The New Mac App Store...
Friday, January 7, 2011 at 2:18PM Well, it finally happened and the Mac App Store has been launched.
Delivered as part of a new OSX update - 10.6.6 - the new Mac App Store (MAS) has surprised a few people by not being a part of iTunes, but a completely separate app.
First impressions are extremely positive, except for the fact that it irritates me there are so many games in the store and in the top categories. I'm not a big gamer! It would be great to be able to exclude all games, except when I want to see them.
Installation of apps is a breeze and in some respects too easy!
Once logged in, it's just a single click and the app jumps out of the store and into your dock. I know some people don't like this, but it's a great visual aid for new Mac users to see where the app is and start using it straight away. Of course, this is a precursor to OSX Lion where we will have the Application grid, and your apps will jump straight in there.
Some other surprises...
Apple surprised us on several accounts, not just with the separate MAS application:
Heavily discounting some of their own applications - notably Aperture 3 and Apple Remote Desktop. Both on the MAS for just a quarter of their usual retail price. If fact, only on the MAS, as they are still up on the Apple Online Retail store with their usual price
The rather hit and miss aspect of identifying existing pre-installed applications within the MAS on your Mac. Not just for 3rd party apps, but also their own. iLife apps were identified correctly but iWork apps not. Some 3rd party apps were marked as installed, some not. The main issue here is how the MAS will handle updates.
If an app (other than Apple applications) has not been installed by the Mac App Store, even if the MAS is showing it as installed, it will not be managed by the MAS and any updates will need to be delivered the normal way!
Whether this ever gets resolved is open to question, but currently, the only way to get an existing app managed by the MAS is to re-buy it through the MAS. I'm sure this is not the last we'll hear of this.
They didn't release iWork '11 - One of the more popular rumours. One can only assume that they didn't want to "overshadow" the MAS launch with a new version of iWork. I'd say give it a few weeks and it will appear. I wonder if this had anything to do with the current versions of the iWork '09 apps not being identified as installed in the MAS. Perhaps, they pulled iWork '11 at the last minute?
Originally there was some confusion over the number of Macs you can update under a single Apple ID. The premise is that once you buy an app via the MAS, you can install in on another Mac that you own. It works brilliantly and is a really easy way to keep multiple Macs in check. The problem is I was under the impression you could install on up to five Macs but it may be in fact, any number of Macs you own and control - for personal use only. Following on from a recent Twitter exchange, I decided to check it out for myself, and was able to install and run an paid app on six different machines, all using the same Apple ID - sweet!
Conclusion
I like it!
Still some issues to be sorted, but I think we'll look back on the launch of the Mac App Store as a hugely important day for the Mac.
Making it simple and painless to find and install software will help the platform tremendously and will contribute significantly to wider adoption of the platform.
Developers will benefit from an easy distribution method although we'll still have the problem of managing the scale of the MAS as more and more apps get installed.
Personal recommendation and guidance will be paramount when trying to find good quality apps.
There's also a great opportunity for anyone who can put together a decent quality screencast or two to help developers promote their apps....
;-)
