Hands on: A Mac fan takes on Vista

Bouncing back and forth between Vista and OS X, I've tried to figure out what it is about the way UAC works that bugs me in comparison to the way Apple handles similar security issues. Part of it is that seemingly innocuous actions trigger it -- such as changing the time and date on the computer. Part of it is that you can't selectively turn UAC off. In Mac OS X, changes to the system through system preferences can be "locked" and "unlocked," making it easier to avoid having to type in your password when making changes. Don't want your time and date easily changed? Just lock that particular preference and you'll be asked to type in your password before you can do so in the future.

My sense here is that Microsoft has been criticized so often for security vulnerabilities that it decided to club users over the head with its new operating system-in-lockdown-mode. It reminds me of the early days of HTML, when Web designers everywhere suddenly seemed to discover the blink tag -- and sites everywhere began blinking at users. In a short while, all that blinking became distracting, then annoying, then finally ended as people got fed up. My sense is that a lot of users will get tired of UAC very quickly and do whatever they can to shut it off. That could leave them vulnerable to genuine threats and obviate the enhanced security Microsoft is so proud of.

I'm more enamored of Vista's Flip 3D feature, which basically takes all of the open windows on your desktop, stands them up on end and stacks them in a way that you can cycle through to the one you want to use. It's similar to what Apple's Expose does. In Mac OS X, all of the open windows are arranged in a two-dimensional way that makes it easy to see what's in each one. But it's not as visually appealing.

Both do pretty much the same thing; Vista's method wins on aesthetics.

Gadgets can be run multiple times, both on the desktop and in the Sidebar.

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I'm less enamored of Vista's new sidebar feature, which allows small gadgets to run on screen all the time. These are useful little apps like a clock, CPU meter, currency converter, a weather window and stock ticker. You can run multiple instances of each gadget, plopping two clocks set for different time zones right on your screen. Gadgets generally sit in the sidebar and can be localized and customized -- moved to the desktop or made transparent, for instance -- or turned off altogether. They perform many of the same functions as widgets in Mac OS X, except that widgets are called up with a key combo and float onto the screen in front a user's other windows. They don't run in the OS X dock, and you can't move them to the desktop without some third-party intervention.