Hey Levi,
I'm a small business I/T consultant - everything from strategic selection of I/T products and services through acquisition, installation, configuration and ongoing support. Target market is clients with fewer than 20 computer users. My clients are business from a variety of industries (http://www.interconnected.com/our-clients/ - not a great web site, but hey, I did it myself!!). I also have picked up quite a large number of single proprietorship home business and residential clients over the years. No idea about development environments on MacOS vs. Windows, but I'd be surprised if anything in that space on MacOS was superior to what's available on Windows - unless you're developing for the Mac, of course. There has always been a pretty high correlation between Palm use and Mac use. Many early- to mid-period Pilot/PalmPilot/Palm users were moderate to vehement Microsoft haters, and so they gravitated to "anything but Microsoft." Obviously that's not the case with me. Maybe the MacOS-based tools lend themselves better to WebOS development? I'm always troubled when people try to compare Windows XP, which was developed in the previous millennium (when the majority of my hair was still brown), with current MacOS systems. Both MacOS and Windows have grown considerably in the past 10 years: I think Win7 compares favorably with MacOS for looks, style and simplicity, and I think MacOS has improved greatly under the covers in that time (although there is still a lot of weirdness under the covers that dates back to the '80s). I think in recent times MacOS increased its market share from 4.3% to 4.6%, so it's seeing some growth (especially with high-end laptops), and it certainly capitalized (brilliant marketing) on the "if you're going to have to 'start over' anyway (as with the clean install that's required to go from XP to 7), you might as well start over with MacOS" concept, but I think that's died down with better (if goofy) ads for Windows 7 (which everyone else seems to like better than I do), and Apple's near-exclusive focus on the iPad (and practically no advertising for the Mac). Don't you just love Peter Coyote's voice in those iPad ads: "you already know how to use it" and "with more books than you can read in a lifetime" - brilliant! All very interesting stuff! Cheers, Don From: [email protected] [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of Levi Wallach Sent: Thursday, May 27, 2010 12:23 PM To: [email protected] Subject: Re: [Treo] Android Hey Don, Can I ask you what you do and who your clients are? I certainly agree that Apple is arrogant and Apple fanboys are ridiculous, but there are lots of people out there who are actually WebOS developers, and/or just web developers, and they seem all to opt for Mac. Could it be that for development that Mac is generally more reliable? I don't know. Maybe Windows 7 is almost or just as good as the current MacOS, but you probably couldn't say the same in terms of UI elegance for Vista, and certainly not for XP and prior. But who knows. I've been fine with Windows, but am curious as to why so many fellow developers (not graphic developers mind you but coders) have chosen Macs over PC's... Levi Wallach blog: http://twelveblackcodemonkeys.com tweet me @dvdmon (http://twitter.com/dvdmon) On Thu, May 27, 2010 at 1:51 PM, Don Ferguson <[email protected] <mailto:don%40ferguson.us> > wrote: > Hi Levi, > > > > It's just numbers. With 90% of the market, there is more "out there" for > Windows than there is for MacOS with under 5% of the market. Just numbers. > Not that the stuff on the Mac is "bad", just that for every one way of > getting something done on a Mac there are 10 ways on Windows. This gives > people / businesses / my clients more options / more flexibility. > > > > Same with Android's Marketplace vs. Palm App Catalog. 50,000 vs. 3,000. > And yes, same can be said about the Apple Store, but in that 200,000 there > are lots of near exact duplicates and non-English apps, so the comparison > is > more like 75,000 vs. 40,000, and Android is catching up fast in a way that > Palm's App Catalog is not. Android outsold Apple this past quarter, too, > so > that pace will accelerate. > > > > I agree about Apple's hardware being "overpriced" but I'm not absolutist in > this. Apple hardware is very overpriced *compared* to its hardware > reliability peers (it is no better than that of Toshiba, HP, etc. - the > "retail" computers out there). I'm talking reliability here, not beauty. > It is somewhat overpriced compared to the best in the industry for hardware > reliability - Lenovo and Dell - which are far more reliable than Apple (I'm > talking hardware here - the core of it all). With Windows 7 being close to > an equal for the Lenovo/Dell hardware, the current Windows package is > superior to Apple in reliability/stability, and approaching it in > aesthetics. No question Apple builds the most beautiful hardware/software > around, but that's not what my clients and I are looking for; or, at least, > we're not willing to sacrifice hard-earned dollars and base reliability for > it. That's why Apple lost in the marketplace and has only 4.6% of the > market. They have over 90% of the market in the most expensive laptop > category, but that's where the Apple fanboys and others live - willing to > pay whatever it takes to stay there, and happily visiting the (oh, so > humble) Apple Experts at the (oh, so humbly named) Genius Bar when displays > go out, keys fall off, wireless adapters fail, etc. etc. etc. > > > > My $0.02USD > > > > But I digress - Android vs. WebOS, round two, coming up next Friday! > Should > be fun! > > > > Cheers, > > Don > > > > From: [email protected] <mailto:treo%40yahoogroups.com> [mailto:[email protected] <mailto:treo%40yahoogroups.com> ] On Behalf Of Levi > Wallach > Sent: Thursday, May 27, 2010 5:43 AM > To: [email protected] <mailto:treo%40yahoogroups.com> > Subject: Re: [Treo] Android > > > > > > Don, > > I'm curious, why do you think Apple (or really the latest version of MacOS) > is "limited" compared to Windows 7? I'm a PC guy myself and used to think > of Macs as more for graphic designers and those without a lot of technical > savvy, but recently I've seen a ton of developers like myself using them > over pc's. I still think they are overpriced compared to the PC > counterparts, but I just don't know enough about them (or Windows 7 for > that > matter since I'm still using Vista), to understand why they are limited. > Sorry if this is off-topic > > To keep this on topic, I haven't played much with the Android OS myself, > but > what I see as its main advantage (for me) is its faster operation. A lot of > that is hardware but I'm sure a good part is the OS itself. It may be true > that the UI is more customizable as well, but I'm not sure. What I do know > is that the Homebrew community has done a lot to make things more > customizable (including some of the things you mention) via patches, and > have even help speed the device up. You may argue that this "hacking" > doesn't really count and that Android probably has a similar community - > actually a friend of mine has a Droid and he did tell me a little while > back > he was overclocking it to 1Ghz, but he didn't like the fact that the > scaling > was slow to take effect. > > In any case, I know you have always been curious about the latest devices > out there and have managed to try many of them for short periods, which I > suppose is a perfectly fair way to look at this. I'm still on contract > though and don't have the funds to put down a couple hundred or more on a > new phone anyway, but I'm sure I'll find a way if that's still the case > later in the summer of fall if a new WebOS device comes out! ;-) > > Levi Wallach > blog: http://twelveblackcodemonkeys.com > tweet me @dvdmon (http://twitter.com/dvdmon) > > On Thu, May 27, 2010 at 12:11 AM, Don Ferguson <[email protected] <mailto:don%40ferguson.us> > <mailto:don%40ferguson.us <don%2540ferguson.us>> > wrote: > > > Interesting. > > > > > > > > I think the comparison with MacOS and Windows 7 is backwards, though. The > > Pre is very much like Apple - beautiful, and limited. Android is much > more > > like Windows - almost as nice to look at, and much less limited. > > > > > > > > > > [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] > > > > > > [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] > > > > ------------------------------------ > > Yahoo! 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