Thursday, January 20, 2005

The [Mac OS X] Dock ... makes a great demo. But ... the Dock is akin to a brightly-colored set of children's blocks, ideal for your first words—dog, cat, run, Spot, run—but not too effective for displaying the contents of War and Peace.

A certain class of Apple users—those who check their email once or twice a week and sometimes need to print an attached photo—may need nothing more than the Dock.

The rest of us need more powerful tools, so,
Apple, leave the Dock as the smashing demo it is, but also supply some serious, information-dense tools. You have the talent and wherewithal to make such tools as attractive as the Dock if only you will cease seeing this one single object as a complete solution.

Apple has made a few improvements to the Dock in the last three years. Items no longer jump around seemingly at random, although the size of the Dock continues to "wheeze" in and out without user control.. Items also act like buttons, so clicking anywhere within their confines will open them. Apple also quickly gave us the ability to turn off magnification, a major improvement in day-to-day usability.

Meanwhile, here are eight continuing problems with the Dock, plus a new one, a decided lack of color. Most of these are inherent, and the solution is more and varied tools. A few can be directly addressed by design tweaks.