This is the story of a guy and an operating system. Said guy loves to reformat his computer and reinstall said operating system, but whenever he does it, he seems to change his routine around. He asks the audience to validate his claims, hoping that he’s not the only one with this “problem.”
While I attempt to write one or two more update posts (one on the recent Revyver release, Django Plugables, and one on the state of Revyver), I thought I’d pose a question that has been in the back of my mind for quite a while.
When you reformat or reinstall your operating system, does the way you use it change?
What I mean by that is quite simple, but I think I can best explain it by answering it. It seems like every time I reinstall OS X, it’s never for a concrete reason that would say, hold up in a geek talk. It’s usually something along the lines of,
Well, I probably have too much crap in my Library folder left by all those MacHeist apps I was “conned” into buying.
But recently, I’ve liked the excuse to start anew. I could have sworn that Spaces would have become a necessary part of my workflow ever since I first saw Chris Messina using Virtue Desktops at the first SuperHappyDevHouse (have there really been like 20 since then?). My foray into Virtue didn’t work so well and, as it seems like during this last refresh, Spaces didn’t quite stick for me either.
I also seem to have an obsession with not wanting to use 3rd-party programs unless they are required beyond a reasonable doubt. Like, I won’t install Quicksilver because I’m perfectly happy with Spotlight’s application launching functionality. A lot of it also has to do with the way applications look. Forget how useful they are, if that logo sucks, I won’t use it. Tell me to get the stick out of my ass, but it’s stuck. But I’ll save that little bit for another post.
So now it’s your turn? Am I the only one who seems to have this obsessive compulsive disorder? Or are there others in the same boat? I hope so, since it feels a bit lonely in here. :(
I think that you my friend have a problem, and amitting to that is the first step to recover :D. But if you really look at it… I think that you come to a point as a power user, that you feel you have justifiable reasons for doing silly things on the equipment you use everyday. You start to worry about storage, cpu cycles and general usefulness of programs on your machine. Avg computer users don’t care about the fact that spotlight can now perform the same task as quicksilver once did. It’s more about install and forget for the users, normally resulting in bloated computer which power user have to come and fix for them. As for the icon thing…well you just have issues, a whole news stand of them.
I do have a similar “problem” whenever I re-install an OS. My workflow does change completely because I realize a golden opportunity to set things up properly that were previously hacked together.
I don’t think it was until the third time I installed Leopard that I decided I absolutely could not live without Time Machine. Spaces still alludes me however.
As for the icon thing in 3rd party apps. I completely agree. If the icon looks terrible, I won’t even think about installing the product. I’ve even gone so far as to begin changing Apple’s app icons. Such as Mail and Safari to something more attuned to my liking.
But what’s this about not installing Quicksilver?! I think you’ve gone too far Bryan. Of course, if all you ever used it for was launching apps, I guess I wouldn’t install it either as Spotlight in Leopard is fantastic.
Me on the spot! I really must say I can relate to all of the said things.
PS. I think you’ll want to turn off debugging in your Python-powered blog.
I am very much the same way. :) Oh, and I’m a Windows user.
I used to do that with Windows, in fact I’d make it a point to do it at least once a year just to get everything cleaned up. But that’s not my reason for posting.
I have a co-worker who has reformatted and reinstalled the OS on his macbook every day for the last two months. He’s alternating between Ubuntu and Leopard, he installs it, finds something he doesn’t like, finds a suitable solution on the other OS, and then starts over. By the time he’s done he’ll have the perfect OS for his use, but the way he’s going it’ll be years by the time he gets to that point!
That’s exactly why I kept the article OS-agnostic. :)
I had the same thing going on with my PC. Wanted to play games on it, but I wanted to run Xubuntu, so I would keep going back and forth between running games in Wine and then getting fed up with it and going back to Windows. Now I dual boot, having Xubutu as my development server and Windows XP as my “gaming rig,” (in quotes because it is FAR from that).
As for Quicksilver, yes, all I used it for was launching applications. My mind sometimes prefers to take the long way when doing things and even if I do find shortcuts to do the same thing, I’ll likely fail in assimilating them into my workflow.
I haven’t done a completely fresh OS install in a long time - Leopard was a straight Upgrade Install on top of the factory install of 10.4 that came with my MBP nearly 18 months ago.
Now, I totally see the use in starting over (you lose lots of cruft in the process, and the computer is always faster because of it), and I’ve done it many times in the past — I just find fewer reasons to lately. That said, now that I’m doing more dev stuff on my MBP, I’m running into weird issues that will likely require a clean install to solve.
But not installing Quicksilver? I mean, jesus dude, Spotlight is so much slower than Quicksilver even as an app launcher (which is 99% of what I use QS for). I just did a few quick tests, and launching an app from Spotlight is at least 3 times slower on average than with Quicksilver.
Speed man, SPEED. ^_^
P.S. For the love of all things sacred and holy, please add a “Remember me?” checkbox to this comment form. Just because I can type “superfluousbanter.org” fast and sans typos, doesn’t mean I want to all the time ;)
I reinstall Windows (gasp — I know) maybe once a year. Starting fresh just feels good. Of course, there’s a lot of work in reinstalling, drivers, etc. But it’s worth it.
Also, I don’t think you’re the only one judging apps by their icon — I think it’s just a bad designer habit. (Or you could argue, not so bad)
And yes, Dan hit the nail on the head; remember me would be a big plus for this form.
I So Aggree i use norton goast (bad spellr) every 6 mths.
I know exactly what you’re talking about. When I had a PC, I used to reinstall my Windows and Linux partitions once a semester. I haven’t yet reinstalled OSX since I got a Mac, but I still know where you’re coming from…especially with the appearance of apps. I can be a quick judge of an application just based on how it looks. Take jEdit for example. It’s a great text editor, but the look and feel drives me nuts.
Dropping apps for their ugly icons is ok, I’m platform switching for the ugliness of Windows (among other things).
I always consider if I really need the program before I install it. I like a clean computer and I really need that the application looks good, is easy to use and feel Mac. Good looking icons is a must too. But Mac feel and functionality comes first.
I recently installed Things. Love that app, helps me out a lot.
It’s funny because I’m just preparing to wipe OS X for a clean install of Leopard. I can feel it slowing down and my Mac is in need of some pruning.
Ditto on the app icons. While I might not go as far as to not use it if the icon is bad, it definitely won’t be seen in my Dock.