Installing Tiger
Originally posted 2005-04-30 06:03:11
Posted Saturday, April 30, 2005
Yesterday evening, I hustled my children into our mini-van to run errands. Since my wife had already left for the weekend, I reasoned that I’d have plenty of time last night, after getting the children to bed, to install Tiger, so I decided to make a Tiger purchase part of the errands. \”Where are we going?\” they chorused. \”To Blockbuster, to take back some movies, and then to CompUSA,\” I replied. I didn’t explain further, not out of any desire to conceal the nature of our mission, but because I figured they really didn’t care.
We got to CompUSA earlier than I would have hoped: 5:35 or so. One of the first things we saw was a big sign for Tiger, indicating it would be available at 6:00. Suddenly, my 11-year-old son Tyson began to giggle, looking at me as if he’d caught me picking my nose or walking down the street naked. \”You are a nerd!\” he shrieked. \”You’re standing in line to buy a computer program!\” I had no adequate rebuttal, so I ignored him.
From the back of the store, in what appeared to be a training room, the glow of several monitors seeped through a metallic fringe draped across the doorway. A sign above the door proclaimed the room a Tiger’s cage. Two of my daughters (Mallory and Camie, 7 and nearly 4, respectively), became giddy, wanting to see the tiger. \”Is it going to jump out? When are we going to see it? I want to see the tiger!\” they said as they bounced, Tigger-like, toward the back of the store. I explained many times that the \”Tiger Cage\” housed no real animal, but only a computer program (my audience required that I ignore the whole \”operating system\” vs \”computer program\” distinction), but they ignored me as effectively as I’d ignored Tyson.
We milled about the store, with Tyson occasionally mocking me with a countdown (\”Only 12 more minutes, Dad. Are you so excited?\”) and Jacob (9) zoning out on the Xbox display. Finally, Tyson ridiculed me with the last-seconds play-by-play: \”5 . . . 4 . . . 3 . . . 2 . . . 1!\” About 10 people filed through the metallic drapery into the room, where they handed us entry forms for a 1GB iPod Shuffle and pontificated on Tiger and their related offerings (new Macs, open box Macs, training). They had a table laden with drinks, chips, and tiger-striped cookies. Jacob left the Xbox and ran in to join the excitement, so we were wedged among the other Tiger lovers, far from the boxes of Tiger. Since my only interest was to grab Tiger (well, I did make sure to fill out the Shuffle entry form), I finally threaded my way through the other shoppers and grabbed a box full of Tiger. Leaving the room posed a bit of a challenge, as my children had spied the food table and decided it had been set up exclusively for them. I told them they could each have a cookie (except for Tyson, not as punishment for his earlier derision, but because he doesn’t do sugar), and we pushed our way back out of the room.
Our hasty retreat caused two tense moments: first, no one had thought to grab a cookie for Leila (18 months), and she noticed. I dispatched Jacob back into the Tiger Cage to right the wrong. Then, Mallory said, \”Look, Daddy, the cookie is in the shape of an apple. Hey! Someone took a bite out of this one!\” I narrowly averted a tearful meltdown by rushing her over to the logo on the side of a nearby G5 tower to demonstrate that someone had taken a bite out of all of them.
Our exit proceeded with only one incident: Camie had sneaked a Care Bears DVD into the cart, so I bought that, too. We then went home and ate chicken wings and watched the new Lemony Snicket movie.
After sending the children to bed, I backed up my home directory to DVD, and then started the installation. I watched TV while it ran, so I don’t really know how long it took. Nothing noteworthy occurred, and after awhile I was up on Tiger.
I haven’t noticed much difference yet. I don’t see the attraction of the new Mail.app interface, and any thought of using Spotlight as a Quicksilver or Butler replacement quickly fled, as it’s not quite fast enough for that purpose. Besides, the entries jump around just enough to flummox mindless selection, which is what I really want from a quick launcher. I’m not sure yet how I’ll resolve the Spotlight hotkey vs Eclipse hotkey conflict (yes, I know I can remap Spotlight’s, but I haven’t yet decided what to remap it to). One mild amusement came when I launched Eclipse: my cursor, which turned to the spinning beach ball, happened to be positioned perfectly to dot the \”i\” on the Eclipse splash screen. I left it there until Eclipse finished launching, and reflected how simple, really, are the pleasures I note these days.
I already suffer from Dashboard-aholism. I’ve got the World Clock set to Melbourne time so I can track my parents. I installed Wikipedia. The sticky note is up for any quick messages, replacing my fledging courtship with Sidenote. I don’t need much out of a quick note taker, as I use StickyBrain for anything serious. I’ve got the calendar, calculator, weather, address book, and dictionary widgets on my Dashboard screen. I’ve still got space for about three more widgets, so I’m open to ideas.
I probably won’t get much out of Safari’s RSS support, as I read RSS feeds during the day when I’m on a Windows box at work. I’m exploring Spotlight’s search capabilities, and it appears I’ll use them extensively (just not for launching applications). I’ll need to remap the hotkey soon, before I get used to it. Probably F5–\”Find\” in Brief. A quick jaunt into System Preferences . . . now it’s mapped to F5, and I’ve turned off Applications. Simple.
I write this blog in StickyBrain, storing it amongst all my other notes. It works well, though it lacks the ability to post right to a blog, so I have to play the cut-and-paste routine to post anything. I’ve flirted with blogging apps like ecto, but I simply don’t want to go to another application to do my blog, no matter how facile the app. It’s staying in StickyBrain. Sadly, StickyBrain’s anemic AppleScripting capabilities haven’t afforded a way for me to use AppleScript to post to my blog from it. I’m hoping Tiger’s new Automator might step in here, but I really haven’t looked at it yet.
I haven’t even brought up Xcode 2.0 yet, though I’ve tried a few other apps (including Windows XP under Virtual PC 7), and everything seems to work perfectly. In sum, Tiger appears to have done no harm, and has added functionality that I’ll use. I’m glad I bought it.
My children have awaken, so I’m off to change diapers and cook pancakes. Here’s hoping I don’t get the two confused.