The talking around the practical water cooler these days among the Mac developer crowd is all about the forthcoming Mac App Store . Announced on Wednesday by Steve Jobs , this store will extend the current Io App Store concept to Mac OS X.
software program developers are of two minds about this twist of events : Many see the Mac App Store as creating a new , level playing field among developer where low and large companies likewise will be capable to present their wares to Mac users . But there ’s an revelatory pains of opinion name the rounds as well . Some people see this as the first step toward a completely unopen Apple ecosystem where , in the near time to come , you will only be able-bodied to purchase Mac software program from Apple . In this1984 - esque scenario , Apple has already become magnanimous Brother , and is just waiting for the right time to exercise the atomic number 26 grip of shogunate .
But , as often , the truth most probable lies somewhere between the two extreme point . The El Dorado of the App Store live only for a small bit of developers . While some in high spirits - visibility companies have done very well sell iOS apps , the majority have not . This level playacting field will benefit those who have really secure political platform to sell , and the Mac App Store — while it may not have any fart apps — will likely be inhabit with a hatful of second-rater . Apple ’s guideline for the Mac App Store are quite restrictive ; perhaps less so than those for iOS apps , but still enough that many current Mac programswon’t be approved without large changes being made . And many best - selling Mac program simply ca n’t meet the conditions that Apple is imposing .
However , the Mac App Store may be an excellent idea for users . Buying , installing and updating Mac package can be a headache . Those who apply iOS devices have check just how easy such undertaking can be ; why not fetch this system to Mac OS X ? For most people , anything that makes their life gentle is a honorable thing .
So , if that ’s the case , why would n’t orchard apple tree shift the Mac OS to a closed poser , where the only computer software you may buy is from the Mac App Store ? I think the response would be so gaudy that the company would never be able to make such a change . I do think , however , that , in a few years , Apple will offer a Mac that works on the nose like that .
think a MacBook or iMac that sits somewhere in between the iPad and the current Mac intersection seam . This would be a stripped - down Mac — perhaps with less entrepot and a slower processor — that consort a rendering of iOS that is more sophisticated than the touch - concealment variation , but that is nothing like Mac OS X. ( Call it xOS perhaps ? ) Users would not see folders , or even file ; as with the iOS , the file system would disappear , and you would access your files from program , not from a Finder - like utility . And this Mac would not allow external software installation . Apple would still trade “ veritable ” computers , but would allow anyone who want this closed approach to use it . ( Apple could also offer this functionality to parents or administrator who want to rick it on on any Mac , alike to the “ Simple Finder ” feature article currently uncommitted in Parental Controls . )
I remember this would be a very democratic computing gadget . Not among the geeky blog - reading crew , who already grovel when discussing the Mac App Store , but among average computer drug user who want to get things done and do so as simply as possible . “ Simplify , simplify , ” said Henry David Thoreau ; this could be a mantra that Apple adopts as well . Such an melodic theme could make another new production family for Apple , standardised to that make with the iPad , and commercialise as a novel fashion of working with computers .
Who would want a computer like that ? Parents , so their youngster could have a really good computation environment . Businesses , to ensure that employee ca n’t install any software , or even bring potentially dangerous file cabinet onto a Mac . Your grandmother , who may never have used a figurer , and who would be frighten away by files , folders and windows . And many more masses , who see a computer as a tool , rather than something to fiddle with and customize . My boy the geek would hate it ; my married woman would believably love it .
Some see this as a slippery incline that Apple has embarked on and that will kill of the computer as we know it today . Others see this as a new way of working with figurer , which become appliances rather than complicated tools . Which approach path will win out ? prison term will tell .
