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  Blog \Blôg\, n. [Jrg, fr. Jrg. "Web-log".
     See {Blogger, BlogSpot, LiveJournal}.]
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Saturday, August 3, 2002
13:47 - Just to cite an example...
http://www.dockfun.com

(top) link

As the philosophical battle rages over Watson and Sherlock 3, I have to call up the example of software like DockFun!.

This thing is the coolest piece of OS X-specific shareware I've run across. I haven't tried it out myself, but people who have used it tell me it's indispensable and oh-so-much-fun. Just watch the Flash intro on the website and see what I mean.

But while I was watching it, the only thing that was running through my mind was, "Wouldn't it be cool if Apple were to integrate this kind of functionality right into the system?"

Why would this leap to my mind? Why would I want to see something created by an innovative, fun-loving third-party shareware developer subsumed into the default OS, presumably without any recognition or compensation?

Because it seems like an obvious thing for people to want. And it's squarely in Apple's development path to incorporate this kind of technology.

When I think rationally about it, no, I wouldn't want to see the developer's efforts brought low by a corporate edict rendering it meaningless. But deep down, viscerally, all development of this type for the Mac community seems to me to be a part of a continuum-- whether it's by Apple or by an independent developer, it all seems to be toward the same goal: making the Mac rock.

And when that presents itself to be the goal, I just want to see it implemented in the most streamlined and elegant way possible (as an Apple-menu option, for instance, like the Location Manager, which switches your TCP/IP settings from location to location-- rather than as a Dock item taking up room)... and in the way that gets it in front of the most people possible. Everybody should have functionality like this. Just like everybody should have a menu-bar clock, WindowShade, and SOAP-based XML database access in customized client panes.

It'll take time, though. And just as I'm waiting still for Apple to incorporate all of the functionality that the Location Manager had under OS9 into OS X (adjusting your volume and power-management settings, as well as a whole bunch of other preferences, depending on whether you're at home or in the quiet office, for example), I'll wait however long it takes for them to enhance the Dock in this way. They've already put in the foundations, responding to customer requests-- allowing you to put the dock on the left or right, or to change the minimize behavior. So it's only a matter of time.

And until then, the DockFun! guy gets the vote of my money.

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© Brian Tiemann