive computer ($2500.00USD), even my Sun SunBlade (UltraSparc-II) with an AMD X86 co-processor was cheaper!
• Every friggin upgrade breaks something!  On my SunBlade (Solaris 8), I can still run Mosaic (the very first web browser, written for Solaris 2.2 [1992]).  With MacOSX, don't expect any backwards compatibility.
• Even though my QuickSilver is a dual CPU machine, I don't get the feeling that MacOS X is really using SMP (both processors).
• Very limited hardware support:
• Only 3 special (PowerDomain) Adaptec SCSI cards are supported by MacOS 10.2 (none were supported before 10.2)
• No native MacOS X joystick support
• No other add-on cards are supported
• Single IDE controller, 2 IDE disk max.  Why did Apple give up on SCSI  :(
• The expansion disk slot (front of case) can only be used for a zip drive because the computer runs so hot. (CDs and DVDs are very hot when you take them out of the computer!)
• The "SuperDrive" DVD writer is actually a Pioneer A04 (DVD-R/W) but Apple does not advertise this nor do they provide anyway to erase DVD-R/W disk.
• Single button mouse.  Yes, some things work with a 3 button mouse, but until this becomes standard,MacOSX will always be a second rate UNIX computer.
• Alot of programs (even Apple's own iDVD) still run thru MacOS 9 emulation (carbon)
• There are very few native MacOS X programs
• Final Cut Pro and DVD Studio cost $1000.00USD each! (The upgrades for iMovie and iDVD)
• The Aqua window manager is not X11 based.  The thing that I love about UNIX based systems is that I can have one computer with a monitor and use all of my other UNIX computers by sending their displays to the computer that has a monitor (no need for a KVM switch).  However, even with XDarwin and OroborMacv0 you won't be able to send any of MacOS's applications to another computer.
• Whacked out directory structure.  /etc is actually a symbolic link to /private/etc.  And, directories have spaces in them! (A major pain for CLI type people)  There is alot of this crazy kind of stuff.


[macosx:/] bob% ls /
AppleShare PDS               Developer                         System Folder                       dev                         sbin
Applications                      Documents                        TheVolumeSettingsFolder    etc                          tmp
Applications (Mac OS 9)    File Transfer Folder??     Trash                                    extras                     usr
Cleanup At Startup             Installer Log File              Users                                   mach                       var
Desktop (Mac OS 9)            Library                              Volumes                             mach.sym
Desktop DB                        Macally iStick Manager     automount                          mach_kernel
Desktop DF                         Network                             bin                                       mnt
Desktop Folder                  System                               cores                                   private
 
 

• It's really hard to change the hostname.  I forgot were it's at.
• In 10.1 (not totally sure about 10.2) most of the /etc databases are not really used (like hosts, passwd, etc).  Instead, this information is stored in the hidden Net Info database (I still don't know where that dang is). Have to use the ni* commands (niload, nidump, etc.) to update the most basic of information.  From the niload man page (MacOSX 10.2):


NILOAD(8)
NAME
       niload - load text or flat-file-format data into NetInfo

SYNOPSIS
       niload  [ -v ]  [ -d ] [ -p ] [ -t ] { -r directory | for-
       mat } domain

DESCRIPTION
       niload loads information  from  standard  input  into  the
       given  NetInfo  domain.  If format is specified, the input
       is interpreted according to the flat-file file  format  of
       the same name.  The allowed values for format are aliases,
       bootparams, bootptab, exports, fstab, group,  hosts,  net-
       works, passwd, printcap, protocols, rpc, and services.
 

• NFS support sucks.  I still can't figure out how to export/share a filesystem (Yes, I RTFM).
• SMB (Winbloze) file sharing sucks.  My Solaris and Linux boxes (Samba) can see my notebook's (NT 4.0) disk, but MacOSX (Apple's version of Samba) doesn't.
• No libc.a or libc.so!!  MacOS X has the gcc compiler, but without libc.a or libc.so alot of Open Source programs won't compile!  And, what the heck is libc.dylib??  It don't work!
• There is no way to backup the PowerMac's disk drive if it has both MacOS 9 and MacOS X on it (required to run most programs).  Mac OS 9 has "resource forks" and Mac OS X has secondary ACLs on files ("Locked").  Apple's own version of tar doesn't understand all of the types and hidden files.  I finally used the Open Source program Carbon Copy Cloner to try and make a full disk backup, but I'm don't have a great deal of confidence that it worked.
• Had several applications totally freeze the computer (iMovie and Final Cut Pro).  The only way to recover from these problems was a power cycle.  A UNIX system should NOT do this!  It's probably because of the Aqua window manager and virtual memory management.
• The 10.2.1 upgrade broke all of the OS 9 applications and even corrupted my OS 9 partition.  Conspiracy?? Possibly, Apple wants to get rid of all of the MacOS 9 apps (all computer sold after 01/01/03 will not be able to boot into MacOS 9)
• I had to pay for the 10.2 (Jaguar) upgrade even though I bought my Apple after 10.2 was released and CDs where sitting on the shelves.  I had to send $20 bucks to Apple to have them mail the upgrade CD to me (my PowerMac "QuickSilver" only had 10.1 on it)
• Apple's free iDisk service is no longer free.  It cost $100 per year.  And, their stupid web server WILL NOT WORK with ftp, it only accepts Apple's proprietary file transfer protocol (Appleshare (or AFS)??)

In short, MacOS X is very pretty, and it does video editing very well, but it won't be replacing my SunBlade (Solaris) any time soon for serious work.
 
 

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