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SOFTWARE
The Gist: In The New Beginning Was The Command Line
Price TBA
OS X is destined over the next year to become Apple's default software for everything from iBooks to G4s, and I couldn't be happier. Sure, it has its critics: The operating system's whizzy interface forces longtime Mac users to relearn buttons and menus, while its Unix kernel irks Linux zealots with violations of the open source creed. But as soon as my PowerBook greeted me with the Unix command line, I pretty much forgot the backlash. I used Unix every day for 15 years, so this was like seeing a dear workmate after years away from the job.
My most satisfying moment came when the OS' combination of Mac and Unix features helped me beat a deadline. I needed to merge a table in a text file with one from a Web page, then bring everything together for an article due that afternoon. Starting out in everyday desktop territory, I saved both tables as documents. I popped up a command-line interface and used eMac's text-editing software to strip the Web page's HTML and convert the table contents to comma-separated rows. Then I unleashed a single Unix command: foreach x (grep \\.\\?\\? file1 | sort -nr +3 | awk '{print $1}' ); echo grep ${x} file1 | awk '{print $2 $3}' " " grep ${x} file2 | awk '{print $1}'; end.
Boom! The tables merged into neat ranks that even Khrushchev would be proud of, and I sent the file to my editor on time. Another deadline put to rest.
New users won't be troubled. Although few commercial software applications run on OS X today, it allows you to keep OS 9 and your existing apps on the desktop. I used Excel and Word to finish my tables with ease. Propellerheads shouldn't be disappointed, either; under its genteel user interface, OS X hides raw and powerful tools.
After years of waiting for a GUI that would bring Unix to the masses, I'm amazed to report that OS X's real value may be that it goes the other way, offering Mac users a chance to experiment with the command line. Once they're seduced by the power of chained, nested, recursive Unix commands and an editor that lets them see data as data rather than as icons, newcomers may find it hard to go back to point-and-click. As Neal Stephenson once groaned, using the GUI is like trying to drive a car with a mouse.
Apple: (800) 692 7753, www.apple.com.
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