What .Mac gets right

Now that we've lamented what's missing and wished for a brighter future, let's send some love Apple's way. .Mac isn't all bad, after all. Today, we're going to highlight some of what's good about .Mac. No bashing today, so save your griping for this post. Yes, I know that iDisk is slow and blah, blah. Today's post is about the positive, for the most part.

Read on for all that's (mostly) good about .Mac.
Exhibit A: It's all built in

One of the things I absolutely love about .Mac is how easy it is to access services. Take the Finder for instance. I keep a local copy of my iDisk on my desktop, so all my files are immediately at hand (hush about upload times). Or, just click on the "Go" menu and there's your iDisk, as well as your buddy's iDisk and/or public folder (depending on how s/he has things set up). Speaking of which, I can give just about anyone read/write access to my public folder which is great for receiving those files that are too large for email (those full-rez, layered Photoshop images, for example). It's terribly convenient and so transparent that it's easy to forget that you're dealing with a remote volume (what did I tell you about your complaints over speed?!?).

Exhibit B: Plays nice with the iApps

This one kind of goes hand-in-hand with Exhibit A, but it deserves its own mention. Just like it does with the Finder, .Mac plays beautifully with the iApps. iWeb is, of course, the shining example. Once you've built your site, getting the thing uploaded and live is as simple as it can be. There's no FTP to worry about, no typing in cryptic paths or scary permissions to consider. Just click "Publish" and it's all taken care of. Which brings me to Exhibit C...

Exhibit C: It's great for n00bs

Before you get all excited, please understand my definition of the term "n00b" in this context. I don't use it in a derogatory manner at all, I'm simply refering to someone who has had limited experience within a given area of expertise. For example: My parents recently moved to Florida and my sister all the way to Houston (Don't mess with Texas). This means we rarely get to see each other (maybe once a year). Rather than miss out on one another's lives, we've all set up iWeb sites that we use to share images and stories from our respective parts of the world. Now, my parents and sister are intelligent people but have no experience whatsoever with web publishing. Yet, over the course of a weekend (via Apple Remote Desktop) I had all three of them up, running and totally comfortable behind the keyboard. Part of that is iWeb's doing, of course. But, the ease of iWeb wouldn't matter a tinker's cuss if they couldn't upload their finished products. "All you do is click 'publish' and watch it go," I said. The point is that it's great for people who have other, more important things to worry about than file transfer protocol. If you want to get the information out to your group of readers, whomever they may be, .Mac lets you do so without getting in your way.

The Learning Center is also quite well done. Again, seasoned Mac geeks like you and I may find it a little pedestrian, but for the average (read: typical) user, it's tremendously useful.

Exhibit D: The do-it-all email address

Apple made a very nice move when they allowed users to use their .Mac email address as their Apple ID (nice or insidious, I'm not sure. Want to keep that address, laddie? You'd better renew.). Want to set up an iTunes account? Use your .Mac email address. Want to place or check up on a purchase made via the online Apple Store? Use your .Mac email address. iPhoto purchases, Apple's discussion boards...on and on. I certainly don't want to try and remember a slew of different passwords. The one-address-does-it-all feature frees me from that burden.

Exhibit E: Back it up

Apple's backup is (I'm going to say that word again) so easy. The Backup application is automated and can be scheduled to back up what you want, when you want and to where you want. Sooo many people don't back up a thing and eventually will (not "may," but "will") find themselves crying. Simply taking one afternoon to schedule regular, overnight back ups can save some very real regret in the future.

Conclusion

Well, it's not so bad afterall, is it? They say you should end on a good note. Unfortunately, this isn't the end. Next we'll publish a "State of .Mac" post that will review what we've written so far and look at the current state of .Mac as we try to figure out just where we stand. Stay tuned.