TextEdit
As a Windows user, I always hated Wordpad, but early on, Notepad was too simplified for a lot of tasks - forcing me to use Word when I didn't exactly want to. The Windows 2000/XP version of Notepad fixed a lot of my complaints, and then Notepad became much more of a useful tool to me. I've seen a similar transition with OS X's TextEdit in Tiger, not to say that TextEdit wasn't already infinitely more capable than Notepad, but with Tiger, it has gone from a pretty impressive text editor to a more full-featured editor, while still maintaining the simplicity of TextEdit.To me, the biggest feature of TextEdit is the ability to now save to HTML. Not only will TextEdit save in HTML formats now, but the HTML saving options in TextEdit are options that I wish all applications which produce HTML had. You can select from strict or transitional HTML 4.01 or XHTML 1.0, and you can choose whether or not you want to use CSS. The HTML produced by TextEdit is just as simple and as clean as you'd expect from a text editor that still appears hardly intimidating. The only requirement for saving as HTML is that you need to be in TextEdit's rich text editing mode.
There's a new checkbox in the Save dialog box - "If no extension is provided, use .txt". That change is pretty self-explanatory.
Hitting the zoom button in TextEdit now seems to expand the window to the full width of the screen, instead of just zooming to a larger, better proportioned window. The button now acts as "maximize", which I don't like so much (surprisingly enough, because my first reaction to the zoom vs. maximize debate the first time I used OS X was that I missed the ability to maximize windows). You can get the same functionality as Panther's TextEdit by enabling Word Wrap, but when doing so, you get a fairly useless layout border around your text as seen below:
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Brian23 - Saturday, April 30, 2005 - link
Does Tiger Direct carry tiger?JarredWalton - Saturday, April 30, 2005 - link
11 - The Windows XP-64 write-up is in progress, as indicated on page 3. While I can't speak for Anand, the stuff I saw at WinHEC didn't give me any reason to upgrade just yet. Those pesky drivers still seem to have issues, and there are software applications that don't work properly right now. (Benchmarking apps in particular.)Unlike Panther to Tiger, the change from XP to XP-64 is literally just a change of architecture. Unless you're doing high-end computing or running servers and workstations, I think waiting for a few months is probably the best case scenario.
daniel1113 - Friday, April 29, 2005 - link
Check out the PearPC site for speed comparisons. Basically, PearPC runs at about 1/40th the speed of the host processor, so there is no comparison between native Mac hardware and and AMD or Intel equivalent.vailr - Friday, April 29, 2005 - link
Any comments on using Tiger 10.4 with the PearPC? Comparing speed on, for example, an AMD FX55 vs. speed on native Mac hardware?Thanks.
chennhui - Friday, April 29, 2005 - link
Why as a hardware review site doing a software review? May be include a windows 64bits in future? Mac to me is nothing but an expensive system full of eye candy that does run game well. A Powerbook G4 can't even run DOOM3. Lolslashbinslashbash - Friday, April 29, 2005 - link
You forgot to mention that there's a Family Pack of Tiger for $199. It's 5 licenses. Even with only 2 Macs (say, a desktop and a laptop), you're looking at a ~25% discount. Great for those who aren't students. With 3 Macs, you're already doing better than the student discount.Cygni - Friday, April 29, 2005 - link
Good piece, for sure. I think im gonna hold off on Tiger for my 15in Powerbook, even though i can get the student discount. The bugs and such kinda un-nerve me, and i cant really see myself using alot of the new features. Maybe after a few patches, i will move on up.Netopia - Friday, April 29, 2005 - link
Great job and interesting article Anand.You might want to correct the following typo though:
Like it or not, there is a lot that has changed in Tiger but obviously the question is whether or not it is worth the $129 entry [b]free.[/b]
I think you menat FEE.
Glad to see any review from YOU!
Joe
Atropine - Friday, April 29, 2005 - link
Yeah Jbog me too, don't want the wife seeing my porn browsing..........................Jbog - Friday, April 29, 2005 - link
"...Safari has grown old and now complains about those darn kids and their programs that they are downloading these days."Ha ha :)
"Private Browsing" -
If this feature is exclusive to Safari, how come no other browsers have thought of this before, I wonder. As a Firefox user, I find myself cleaning history, cache and other junk every so often.
* In second paragraph of Page 4 - Tiger: The Overprotective Parent?
"... to protect the user from him/her actions -"
should read "his/her"