It has been an interesting year, and those of you who know me should certainly agree. This last year has been my Industrial placement year as part of my Degree – All fun and games you might think. Mostly, you’d be right – aside from the daily struggle of commuting to Leeds every day.
It’s been a busy year in YSTV too. This time a year ago I had just rolled out a bunch of new servers, setup a new flash streaming solution and generally made life more difficult for myself (but better for everyone else, i hope!). A year later, and I’m at it again. This time I’ve rolled out some new high spec Edit PCs, complete with Windows 7. On top of that, myself and several others completely rewired and re-organised the Control Room.
However, what this post is all about is how my outlook on a certain few big corporations has changed – Microsoft and Apple.
In particular, the Windows OS and Apples iPhone and iPod. For a long time, I was firmly of the opinion that Windows sucked, but Apple sucked more. It wasn’t until I saw OS X in action several years ago, that I started to change my mind. I thought, “hey, that looks pretty snazzy. It seems responsive, and might actually be nice to use”, but still I didn’t really *want* to use OS X, or any Mac for that matter. By the same argument, I wanted nothing to do with the iPhone either. Not to mention the iPod before that – although that was mostly down to some of the awful reviews and comments I’d read about the device.
But, as is the theme with this post, things change. Almost a year ago today, I bought my first iPod – a 120Gb monster that is the new ‘iPod Classic’ (that’s surely a contradiction in terms?). Guess what? I liked the damn thing. I’d already been using iTunes for a long time, so that was nothing new. The fact that I instantly had all my music in my pocket was a totally new experience to me, and one that I don’t think I can live without now. My iPod was invaluable to me this last year. It was one of the few things that kept me sane during a year of programming ASP.Net and C#.
So. It starts. About a year ago, I finally opened the door to Apple, and liked what I saw for the first time. Which leads me neatly on to the iPhone (alright, not that neatly but whatever). When it was first released I thought “heh, that looks cool. insanely expensive though.”, and I gave it a miss. Instead, deciding that I didn’t need such a device. Why would I pay that much for a phone? But, time passed and I found myself wanting an iphone, yet unable to afford one. Instead, I got an LG Viewty. This was LG’s first touch screen phone and it was awful. I survived it for the first 6 months – still impressed by the novelty of it. But soon, the interface started to irritate me and then it became a waiting game. All the while, I decided that I hated touch screen phones and would never use one again. ever. That of course, turned out to be total rubbish, because just over 2 months ago, I went through that Apple door again and got myself and iPhone 3GS.
Now, lets be clear here. 6 months ago, I wanted an iPhone. Not because of all the amazing features it had, but because it was a new toy. It had a good interface and it just looked fun to play with. Of course, since getting it, I’ve done nothing but play with it. Now, I can’t live without those amazing features I didn’t really care about. I seriously wonder how i coped before. I never realised, for example, how useful it would be to have the internet (the proper internet, not this crappy WAP business of days gone by) in your hand. I’m not going to go on about how amazing the iPhone is any more, there’s been far too much hype about it anyway.
My point is, a year ago I wouldn’t have gone near an iPhone. At the time, I firmly believed it would be rubbish. I’m glad I was wrong.
So now we get to Microsoft. They’ve done a lot in the last year. Most notably they’ve released Windows 7 (well, to MSDN and Technet subscribers so far). When it was first announced, i was a little apprehensive. Especially after the colossal disappointment that Vista was. Microsoft promised Windows 7 would be better – and it is. Again, this time a year ago I wasn’t so sure. I was still firmly in the “Windows sucks” camp, but used it anyway. Why? Because it’s the only OS that worked nicely with my Tablet PC (and it had OneNote). I would claim that games kept me on Windows…But i don’t really play games any more(no time!), so that would have been a lie. I still Dual Boot with Ubuntu though, for all my programming needs (unless it’s .NET. I have Visual Studio for that). Point is, I wasn’t all that hopeful for Windows 7 – Microsoft’s Track Record didn’t really give them much to stand on.
But then, along came the Beta. Aside from a few tiny bugs, which was to be expected, it worked fine. It was faster than Vista, less of a memory hog and more responsive – almost like going back to the days of XP! So far, no downside and this was just the Beta. In addition to this, it had a much nicer look and feel than vista. Hard to believe since they’re both based around Aero. Then came the Release Candidate a few months ago. As far as I could tell, not much had changed. Few tiny bug fixes here and there and it felt like an Operating System worth using. So finally, I’m using the final released version now from MSDN. I have no complaints. Which is rare for me, especially for a Windows OS. It looks shiny, granted some of the ideas are blatant steals from OS X, but i don’t care. It’s fast, responsive and doesn’t hammer what little battery life i have left like Vista did. I think it’s the first Windows OS I can actually enjoy using.
So that’s that then. In the space of just over a year, I’ve gone from hating iPod, iPhones, Apple and Microsoft, to Loving all three. Well…Liking. Loving might be too stronger word to use here. Point is I don’t hate them, and in some cases would now find it hard to live without them.
Like I said….It’s been an interesting year.
