Apple Drops Mac OS 9 675
Eugenia Loli writes "MacCentral has the up-to-the-minute updates on the Apple WorldWide Developer Conference. The first big news is that Apple drops Mac OS 9. 'It's time to drop OS 9,' Steve Jobs said. 'We can do things in X that we just can't do in 9... a hundred percent of what we're doing is X only. [...] Mac OS 9 isn't dead for our customers, but it is for developers. Today we say goodbye to Mac OS 9 for all future development,' said Jobs." We all expected this to happen sooner or later, more sooner than later. There's been no new Apple development for Mac OS 9 in some time; only maintenance updates. But I won't stop Mac OS 9 development. You can't stop me! Muahahahaha! Update: 05/06 18:31 GMT by P : More news from WWDC continues to roll in.
Eugenia Loli writes "Probably the really big news is with Jaguar, the codename for Mac OS X 10.2. There is handwriting recognition technology that will be recognized by any application that uses text. Apple also introduced Quartz Extreme, which takes the compositing engine in Quartz, and accelerates it in graphics cards, and combines 2D, 3D and video in one hardware pipeline via OpenGL. 'Everything on the screen is being drawn in hardware by OpenGL.' It requires AGP 2x and 32MB of video RAM. It is not possible on older graphics cards like RAGE 128 cards, said Jobs -- that means it'll work on newer iMacs and eMacs, but not on older machines, he emphasized. Jobs said this puts Apple two years ahead of 'the other guys.'"
Update: 05/06 18:46 GMT by P : An anonymous user writes: "Apple is releasing Mac OS X Rackmount Servers. Also releasing AIM-compatible messaging called iChat; you can create buddy lists of anyone on the local network, and you can use your mac.com username to log in to it."
Not quite as good as 9.x yet (Score:4, Insightful)
Then there are programs I used everyday, MUSIC programs, like Finale and Digital Performer, that don't work (Performer) in OS X or are buggy (Finale).
I mean, it's great that they want to move to OS X. It's a great OS. I love running it. I just can't get all the things I need to work on it yet. And, if memory serves me, didn't Apple support System 7.X for a long time after System 8 came out? And when they switched to Power PC Chips from Motorola 680XX chips. We had FAT (68K/PPC) programs for like years.
What is the big rush Steve?
*nix marches on (Score:3, Insightful)
OS X brings Apple into a larger community and out of isolation. It may take some time for all of this to become apparent, but I think it is pretty obvious that everyone involved (Apple evangelists, *nix evangelists) will be better off with this move.
Guac-foo.
Really Good Idea (Score:2, Insightful)
Since Oct 2000, there were only 2 minor updates to OS 9 anyway.
Just because they arn't going to develop for OS 9 anymore doesn't mean OS 9 that's installed is going to stop working.
Tough Shit. (Score:5, Insightful)
MacOS 9 sucked. MacOS X is better. The next release should suck even less. That's how these things work. You can whine about it all you want, but whining never turned the tides of progress (if it did, slashdot would be trend-setting.)
- A.P.
Re:Not quite as good as 9.x yet (Score:5, Insightful)
Then there are programs I used everyday, MUSIC programs, like Finale and Digital Performer, that don't work (Performer) in OS X or are buggy (Finale).
Well the biggest incentive for a developer to port their software to Mac OS X is that Mac OS 9 isn't going to be developed in the future. So their revnue streams dry up if they don't make the leap to the new OS. I'm sure this move is primarily aimed at getting more third party software to X, so it should address your concern.
I mean, it's great that they want to move to OS X. It's a great OS. I love running it. I just can't get all the things I need to work on it yet. And, if memory serves me, didn't Apple support System 7.X for a long time after System 8 came out? And when they switched to Power PC Chips from Motorola 680XX chips. We had FAT (68K/PPC) programs for like years.
Apple haven't announced they will stop supporting 9. I would guess (no inside info) that they'll support it for years to come. They've just announced they won't be developing it any further. That means no more releases of 9.x except for bug fixes. This is exactly what happened with the shift from 7.x to 8.x: they continued to support 7.x but didn't release any version after 7.6 (if that's the right number).
What is the big rush Steve?
Don't forget this was announced at the developer's conference. The venue is significant. It's Apple's way of telling its third party developers that it is time to port your software to Mac OS X.
Re:Not quite as good as 9.x yet (Score:5, Insightful)
Apple will continue to update OS 9 a little, but no new features should be expected, only the occational bugfix and updates to CarbonLib so that OS 9/X compatibility will be maintained.
I expect that classic will become an optional install (not by default) sometime in 2003 and it will probably be wiped out all together by 2005.
Also, FWIW, OS 8 was going to be OS 7.7 but Apple decided to call it OS 8. There were not that many changes. It was certainly nowhere near the OS 9 to OS X shift.
Gee, Thanks! (Score:5, Insightful)
B. Thanks for getting the maccentral.com link hammered halfway through the keynote. I always enjoy having my keynote newspage refreshing session destroyed by a few million of the unwashed slashdot masses, half of whom are probably just trying to read the article to find trolling material. This ties back to A. in that if you had waited to post this till after the keynote, those of us that *really* care would have been able to finish getting updates about the keynote before the link was trampled.
Mod me down, I don't care. I'm frustrated.
Re:Makes sense (Score:1, Insightful)
As a fun experiment I replaced "Apple" with "Microsoft" and "OS X" with ".Net". The result shows just how hypocritical slashdot visitors are when it comes to Microsoft vs how much they praise Apple/Linux/Whoever for the same thing...
This makes huge sense for Microsoft: their future is
And again it shows that Microsoft are able to make gutsey decisions and lead the market rather than follow it. Whatever you think of the relative merits of
Re:goodbye beige (Score:1, Insightful)
Since when does it make sense for "Shut Down" to be classified under a little picture of an Apple?
Yeah! What kind of fool thinks that the action "shutting down your Apple computer" should be under Apple -> Shut Down!
The nerve!
Sticking it to Gates! Apple and AOL (Score:4, Insightful)
iChat: AIM-compatible messaging built in to Jaguar. Can create buddy list of anyone on the local network, as well. You can use your Mac.com name and don't need AOL account. Sorting. "First time AOL has let anyone under the tent," said Jobs (although others have reversed-engineered AIM compatible chat apps).
I think this is a huge announcement from Apple. With AOL taking Netscape/Mozilla and using it as its Web App replacing IE, we saw the first shot across the Microsoft bow by Case. Now Jobs and Case are teaming up to make AOL IM a bundled part of Mac OS X. Taking Microsoft's game and shoving it right back them. I assume this is why MSN has finally started supporting Mac OS with their service. They are reading the writing on the wall.
We have been seeing Apple getting more aggressive in dealing with Microsoft. Jobs balked at the Microsoft/DOJ "Give the Kiddies Windows" settlement, Apple's website now shows you that Mac OS X kicks XP's butt, the famous Photoshop "bakeoffs" and now the AOL IM in Jaguar. What next?
Instead of sprinkling around duplicate code... (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Two years ahead of the "other guys" (Score:4, Insightful)
The only thing I have to say about this is that Microsoft is doing the exact same thing with their next windows release - dubbed "Longhorn". The gui is going to be accelerated by your graphics card using the 3d features of your card. This will (no doubt) use Direct3d instead of OpenGL but it serves the same purpose.
So your argument is invalidated because both sides are doing the same thing - Apple just happened to beat them to the punch, and I , for one, applaud them for it.
Derek
Re:Two years ahead of the "other guys" (Score:5, Insightful)
This isn't going to "force" anybody to do anything. I am typing this from my 4-year-old Mac running OS X. It's slower to respond than OS 9, but I like the OS so much better that I put up with it. (The developer tools alone are simply wonderful, and worth the switch.) There's nothing I have to "go without" in using my old computer, I just have to wait longer for it to happen. Same deal here. Don't want to upgrade? Then deal with it -- it won't suddenly get worse than it was, just because of Apple's decision.
they are dead last in Legacy Support
I can't agree with this. Yes, there have been many times when Apple said, "We've decided to ditch this old technology, and move to something far superior". Every time it happens, people whine and moan. But they always have plenty of time to upgrade (years, usually), and backwards compatilibily has always been excellent (68k to PPC, for example).
Your computer doesn't become less productive when Apple decides to put in a new feature. This is ridiculous. I can understand some frustration when your 1337 new computer isn't the hottest thing on the market anymore... but it really is silly. Apple says, "Buy a new iBook tomorrow and you'll get [feature]!!" And everyone who bought an iBook last month complains that Apple isn't selling the same product for 5 years. Look at the big picture, people.
Re:goodbye beige (Score:4, Insightful)
I personally think the way they have menu layouts now make more sense - all system stuff (shutdown and restart) under one easy to find and always availiable apple menu. Then really common app things like preferences or services (and YES that is an app specific menu, read the UI development guidelines) or Quit belong under an app menu, followed by all the other menu items an app might need.
Just because you are used to doing something a certain way does not make it more "intuitive" for new users. I herald the approach of systems with a whole new level of rationally thought out intuitive and powerful interfaces - sure there will be missteps but it's time for a breath of fresh air in something that has been written in stone for fifteen years without question. Do you really think that ideas for UI's developed on computers that long ago need no more rethinking? Even the constitution has amendments, and the way you govern people doesn't change as fast as computers do.
Re:Rendezvous sounds interesting... open standard (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Tough Shit. (Score:3, Insightful)
The Mac world had the same problem with the shift from System 6 to System 7. I was a die-hard System 6 user. As far as I'm concerned, it still represents the peak of the Classic Mac experience.
The initial System 7 was buggy and made some fundamental changes. Most of those changes were good, although about half of them took awhile to convince everyone. System 7 eventually stabilized and the last die-hards migrated. I lived. :) MacOS 8 and 9 made a lot of great innovations, but didn't change anything fundamentally with what System 7 was doing, and so there wasn't near as much of a shakeup with upgrades until OS X, which again is making fundamental changes.
OS X Rackmount Servers? (Score:2, Insightful)
I told him I had been using it on the student body webserver, but then ditched it in favor of plain Darwin. After all, if you're in the market for a UNIX server, you probably don't need a GUI.
I also told him I was going to replace it any day now with FreeBSD running on off-the-shelf PC hardware. Apple themselves admit:
In other words: Why Bother? A rackmount PC will be cheaper, and FreeBSD is far more proven in this arena. Darwin is simply FreeBSD tweaked to run Aqua (yes, I know, oversimplification), which you'll never use on a rackmount server anyway! Seems like OS X won't be bringing the beauty of BSD to the uninitiated anytime soon--let's think. . .these OS X rackmounts will appeal to people who use GUIs on their servers already; idiots and idiots who run Windows NT.
Re:Makes sense (Score:5, Insightful)
No. I'm a rabid Mac addict. Nevertheless, Apple's current behavior would be totally unacceptable if they were in charge. But. They're. Not. And that makes all the difference in the world.
If Apple and Microsoft magically traded places, and Steve Jobs controlled 90% of the computer industry, the world would be much worse off. Lord Steve is a brilliant visionary, but he's also a vicious tyrant (when he gets the chance to do so). Imagine the alternate universe from Treehouse of Horror where Ned Flanders ruled the world. It would be like that, only with lickable widgets.
Restatement: the rules are supposed to be different for a convicted monopolist.
Re:Makes sense (Score:3, Insightful)
--Bud
gross misunderstandings (Score:2, Insightful)
Or, to put it another way, it's as if I accused you of hypocrisy because slashdot visitors criticise Microsoft, and here you are, defending them. That's every bit as hypocritical as what you're accusing others of. (Zero is equal to zero.)
The second, and more egregious, mistake is assuming that Microsoft and Apple are equivalent. Here's a clue for ya: Microsoft has been found guilty of anti-competitive behavior in a court of law. Apple hasn't. I'm not really a fan of Apple, but to assume that people should judge these two companies by the same standards is just plain foolish.
Which leads to the conclusion that even if you could find some specific individuals to accuse of hypocrisy, your accusations might not stand up too well.
My god man, I remember the IBM and AT&T cases, and MS makes both of those companies (who were pretty foul in their day) look like saints!
Apple Lists Supported Cards for Quartz Extreme (Score:2, Insightful)
For everyone wondering whether their video card will be able to use the hardware-accelerated Quartz, I quote from Apple's website [apple.com] (at the bottom of the page):
"Supported cards: nVidia: GeForce2MX, GeForce3, GeForce4 Ti, GeForce4 or GeForce4MX. ATI: any AGP Radeon card. 32MB VRAM recommended for optimum performance."
Also note that they say 32 MB of RAM is recommended but theoretically not required. So I don't think this is quite as much of a debacle as some posters have made it out to be. Besides, Quartz should be improved and faster in 10.2 whether you're using hardware acceleration or not; you just won't get the max performance if it isn't hardware-accelerated.
Re:Apple's Mac OS X "Jaguar" Site (Score:2, Insightful)
Ahead of the other guys? Not really... (Score:2, Insightful)
Is it just me or is Mac OS X not ahead at all? Windows has had hardware-accelerated GUI redrawing since, like, forever, mostly provided by drivers. 2000/XP extended that even further. And if I remember right, I thought some of the *nix UI stuff like KDE/GNOME supported hardware acceleration? BeOS supported hardware acceleration for the GUI, using VESA, as well. I don't know about any other OSes though, I haven't used most of them much. I really don't see how Mac OS X is 'ahead' at all, considering that their current versions aren't very accelerated at all (even though their speed is impressive considering what they do.)
Re:One rather ballsy note from Jobs (Score:3, Insightful)