I've been trying to do all my regular stuff with this mac computer and get used to it. Of course there's a number of little "gotchas" to get over. Most are slight variations that don't make any more sense on one system than another. One that keeps tripping me up is the end button, or rather the lack of one. I mean, it's there on the mac's keyboard, pretty much right where I'm used to finding it. But I guess I've grown used to the button, you know, doing stuff.
Until this mac came along, I don't think I ever met a text editor in the past 20 years that didn't have the profoundly useful option of moving the cursor to the end of a line with one click on the humble end button. It's not some fancy shortcut that only ultimate geeks know, it's a basic function of text editing. So I'm a little surprised that mac folks have, for years I guess, just left that little end key sitting there without much to do. And that's the other thing that is surprising about it. I mean, it's called an end key. What else would it do?
Do mac folks have some sort of fear of the end key? I suppose it does sound kind of ominous. But by leaving it unassigned (as it is in XCode and Pages) really just makes it more ominous. I continue to press it out of habit, but I'm growing more nervous with each press. The computer does absolutely nothing when I press the end button - or at least nothing I can detect. But that just leaves me to worry that in fact it is counting down to some cataclysmic event with each press of the end key.
Macs are scary.
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I've never really needed the end button, but I suppose it could also be with your software. What word processing program are you using? Are you using the Mac keyboard? If so, maybe a Logitech, Microsoft or other Mac keyboard will solve your little problem?
ReplyDeleteMacs are really not scary, there just different. Learning some thing new always gives one a pain in the you-know-what? Hopefully, the more you use your Mac, the more you will get to know it, it's strengths and it's weakness's.
"I've never really needed the end button, but I suppose it could also be with your software. What word processing program are you using? Are you using the Mac keyboard? If so, maybe a Logitech, Microsoft or other Mac keyboard will solve your little problem?
ReplyDeleteMacs are really not scary, there just different. Learning some thing new always gives one a pain in the you-know-what? Hopefully, the more you use your Mac, the more you will get to know it, it's strengths and it's weakness's."
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First impression is important my friend. If there are people said Macs are scary, then they are, at least for these people. Y'know what, my experience of using a PC/Mac only started a decade ago, which means I'm still new to this computing world (no surprise since I came from a 3rd world nation). However, from my experience, Windows PC impresses me more than any Mac can do, except for the visual appearance on both hardware & software of course (of which Windows can easily overcome by installing some free 3rd-party transformation packs). A PC get my jobs done with little trouble as compared when using a Mac, and I also can do almost anything I could think of to do on a PC, from upgrading, overclocking, hardware/BIOS tweaking to case-modding, and most importantly, extensive gaming.
If Macs really for EVERYONE then Steve Jobs should REALLY think of reducing the price of a Mac and improve its upgradeability (which he might have to trade-off with the hardware's good-looking design). Having such premium-priced hardware only gives the impression of "Macs are only for the wealthy ones", especially for the people of the 3rd-world nation like me. That is one of the major reason why Macs draw people away.
In the PC world, there are already initiatives like the OLPC, US$100 PC as well as the netbook revolution to make PC more accessible to anyone, which greatly reduces the price of a fully-working PC with a large margin. Can a Mac do that, or should I ask will Apple do similar thing to bring Macs closer to average computer user? I don't think so, at least in the near future. Until Apple do that, I can confidently say that Macs will NEVER NEVER NEVER steal the market share from PCs.
(Phew! Sounds like I'm a guy who are totally pissed-off by a Mac)