[scribus] Newbie Mac User

[John Morris]

>John Beardmore wrote:
><snip!>
>>  Don't take this the wrong way, but 'not round here it isn't' !  I can't
>>  speak for MSIE, but firefox and the things in it gobble and leak more
>>  resources over a few days than can be casually be explained away. At the
>>  moment it's using 225,052k, but anything up to half a gig before it crashes
>>  seems to be common on machines where the browser is left open for sustained
>  > periods. There may be better browsers. I sure hope so...

and Jeffrey silverman responded
>Ugh, I hear you. I spend a LOT of time using Firefox and do so only
>out of necessity. I am *extremely* disappointed with the general
>crappy direction FF has gone in wrt stability. I seriously have FF
>crash up to five times per day, which is just plain unacceptable.

   I'm surprised to learn this about Firefox. It 
and Safari (built on top of the same foundation, 
as understand it) seem very stable on a Mac. I 
use Safari primarily, but I also use Firefox as 
necessary and I don't think either of them has 
crashed on me in months.
   While I don't generally run my computers 
overnight, so my browsers get shut down at least 
daily, my daughter's computer gets restarted 
about once a month and her browser, Safari, is 
always open. She has no problem with resource 
leakage. In fact, she was running pretty well 
with 512MB of RAM up until a few weeks ago when 
she finally decided she could afford more.
   Safari used to have a memory leak and would 
gradually increase the share of the CPU it used, 
but that was years ago in version 2 or something 
like that.

>A *very* viable alternative is Opera. Opera is way better than FF. WAY
>BETTER. But also, not without its issues. But seriously, it is much
>more stable, much faster, easy on the eyes, renders pages great, and
>has great user features. Now if only all websites would figure out,
>finally, that designing sites or web apps to only work in MSIE with
>ActiveX plugins (Quicken/Quickbooks, I'm looking at you) is a Bad
>Idea(TM), long -term... Ah, well, maybe by 2014.

   I tried Opera for Mac some time ago. At the 
time, it was supposed to be this blazing fast 
browser with other great features. It was slower 
than molasses and I have not been back since. Of 
course, I'm not likely to go looking until I find 
problems with my current choices.

>Actually, I really don't mean to pick on people who actually remember
>using punch card readers -- I have fond memories of playing with
>discarded punch cards and I also am fond of several old geezers. I
>just think hearing old ("old" as in "older than me") people talk about
>technology is funny, and I hope I can remember my current vantage
>point 20 years from now. I have always found that older people,
>especially smart ones, have trouble with certain types of new
>concepts. I'm not explaining that very well, but I do have examples if
>required.

   The effect is much broader than just computers 
or even technology. Change happens. There is no 
doubt about that. Also, for many different 
reasons, younger folks are more likely to embrace 
change than older folks. However, in this 
particular discussion, I don't think this is a 
young--old dichotomy. In fact, I have not seen 
any evidence that convinces me that I'm younger 
or older than anyone in this discussion besides 
John Culleton.
   This more about personal preferences. I have no 
use for most of the "latest and greatest" in 
technology these days. I don't need to watch 
videos or listen to music on my computer. Cutesy 
graphics don't impress me, Therefore, I don't 
need to move up to the latest and greatest. 
However, I would like to continue to be able to 
do what I need to do with my computer. That is 
generally possible without upgrades, except where 
it intersects with the Internet. When a web page 
displaying static data gets upgraded with some 
flashy new graphics or layout, it often breaks 
the older browsers even though it does not 
present any new content.

Best,
John