Feb 00 Viewpoint
Volume Number: 16
Issue Number: 2
Column Tag: Viewpoint
Macworld SF 2000 Show Report
by Jordan Dea-Mattson and John C. Welch
Once a year, tens of thousands of Macintosh enthusiasts descend on San Francisco to
hear Steve Job's state-of-the-Mac address, to see the latest technologies in action, and
play with the wonderful new solutions provided by third party supporters of the
Macintosh platform. This year was no exception, as show management announced over
85,000 enthusiasts attended MACWORLD Expo 2000 and hundreds of great new
products and technologies were there to meet them.
To give our readers the most complete show report, MacTech has asked two reporters
to provide us with show reviews based on their individual and very different
experiences and perspectives. The first show report is by Jordan Dea-Mattson, a
former Apple insider and long time supporter of Macintosh development. The second is
by John C. Welch, an experienced system administrator and IS professional. Their
combined report presents a summary of MACWORLD Expo for those of us behind the
box, a view of MACWORLD Expo from the perspectives of developers and system
administrators.
What a Difference a Year Makes
A year ago, I was the consummate insider, fully plugged into what Apple and many
developers were doing at MacWorld due to my position as a Technology and Relationship
Manager (Evangelist for all of you old timers) in Apple Worldwide Developer
Relations.
Its a year later, and I am now "just another developer" and member of the press,
reading the news and rumor sites on the web and waiting anxiously for MacWorld San
Francisco to roll around, so that I can catch the latest and greatest.
And I wasn't the only one with a different perspective this year. Despite the successful
launch of the iMac, a year ago, many members of the press still felt that "beleaguered
and "Apple" belonged together like "ham" and "eggs". A year later, only the most fringe
analysts and pundits are painting a picture of an Apple that will be going away any time
in the near future.
In addition to the analysts, press, and pundits, many in the developer community had a
difference in perspective this year. While there is still some justifiable level of
skepticism about Apple's ability to stick to a strategy and deliver the goods over the
long run, no one was seen fleeing for the exits as many were in recent years.
The Fun is Back!
This MacWorld was the most fun of any in a long time. It wasn't that the show itself
was overwhelmingly fun - though it had its moments, but rather that it pointed to a
future for Apple and the Mac that was fun.
Just looking at the user interface for Mac OS X or playing with the new apple.com web
site - more on these two later - demonstrates the renewed sense of playfulness and
whimsy that has been missing for far too long.
Like a Pixar movie, which can be watched and thoroughly enjoyed by anyone from age
2 to 100, the new Mac experience is best expressed as serious and powerful tools that
are fun to use. Tools that capture that childhood sense of discovery and play that is
what drives so many of us. It was these attributes that attracted many of us to Apple
and the Mac in the first place. And it was the memory of them that sustained many of us
during the darkest moments of the last-half decade.
For this reason, it is with all respect that I shout: "the fun is back!
Mac OS X - In Our Lifetime
Mac OS X has had a difficult and painful gestation to date. From its genesis as Rhapsody
it has been - often rightfully so - greeted with skepticism and even - if we most be
honest - a little ridicule.
These attitudes seem to be changing. And changing for good reason. Apple has shipped
two developer releases of Mac OS X and in Steve Jobs' keynote at MacWorld
demonstrated a compelling pre-release of Mac OS X and its new user experience.
In his keynote demonstrations of Mac OS X, Steve Jobs demonstrated a number of
features of Mac OS X. The two demos that caught my eye most intensely, were the
various demonstrations of the Quartz graphics engine and of the Classic, Carbon, and
Cocoa APIs.
Working on Quartz are some of the hottest and smartest graphics programmers in the
software industry, and it shows. The Quartz demos that we saw showed a graphics
engine that isn't just "What-You-See-Is-What-You-Get", but rather,
"What-You-See-Is-What-You-Want." With its snappy on-the-fly rendering,