I’ve upgraded to Leopard and am beginning to find little bugs and quarks. This is will be a quick post but I’ll build on it more later.
The firewall is disabled by default, even if you had it enabled in Tiger. Also, file sharing is enabled by default as well. Let that be your first stop post-upgrade. UPDATE: Leopard’s implementation of a firewall is depressing to say the least. Here is a very good run-down on its short-comings.
Spotlight seems to do a full re-index immediately, which makes the OS seem very sluggish. I’ve since disabled it entirely in favor of Quicksilver.
So far the following apps simply don’t work:
- PGP (Wish I had checked that first) I’ve read that 9.6.3 works somewhat, but I can’t verify that.
- VirtueDesktop
Spaces
- Parallels doesn’t get along well with Spaces. If you are in Parallels in full screen mode and switch to another desktop by specifying the desktop number, Parallels shifts to desktop 1. Even switching to full screen in Parallels immediately shifts it to Desktop 1. See below. Opening Parallels then moving it to another desktop produces this behavior
- Minimizing apps on one desktop does not allow you to maximize them on another. Instead, Spaces shifts you to the original Desktop, which is annoying. Also, while you’re on one desktop and switch focus to an app that is on another, Spaces shifts to the other desktop and that isn’t configurable. I prefer to shift spaces manually. That way I can be on Desktop 1, where I keep my browsers, shift to email and start a new email, still on Desktop 1 so I can cut and paste information from a browser to an email without moving any apps or switching back and forth between two desktops.
- If you open an application, say Mail.App in one desktop then move it to another, every email you open will shift to the original Desktop immediately.
- If you open an application in one Desktop then move to another while it’s opening, Spaces will shift to the previous desktop once the app is open and active.
I’m starting to wonder if the folks who coded Spaces used VirtueDesktop or Desktop Manager before. It doesn’t seem like it.
Aesthetics
- Some aesthetic observations; the default splash screen is ugly and very un-mac. It looks more like a SolarWinds splash screen. The transparent menu bar is annoying and not configurable.
- Quicksilver now refuses to hide the icon in the Dock while Quicksilver is running.
The new 3D dock seems jumpy and jittery. After switching back to 2D its once again smooth. I like the 2D background for the new Dock better than the 3D version anyway. I also don’t mind the blue dots beneath active apps, though you can change that as well.
Safari now looks more crisp. I like the ability to shift tabs to and fro and its Java implementation got tweaked a bit. Things that didn’t work in the old version now do (like certain functions in Gmail, just not the browser-based google talk applet).
