[P1] a couple observations...

[Paul Bernhardt]

There is no doubt that OSX is a *lot* less customizable than previous  
Mac OSes. Particularly in where you put files. I wish it were not so  
sometimes, but I suspect this is from my old habits of usage, expecting  
to put things some places, generally disorganized, etc... I suspect  
that if I thought about it some, organization the way Apple mandates  
would be close to how I'd pick it.

Some of your issues are addressable:

On Friday, June 27, 2003, at 08:13  AM, Jack Rodgers wrote:

> I would like to change the hot keys on the menus of my applications.
> Some folks would like to turn off the default FKey settings in OS X.

Probably a hack out there to do some of the above...
Ah, here's a program:  
http://www.transaction-one.com/gs/html/gs/f2/en/ 
products.jsp?sfid=5647&pubid=2
Probably some others.

> I would like to get rid of the Dock.

Here's a hack to get rid of the dock:  
http://mirror.macupdate.com/info.php/id/10978
Probably a way to go directly into the unix underpinnings to change  
lots of those things.

> Some folks would like to arrange the applications in the Applications  
> folder in ways they prefer. They can't since the updaters won't work.

Some folks, but not many, I'll bet...

> I would like a trackball instead of a trackpad.

Buy one. Apple had some trackball machines some years back. I have a  
Duo 230 that has a trackball. I like it. My father uses  a trackball  
for his desktop.

> I would like an extra drive instead of a CD.

Buy a firewire drive... but, I suspect you mean in a swappable bay. I  
think the Wallstreet Powerbooks had hot swappable drive bays. But, why  
do you need an extra drive? For many people, the optical drive is the  
way they back up files. CDRW will serve as a 700MB removable drive, if  
you want to use it that way.

Paul