Happy 10th Anniversary OS X!

[FanIn80]

Mac OS X celebrates it tenth birthday today. The groundbreaking operating sytem was introduced to the public on March 24, 2001. Mac OS X helped reverse Apple’s fortunes in the desktop PC market, and has underpinned a lot of Apple’s subsequent success. Most importantly, it spawned iOS, which runs today’s iPads and iPhones.

Below is the story of how OS X’s game-changing interface came about. The story gives some insight into corporate creativity at Apple. OS X’s interface started as a side project. But as soon as Steve Jobs got wind of it, it was fast-tracked. Jobs became intimately involved in its development — a scary prospect for the programmers working on it.

But the struggle wasn’t just in its development. Apple had to nail the switch from the old Mac OS to the new, or it could have sunk the company. Guess which ally was crucial to the transition — Apple’s old enemy, Microsoft.

With the launch of OS X, Jobs finally took the title of Apple’s permanent CEO. Prior to that he’d been the interim CEO, or iCEO, and OS X was the last major part of the company he needed to fix.

“We made the buttons on the screen look so good you’ll want to lick them.” — Steve Jobs, on Mac OS X’s user interface, in Fortune, January 24, 2000

OS X's 10th Anniversary is today. Here's an incredible look back at how it was made, and some of the iterations it has gone through over the decade. Even if you don't like Apple or Mac or whatever, just the background glimpse into the process itself is fascinating. Some of the decisions and stories in this article played a major role in one of the greatest turnarounds in business history.

http://www.cultofmac.com/how-mac-os-...iversary-story

[Hack&Lube]

I never get tired of Steve Jobs the used car salesman, but he sure knows how to sell the things to the public that people want.

“We made the buttons on the screen look so good you’ll want to lick them.” - Steve Jobs

Most of the article was about Aqua (yeah, it looked like candy, of course I wanted to lick it) which I couldn't stand along with the entire Apple design ethos from GUI to industrial design. It's still highly unpleasant as ever (to me) today, although I loved the big black boxes and straight edges of Jobs' NeXT cubes.

I've recently been playing with Linux distros, especially Ubuntu (already a brilliant interface out of the box but still a little too rounded and a little too orange) and really appreciate the ability to completely tweak every last bit of the interface extremely easily to be exactly how anybody wants it.

I do always like reading the stories from the transitional era at Apple when Jobs came back in and cut everyone down to size. It was like a King returning to his kingdom to reign in terror but he got the job done.

[You Need a Thneed]

10 years, and they still haven't released OS 11...

[Russic]

Just watching the video in the article of Steve announcing OSX. Were they using comic sans in their presentations? Seems really out of place for such a design focused company. Also notice they use the same gradient background slides for the presentation.

[Hack&Lube]

Originally Posted by Russic

Just watching the video in the article of Steve announcing OSX. Were they using comic sans in their presentations? Seems really out of place for such a design focused company. Also notice they use the same gradient background slides for the presentation.

People always give Apple design too much credit. They have very simplistic monolithic themes and just apply them to everything.

1999-2000 was a strange time for Apple. They were going after the whole candy/gel/cute/translucent/friendly plastic/fisher price look to their computers and software. The font and presentation fits into that theme because they were trying desperately to reinvent themselves and differentiate themselves from the rest of the business by being more consumer friendly and "cute" for a lack of a better word. This was before the iPod and Apple wasn't as financially stable and Jobs coming back was seen as radical. Since then, you can see the designs being clawed back to a minimalist/modern/professional look which is for the better. At the time though, it put money into Apple's pockets as more families and schools and previous non-computer users bought iMacs and iBooks, etc. for the new fangled thing of surfing the net, etc. You have to remember the state of computer and internet adoption only 10 years ago was radically different.



^^^
This is another reason why OSXI maybe needs to come out because the current aqua evolved designs were still conceptualized to match the hardware scheme when it used to look like that!

[Hack&Lube]

I know I rag on Apple's design (I really don't like it, I think it's cold and boring and for mass consumption and uninteresting) but remember, we're talking 1999/2000.

Aqua was a hundred years ahead of this:

YUCK

[sclitheroe]

Originally Posted by Hack&Lube

I know I rag on Apple's design (I really don't like it, I think it's cold and boring and for mass consumption and uninteresting)

What are some examples of design in the industry that you do like? Serious question, I'm genuinely curious.

[Hack&Lube]

Originally Posted by sclitheroe

What are some examples of design in the industry that you do like? Serious question, I'm genuinely curious.

As far as mainstream industry OSes? None. They are boring and uninspired and generic but that's what you have to do for the mass market right? Some of the Linux distros look pretty good out of box though.

Here are some examples of what I like, mostly user customized Linux. One rule is that I really can't stand most icons as they often don't follow a good rigid design scheme and many look cartoony and unprofessional and idiosyncratic with each other.





I've been trying out a few different distros with Oracle VMBox. I'm liking Ubuntu although it's a pretty fresh install, I haven't done much with it.


My WinXP music production and gaming machine because that's what my licenses were for and there was more legacy software I needed that had 64-bit problems. I thought all the icon dock software out there was boring so I made my own custom shapes. Still way too busy and too many icons though. I need to delete the upper dock and remove a bunch of it.



I haven't had a Windows 7 system for a few months so I can't get any screens. Waiting for a new Sandy Bridge laptop after recall delays to install 7 Enterprise and other virtualizations on it.

Now if we're talking about industrial design, that's a different matter, there's so much more stuff out there that is more interesting than a piece of folded, rounded, textured, aluminum but I totally understand if you like that look. The centered Apple logo always bugs me though, because they always put it smack dab center and that's usually the last place you want to place something in good design. MacBook Airs are actually quite beautiful without it.

[MrMastodonFarm]

Threads like this remind me that no matter hoe geeky about things I get, I'll never be as geeky as Hack&Loob.

[Hack&Lube]

Originally Posted by MrMastodonFarm

Threads like this remind me that no matter w geeky about things I get, I'll never be ax geeky as Hack&Loob.

And nomatter how geeky things get, I can always count on you and Yeah_Baby to tag team me (I can totally see you two going: "high-five! burn!") along the way. It's nice to feel special.

[MrMastodonFarm]

Originally Posted by Hack&Lube

And nomatter how geeky things get, I can always count on you and Yeah_Baby to tag team me (I can totally see you two going: "high-five! burn!") along the way. It's nice to feel special.

That's not fair, we only high five when FanIn80 gets zinged.

[Hack&Lube]

Originally Posted by MrMastodonFarm

That's not fair, we only high five when FanIn80 gets zinged.

A worthy cause, gentlemen.