Developing
Posted October 26th, 2003 @ 04:45pm by Erik J. Barzeski
Sam Caughron lost a lot of my respect recently. He didn't invent app switching. Application switching has been in previous and various OSes by various companies. Sam didn't invent "the look" that he used for his app switcher, instead borrowing the "layered-on" look of things like volume and eject graphics from the OS.
I didn't agree with Dan Wood, and I don't agree with Sam. He's getting a lot of PR right now, but it's not good PR. I don't agree with the whole "any press is good press" ideology. Sam's a whiner. Instead of saying "hey, welcome aboard, now look at how our software extends on that cool new toy" he's pouting.
Update: You don't see Unsanity asking for "credit" for Labels X, do you?
Donate Life
Posted 26 Oct 2003 at 4:53pm #
I agree with you on Liteswitch, but why did you not agree with Dan Wood? I thought the argument for Watson was a pretty convincing one...
Posted 26 Oct 2003 at 4:58pm #
Liteswitch is a not a new idea, it was in Mac 0S 9, but Watson you should sympathize with, it was revolutionary...
Posted 26 Oct 2003 at 5:05pm #
Because I saw Sherlock III before Dan Wood even began work on Watson, and because it looked pretty much just as it ended up. The only similarity the two really had - outside of the general concept* - was in the movie channel, and frankly, I can't think of another way to way to do the movie channel.
* Watson, of course, took the Sherlock ball and ran with it. Why Dan thought that the Sherlock team wasn't running with their own ball is beyond me.
Posted 26 Oct 2003 at 8:12pm #
Right on..... There are a bunch of whiners in the industry and it has to stop. You don't see Xerox crying about the "mouse", do you?
Posted 26 Oct 2003 at 11:58pm #
Erik, I don't read your blog much since you were censored. Are you still at Apple?
Posted 27 Oct 2003 at 7:37am #
To be perfectly honest, I had never heard of proteron much
less Liteswitch before the so called open letter was
released. Maybe I don't get out enough.
Posted 27 Oct 2003 at 9:36am #
Tying
Sam Caughron at Proteron wrote a memo to Apple complaining that Apple didn’t credit Proteron’s LiteSwitch X when it developed Panther’s Command-Tab application switcher. By Proteron’s own words: LiteSwitch has been called by so...
Posted 27 Oct 2003 at 12:38pm #
I've been using LiteSwitchX under Jaguar for awhile now and love it. The new feature in Panther is nothing like it and now that Proteron decided to whine about the Apple's new app switcher instead of making their own run under Panther, I'm done with Proteron.
Proteron didn't invent jack. They took an existing idea and made it better yes, but that does not imply invention.
Babies.
Posted 27 Oct 2003 at 1:14pm #
Sherlock 3 was in development for ages. Watson, afterall, was originally based on Sherlock. As for command-tabbing, personally, I prefer how it worked in Jaguar - where the icons in the Dock would become enlarged. I think that is much more consistent with the purpose of the Dock.
Phil Schiller brought up an interesting counterpoint to this whole argument - Apple was one of the first companies to come up with an integrated application called AppleWorks (not the AppleWorks that was formally ClarisWorks). So in theory, all the developers "stole" from Apple when they created their applications. Of course, we know this isn't the point. Competition is good, but Proteron's claim are fruitless. Even it is an exact duplication, there was no patent.
Moreover, Apple does give credit where its due. Recall System 8.5 (or was it called Mac OS 8.5 back then?) which had "50 new features" - they were all just shareware applications that Apple bought, and provided full credit to the creator in the About... box.
I also stand behind the argument that Apple wouldn't have to create their own software if developers did a better job of it. PowerPoint is good, but Keynote kicks its ass. Premier was good, but Final Cut Pro is much better and way more optimized on the Mac. AvidVideo was cumbersome, whereas iMovie put it all together.
OK, I'll get off my soap box now. hehe 🙂
Posted 27 Oct 2003 at 8:37pm #
John Gruber, sans TrackBack, weighs in. He links to this article and largely agrees.
Posted 28 Oct 2003 at 2:42pm #
Didn't Andy Hertzfeld contribute something of a AppSwitcher in 1985?
Posted 28 Oct 2003 at 7:03pm #
Funny you should ask.
Posted 28 Oct 2003 at 11:36pm #
Memo: Cry Babies Aren't Fun
One of the more useful features that I use daily while working under the Windows stranglehold is the alt-tab application switching. I freaking love it. Normally I have like 20+ applications/windows open at once and alt-tab is the fastest way...
Posted 30 Dec 2004 at 3:48pm #
The home page of a company I'd only ever heard of a few times before today has taken a potshot at Apple for stupid things, and I'm bored enough to take a few pot shots back. My text appears in...