Impulsive Highlighters

Safari Beta for Windows

I'm sorry, but it a-sucks. You hear Mac people saying all the time how those Windows developers don't know what they're doing when they're porting applications to the Mac and make these fake Mac applications that're actually straight Windows programs with Mac title bars? Yeah, well, that's exactly what's Apple's done with Safari and iTunes and I've honestly never enjoyed using them on Windows. What they've made is merely the exact same Mac software with a Windows menu and title bar slapped on. Unfortunately for them (but mostly for us), that is not a Windows app!

But the look is not all. Since all the UI widgets used in Apple software is custom made and all their frameworks are custom made and loaded (keyword: custom), Safari is dog slow on even the fastest computers (and I am using a very fast computer, by the way). Now, some of you may say that, well, actually, it loads pretty fast. Yeah, so they've somehow managed to optimize the base loading time for Safari such that "something" shows up on the screen pretty reasonably soon. However, the time it takes for it to become responsive to keyboard and mouse events both after a fresh launch and after Alt+Tab-ing to it is unbearably high (anything that's not instantaneous is unbearably high). Also, Windows+Tab, Alt+Tab and other keyboard commands don't always work the way they should, and Safari doesn't do the Windows animations while minimizing, maximizing or restoring (key visual cues in Windows, the lack of which makes a program seem foreign). Safari also doesn't respect a lot of Windows HIG's such as the fact that windows in Windows are meant to be resizable from all sides and corners instead of just the bottom-right. Not only that, but the resize triangle doesn't disappear and continues to work when the window has been maximized. Lastly, and most irritatingly, Apple has forgotten all about "magic corners", the four corners on the screen that are easiest to reach with the mouse, which is why the Start menu is on the bottom left and the X button while in maximized mode, is on the top-right. If you use Apple software on Windows, you will notice that Apple has left a neat amount of margin in its X buttons such that you can't simply take your mouse to the top-right and click to close. No, you have to pin-point the mouse to the small X button (smaller than the standard Windows X buttons which are larger in both XP and Vista by default) to click it closed. Sigh...

In all, it's not a terribly satisfying experience. I know that a lot of people have got used to using iTunes on Windows, but honestly, I would be a very sad person if I were asked to use the current iterations of iTunes or Safari on Windows for the rest of my life. I like the font smoothing and all, but really, Apple needs to start making Windows applications for Windows instead of trying to make odd-looking and odd-behaving Mac apps for Windows. 

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