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Macs and GPS - please sign the online petition


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A retailer GPS equipment is looking for respondents to an " online petition to increase support for the Mac platform among manufacturers of GPS equipment. The site reads:

"As you browse through the GPS products and software we carry on our website, you will note that the vast majority of the products are all PC based, with no support for Apple products. Delorme currently is the only manufacturer selling mapping software that is Mac based.

"We have talked in the past with the manufacturer's of the GPS products about providing Apple compatibility. We even offered to assist them by allocating our own resources to get the job done. But to no avail. They always cite 'lack of development resources' and 'not enough market share' to make it worthwhile.

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I signed the petition. I also wanted to note a couple of good, ongoing third-party efforts on software: MacSimpleGPS and Magellan Waypoint Manager.

 

In addition, Mac OS X's Unix underbelly means you can (with some initial effort) run GPSbabel and other utilities.

 

I agree that more OEM and third-party support is sorely needed.

 

JCR

 

--

Flat_MiGeo_A88.gif

"I saw two shooting stars last night,

I wished on them--but they were only satellites!

Is it wrong to wish on space hardware?

I wish, I wish, I wish you'd care."

--Billy Bragg, "A New England"

 

[This message was edited by Team Shredded Bark on August 11, 2003 at 12:32 PM.]

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I signed it -- I use both, but really prefer MAC. Part of the problem is that it's a Catch 22-- Mac is number two because there isn't software for Macs, but because there isn't software, Mac is number two. Oh, and a lot of people who have never used the MAC, or remember it as the old 1980's APPLEs, are vociferous in their protestations against MACs. If we compared DOS to modern-Windows, would we argue in favor of DOS? Once, my sister, a PC snob emailed me with "Can a Mac write programs in Borland?", and I replied, "Can you?" She never emailed back on that topic. Now with Unix and OS X, what's the big deal?

 

"All of us are standing in the mud, but some of us are looking at the stars." Oscar Wilde

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quote:
Originally posted by Metaphor:

If we compared DOS to modern-Windows, would we argue in favor of DOS?


I would. DOS worked. It still does. DOS doesn't blue-screen or lock up for no apparent reason. DOS applications typically have a small footprint (disk and RAM) and do their job well. Installing a new version of DOS didn't require a complete system upgrade. You never had to reinstall the OS because the DOS registry got corrupted. Uninstalling a program in DOS was a matter of deleting a directory and didn't leave a bunch of garbage files and registry entries. DOS never tried to plug and pray^Wplay the same device every time the system booted. I could go on forever...

 

--

Pehmva!

 

Random quote:

sigimage.php

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-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----

Hash: SHA1

 

Re: DOS versus the Blue Screen of Death:

 

My Mac (OS X) here at work has never crashed.

 

I leave it running 24-7, use it hard all day, and I have only

rebooted when required after installing system updates. Yes, the

occasional application hangs or unexpectedly quits (usually MS Office

for Mac, ahem) but it has never brought down the system--you just

kill the app that hung go on as if nothing happened.

 

My home Mac did have 1 to 2 crashes per week (well, they're called

"Kernel Panics" but they are the functional equivalent of the Blue

Screen of Death), until I figured out that it had a bad (generic) RAM

DIMM. I replaced it with (more expensive) Kingston RAM and now it

never crashes either.

 

It's the stingy one who pays the most.

 

Having used Windows and earlier versions of the Mac OS before, I

probably would have accepted 1 crash per week as normal and perfectly

acceptable if I hadn't seen the rock-steady performance of the work

Mac.

 

I believe this rock-solid system stability is a direct result of it

being Unix under the hood.

 

My point? We should demand better from our computers and software. We

should all buy Macs, if only to spur Microsoft to do a better job. It

is possible to design and build a stable system.

 

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Version: PGP 8.0.2 - not licensed for commercial use: www.pgp.com

 

iQA/AwUBQKJ2OEcrpacku1SeEQKnmACdFtNYQmNyOfKfGGLBliNMBQcKdY4An1ZF

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I signed the petition. I am a member of standing in the "Macs Rights" community, and I abhor the prejudiced treatment Mac owners receive.

 

I don't have a Mac myself, but I've definitely had issues with my PC. The ultimate problem with Windows is similar to the old bromide, "The boss is never wrong." You know, even though the boss is wrong, he'll never admit it. He'll sidestep, point fingers and pontificate. That's what Windows does. There's always a million other problems that aren't related to Windows. Check your device drivers, check your newly installed programs, defragment your hard drive, reboot three times, start up in safe mode, disable your graphics card etc. etc.

 

Then again, when I think of all of my gizmos, devices and equipment and rate how close they are to doing what you expect them to do, namely, work. My computer is actually well above average. Almost nothing works like it is supposed to. Including me. Hehe, especially me! I'm supposed to be working right now!

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My Mac (OS X) here at work has never crashed.

 

I leave it running 24-7, use it hard all day, and I have only

rebooted when required after installing system updates.

 

I believe this rock-solid system stability is a direct result of it

being Unix under the hood.

 

My point? We should demand better from our computers and software. We

should all buy Macs, if only to spur Microsoft to do a better job. It

is possible to design and build a stable system.

 

Not to argue with anyone, but just to point out that...

 

At work I use and have around me many tens of computers. All of them run 24/7. Many of them are most of the time at 100% processor. None of them crashes, almost never (i probably see one - two actual system crashes a year) .

 

All of them are PC's, not MAC!

 

But... strangely no virus risks, minimal security issues, no 2 critical security updates per month, the OS and the soft is amost entirely free, and IS UNIX... maybe you guessed it, is Linux.

 

I like macs a lot... but the reality is that you don't need to change computer... the problem is not the PC. The problem is Microsoft.

Mac OS X was probably what Apple did, when they realized that Linux was spreading (even if the core of OS X is not linux), and saw the reasons why it was spreading: stability, security and efficiency. As usual for Apple, it was a clever move.

 

When (is not an IF) the competition will become strong enough, Microsoft will hopefully spend some money in producing a decently secure operating system...

 

Ciao

 

Acaro fo Team TAR

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Funny, but when I use a Mac I stress it to the max usually. Artwork will do that. PC's have the blue screen of death, but Macs just lock up dead. The only solution is a hard restart. Both occurrences are equally frustrating. PC's are great with numbers; Mac's are great with graphics.

 

Wow, pretty old topic. Only 7,630 signatures. B)

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