How to make Make OS X behave like Windows XP/Vista/7?

Can you post a few examples of what she doesn't like about the interface or workflows?

Matt

You could enable the root user, open up all your router firewall ports and publish the password on the internet. It should be just like Windows pretty quick.

Other than that, I'd suggest getting a $200 PC and let her use that. Your time wasted trying to get her to change has got to be worth more than that.

Sorry to get all tongue-in-cheek with ya, but if you want a Mac to run like a windows box, just leave the power off... haha. 🙂

Tell her to embrace change. It'll be easier to retrain her to use a mac than it would be to make it "look and feel" like an xp box.

For the Activity Monitor, tis better to put its icon on the Dock and have her just click on it. That will launch it. Alternatively, add it to her login items, and it'll launch on startup. BTW, why does she want that running if her main task is mucking with iPhoto?

AFAIK, you can't assign keyboard shortcuts to launch apps. What can be done is assign keyboard shortcuts to launch AppleScripts that launch apps, but that's a bit above the norm.

I'm afraid what your wife wants just isn't possible. Give up! (Read into that what you will.)

Hi Brian S. Campbell;

You have my deepest sympathies.

My suggestion would be to use Boot Camp and install Winders for her. If she is that picky, she'll never be happy with Snow Leopard.

Allan

Brian

What I did here with a similar situation was simply develop a different way of working. As my nearest and dearest was very comfortable with the keyboard In Windows I simply encouraged her to use the mouse as much as possible on the Mac. So rather than being confused by the various shortcuts for one she uses the keyboard mostly, for the other she mostly uses the mouse.

Regards

TD

Hello Brian,

As I sure you've already concluded, it's just not possible. Anytime a user tries to force an OS to look and respond like another OS, they will always be sorely disappointed.

The Mac is a Mac, not Windows (of course). The same is true in reverse, you can't make Windows behave like a Mac. Your wife would be just as unhappy with Linux. It again has its own subtle differences that would take a while for both Mac and Windows users to learn and get used to.

As Allan noted, it would be easier to install Windows via Boot Camp. My wife's iMac is set up that way. She does a few things on the OS X side, but does everything else in Windows. It's what she uses all day at work, so it's more fluid for her to use it at home too.

Do note that Apple hasn't released a Windows 7 update for Boot Camp yet. It's slated to have Snow Leopard drivers sometime around December.

Brian S. Campbell wrote:
Ok, I feel unclean making this request, but it's for a good cause. My wife H.A.T.E.S. her Mac Mini. She's a particularly stubborn form of Windows user that grumbles about the differences in the Mac/Windows UI at every available opportunity. In order to make her happy and keep my sanity, I want to do everything in my power to make her OS X experience as comfortable (windows-like) as possible. I would greatly appreciate any suggestions anyone might have!!! Oh, and installing Windows on her Mini isn't a valid option. It's one of the early Intel models with limited RAM/HD and she's also a heavy iPhoto user so I don't want to make her switch back and forth. This is your chance to help save a marriage 😉

how about installing Parallels or VMware Fusion and get the "best" of both worlds ?

I second Barney. I gave up trying to evangelize the Mac a long time ago. I also gave up fixing PCs. Get her a nice laptop from BestBuy with some kind of GeekSquad contract.

Brian, I found three applications that make using OSX easier for people who are used to Windows/*nix standards.
First one, DoubleCommand, deals with keyboard. It allows you to re-map the keys so it makes more sense to a PC user, plus it allows you to use Windows keyboards.
Second, iStat menus, will give you similar to Task Manager functionality. Activity Monitor can launched from it.
The last one is SteerMouse. It brings standard Windows mouse features to OSX.

I use both. Installed Vista out of curiosity when the RC was free to download 3 yrs ago. And 20 yrs of Mac only prior to that (and used XT and AT at work before that, to do word processing mostly and because IT needed to).

Windows 7 feels more at home, natural, has more options for me when it comes to interface and desktop as well as key commands. Every time I go back to Mac Finder and how it behaves, I already miss 7.

So now I have a PC I built for under $2K maxed out just for Windows 7 (Apple says it isn't supporting my 3 yr old Mac Pro when it comes to Windows 7 and have to say what they had before couldn't really be called supported).

Maybe the newest Mini for $800 is one way to bring peace at home. I would definitely pick up David Pogue's Missing Manual for OS X (my brother switched and found it helped more than Pogue's book for Switching to Mac from PC title).

There is an article today about how head of Nvidia is a Mac only household, loves it, and they have a spare Mac, just in case. Whole family, kids, wife and how all his presentations are done on Mac.

Nvidia's Huang uses Macs at home
http://techreport.com/discussions.x/17928

I got a Mac to use MS Word 3.02 in the beginning, and after hearing all anti-rhetoric for years, and trying every possible alternative for w/p on Mac, I really like Word 2007 and Excel. What can I say?

The world doesn't have to be any one way or the other.

I think the underlying issue is why she is unwilling to give the Mac a chance.

I have been using computers since the days of CP/M. Remember that? Then Dos came out and I switched. What a hassle that was with the order the commands at a A: prompt or C: prompt reversed! But I adapted and was a MS user for a long time--95, 98, NT, W2k, XP. I resisted the change to a Mac for a long time--they are just too weird, everything is backwards or screwy (my thoughts). They can't even get the delete key right!

After many years of a love/hate relationship with Windows I finally decided to get a Macbook Pro. I decided to give it an honest chance. Yes, the first week or so was frustrating. But I stuck with it and after a couple weeks I felt at home. Now I cannot imagine using a windows machine.

The point is, I made an effort to change, I decided to give the Mac a chance and let it show me what it could do.

Unless your wife decides to give the Mac a chance, nothing you do will be "as good as Windows" for her. Until she recognizes her bias against Macs, there will always be some excuse, some reason to hate the Mac. Now it is the crtl/alt/del issue. What next? The log on chime? 🙂


This is not meant to be a "one is better than the other" opinion.