I believe that software has two test phases. The first is in the confines of trusted groups, developers, and beta testers. The second test phase is the initial release, where customers find bugs that couldn’t be found without them. That is, the software company has clean machines that test basic functionality. The customers have dirty machines with sometimes terrible defects. The software tested on those machines in the real world is more likely to show whether the software is robust or not.

Well, I can’t make up my mind on this problem. I downloaded and installed Apple’s Mavericks on top of a Mountain Lion installation. Foolishly, I trusted it, and didn’t do a complete backup before I started. I haven’t in the past found Apple’s software to be buggy in any really devastating way.

But when I went to project my slide show the next day, the show refused to project properly. I found a workaround, but it really sucked and was inconvenient. This is what happened. I use Keynote for my presentations. Keynote has been a robust and on many accounts, flawless, piece of software. Mavericks allowed me to update my version of Keynote to version 6. It was an easy installation, and that part went fine. I was a little distressed that the user interface was so different, but I knew I would find my way around eventually. I thought that it wouldn’t stop me from presenting the next day, the shows I was using were already set in place, and didn’t need editing. I was wrong.

At home, I have a single external monitor. I plug my Macbook Pro into a 40″ Samsung TV. It works great. No issues. But it looks like Mavericks thinks my external monitor is the primary monitor. When I do my presentations, the external monitor is my secondary monitor. So when I tell the presentation to play on the external monitor, it plays on my laptop. I will have to figure out a way to fix this. Unfortunately, I think I will have to revert to the prior installation on a week old backup, then restore newer files, reinstall Mavericks without the external monitor hooked up, then we’ll see what happens.