WWDC Steve-Note 2007 - The good about disappointment

Well, Steve Jobs gave another great presentation at WWDC this. As usual, people are a bit disappointed about the announcements regarding MacOS X Leopard.

The announcements (updated finder, ical, 64-bit, etc etc) are boring. For the consumer, it SHOULD be boring despite Apple needing to find a way to make it exciting. Now, I understand we don't want it to be boring - we want a lot of new toys for our $129. However, operating systems should not be too much about the bells and whistles. I heard some podcasts reviewing some of these changes and they were disappointed in things like how the finder works and how they'll continue to use 3rd party apps. As a developer, I say "that's wonderful! Go ahead and buy those third party apps". OSs have to be the lowest common denominator AND there has to be room for developers to extend the system for power users. So, I'm fine that some people think it's not enough. But then, that's not everyone.

On the other hand, the most important thing about an OS is how developers interact with it. Now, that's cold comfort for the consumer, but it's true. Most of the features announced has two purposes: marketing to consumers, marketing to developers. Marketing for consumers is always going to be weak when it comes to mature and maturing OSs. Look at Vista. But both Leopard and Vista show off much of the 'under-the-hood' tech in their everyday use. That is for the developer.

Never-the-less, I think Leopard is shaping up and I look forward to it's release come October and I will be happily upgrading.