A few quick impressions of Leopard, or "I can't wait to lose a file"

On Friday I went and got Leopard. Due to how long it took trying to safely clean up an external hard drive to use with Time Machine (long ago purchased for backups, no less), I did not get around to trying out most of Leopards features until Sunday.

Overall, it is a joy to use. I keep the dock off to the side, so I have not had a visceral to the shiny dock, although I am undecided about those lights representing a program is running.

I’m just now trying out Spaces. I used to use VirtueDesktops (I’d give a link, but it has now gone defunct due Leopard announcing similar features). Spaces does not have as many features, but it definitely seems smoother. This is most likely because it is now built in to the system.

The most fun feature is Time Machine, though. I only have a couple of backup points now, but it’s fun to go back and forth in it. As one of my friends said on Friday, “I can’t wait to lose a file.”

There are still a few things I have not tried yet. Mail.app being a major one. The thing is, I still don’t have IMAP with Google. Once I have that squared away, I will probably use Mail.app more, what with its “to dos” and notes and all. I also need to check out iCal, but it is less pressing (if iCal updates without needing to be open, it will be my new best friend). And of course, I really want to try out Xcode.

As one last thing, it appears Adium gets pushed away when I have Exposé show the desktop. This will probably be fixed soon now that Leopard is out. I’m sure it’s not easy to fix bugs in an open source project, if those bugs potentially reveal features you aren’t allowed to talk about.

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