I totally agree. But it also seems like a lot of people don't. Frustratingly enough when discussions like that come up a lot of people respond with a "MacOS just works differently, you just need to get used to it" discussion killer.
Yeah, I know some design principles are different. That doesn't always mean they are better or couldn't be better.
In general I feel like UI/UX on MacOS for the most part has stagnated in the past decade or so. Where there has been evolution, it mostly has been things (poorly) ported over from iOS (system preferences for example).
This in contrast to other desktop platforms that have kept evolving and experimenting with other ways of working. Granted, not always improving things but often making things much better. Window management on windows 11 for example is just plain awesome imho. Certainly on wider screens or screens in portrait it is extremely powerful.
Everything I am working on MacOS I feel very limited in that area. Even with tools like Rectangle it still doesn't work as fluid as it does on windows.
I'm one who doesn't care. I didn't like to have a lot of system tray icons when I used Windows, and I don't like having a lot of them in macOS. I turn off the ones I rarely use (when I can).
However, I also feel Apple have reduced the usability of the menu bar icons in recent iterations. Their clickable area/spacing has enlarged, which is counter to having small icons in a focused space. The Clock and Control Centre can't be moved around. I didn't use Control Centre at all until I discovered some setting that can only be toggled. Since I toggled it, I've forgotten what it was and haven't touched Control Centre since. I'd turn it off if I could. Maybe I need Bartender after all.
The menu bar has now to have more icons than in earlier OSX as to run services like dropbox, 1password etc they now need to be in the menu bar whilst previously they were not needed there - now I suspect this might be the app writers fault as well as Apple's but it is an annoyance.
I think this sort of thing is more subjective and dependent on what the user is used to than most are willing to admit. I find the vaunted Aero Snap feature incredibly annoying for example because it’s so “noisy” with its proposed-snap animations and how easily it’s accidentally triggered (especially when multiple displays are involved) — the way the third party app Moom does it with a popover that appears on green traffic light hover or key shortcut is vastly preferable to me.
It’s true that Mac desktop evolution has somewhat stagnated and could use some movement, but that movement shouldn’t necessarily be toward the Win9X desktop paradigm.
Yeah, I know some design principles are different. That doesn't always mean they are better or couldn't be better.
In general I feel like UI/UX on MacOS for the most part has stagnated in the past decade or so. Where there has been evolution, it mostly has been things (poorly) ported over from iOS (system preferences for example).
This in contrast to other desktop platforms that have kept evolving and experimenting with other ways of working. Granted, not always improving things but often making things much better. Window management on windows 11 for example is just plain awesome imho. Certainly on wider screens or screens in portrait it is extremely powerful.
Everything I am working on MacOS I feel very limited in that area. Even with tools like Rectangle it still doesn't work as fluid as it does on windows.