A short guide for surviving Windows [aimed at Mac-users]
Let me just start with that I don’t hate Windows, far from it! I like that I can run most applications on it and, let’s face it, it is still a Windows-centric world, so knowing your way around the operating system is a fairly important skill.
As the latest update to Mac OSX Leopard, 10.5.7, has caused some mayhem on my company’s server (something to do with DHCP constantly refreshing my IP, if you can help buzz me), I am now booting into Windows XP via Bootcamp. Additionally, my boss also ordered me a new Dell PC to persuade me to “be like the rest of ‘em” (my own words), but really more to do with security: we work in a Financial Trust, which means that we deal with highly sensitive data that shouldn’t be stored on any laptop, really!
OK, so how do you, as a Mac-user, survive that Windows experience (slash “Trauma”)? Here’s what I did:
- I love Quicksilver (a launch-utility that allows me to circumvent the mouse and explorer interface and launch apps with a few keys), and I am currently using Slickrun as a fairly effective replacement. OK, you won’t exactly be able to program triggers or append text to files, but it works.
- Expose is another “interface aid” I use instead of alt-tab. DExposE2 is a Windows replacement that works fairly similarly.
- Marsedit is my favourite blogging application on the Mac ever (you all know, how frequently I write..) and Windows Live Writer is a surprisingly good replacement for it.
- GDI++ is an interesting font-rendering app for Windows XP users. It took some getting used to, but I find it works well when Cleartype is turned on.
- Textexpander has made writing a slightly more efficient task on the Mac, certainly a less error-prone one. It basically allows you to create abbreviations or add frequently misspelled words and the program then replaces it with the word you intended. On Windows: check out Texter.
As you might have noticed, the “Mac Experience,” to me at least, is not about Application support, it’s about productivity, i.e. doing stuff quicker, which the Mac excels at. Everything else, from Microsoft Office to Mozilla Firefox essentially works the same and, in several cases better, on Windows, so no survival guide needed there.
While I will never enjoy the Windows experience as much as the Mac one, these few things have made my life a little more bearable. If you have some nifty tricks to share that have made your Windows experience better, please share them in the comments!
Vincent
P.S. One thing I would still love to have is a system-wide spell-checker like in OS X.
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Tags: bootcamp, Productivity, XP
Apple, Consumer electronics, Dell, Design, Education, Organization, Review, Software, Technology, Windows, open-source
So if you are booting into Windows via Bootcamp, it means you basically loose the the greatest thing ever
I actually come from a windows family and i moved to a mac about 8 months ago, and am super happy with it. But the issues i have are that everyone else is still on windows and our companies programs run on windows only…
So i tried this bootcamp way, but didnt like it too much, since i always had to reboot to switch between windows and mac…
i recently tried parallels desktop and i was very disappointed with it, cause it lagged more than i could actually do any real work..
So you got any tip for me? i always used windows 7 though, so not sure if it has to do something with it or not…
My tip: accept the lobotomy that capitalist society is trying to give you. I predict that in less than 3 years I will have convinced my boss that Macs are the way to go. Alternatively, I may decide to go freelance or work for a company that uses Macs or lets me use one.
More practically, as I wrote, Windows developers have been trying non-stop to emulate the really cool software we Mac users enjoy. Some of those I mentioned are no more than a hack, but I’m definitely liking Slickrun as a Quicksilver replacement. And Windows Live Writer ain’t too shabby either.