The uncharacteristic silence from my keyboard is more apparent than real. I'm not blogging much because I'm in love with my iMac. After plugging it in I decided to see how much I could do without buying replacement software for all the things I'd enjoyed working with on my PC.We bought our first PC in 1990. It wasn't my first computer -- that had been a Commodore 64 back in 1985. But the PC was my first home office tool. The three commercial task-oriented pieces of software I bought for it were Adobe (then Aldus) Pagemaker for desktop publishing, CorelDraw for vector graphics and Finale for music publishing. I upgraded over the years, and eventually switched to PaintShop Pro for graphics, but otherwise stayed fairly loyal to my software and fairly consistent in what I used my computer for. I got into web publishing, video-editing and photo-editing and added bits of software for those things. More and more open source software, as it turned out. But the bulk of what I was doing was graphics and publishing.
In the meantime I had fallen in love with my iPod. And iTunes.
It dawned on me that the sorts of things I was doing with my computer, and had from the start, were the sorts of things that Macs were renowned for. I wasn't gaming, or crunching numbers. I wasn't buying tons of commercial software.
Then I saw a Mac ad at the moment that I was just beginning to think about the necessity of making the leap to a new PC, of leaving Windows XP behind and take on Windows 7. It was an epiphany moment. The timing was right for me.
My music publishing program, which I love and will never leave, is cross-platform, so that was the first thing I loaded. And it was really the only piece of commercial software I installed. Everything else has been open source, or included with the Mac, and it all functions so much better than the commercial PC software I'd been studiously upgrading for years. Gimp, iMovie, iPhoto and Scribus are keeping me happily busy learning to do things that I never imagined possible -- for free. This week I'm especially enamoured of Scribus which is so much more robust than Pagemaker ever was.
So yeah, I'm in love with my Mac. Forgive the blog silence.
Geesh this blog isnt just about you..I need something to read!! lol
ReplyDeleteI also love my Mac, having fought my DH giving me one for ages, because of my little Windows programs I liked using. I did pay for the Amazing Slowdowner, but it is better than the free thing I was using on Windows. itunes rules, and imovie is miles easier to use than the program I had before (and even turns video sideways for forgetful people who think the video function on our camera is still a camera and film portrait layout. :) I just need a really good vanilla (like text) editor that I can use for html like I used to use Notepad. The Mac equivalent is too clever and converts things I want left vanilla. And the program I did find can't handle half and quarter signs, which is awkward considering my kids' webpages are written by age in 3 month intervals: saying "3 years 3 months" as a page heading is very clumsy.
ReplyDelete"Once you go Mac, you never go back."
ReplyDeleteGlad you are enjoying your iMac :)
But IF you get a free few moments, a new blog post would be nice ;)
we are a Mac family and love 'em too...
ReplyDeletehappy new year to you and your family
nicola
Beccy,
ReplyDeleteI'd recommend TextMate (http://macromates.com/) as a good html editor. It's not free, but it's very nice for editing html, javascript, css, etc. I use it as often as I can.
There is a 30 day trial you can download to see if you like it.
Congratulations, we are a Mac family too. DH finally convinced me 3 years ago to switch and I've never looked back.
ReplyDeleteI have a mac as well:) Personally I have been playing with my new (to me) iphone that I am using as an ipod touch.
ReplyDelete