November 5, 2003

I'll Have One Democratic Party On the Rocks

Here's the bitter brew this morning, nicely served neat by Stephen Green at VodkaPundit - Chill Before Serving

In 2000, Democrats lost a nailbiter to George W. Bush. They comforted themselves by claiming a "stolen" election, and by recapturing the Senate the next summer – because one senator switched from Republican to Independent.

Two years later, Democrats lost two Senate seats, and control of the Senate. Contrary to all historical expectations, they even lost six seats in the House. But they comforted themselves knowing they'd picked up a couple of governorships, winnowing the Republican lead to 24-23.

Last month, Democrats lost control of the California governorship to Arnold Schwarzenegger, but comforted themselves with the knowledge that "hey, even we don't like Gray Davis."

As of today, Democrats will control only 21 states – with Republican-leaning Louisiana yet to be decided. Perhaps the Democrats will find some comfort next week in Baton Rouge

Let's not forget that governor's mansions are the breeding grounds for future presidents. Bush 43, Clinton, Reagan, and Carter were all governors before becoming President. Every Senator may "look in the mirror and see a future President," but other than Kennedy, can you name one Senator this century who made the jump right into the White House? There's damn little comfort to be found there.

Posted by Vanderleun at November 5, 2003 8:18 AM
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In building your amazing Aqua application, one of the most important things to consider is the Dock. There are three things your app needs to be "Dock Compliant." Now, I write this knowing that the Dock will be going through some major changes soon, but for the most part, these should still hold true.

Posted by: Lionel at January 13, 2004 3:26 AM

Drawers. Similar to Sheets, this is a "child" window that gives users access to items that do not always need to be present. But when do you use a drawer and when do you use a palette?

Posted by: Justinian at January 13, 2004 3:26 AM

If an application is designed well, the reward for users is that they will learn it faster, accomplish their daily tasks more easily, and have fewer questions for the help desk. As a developer of a well-designed application, your returns on that investment are more upgrade revenue, reduced tech support, better reviews, less documentation, and higher customer satisfaction. The rewards of building a good-looking Aqua application are worth taking the extra time.

Posted by: Margery at January 13, 2004 3:27 AM

User Assistance. This is helping the user with the proper "next step" when performing a task. Less guesswork for the user on what to do next makes for a better experience.

Posted by: Bertram at January 13, 2004 3:27 AM

So far in these articles, I have only dipped a toe or two into Aqua's pool. I have covered basic aspects of building an Aqua-compliant application, including the building of photo-illustrative/3D application icons. Now it's time to address other components of our Mac OS X application.

Posted by: Rose at January 13, 2004 3:28 AM

This is the first thing your users see, and probably the single most important visible part of your application. It is the first chance you have at making an impression and the best chance to help establish your brand.

Posted by: Joshua at January 13, 2004 3:29 AM

Clicking an application in the dock should always bring forward an active window. If the user clicks on an open app's icon in the Dock, the application is active and all unminimized windows come along with it. I have found a few problems with windows behaving independently of their application.

Posted by: Jesse at January 13, 2004 3:30 AM

Other examples of these animations might be to show the status of an FTP transfer, the progress of media being digitized, or an updated time signature. And don't forget that users may want to have some control over this, so give them plenty of options, including the ability to turn these functions off.

Posted by: Josias at January 13, 2004 3:31 AM

User Assistance. This is helping the user with the proper "next step" when performing a task. Less guesswork for the user on what to do next makes for a better experience.

Posted by: Thomas at January 13, 2004 3:32 AM

For example, if you see an AIM window peeking out from behind your browser and you click on it, that window will come to the front, but the main application window will not. The Mail.app/Activity Viewer is another example. The Aqua system of layers works well in many instances, but not in all. Thank goodness that the Dock is always there to come to the rescue. I know that clicking on an application icon in the Dock will always result in not only the application coming to the front, but also any non-minimized windows associated with it. And if the application is active but no windows are open, clicking on the Dock icon should create a new window in that application.

Posted by: Gervase at January 13, 2004 3:33 AM