Honestly, it's the first Mac OS release I'd actively recommend avoiding upgrading to. It offers essentially no benefits over the prior release, and a whole lot of downsides. (Security issues notwithstanding, High Sierra also drops compatibility for a lot of older software.)
Lion actively screwed up normal people's workflows with the botched "Save As" replacement. I still want an explanation of why they thought that was a good idea. We skipped that one after one of the admin assistants discovered the new joy.
The whole California-series of OS has had a broken Finder. I see some fixes in High Sierra, but its still buggy as heck for large file moves and broken scripting. I'm hoping they take a long hard look at Mac OS like they seem to be with the next iOS. I can forgive removing some UNIX commands, but the general bugs and unexplained crashes are starting to get on my nerves.
I know I sound like an old crank, but I've been a Mac user since 1984. And the last MacOS version that I completely trusted as being loyal to my needs and workflow was Snow Leopard. Every later version has felt like it was really Apple's OS and I was just borrowing it.
It’s certainly no coincidence that the last version of OS X that you could buy with money (be a customer) was Lion, which marked the beginning of a decline.
I would be very happy to see macOS drop back to bi-yearly/loose schedule upgrades. It’s a mature platform that runs on hardware that improves significantly slower than the hardware iOS runs on; at this point insisting on a new release every year rather than when it’s ready is actively detrimental.
As much as I still get excited by new features and tech, I use my Mac exclusively for work, and rock solid reliability is more important to me than new features.
As did other versions of OSX[0]. This whole meme should get a law like Betteridge’s. Complaints about the current release of macOS are as old as the hills[1] and have become entirely vacuous. That’s not to say the complaints aren’t necessarily without merit; just that there is too much hyperbole around them.
As well as every version of every OS ever. Windows 98 was the best, Windows XP sucked with it's Fisher Price UI. Then Vista/7 came around and the outcry of "if you want the latest DirectX, you have to upgrade". And then Windows XP was discontinued to much wailing and gnashing of teeth, because XP was the best. Then 8/10 came out and everything was terrible and we're just going to stick to Windows 7 because it's the best.
To many techies, version n-1 is the best thing ever created, until version n+1 comes out and the "best ever" shifts up one revision.
Few if any people glorified Panther when Tiger came out, or Leopard when Snow Leopard came out, or Win3.11 when Win95 came out, or Win95 when Win98 came out, or WinME when WinXP came out, or Vista when Win7 came out.
Stop dismissing legitimate complaints just because you worship "new and shiny"
No, he’s right. Whilst there was a bit of criticism of Windows XP, most people were fine with it and it was widely praised. Same with Windows 98. In fact, Windows ME, Windows Vista and Windows 8 were widely criticised when they came out for good reasons, and Windows 7 and Windows 10 were widely praised.
Oh I fully understand that. However, in the past, I would argue those versions actually added useful things, so there was a bit of a tradeoff to consider.
High Sierra has essentially no enhancements whatsoever.
YMMV. I haven't seen any issues, and I jumped right to APFS (yes, I backup religiously). FWIW, High Sierra been out for months and seen 3 public and many developer releases since its dot-0.
I postponed upgrading because of reported issues with the original Magic Trackpad, and it looks like a dodged a real bullet right there.
Every few months, just as soon as I start thinking maybe I should give in to Apple’s incessant nagging and dark-pattern prompts to upgrade, stuff like this comes up.
I think I’ll just wait for the new release, or for a time when I’m ready to wipe any machine I want to upgrade.