Check this out.

I swear, it's like pointing out to a Scientologist that there's no Xenu. Will I ever learn? When I open my mouth with legitimate concerns, threads lock.

To base the merits of Leopard by this forum and the people who pose problems is irrational. It is time for this thread to end.

Oh, geez. A full dose of boosterism. Let's reach for the "see-no-evil/hear-no-evil" button. And you got yourself a mind reader. You didn't say (at least in the post that proceeded this guy's comment) that you thought Leotard was crap because there was a troubleshooting thread devoted to it. Just another case of someone trying to deflect and deny by using gimmicky arguing tricks.

Leopard works for me and my college of 8500 users, none of which have issues.

Eighty-five hundred users, and none of whom have issues? Oh, man. That's one powerful sip of Kool-Aid this guy has drank. He's boosterism all the way. Hey, let's enumerate the many good things about OS X (Leotard included). There are many. But there are many problems as well. This knee-jerk "circle the crap wagons" boosterism is just so...well...Scientologist.

Eighty-five hundred users and no issues? I think FB's angels are much more plausible.

Are you surprised to only ones complaining have no tech experience? All level three users love it....Look at all the level three and four techs, they all love it.

There's your problem. If you'd only post more at Apple Delusions then Leotard would run better.

It must be just you. I loved the reply right below your post where the fellow said:

Are you surprised to only ones complaining have no tech experience? All level three users love it. If you have a question or problem, post it and allow us to help you.

Well, there you go right there, thalo. You need help. There's the problem. I think this fellow is willing to go the extra mile and get you all the professional help you require until you get your mind right. Repeat after me, "there is nothing wrong with Leopard. I need help!"

Say that ten times in the morning when you arise and twenty times before you sleep. Soon you'll feel ever so much better. Your computer won't work any better, but after some years of this treatment you'll eventually come to love the OS. Well, maybe not, but if you don't you will at least be able to post on the Apple Support Forum and admit there must be something wrong with you and get that help you so sorely need.


I kinda liked this post from John on the forum,

I think Leopard is a nice upgrade. That is not to say that Tiger was not incredible.

Whereas he meekly added his opinion that maybe Leopard didn't work as well on G5's and those people would be better off using Tiger. He was quickly reprimanded and told that "Most Leopard users have no serious problems on either a PPC or Intel Mac." That was the end of that discussion. I guess it turns out that Leopard is good for everyone! Holy shit! My downgrading to Tiger must have been a mistake! How could I have done it? Well, in my defense at the time I was looking at how my computer behaved with Leopard and I hadn't read the official party line concerning the OS. I didn't yet know that Leopard is good for everyone everywhere.

quote:

Eighty-five hundred users and no issues? I think FB's angels are much more plausible.

All I could think there was how these guys used to ride me for daring to speak as a Pro user... as if I was speaking for ALL pro users. But it's perfectly OK for this guy to speak for 8500 people. And actually BELIEVE they haven't had any issues whatsoever.

quote:

Whereas he meekly added his opinion that maybe Leopard didn't work as well on G5's and those people would be better off using Tiger. He was quickly reprimanded and told that "Most Leopard users have no serious problems on either a PPC or Intel Mac." That was the end of that discussion.

Oh my god, I couldn't stop laughing. That's exactly how it operates. Just the barest hint, and the hammer drops. That thread has been open for how long? Weeks. Then me and my "absurd" statements shut it down. Ow. Ow. My eyes. Rolling. Too. Hard.

I think Leopard is a nice upgrade. That is not to say that Tiger was not incredible.

Oh, geez, that is a good one, HH. I guess if I came to your house and kicked your dog and said your kids were ugly, you’d have every right to throw me out on my ear. But is the Mac crowd really of such low self esteem that they have to follow a compliment to the OS with a “don’t get me wrong” about an earlier version of it? Can it really be such a clubby, chummy Mac community if one has to work so hard to avoid being painted as an apostate?

All I could think there was how these guys used to ride me for daring to speak as a Pro user... as if I was speaking for ALL pro users. But it's perfectly OK for this guy to speak for 8500 people.

Good point.

quote:

Originally posted by BN:
I guess if I came to your house and kicked your dog and said your kids were ugly, you’d have every right to throw me out on my ear.

But, it's not the same as being a guest in someone's house. Not at all. It's a public forum on the Internet. All of these people bought Macs, and Leopard, and use them. Everyone of them. It's all the same tribe. This is about intertribal discipline and obedience to the official line. These people eat their own.

quote:

Oh my god, I couldn't stop laughing. That's exactly how it operates. Just the barest hint, and the hammer drops. That thread has been open for how long? Weeks. Then me and my "absurd" statements shut it down. Ow. Ow. My eyes. Rolling. Too. Hard.

I'm using my magical and all-powerful moderating abilities to upgrade you to Master Baiter Level II.

"It's all the same tribe. This is about intertribal discipline and obedience to the official line. These people eat their own.

Yeah, they do eat their own. I guess that's how "group cohesion" is maintained. I'm trying to train myself off of those smart-alecky, down-talking "quotes" around words, but it seems to fit in this instance.

Look at the rest of the post's made by smithrj. I think From: Manhattan and Upstate New York sums all this up. First he responds to the post he had made in response to thalo. Then Tom in London comes in to thalo's defense. smithrj rebukes Tom. Then apoligizes. After rereading Tom's post smithrj becomes indignant finally responding with:

After reading your post again, I resent the fact that you claim I look down upon others who know less than I. ....

I am a Religion major, I do this to hopefully help others with problems I have learned to fix. Please retract your claim for you are incorrect.

A retraction seems in order.

The top Apple posters have now started to exceed 100,000 post's. How many man hours could that total? I remember when Apple did an overhaul of the Discussion boards implementing the user Levels at first your total post count was going to be erased. Everybody would start at zero again. The outrage of those Helpers spawned a special Lounge area being created for them. Like an inner sanctum governing party. Some surely are MFI expatriates.

I think I was grandfathered in as a Level 3. I did not have enough post's to get into the Special Lounge.

And if anyone is questioning this whole reward point system need only to find the answer in this statement of clarification:

quote:

Why do you reward points?
The reward system helps to increase community participation. When a community member gives a reward to another member for providing helpful advice or a solution to his or her question, the recipient's points will help increase his or her status level within the community. Members can see their status level by Forum, Category, or at the main Community level.

quote:

The big attraction of Macs, for me and for millions of other users, is that we've never had to worry about that too much. There simply never are "tech problems" so long as you do very simple basic maintenance once a week or so.

My main concern about Leopard and future new versions of the MacOS is that this user-friendliness may disappear. Already be we getting people who come in here and sneer at the lack of tech knowledge of others.

That's my main concern.

Oh, geez, Tom in London, I want to have your baby.

quote:

The reward system helps to increase community participation.

With the eBay "star" system, it makes some sense to have ratings for sellers (and buyers, presumably) because then you can sniff out the obvious rats. And there are some rats. My own brother is rather anal about it. He tries to maintain his rating as crystal pure as a Vestal Virgin. If one of his customers complains, he's all over them trying to make them happy. And he's experienced what the thinks have been cases of people (competitors, or disgruntled losing bidders) trying to smear him. And I have little doubt that he's right. But, all in all, the eBay "star" rating system seems to work. But why in god's name do you need a rating system for an internet forum? What commodity is there to rate? Yeah, that's right. There's only one: prestige and status. And if your life has dropped so low that you need to pick of prestige points on an internet forum, well, there's nothing I or anyone else can do for you. You're fucked. But I admit I've sort of "been there, done that" so I speak a bit from experience.

To speak plainly, the reward system that Apple has helps to increase community Scientology. Hey, my hat is off to those generous souls who give of their time to help others with their computer problems. I have, through the years, been helped by many of these people and am grateful. And I try to give back a little from time to time. But having a point system for a fix-it forum is just asking for ass-kissing and Scientologist-like behavior. And that's just what Apple is getting. It's been a while since we've delved into the subject, but the Scientology and squelching is just wreaking over at Apple Delusions. Maybe that's the way Apple wants it. Hey, what company has the balls to just let people say what they will -- good and bad -- about their product? A certain amount of decorum I can understand. And although I'll acknowledge that brother thalo can be an expert at master baiting when he sets his sites on it, I thought his post over at Apple Delusions was totally innocuous. Boy, have they ever lowered the bar over there on what is considered improper discussion. Again, it's sort of embarrassing to be a Mac user when you see this kind of stuff. Maybe that will be NeocomSoft's official slogan. "It's sometime's embarrassing to be a Mac user."

Is it just me?

Not this time.

Will I ever learn?

You already know the game far better than those who blindly follow or make the rules for this game. What you need to learn, grasshopper, is...well...I'm not quite sure. Who really has the definitive answer to this Scientologist stuff? You do realize that we ask some questions here that, if they ever were answered definitively, could win the Nobel Prize. It might even bring world peace.

If we could learn all that there was to learn just from the behavior of the Apple Delusions members, we would instantly understand a number of things, including religion. Don't get me wrong. I'm not saying it's wrong to be a booster of some cause or to identify with certain ideas, people, or things. That's just how it works in the human world. There's probably no avoiding it. But there's a sense to it, at least to me, that understanding all this would detract from the enjoyment of it. It's often more fun to be mystified by The Great Oz then to experience the let-down of seeing someone behind the curtain pulling strings. Me, I gain fascination from the string-pullers, but not everyone does. Do you really want to go there? Do you really want to understand human nature and why it is the way it is and thus how it manifests itself in the real world?

Going over to Apple Delusions is like poking a stick into an ant mound. The ants rush all over the stick and put their pincers into it. The social aspects of this behavior are fascinating.

He was quickly reprimanded and told that "Most Leopard users have no serious problems on either a PPC or Intel Mac." That was the end of that discussion.


I just now did a more careful reading of some of those posts, Wow, I was unfair to that poster. That guy wasn't reprimanding anyone. I just didn't read the whole post. Sorry. The dangers of skimming I guess. Here is a fuller version:

Most Leopard users have no serious problems on either a PPC or Intel Mac. Also, the list of problems that have been encountered are not specific to or consistent with either. Unfortunately, I had too many problems to continue using Leopard and am now back to Tiger.

Leopard is an awesome OS with many great features, however, the problems that 'may be' and 'have been' encountered by a growing number of users are abominable!

Nowhere in the history of computers are people so afraid to say there are problems, and so afraid to attribute them to the company that makes the hardware and the operating system software.

If you follow the instructions, install your software and start using the computer, and stuff doesn't work, then there are problems. That's the bottom line. Work, no-work. That's the two flavors of computer use.

If you press the spacebar on your keyboard, and a space doesn't appear on the screen (as I was experiencing)... then that's no-work. Something is wrong. i.e. there's a problem.

With Apple, Apple Discussions, and the Mac Faithful at large, almost nobody wants to admit there are problems. What they'd much rather do is BLAME the problems on everything but Apple. I understand that, I really do. Any Tom, Dick, and digikid can be a developer. They can write code that not only doesn't work, but can bollox up the computer. But THAT, in and of itself, is a problem with the operating system.

If an OS is so delicate that it can't deal with crappy software that's loaded on it, without TELLING THE USER hey, this shit is causing problems, then something is wrong. The OS isn't doing its job.

If the OS can't function without having an absolutely perfect-perfect clean install on zeroed data, then maybe it's not tough enough to survive in the real world. Maybe it's too delicate for pro use. Or maybe the installer isn't good enough. Seems to me, if I was writing an installer routine, I'd make it so that if the installer found bad blocks, it would notify the user that the install was pooched.

When you dare to mention a problem at Apple Delusions, people come out of the woodwork to tell you to go ahead and rebuild your permissions. That tells me what? Right. That permissions screw up a lot. In other words they either don't work, or they're also too delicate to live in the real world. That they're too easily corrupted.

My rational mind takes information like that and asks crap like: if permissions are that important, and they go south that often (requiring them to be rebuilt)... then shouldn't there a) be a self diagnostic that can determine WHEN or THAT they have indeed gone south, AND which can either repair them then, or notify the user that they should be repaired post haste?

Since I've been having these crash problems with Leopard, I'll tell you what really steams me. How ARCANE the crash reports are. Have you ever looked at one of them? Ever try to determined what crashed and why from the gobbledygook that the report presents you? Yeah, OK, I send it to Apple, where the juicy chessclub brains of the OpenSource secret society can decipher that crap... but--and this is just a wild idea off the top of my head--wouldn't it be better if somehow THE USER was told more or less what crashed and why?

In the legacy days we had simple error codes that we could look up. Not enough memory for an Application? We knew. Bus error? We knew.

I can't tell you how much I'd friggin' LOVE crash reports to be delivered in plain English. Even if it were verbose. Something like: The Application crashed for the following reason: <whatever>.

"The Application Unexpectedly Quit" only tells us precisely nothing. And yet a huge crash report is generated. For that much data to be generated, I really think they could be telling us more than they have no idea why. If they don't know, they fucking should.

If you press the spacebar on your keyboard, and a space doesn't appear on the screen (as I was experiencing)... then that's no-work.

You're forgetting, Jackass, that the Macintosh is an "Experience." It would only ruin that experience to point out the faults. Geez. Get with the plan already.

When you dare to mention a problem at Apple Delusions, people come out of the woodwork to tell you to go ahead and rebuild your permissions. That tells me what? Right. That permissions screw up a lot. In other words they either don't work, or they're also too delicate to live in the real world. That they're too easily corrupted.

Ya know, I still don't get that whole "repair permissions" thing. I mean, if there were a standard "repair marriage" button, I don't think it would be used as often by people. What's with all the repairing? If permissions are important (and apparently they are), why are they getting so pooched in the first place? Would you feel confident driving across a suspension bridge where you saw this little red button on the side of the entrance that said "repair cables"?

Yeah, the whole crash report thing is still highly user-unfriendly.

quote:

Ya know, I still don't get that whole "repair permissions" thing. I mean, if there were a standard "repair marriage" button, I don't think it would be used as often by people. What's with all the repairing?

LMFAO! Exactly. Stuff that needs constant repair, is stuff that's constantly BREAKING.

And for Apple types to sit there and talk up and down about how wonderfully rock solid and stable this operating system is, is kinda funny. Because they're the FIRST people to suggest "repair permissions" as the answer to everything. And yet, if the permissions were so rock-solid...

Well, memory testing has turned out to be an interesting experience. First thing, it takes a LOOOONG time. Especially if you repeat the rounds three times, like you're supposed to.

Next thing, I get this weird statement in Single User mode to the effect of: "attempting to lock memory... ERROR... can't do memory lock, reason unknown." But then it goes ahead and tests, but gives you the caveat that unlocked memory testing is slower and less reliable. Eye roll.

"attempting to lock memory... ERROR... can't do memory lock, reason unknown." But then it goes ahead and tests, but gives you the caveat that unlocked memory testing is slower and less reliable. Eye roll.

Yeah, that is worthy of an eyeroll. If the programmers know that the memory can't be locked, they could tell us if this is a symptom of something. Is it because of the style of RAM chip or something? An older type perhaps? A cheaper type? All of that would be potentially useful information. Maybe there's an included Help file or some documentation that mentions this. But you really shouldn't have to dig for that information. If someone is going to the trouble to check their memory, they probably suspect something may be wrong so these "Ooops. Shit happened." messages are particularly disconcerting and user-unfriendly. Do we then need a tester program to test the testing program? Ad infinitum.

How long you figure before this thread is locked?

The case I make, is that I'm Leotard's worst nightmare, and that it's a memory management issue. That's the only thing at this point that makes any sense to me.

After all that memtest testing, I refuse to believe it's marginal RAM.

Thinking back to something Scott said earlier. He believes the computer should be as stable for Grandpa as it is for a power user. The more I think about it, the more that doesn't strike me as true. Because there's hard use, and there's light use. Any device made by the hand of man, whether it's a car or an electronic gizmo, is affected by the type of use. Hard use is not the same as light use. Some people change cell phones all the time, some people have the same one for two or three contract periods. Why? Because some people pound them, and others use them lightly, if at all. A race-car driver is more punishing on his car than is somebody who only goes down the street to the grocery store on Sundays, and never breaks 30mph.

I love good analogies. That's Andy Griffith pulling up a chair in Floyd's barber shop and talkin' 'bout the OS issues he's havin' that Aunt Bee ain't.

For example, if I have nothing running but Safari and iTunes, the computer seldom gives me problems over the course of a Saturday afternoon.

LOL. Oh, the crowd will love that.

My conclusion: instability in the operating system. Bugs in Leopard. Stuff that Apple needs to fix.

I think it's time to stop victim blaming and pretending that Leopard is unassailable.

Burn him!

Once again, I'll return to my point about degraded performance with time and use... and the fact that the issues are cured by a restart. I think that fact has memory management written all over it. Another puzzle piece is "mdworker" crashing so much. If I had to hazard a guess right now, it's a memory management bug that kicks in when the mdworker process is deep into its indexing. I bet I'm feeling it more acutely by the number of files I generate, the frequency with which I change file CONTENT (all has to be indexed)... and by the fact that Adobe apps make unique demands on Virtual Memory and scratch disks and the window manager during all of this. I think I choke processes that have to index, by being a pro user. And I think that because much of the memory is taken up by Photoshop or whatever other big application, the combination of going to Virtual Memory, just when "mdworker" takes off and has to do its thing (and maybe TimeMachine)... causes trouble.

That doesn't sound like a bad bit of reasoning. I'm not running Leopard with the latest Adobe Apps so I don't can't chime in yeah or neigh. But, no, that thread won't stay open for long.

Are you making that stuff up or what thalo?

How the f did your boot drive permissions get all screwed up like that. What short cut did you make installing?

You are railing on the operating system were to even start. A clean install is pretty basic. Some how you end up with a machine you don't even have permission to access. Have you ever locked your car keys in the car while it was still running?

Off hand the only thing I can think of is that you installed Leopold with the drive in the enclosure. Then moved it internally. Now there was some problem with the 150 Raptors not working in G5 machines properly. The motherboard SATA controller was not adequate enough in some way. This could be an issue. On top of that the install was done vie the Firmtek card that did not have the right firmware and driver.

Did you ever fix the permissions on the boot drive? You should have been able to easily change this by unlocking the lock at the bottom of the get info window.

brother, I made no shortcut installing.

The only time I messed with permissions was so I could access the drives on the server, Seabiscuit, because there was some problem. And whatever I did WORKED, by the way. I didn't have server access problems after that.

What do you mean "end up with a machine I don't have permission to access?" I never didn't have access. All I was wondering, was if by changing the permissions so I could make SEABISCUIT accessible to the radiator, if I had pooched something that might be contributing to my problems.

And remember, all I did as far as changing permissions, was match the permissions of disks that I COULD access, and apply them to the disks on the server I was having trouble with. Then applying the permissions to the contents of the drive.

I think what happened then, was that as I began moving stuff on and off the Seabiscuit drives, something happened to the Radiator drives.

I also think that some software installers (I was installing everything fresh after my clean install)... had something to do with messing up the permissions on the boot drive.

Meanwhile, I know how to change permissions, you smartass. But when I unlocked the lock, there were options that were no longer available, and suddenly I had a missing "system" and two "unknowns", no "staff", no "admin" and it wasn't me who set it up that way. Do you honestly think I'd say, hey, well, wouldn't an "unknown" permission be fun to set? Wouldn't it be fun if I got rid of "admin?" Come on.

Something got bolloxed in the OS, and all I did was try to adapt and overcome... I didn't sit there figuring out ways to wreck it. I was trying to make the Radiator work with Seabiscuit and I did... but then it looked as though the permissions were weird. They worked, they just seemed fucked up, and they wouldn't let me change them to what I remember as being normal.

Yes, I installed Leotard by putting a raptor in the enclosure. I had my old boot drive internally (you know, the one that had similar problems to now after a supposedly clean install and setting up the Rico way). Then I moved the fresh raptor into the slot occupied by my old boot drive. I still have that old boot drive which represents my life before the reinstall.

I had no TROUBLE installing. And remember, I merely REINSTALLED the firmware and driver on the Firmtek card, as a just-in-case. I didn't have the wrong driver, I just redid it because I didn't know what else to try and fix.

And suddenly the keyboard issue was gone. I haven't seen it since doing that.

My permissions on the boot drive still don't look right after doing all that terminal crap that Scott gave me.

Here's what I have currently on the boot drive:

(unknown) - Read only
admin - Read & Write
system - Read & Write
admin - Read only
everyone - Read only

So in other words, an unknown, read only... TWO friggin' admins (when I figure I need only one).

What does your Leopard boot drive say?

All I notice, is that when I change the second admin to "Read & Write", the (unknown) user disappears. When I try to delete one of the admins, BOTH disappear. So I add one back.

I can get it to this point:

admin - Read & Write
system - Read & Write
everyone - Read only

but I'm afraid to apply it throughout the contents. I'm just going to leave it alone for now. And when I rebuild permissions using the install DVD, the unknown and all the other crap comes back.