[hopeless]

  "has your G-mail or Google Reader gotten any easier to use, or less stressful on your eyes? ... No. Just look at the music listings in new, redesigned iTunes."

Actually, yes I do find gmail and reader easier to use - actually quote preferable. In contrast, iTunes is one of the most confusing pieces of software I have to use on a daily basis - second only to Lotus Notes. All that is Apple is not great.

[derefr]

I've wanted to expel this rant for a while: when you pick it apart, iTunes is basically as great as it can be while still running on Windows as well as OSX (not to say that it's great in any absolute sense.) It has to be monolithic to be multi-platform, and it has to be multi-platform to serve as a life-support system for all the iConsumerElectronics on Windows.

If iTunes was OSX-only, it could spray itself all around OSX as a bunch of cute one-screen utilities with clever integration hooks:

1. The App Store would become part of Software Update (which would thus become a general Mac App Store and App Update manager—hopefully buying out AppFresh and giving MacPorts a GUI);

2. Contacts, Bookmarks, Notes, etc., and the transfer of media to the iConsumerElectronics in a friendly, GUIful manner, would all be a part of the iSync utility (yes, that exists—it's the ghetto for synching phones that aren't made by Apple);

3. Podcasts would just be a client program that relies on the same background-downloading daemon that System Updates do, with a modification to read arbitrary feeds, and extract enclosed media files (or torrents!); once downloaded, iSync would just see them and sync them;

4. iTMS would just be a website, which would expose special content types that Safari would know what to do with (audio/x-apple-ringtone = save to the Music/Ringtones folder, etc.);

5. and iTunes would be left to be a music library, consisting in its entirety of Playlists, Genius, and perhaps the Radio (and hooks to send events to Ping, if it likes.)

If iTunes was OSX-only, it wouldn't need to know how to burn CDs; it could just allow you to export a playlist as a folder of MP3s, and then integrate audio-CD burning as an option in the OSX Burn Folder menu.

If iTunes was OSX-only, it wouldn't need to have sections for TV Shows, Movies, Books, Ringtones; those would just be folders on your hard drive, which iTMS (through Safari) would write to, and iSync would read from.

There's a thousand other ways it could be better and slimmer—but, if you'll notice, none of these things could work given the restriction that they have to work on Windows as well.

[acdha]

Even when iTunes was OS X only it felt awkward and unlike most other OS X programs. The problem is that they bought an OS 9 MP3 player (SoundJam) and have been hacking at it for years without doing the rewrite needed to get things like platform-standard UI, non-blocking I/O, etc. Any time you see a modal dialog, remember it started out on an OS which barely multitasked. Cross platform isn't an issue - Windows has equivalents for every single thing on your list, whether native or something they already ship like Apple Software Update.

As far as package management goes, the problem here is that Apple simply does not care. The Mac sysadmin community has been asking for better solutions for years but it's just not a priority for Apple - even App Store updates, which theoretically are more important, have been broken[1] for something like the last 4 major iTunes releases but since it's merely clumsy and doesn't prevent sales it obviously hasn't been as important as a new version of some non-standard window controls.

[1] The process is now: click on Apps. Click on "Get Updates". Click on "Get All Updates". Wait. Dismiss erroneous "The information on this page is outdated and must be refreshed" dialog. Click on Apps. Click on "Get Updates". Click on "Get All Updates". This from a UI powerhouse? The phone almost gets it right except for the gratuitous password nag.

[derefr]

Indeed, it did start out as a part of OS9. However, I think the Principle of Charity applies here—Apple generally employs good engineers, and they got everything else native-ized, standardized, POSIXized, etc. for 10.0. There must have been a particular reason for iTunes being the one thing that got left out of HIG-ification in 10.0 and every update since, and I propose that that particular reason is Windows support.

Yes, Windows does have hooks to add functionality—but hooks aren't enough. The reason Apple could remove components from iTunes was that it could, itself, integrate them into all shipping copies of OSX. Apple doesn't decide what drivers and plug-ins get shipped with Windows, so anything they'd install would be third-party and after-the-fact (which is what already happens: e.g. the CD burner driver bundled into the Windows iTunes installer.) You can't slim down Windows iTunes because you have to ship all the programs that make up the functionality of iTunes, whether modularly or monolithically. However, you can slim down OSX iTunes if you just start saying "this will be an OS feature, not an iTunes feature."

Also, on a completely unrelated note:

> The phone almost gets it right except for the gratuitous password nag.

I've always taken that to be a sudo escalation prompt. You don't want your kids picking up your phone and buying things on it.

[notahacker]

The most irritating features of iTunes on Windows are its constant attempts to persuade you to download QuickTime and Safari and the fact you need to use it at all to "activate" a phone. Neither of those are a prerequisite to run on the platform. The dreadful initial release of Ping also has a lot more to do with Cupertino than Redmond (and they say Google doesn't get social networking!)

An integrated iTunes as an all-in-one media file manager linked in to the iTMS is also pretty integral to Apple's desire to drive people to that store - they _want_ people to think about buying more music and movies when they go to update their podcasts or back up their phone. Much like an instant search that serves more ads or an unnecessary password prompt when downloading a free app update, it makes a lot more sense from the perspective of encouraging particular consumer behaviour than from enhancing their productivity or enjoyment.

[nhooey]

To extend your idea about redundantly entering a password when downloading a free application, Apple also sends you a redundant receipt for $0. That can't be anything but training the user to a set of behaviours.

[hopeless]

I think you have some good ideas there but I don't think Windows integration is the main issue. Sure, iTunes is trying to do too much but a bigger problem is Apple's willingness to throw in different, non-standard components and generally mess with the UI... making the window controls vertical is just their latest strange decision. There's no reason why all the same functionality couldn't be provided with a consistent UI

[mhw]

Hmm; I like your thinking. It makes me wonder whether integrating all this stuff into OS X would make OS X more attractive as an overall user experience when compared to Windows. "If you use Windows you get the old iTunes interface, but OS X has iOS synchronisation baked in."

[boyakasha]

I agree entirely. I'm very happy with Gmail, and switching from Winamp to iTunes just left me wishing that a Mac version of Winamp existed, even after using iTunes for about two years.

[joshuacc]

I came over here to post that very thing. Gmail and G Reader have both improved tremendously in the past year.