Lion's Address Book - A WARNING
for those upgrading to the latest version of osx ("lion"), a word of warning. prepare to groan over some annoying changes to ical. but when you launch the new address book, be careful. your first impulse, like mine, may be to jump out the nearest window.
apple's later rev to address book is a TOTAL DISASTER. and just to be clear: the problem is not the ugly "leather" cover (but make no mistake: it is ugly) or the misguided and juvenile attempt to mimic a real-world object (for the sake, one assumes, of simplicity and ease of use). the problem is that the "updated" functionality of the address book *****. it is both harder to use and less useful than its predecessor.
being able to see groups, people, and their data at the same time is essential to easily modify and browse the address book. now not only do i have a more difficult click-path to navigate my contacts, but i have to hold in memory (my memory) the context of what i am looking at.
the old address book, while not perfect by any means, helped me organize and use my contacts. the new address books makes it significantly more difficult. in this age of social networking where people and connections are fundamental to how we work and play on the web, is this really the best apple could do? TOTAL FAIL, APPLE.
iMac / iBook / iPhone, Mac OS X (10.5.2)
