More Planned Obsolescence: Evil Lion

By Ctein

[Before we get started...want to help me do some research? I'm studying printer variability and I'm looking for owners of Epson 3880 printers who are willing to make a couple of 8.5 x 11" prints for me to my specifications. If you're willing to help out, please e-mail me at [email protected] with the approximate purchase date of your printer. I'll get back to you with details. Thanks!

We now return to the usual program in progress.]

If you're a long-time Mac user and you upgrade to Lion (OS X 10.7.x), there's a good chance at least one of your programs or peripherals will stop working. Lion will not run PowerPC-coded programs because Apple decided to eliminate the Rosetta translator.

This will be old news to some of you, but not all. To find out if this is going to affect you before you upgrade, launch About This Mac/More Info...and click on Software/Applications. Click the Kind column and your applications will be sorted by type. Scroll down the list and look for anything that says PowerPC. You may well be unpleasantly surprised.

Drivers for older peripheral equipment—scanners, printers, cameras, etc.—may never been rewritten for Intel processors. Older applications may also turn out to be PowerPC. You may, but not always, be able to upgrade them to Intel versions for some outlay of money.

This is an unsatisfactory situation, he said with extreme understatement. Apple's behavior around this one has been cheap, mean, and, frankly, stupid.

Any time there's a major OS or application rewrite, stuff breaks, and sometimes it is very difficult to repair. See Windows Vista, Microsoft Office, Adobe Creative Suite. Mind you, I'm not going to stop railing against that progressive obsolescence, but I do understand why it happens. There was the year Apple eliminated the Classic compatibility box from OS X. I've had to keep an old Mac running OS 9.2 around for the small amount of business-critical software I have that never got upgraded to OS X by the manufacturer. Part of the problem for Apple was that Classic mode never was fully functional, even in its final incarnation. When Apple decided to migrate to the Intel platform and rewrite all its core functionality for 64-bit, it's easy to see how the problems of even keeping Classic compatibility working as not-very-well as it did could became overwhelming. It interacts intimately with OS X functionality.

Rosetta is another matter. It's a translator; it converts PowerPC code to Intel code. It's dealings with OS X are much more constrained. Frankly, if I were to imagine a technical need to eliminate Rosetta, it would've happened when Apple moved from OS X 10.4 to 10.5. There was major recoding of the core functionality. But 10.6 to 10.7? This is an evolutionary product, and there are only modest issues involved in ensuring Rosetta compatibility.

This wasn't a case of Apple saying, "This is going to be really tough to do," it was a case of them saying "Screw you, we can't be bothered." That's the cheap part. I'll get to the mean and stupid part presently.

First let's dispel a few apologias concerning Apple:

1.) "It's the price of progress." No; the price of greed, perhaps. The progress from 10.6 to 10.7 didn't fundamentally break the concept or functionality of Rosetta or even require a major rewrite. This was not necessary, technically nor economically. It's a very minor development project in the total scheme of the OS.

2.) "You got your mileage out of those old programs, you might as well upgrade or find an alternative." Assuming those exist—they don't always. It also ignores the money you'll have to spend to do that and the considerable time (= money) you will have to spend installing and bringing yourself up to speed with the new software. Conservatively, an upgrade to Lion would cost me $1,000.

3.) "Why should all users have to pay for something only a minority need?" With any big-tent operating system or application, most users don't use most of the features. A major OS, or an application like Microsoft Office or Adobe Photoshop, has to include all the functionality that all their users might need, even though no user will take advantage of any but a small fraction of that. If I listed the 10 major features of OS X, hardly any TOP readers would be making use of all of them. Conversely, the majority of TOP's readers make use of some obscure OS component that a very, very small fraction of users need. That's just the way it is. Anyway, the cost of keeping Rosetta is not huge.

4.) "No one is making you upgrade to Lion." Oh, they will. If I buy a new Mac I'm going to be stuck with Lion. Worse, it's SOP for software manufacturers to not support OS's more than a generation back (the early release of Mountain Lion may throw that off for one cycle). Photoshop CS6 will run under Snow Leopard, but will CS7? CS8 surely won't. Within a few years, one way or another, this is gonna bite me.

Okay, so what should be done, given that big companies like Apple almost never backtrack on technical decisions, no matter how brain-dead they may be? Well, there is a simple and only mildly inconvenient solution. Allow users to virtualize their copies of the older OSs. VMware, Parallels, and VirtualBox can all run virtual Mac OS X; folks have hacked their way through the technical thicket to show that's the case.

Just one little problem. Apple's end-user license forbids virtualizing older Mac OS X clients, even on Apple equipment. Consequently, virtualization software does type-checking to prevent installing a Mac OS client. Usually. An interim release of VMware had a different installation interface that would allow client Snow Leopard to be installed. I quickly grabbed it and created virtual Snow Leopard machines to experiment with (figure 1). I believe the current version won't do that. I have this suspicion it was a trial balloon that Apple pricked.

It's illegal and it shouldn't be. My virtualized Snow Leopard client OS, running here under VMWare, is prohibited by Apple's EULA. Think I'm going to delete it? Think again!

Apple could enable this with the stroke of the pen by issuing an EULA addendum for the older client OS Xs stating that they may be virtualized on Apple hardware, and that Apple does not support this. That means they're not responsible if the older virtualized OS doesn't work, so no cost to them.

That's all it would take. Let me run Snow Leopard, or even Leopard, or maybe even Tiger in a virtual machine on my Mac. I get to keep all my old functionality with modest inconvenience and expense. A couple of paragraphs from Apple would solve so many headaches and it wouldn't cost them a penny. (It's not like there's a big market out there in pirating old OSs, and besides, pirates don't pay much attention to EULAs.) So far, though, they haven't budged.

That's the stupid and mean part.

Ctein

TOP runs its verbal Ctein emulator on Wednesdays.

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Original contents copyright 2012 by Michael C. Johnston and/or the bylined author. All Rights Reserved.

Featured Comment by Thomas: "Rosetta isn't Apple's code to do with as it wishes. (Source here.)

"I'm a former software engineer who is now a patent and copyright attorney. Part of my work involves reviewing software license agreements. I'm posting semi-anonymously to make clear that I'm not soliciting clients with this post.

"It is the typical practice for software to be licensed in commercial environments for a certain term. That term might be denominated in years, in relation to other software releases, or anything else.

"Your invective at Apple would be sorely misplaced if their hands were tied.

"Say, for example, that Transitive, the owner of Rosetta, had licensed it to Apple for five years or three major releases of OS X, whichever came first. (I'm making the exact terms up, but you get the idea.) Apple would have had to go hat-in-hand to Rosetta to get a license if Apple wished to included it with Lion. Today, however, Transitive is owned by IBM. IBM might will simply not be interested in helping Apple maintain backwards compatibility or, perhaps, the necessary technical expertise to maintain this old code isn't there anymore and so IBM can't or won't license the code to Apple.

"I can speculate (and so can you) as to what really happened here, but we simply don't know. Getting nine women pregnant won't result in a baby in one month; no amount of cash is sufficient to conjure software out of thin air. Given the software patent environment of late, it is even possible that IBM wanted to license it to Apple, but another patent holder who'd given a license to Transitive/IBM refused to grant a necessary license. I doubt we'll ever know.

"If 30 years of hanging around the computer industry has taught me one thing it is this: you can't upgrade part of a system and expect that nothing could break and, eventually, you have to upgrade part of a system because old hardware will fail. In other words, find a working system and enjoy it while you can because, eventually, you'll have to find a new and different working system to replace it. Change is the only constant.

"Happy computing!"

Ctein replies: I much appreciate you posting an authoritative reference on the Transitive/Rosetta business. It's nice getting that confirmed instead of dealing in third-hand information.

That said, this is something of a red herring. As you carefully note, this is all speculation. It might have been beyond Apple's control. It might have been entirely within their control. We don't know. The real point is that they, like most of the companies in this industry, don't even care that they screw people by systematically breaking existing hardware and software. This is merely just one more example of it.

The industry has collectively decided that it's okay to constantly break our tools in the name of next year's profits. They've decided it's okay to screw us over, repeatedly. I've decided that policy sucks. I don't have to lie back and grin and take it. This isn't even close to the first article I've written about planned obsolescence in the computer industry; I've been in it for 45 years. I promise it won't be the last.

If, and I emphasize if, Apple had no choice in this matter, then Apple could ameliorate this with the stroke of the pen, by changing their EULA. That's just policy, not engineering. Policy can sometimes be changed by force of opinion. This is mine. I don't plan to stop writing about specific complaints against the computer industry's planned obsolescence policies.

Comments

[Karl]

I said it once before,in one of your columns about snow leopard and profile headache, to which I received a virtual slap: Don't you ever get tired of the shakedown? I am, and I'm dual booting while keeping my peripherals working in 10.5.8

[Terence Hogben]

I have always had Apples from the beginning but avoided going the Apple route for software ever since i bought the expensive Quick Time Authoring and Apple just dumped it leaving me high and dry after a short time. And my newish iMac has no USB 3 another irritating move on their part , try finding affordable Thunderbolt devices.

[Janne]

OK, I suspect I am going to get flamed for even mentioning this: but for all its flaws, for all its shortcomings, Open Source systems have a definite leg up on its closed counterparts in this particular respect.

No, I don't suggest you try to use Linux or something — if you have major problems upgrading the version of your current OS then switching to a different one would be a thousand times worse, assuming you could even do it at all.

All I am saying is that an open development model does bring a good deal of benefits in this particular area, and is one major factor that open OS's are by far the preferred ones for servers and other infrastructure that you want to keep running for many years. And your use-case, where you want to keep the same peripherals and workflow as stable as possible for years and years, is really much closer to a typical server installation than a desktop in spririt.

[Joseph Reid]

Dead right! Thank you for ranting on the behalf of all of us who are dealing with this. What I'd like to know, also, is since all this stuff won't work on my new Mac, how do I remove it safely so it doesn't eat up my hard drive space?

[Michael Bernstein]

I agree that dropping PPC support in Lion was unfortunate (as was dropping Classic support on x86, but that's another discussion). That said, if you are looking for a fully 'legal' solution, Snow Leopard Server is officially supported on VMWare (and not just in 4.0). Possibly older OS X Server versions too. Ironically the Lion EULA actually does let you virtualize 10.7, not that this is particularly helpful at this point.

Mike

[Randolph]

Apple's a media device company now--it's 80% of their revenue. They've no reason to maintain Mac as a general-purpose computing platform and I wonder how long they will.

I think we're all going to end up running Linux, probably from Google.

[Timothy Gray]

Does anybody know what version of VMWare allowed for this OSX virtualization? I'd love to be able to continue running Tiger/Leopard/Snow Leopard if possible on a new iMac.

I'm currently staying put with a PowerMac G5 Dual 2.3 running Tiger because one of my mainstay apps, Silverfast HDR Studio, is not available yet for Lion (they have a beta, but the final product is still a ways off).

Thanks!

TG

[Geoff Wittig]

The end-game was obvious the instant Microsoft imposed its obligatory on-line "activation" process, and other companies (cough-Adobe-cough) instantly jumped on board. In a heartbeat software went from a product I bought and used as I saw fit to a transient, totally contingent rental from a giant corporation looking to squeeze every nickel they could from their customers.

It seems self-evident to me that Adobe's final goal is to gradually (frog in a frying pan style) compel everyone to migrate to a monthly on-line-access rental model rather than actually "owning" something like Photoshop. That'll make us real cyber-serfs.

[Ed]

Rosetta may have only been a translator but there was almost certainly Rosetta-specific support code within OS X, it was possibly the EOL-ing of this code that rendered Rosetta non-viable.

If they did this without good notice then it indeed a poor move (though I don't remember any notice being given for the removal of floppy disc drives).

[spence]

You are angry that apple stop supporting a legacy architecture created in 1991 (21 years ago) and who's last apple chip (the G5)was released in 2005 (7 years ago) and when OSX 10.5 "Leopard" (2007 so 5 years ago) was announced apple said it would be the final version to support PowerPC. And then just to be nice they extended that suppor to 10.6. It's not like these changes were suddon and not revealed to the general public.

[Andrew]

As such behavior from vendors continues, I hope that more users will demand open source drivers. There is absolutely no reason for drivers to be closed source.

[David]

Am I missing something? I am pretty sure that Power PC programs stopped working with Snow Leopard, not Lion.

[George LeChat]

Ctein:

I had this problem as well. NikonScan4, which runs my 9000 film scanner, is a PowerPC program. But it also runs in Windows, and it's easy to run a virtual copy of Windows on any Mac, including those running Lion.

Problem solved, I would guess. Although, personally, I didn't bother. SilverFast works as well or better than NikonScan. I just switched.

Cheers,

G.

[Marc Rochkind]

I think Apple killed Rosetta because they want all developers to use the latest Xcode development system, which is Intel only. (Supporting PPC really would be a lot of work, unlike supporting Rosetta itself.) For example, the new Gateway/Developer ID system requires the newest Xcode, as does the Mac App Store. Any developer who hasn't yet generated Intel code is so far behind that Apple doesn't want them in its ecosystem any longer.

As anyone who knows Apple would realize, this is very Apple-like.

[Mark St. John]

Rosetta was a compatibility patch to ease the transition to Intel from PowerPC; it was going to be removed eventually. Rosetta had a pretty good run, you have to admit.

Maintaining Rosetta consumes finite engineering talent. Apple is famous for pointing out that talent cannot be created with more money. Apple is a business that wants to make money. Apple is famous for choosing to make money by creating customer value. Putting all this together: Apple sees the need to direct their talent in other areas that will generate more customer value (and profits) and recognize that a minority will (most likely temporarily) experience reduced value as a result. So, it isn't "cheap", it's economizing with their talent in the manner that has worked for Apple since about 1997.

As for virtualization of older Mac OSes, I haven't thought much about this but agree it would be a nice thing to be able to do. Apple has changed their stance on issues like this in past after enough reasoned dissatisfaction has been expressed in the media. However, they will not acknowledge the problem until they've decided on a solution (assuming they even see it as a problem).

[Mike Johnston]

"Apple is famous for pointing out that talent cannot be created with more money."

Mark,
That idea predates Apple...in David Pye's famous book "The Art of Workmanship" he points out that you can't pay for better work than a workman can do. His notion is that at the limits of skill, it is the workman, not the client, who controls the quality of the result.

Mike

[Andy K]

Whiner! I've got a bunch of MacWrite documents I may never be able to read again - you don't hear me complaining.

[Rick]

George:

How are you doing this? I have Parallels, but it doesn't support Firewire, and Coolscan 9000 is Firewire only? I'd love to do it- please elaborate.

"Ctein:

I had this problem as well. NikonScan4, which runs my 9000 film scanner, is a PowerPC program. But it also runs in Windows, and it's easy to run a virtual copy of Windows on any Mac, including those running Lion.

Problem solved, I would guess. Although, personally, I didn't bother. SilverFast works as well or better than NikonScan. I just switched.

Cheers,

G."

Thanks!

Rick

[hernan zenteno]

I agree Ctein. And you can add that Lion have no significant upgrades and is more slow than Snow Leopard. Include the wifi connection at home take more time to connect. I had to turn off some of the new "improvements" that only confuse me and consume more memory.

[sporobolus]

yes it's annoying, just one of many moves Apple has made that close off options for less mainstream customers; running 10.5 is also risky, since Apple only provides security updates for OS X 10.6 & up; but note that virtualizing 10.5 or 10.6 _Server_ is permitted, so the only real obstacle is cost — older OS X Server installers are available on the open market and will run everything the non-Server version can run

for David and others wondering, 10.6 included Rosetta as a special install step, which many people never noticed; 10.6 Server supports Rosetta too

if you must buy a new machine now, i suggest an Apple refurb; many are "late 2010" or "early 2011" machines which will run 10.6 (check everymac.com to be sure on specific models), and they come at a good price and with a full warranty; heck, you could buy a refurb Mini that comes with 10.6 server, and you'd have; refurbs are available in a back corner of the online Apple Store; a few retailers also sometimes sell new back stock of older machines; i got a good price on such a machine (that will run 10.6) at MicroCenter recently

[robin]

"Apple's behavior around this one has been cheap, mean, and, frankly, stupid."

But at least they have the virtue of consistency.

[Marcelo]

I have a 1230UF scanner for which Canon US stopped distributing the driver. It only installs cleanly on CS3 and functions when started in Rosetta since it communicates via 32 bit Twain. So no surprise when it stopped working after the Leopard to Snow Leopard update. It wasn't that hard to make a small partition on an older MBP that boots into Leopard. I save the scanner files directly into the main partition for editing in CS5. Apple, Adobe, Canon, they all abandon their children and it truly does take a village. I just have to be sure I've archived copies of every link in my chain of legacy software bits, at least as long as the hardware lasts (I think the scanner is around 9 or 10 years old and the MBP is 5). One of these days I'll get my money's worth.

[John Holland]

It's funny you brought this up. I have a perfectly serviceable Macbook, but with older Intel chips. The Lion release drops support for these chips, so even though I've been running Tiger happily for yonks, I bought Snow Leopard last week as a contingency, just in case Apple decides to stop selling it. I have yet to tackle which software upgrades I'll need to buy to move from Tiger to Snow Leopard. I'm not prepared to lay out money for a new laptop.

Unlike Ctein, I don't rely on my Mac for income, so it's only mildly annoying to me that a 5 year old computer is considered beyond obsolete. It still has plenty of life and usefulness for me, and boots faster than the brand-new Thinkpad/Windows 7 laptop my employer dropped on my desk.

[Will Frostmill]

Mike,
Thanks for the pointer to "The Art of Workmanship". I have a hunch that is going to be very useful to me.

Wil

[Andrew Webb]

I agree with Spence, above, and would add that the fault lies more with the software developers whose products you're clinging to. This is an industry where things change and grow very rapidly. It's not about to slow down for a few cranky folks who can't figure out how to keep up.

If you need the old software, then don't upgrade your system. Simple. There are thousands of older Macs in the world, and you can get them very cheaply. I know a guy running OS9 on an old PowerTower Pro 250 so that he can keep using his ancient Howtek drum scanner. He's not complaining about it. If you need something that only newer hardware will give you, get a second Mac or make a decision about which need is more important to you.

Hardware and software companies are in the business of making money. In order to do that, they offer new products every 18 months or so, and sometimes changes in technology make the older tech obsolete. The whole environment of peripherals and software works the same way, for the same reason. You knew that when you bought your first machine,

I understand your frustration. Nobody likes to feel as though they are being forced to spend money unnecessarily. I think, however, that you are creating your own problems.

[Will]

The real insidious one for me was the following:

I recently replaced my aging Dual Processor G5 (7 years old) with a spiffy new i7 iMac. I knew I was going to lose some unessential software, but not Final Cut Pro. I didn't have the last version of FCP before the debacle that is FCPX (FCP7), but I had the second to last version, FCP6. I'd done my homework and determined that FCP6 is a universal app, and entirely compatible with Lion. I was good to go.

Except I wasn't.

Because it turns out that while FCP6 *is* a Universal app, the installer on the discs *isn't.* The installer is a PowerPC app, and requires Rosetta to run on any Intel machines.

Meanwhile, due to the release of FCPX, Apple had discontinued FCP7 (a front to back Intel-only release), so I was left without any options.

Even though the software that I didn't want to replace would run on my OS. I just couldn't get it on the machine.

[Julian]

With this in mind, I deliberately kept my MacBook Pro running plain vanilla Leopard. Now that I have 'replaced' my laptop with a Mac Mini and an iPad, I have the best of both worlds. But you're absolutely right. Just because Apple are now the world's most valuable company (at least going by the numbers) doesn't mean they should be able to bully their loyal users like this.

The virtualisation solution is good, comparatively cheap and, one imagines, a win for all involved. Presumably, the only reason Apple don't allow it is because it would allow the possibility of running OSX (legally) on a PC, thereby potentially reducing sales of Macs at a stroke. Perhaps they could find a way of only allowing this for defunct versions of the OS?

[Rick in CO]

Old News. I have been putting up with this from Apple for years (Mac plus user). Microsoft is much better about backwards compatibility and Apple should be ashamed. But we are talking about money and market perception which Apple always wants to have the appearance of being at the forefront of innovation. Can't really blame them, as for years they were maligned by the rest of the industry and IBM & Microsoft users (you know you did!) as the itty-bitty market share company that won't go anywhere. I keep a Power Mac G4 around running OSX for my film scanners that require a scsi port and have firewire cables that are now persona non grata on my MacBook Air. Thunderbolt - Schmunderbolt!

[John Banister]

I quit using Apple's computing devices the time they ended their last flirtation with ditching the vertical integration, quite a while ago now. I have had a similar experience though. For reasons probably relating most closely to sanity-loss issues, I have for a few years been running openSuse KDE4 edition on a Motion Computing tablet PC (which has completely spoiled me for laptops with only one battery that put the expensive parts under the keyboard instead of behind the monitor). The best bluetooth keyboard I've found to use with it is the one Apple used to make, with the numeric keypad on the side. It turns out that it takes a special exception written into the bluetooth code to get the internal adapter used by Motion Computing to turn on the bluetooth radio, and another special exception to get it to pair with an Apple compatible keyboard. Twice in my life these have both worked simultaneously. Then, owing, I presume, to personnel changes on the coding team, someone decides to rewrite that code from the ground up. All the special exceptions get thrown out, and my system "upgrades" to less functionality. I have a feeling that fighting against the apparently instinctive desire to remake hardware drivers into clean, beautiful code is equally as futile as fighting against the shiny behemoth's corporate self-interest.

[Michael Barkowski]

David, I've been running Photoshop CS2 PowerPC on Snow Leopard 10.6.x for a year, presumably because of Rosetta. I can't tell if it's perfect, but it works for me.
It would cost me a couple hundred bucks to downgrade to Lion because I'd need to upgrade to CS6. Not interested at this point.
The tenuous strands that keep me away from Linux at home are always under attack. Miraculously, they continue to hold.

[MarkB]

"Dude, it's Apple."

The longer version of this is "Dude, you're talking about a company that is currently at its financial and influential zenith. Rant all you want, but the decision-making machine in Cupertino is likely focused on 2016, and things that will make far more than your device drivers obsolete. Apple has already seen what consistent backwards-compatibility has done for Windows, and that's not their vision of the future."

[MHMG]

So, yes, I'm one of Apple's customers it holds in gleeful contempt because I need to keep running some mission critical hardware/software requires Rosetta. Snow Leopard is thus the end of the line as far as ease and convenience goes. I'm trying to plan a pathway forward, but it's not so obvious what's the best and most workable solution. At this point, I'm thinking about just stocking up on a couple of new Mac Mini's, and downgrading them to Snow Leopard. That would buy me another few years, but it's not clear to me downgrading isn't without it's own Mac compatibility wounds. Anyone tried this?

[Marc Rochkind]

@David: Snow Leopard was the first OS X version to NOT run on a PPC computer. But it still had Rosetta.

[Rob L]

Rosetta was time-limited since it was unveiled, so it's being dropped in Lion is no surprise. It was originally going to die in Snow Leopard, but there were enough older versions of photoshop out there that they kept in on. The point of all this, of course, is that Apple does not want PowerPC code out there, it's dead, and forcing developers to update their code is the way they get past this. Thankfully scanners are less affected than printer drivers - after you deal with SCSI issues - but making Apple the sole culprit here is a bit untrue. Companies that don;t update their software deserve their share of blame as well, but again, after a certain time frame, it's hard to demand lifetime software updates for a product no longer in production.

Entropy's a bitch.

[Raxtich]

When Microsoft continued baking in support for old hardware and software in Windows, people complained that it got slow, bloated, and buggy and refused to upgrade, or switched to OSX.

When Microsoft dropped support for old hardware and software, people complained that Microsoft didn't care about them anymore and refused to upgrade, or they switched to OSX.

Seems like Apple is about to get familiar with the Microsoft experience.

[MHMG]

Just got off a live chat with an Apple support lady. Answer to my question about downgrading a Mac mini to run Snow leopard. "it can't be done, Apple has locked out all previous Mac versions in the Mac firmware itself" She then asked me what hardware/software I was running that needed Rosetta. I told her. Her reply: "Will it run on Windows?" My answer to her: Sure, but it's an amazing day when a long time Mac user gets told by an Apple rep that the best solution is to switch to Windows"!

[KeithB]

I don't know that it was just Apple meanness (or marketing, same thing) In this post on the Apple support site:
https://discussions.apple.com/message/15736543#15736543

It is mentioned that Rosetta was actually a licensed product:
"There are at least two things that kept Apple from including Rosetta in Lion. First, Rosetta was licensed from Transative, it isn't Apple technology. To include it in Lion would have required Apple to license it again. Second, and almost certainly the killer, Rosetta is a 32 bit technology and Lion is 64. The hurdles of making Rosetta work in Lion without rewriting it as a 64 bit application probably made it a non-starter. "

Also Transitive was bought by IBM, which might have thrown a wrench in the works.

[ctein]

Dear Janne & Timothy,

Yes, VirtualBox is either an Open Source virtualization package or pretty close to being one, and people have hacked it to run almost any imaginable OS. The problem is there's no “official forum” support for running client Mac OS, because it runs afoul of Apple's EULA. I cannot fault them for not wanting to flout the law, but it makes it difficult to get the information needed to pull this off.

For example, I tried installing Tiger as a virtual machine, because my MacBook Pro came with it. I not only have the original installation disks, I have a mountable disk image of a bootable installation on one of my external drives. I could not get it to install in Virtual Box, although reading of old messages informed me that at one time people had managed to do so. I figure if I can't do it easily, most end-users can't.

By the way, Tiger wouldn't install under the “magic” version of VMware ("VMware-Fusion-4.1.0-529802-light" is the name of the dmg file) , either; neither from the installation disks nor the disk image. The process would hang at the point where the installer had to go look for the virtual disk VMWare/VirtualBox had built to install it on. Sorry, Timothy!

Not saying that this can't be done, as people have done it in the past. Just that it requires more technical chops or hand-holding than I have available.

pax \ Ctein
[ Please excuse any word-salad. MacSpeech in training! ]
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[Robert Roaldi]

I am so sick of all of this.

[Kevin Purcell]

The primary reason Apple pulled Rosetta was size reduction in the OS.

Running PowerPC apps is not just a matter of translating them (the Rosetta part). They also require PowerPC versions of the frameworks and libraries to link to. These take up a fair amount of space: almost doubling the size of the OS (every lib and framework has to be provided for Intel and PPC).

Dropping PowerPC meant the OS install (and OS footprint on disk) dropped to a bit more than half. In fact the DVD9 (double sized) that Snow Leopard shipped was replaced by less and DVD4 sized Lion OS.

Why?

Because they wanted to enable selling the OS from the App Store. So you could download it easily (4GB is easier 8GB). They also added a new feature Internet recovery that will download and install Lion on a system that can't boot from the hard disk. A very useful feature for the naive user with a dead machine.

Just like Classic they gave Rosetta a good run and phased it out though the demise of Classic came with a longer warning. It could have gone on for longer but it would have impacted their other plans.

It certainly did break printer drivers (the most insidious failure) but printer drivers were the weakest part of Apple ecosystem though you'll be suprised how many printers are supported with Gutenprint (color accuracy may be an issue!)

Apple has certainly moved from the old Apple "This new OS works on 10 year old hardware" to the "No soup for you!" new Apple.

The focus on the Mac App store is potentially a problem. Will Apple prevent non-App Store apps from running on the Mac. They might. The current sandboxing effort and features in Mountain Lion to "trust" the App Store (and not others) seems to point in this direction.

I'm typing this on a 2006 MacBook Pro Core 2 Duo Snow Leopard machine. It's the oldest MBP that can still run Lion (just squeaked in!). I haven't upgraded yet either. But I probably will.

Workaround: keep old hardware running on your network and use it to provide file and print servers. Don't rely on Apple.

I'm also running two PowerPC Mac mini (Leopard) as servers, a Core Duo Intel Mac mini on Snow Leopard and Powerbooks (TiBook on Leopard as an entertainment machine and Pismo on Tiger that can still run Classic though I never do).

Keeping old hardware up and running is an valid option. You can still buy these cheap on the used market if you don't own them. Minis make great file and print servers: they're compact, quiet. You can use them to make Time Machine backup servers. You can expect them to run for a few more years too.

The other alternative is to run Linux or Windows in the same print serving role but that's a lot more effort.

But the old Apple you could trust to keep things going for a long while is long gone.

[Jon Bloom]

I don't have certain knowledge of what the retention of Rosetta may have required in terms of maintaining/updating the frameworks and libraries of Lion, so I'm not prepared to say whether Apple's decision was pragmatic or wholly arbitrary. Either way, though, it certainly affected a lot of their customers, and that's not good.

But shouldn't we reserve at least a little bit of our outrage for the software and hardware manufacturers who continued to ship products with PPC-only binaries even years after it became clear that Rosetta was an obsolescent technology?

[Dave]

As a software developer myself, building OS like software, it amazes me how much of a drain backwards compatibility is on engineering resources and the ability to create new stuff. Something like Rosetta would cause many issues throughout the rest of the OS. I'll bet Apples engineers are really pleased to see the back of it.

Dave.

[Mike Boudreaux]

I thought Mac's were supposed to "Just Work."

--Mike, who is enjoying all kinds of legacy software on his Windows 7 Machine.

[Matt]

Get a Linux as your base OS and run whatever virtual OS you need on top of that. Windows, Mac, different versions, whatever. You really don't need to upgrade a virtual OS. Not many of them needed anyway while Linux is so damn good these days. The whole system (not just the OS) upgrades itself automatically and there's never been a major downward compatibility issue.

That's what real IT professionals do.

[Kevin Purcell]

And a follow up on virtualization ...

For the curious it was VMware Fusion 4.1 that could virtualize previous versions of the client version Mac OS X. This was "fixed" in VMware Fusion 4.1.1 but VMware Fusion still allows you to run Mac OS X server on Lion.

VMWare described it (in the passive voice) as "When the license verification step was added in VMware Fusion 4.1 the server edition check was omitted." in their blog entry.

http://blogs.vmware.com/teamfusion/2011/11/vmware-fusion-41-and-mac-os-x-virtual-machines.html

It seems it was deliberately omitted and Apple were not happy and made that known to VMware. Apple (at least under Jobs) was known for the occasional vindictive streak against people or companies that crossed them.

http://www.macrumors.com/2011/11/20/vmware-fusion-now-allows-virtualization-of-mac-os-x-leopard-and-snow-leopard/

The next blog entry doesn't make any explanation for the changes.

http://blogs.vmware.com/teamfusion/2011/11/vmware-fusion-411-is-now-available.html

It is an ideal solution but as Apple makes most of it's money from hardware (selling Macs that come with OS X) they don't like the idea of running OS X in emulation on other hardware. Clearly they could permit a VM system running on version Mac OS X to virtualize.

They do, in fact, permit VMWare Fusion running on Lion Server to virtualize Leopard Server or Snow Leopard Server or Lion (client or server). So you can do this today if you wish.

http://kb.vmware.com/selfservice/microsites/search.do?language=en_US&cmd=displayKC&externalId=2009990

Of course that costs money: $50 for Lion Server upgrade; $50 for VMware Fusion and $500 for (Snow) Leopard server -- with some shopping around you may be able to find a second-hand Mac OS X server license in the second hand market).

It's a pain. Apple could make a lot of Apple hardware (and software) users a lot happier but they really don't seem to want to.

Lion has generated more backlash from dedicated Mac users than any other Mac OS version but with Mountain Lion Apple doesn't seem to have changed it's tune. They know that current Mac users are a mostly captive audience but there is the risk of a backlash from loyal users (especially those doing something more than trivial use of the built in and iLife and iWork apps). The focus on Chinese users in Mountain Lion is interesting: that's were the growth is in future.

[Zeeman]

(Insert commiserating faces peering out from some windows* here)

*Pun intended.

[Rob]

The focus on the Mac App store is potentially a problem. Will Apple prevent non-App Store apps from running on the Mac. They might.

No, the http://arstechnica.com/apple/news/2012/02/developers-gatekeeper-a-concern-but-still-gives-power-users-control.ars>Gatekeeper API puts that notion to rest.

Get a Linux ... That's what real IT professionals do.

As has already been mentioned, you can't legally or easily run OS X as a VM, except for Lion. And I'd image that most of the readers of TOP neither are nor want to be IT professionals.

[Richard]

Wow, you're running business critical software that has no guaranteed future platform on the hardware of your choice?

[Bill Van Antwerp]

Will:
Can't you simply transfer the Final Cut 6 from your old to new mac via the transfer program. We just upgraded and 6 works fine on the new Imac.
Bill

[Mark K Lough]

Yes, Mr. Ctein
It is good to read your words, even if only for the salve of commiseration.
When I moved from Leopard to Snow Leopard (now derisively referred to as Snow Job) I lost immediately the drivers for both my Epson printers, Epson scanner, and the monitor and printer calibration software and hardware I had been using. The $30 "upgrade" cost me well over $1000 and it was three months before I had drivers for the printers that were the equal of the originals.
Now, the brakes are on and with the demise of Rosetta in Lion, I cannot go there.
I've been very pro-Apple up until now. With their self-vaunted Aluminum machined from a single slab and Glass construction, resulting in a machine that will last decades, the only reason that one cannot actually make use of that is software.
In my mind, the perfect computer will run anything I ask it to, and Apple could make that happen.
I wrote essentially this to them, but I doubt that anyone in the $500 billion dollar corporation read it.
Um, cheers.

[Andrew Johnston]

This really chimed with me. Apple's implacable opposition to virtualisation is a significant opportunity lost.

I'm a Windows user, spending much of the working week away from home. I get a vast amount of value from virtualisation. It allows me to carry just one PC with multiple "client specific" images, and enables me to keep running legacy software almost indefinitely. My main client uses the same technology to provide legacy support for essential software, which in long-cycle engineering businesses can easily be 20-30 years old, as physical assets age many times more slowly than the computing equipment around them.

I also develop plugins for the Bibble RAW processor. The same code should run on Windows, Mac and Linux, but you have to compile and test to confirm this. I've recently added a Linux Virtual Machine to my kit. This was remarkably painless, just a few hours work, and I can now rapidly cross-compile and test between Windows and Linux. If there's an issue which means having to support more than one flavour or version of Linux adding it would be trivial.

I just can't do this for the Mac. I don't want to buy and carry another laptop (which would be useless for any other purpose), and you can't get virtualised OSX, either as a VM or as a service, through any legal route. The result: as far as I am concerned OSX is a "third-class" OS, and I have to rely on the good offices of other developers to deliver my plugins for it.

People will put up with a lot in the name of love. Maybe Mac users "love" their computers enough to tolerate this behaviour. But looking in from outside I find Apple's attitude perplexing and very annoying.

[A. Dias]

You do not have to upgrade to Lion. You can run Leopard or Snow Leopard for a while. Or... you may ask your favorite app developers to recompile for a newer OS...

[Crabby Umbo]

This is timely because I just sat around with a bunch of media people in our small midwest town and lamented about how few businesses and services there are here any more. This all happened because the income matrix for media service industries in my town cannot keep up with the need to upgrade both hard and software every 18 to 24 months. The cheapskate customers, and lack of even those, will not support an 18 month ROI on this type of stuff. My peers in larger cities are shooting with and replacing large chip digital cameras every 18-24 months, while we eke out a living trying to game smaller and cheaper equipment to do what we need.

I use both Mac and PC equipment, and I really don't care which either. A fully tricked out Dell laptop with all the high-speed crap you need is floating around 800 bucks, and I can only touch it with a Mac laptop in the 2500 dollar range. Sure, the screen might not be "print spec" ready, but I'm not printing, just passing files on to the the end user. If I had to think about making prints, I never would have left the wet darkroom, the replacement and recalibration costs every few years is stupid.

A few years ago, I bought a camera with included software, and it really hit home that the software would load on Windows from Vista back to 98, while it would only load on Mac 10.4...sheesh, really? That's is crazy!

The era of the small one or two person commercial studio in a town of 750,000 to a mil in population is far, far over...

[Leigh Youdale]

My word! Wrong side of the bed this morning! Talk about Grumpy! You can't say you weren't warned - there were lots of bits of information in MacWorld advising what the shift to Lion would involve and yes, some of my programs wouldn't run as predicted. Got upgrades for most of them and the others are still running fine on my iBook G4 which is using the last version of Snow Leopard on a PPC chip.

This is like saying you're pissed at General Motors because they don't put 6 volt electrical systems in their cars any more.

[Eolake Stobblehouse]

Thank you.
This is a major headache for me, for the first time in nigh 20 years, I can't just upgrade from day one.

http://ereaderjoy.blogspot.com/2012/02/more-planned-obsolescence-evil-lion.html

[James A Tarantino]

Ok.....I understand this is an Apple rant and I whole heartedly agree with all that has been written so far. So how about Adobe Lightroom 4 not supporting Windoz XP! I preorderd the Oly E-MP not knowing Adobe was dumping support for XP. So is Adode going to update LR3 to 3.7 to include the new camera or are they only going to include it in LR4? I can't afford both a new Camera/Lens with the xtra junk that goes with; spare batt, more SDHC cards, dedicated cable release etc. (don't even get me started on all the proprietary shutter releases, batteries, battery chargers etc) and a new Windoz computer that runs 7 Plus an upgrade to LR4.....just so Lightroom can work with the new RAW files.
Than there is the whole camera/lens update path as well. If I order an Panasonic 20mm f/1.7 pancake to mate with the E-M5 will Panasonic be updating that lens anytime soon with weather sealing? Who knows. I can't afford to do this stuff two or three times because the manufactures/hardware/software folks will not release their future product intent. As I said I can wait a few months for a new product.....I can not buy things two or three times. This is turning into a rich mans game which is sad for the rest of us. And yes I keep a Windoz 2000 machine around just to run my OLD SprintScan 4000, VueScan and a Epson 2200 printer. Some of us just can't afford to drop a grand or two or three because a device has become 'Obsolete' in a few years. Soon my Windoz 2k machine will die and Epson will stop producing ink carts for the 2200. Oops there goes another 4 grand. End of Rant.
~James~

[Kevin Purcell]

A third comment is perhaps a bit much ... but I can't help thinking of the Dilbert cartoon (from June 24, 1995 ... before Windows 95!)

http://tomayko.com/writings/that-dilbert-cartoon

Of course, Ctein is a bit of a hacker. Though clearly not the same attitude. Hmmm, that greybeard even looks a bit like Ctein (see link).

http://theonlinephotographer.typepad.com/the_online_photographer/2007/07/ctein-post.html

Otherwise why would a hacker include something as precise as "VMware-Fusion-4.1.0-529802-light" in a comment if he didn't mean for you to do something, like, oh, I don't know, stick it into Google and see what turns up and then play with it.

[Mark Probst]

Apple never made a secret out of the fact that they don't care a lot about backward compatibility and supporting broken software. You know that, yet you decided to use their stuff instead of Microsoft's, who treat backward compatibility almost like a religion.

As for the licensing issue, you're absolutely right.

[Sam]

Actually run it on virtualbox, its free and runs well.

If I'm not wrong, you can actually legally run it as a vm as long as the host is running on an Apple machine. You're not allowed to install OSX on a non-Apple machine.

I'm running Snow Leopard with virtualbox on it(running loads of other oses). Its much more more stable than Lion. Once support for Snow Leopard ends, I'll just install linux on it and re-import all the vms in again.

[Paul H]

The lack of virtualisation options is also a pain on the OS X server front, especially since the x-serve line has gone. The only server now is the Mac Mini server.

Ctein, EmpireEFI may help you. This does work with VirtualBox, or, ahem, at least it does as far as I have been lead to believe ......

[Lynn]

With quality film cameras and lenses you bought the tools which performed beautifully and lasted more than a lifetime, with occasional maintenance. With digital you are really just renting it until it is deemed uneconomic to maintain you as a (non revenue generating) customer - about 18 months to 3 years. Even film users are caught up in this if they use a scanning to digital workflow.

[John Camp]

Man, that column really made my day. I *just* spent almost $500 on a Spanish-language program from Fluenz and find that it has a PowerPC set-up program. I'm getting tired of this Apple upgrade bullshit.* When I run out of time on this computer, I think I'll go back to Windows.

*Also, the Adobe upgrade bullshit.

[John Shriver]

The demise of Rosetta was probably about cost. Partly the technology license, and the support contract for that. Partly for the testing cost -- testing isn't free.

But a lot of software and driver vendors have had their heads in the sand, ignoring the coming demise of Rosetta.

Intuit has started a crash program to recompile Quicken 2007 for Intel. It will still be the 2007 version when they're done! That's what's holding me back from switching to Mac.

Epson is good about drivers for most devices on Mac OS.

Hewlett-Packard is pretty scummy about drivers. They're tolerable on printers, since there's a revenue stream if they update the driver. (Remember that HP is an "Ink Company", the computers are a sideline.) They are a lot more cavalier about scanner drivers, since there is no revenue stream for consumables. (The driver for a HP ScanJet 4600 almost destroyed my Windows XP desktop, thankfully I managed to remove it.)

Nikon has been pretty awful about software support for their film scanners. Thankfully there's SilverFast and VueScan, which ever one you like. But buying a second license for SilverFast (I already have one for the Epson V750) is going to be part of the cost of switching to Mac.

If Microsoft offered Office for Linux, I'd switch to Linux at home as I do at work. None of the open-source Java competitors to Office are ready for prime time yet. (I've tried. My employer wants me to use them.)

[Paul De Zan]

I have...limited sympathy (but do agree that blocking visualization is really, really stupid). I own a Pakon roll film scanner with software that will only run on XP and hardware that will only interface through very specific older USB adapters. This is a huge pain, but the functionality of the scanner and its outrageous price/performance makes maintaining a single-purpose XP box 100% worthwhile.

But profit-making businesses can't be held accountable for eternal support of aging systems and expect to survive. In larger markets whole companies are formed to support legacy systems, but serious photography is not likely to ever be one of those markets.

[ctein]

Dear Richard (and James),

Unless you're running strictly COBOL or your "business critical" systems include a crystal ball to tell you which vendors will be doing what in five years (or if they'll even be around), you do not have a "guaranteed future."

That's the whole point of these periodic rants about planned obsolescence. It's not about Apple. It's not about any specific software vendor. It's about a general attitude among all the computer-related companies that amounts to, “We don't care if you're in a long-term business, screw you.”

James, your complaints are not remotely out of place -- Microsoft, Adobe, and other major companies have also been screwing us over.

~~~~~~

Dear A. Diaz, Spence, and Leigh,

Did you folks read my entire column and understand the import of it, before you penned your responses? They seem more reflexive than responsive.

~~~~~~

Dear Andy,

I can convert those MacWrite files for you! (If you're serious, I am.)

pax \ Ctein
[ Please excuse any word-salad. MacSpeech in training! ]
======================================
-- Ctein's Online Gallery http://ctein.com 
-- Digital Restorations http://photo-repair.com 
======================================

[MHMG]

And one more thing. Manufacturers often have blinders on and can only see the water in their own pond. Yet their customers are dealing with multiple technology variables in their daily lives that extend well beyond one pool of water. My relatively expensive Bulova watch broke at 7 years old and is not repairable because Bulova won't make replacement parts. My answer: Good watches are keepsakes that one should be able to pass on to children or grandchildren. My conclusion: No more Bulova watches for me. My family's fancy "eco smart" washer and dryer are needing expensive repairs at just three years old when our last washer and dryer ran 20 years without trouble. My computers need replacement every three to five years due to hardware/software orphaning, not because they won't run. Phto printers are now throw away. The inks cost as much as the printers, and often you can buy the whole printer with new ink set for less than buying replacement inks. LIghtening caused $1000 worth of damage to the microprocessors controlling my "energy efficient" furnace in my home this year. I'd have been financially better off if I'd kept the old furnace a few years longer. Smartphones and service contracts -so ridiculous on monthly operating costs and planned obsolescence that I won't even consider them. These are but a few examples of the average U.S. consumer's daily life. A bright note: The average age of a car in America climbed from 6 years to 11 years during the last decade and they can still be repaired (car companies apparently get the fact that not everyone can buy a new car every three years).

There's a financially overwhelming technology game going on here for the average consumer, and smart people are starting to limit the number of "systems' they are willing to abandon on 1- 3 year "life" cycles.

[Dillan Koropatnick]

I do live in a cave, but this is the first time I've read such vitriolic comments pointed at Apple. It does not surprise me at all. It is easy to see that in the future, Apple will be no more loved than Microsoft. C'mon! They're the largest consumer product company in the world! Of course they're evil!

It's enough to make me want to sell my computer and start shooting film again. Well, almost. I'd miss The Online Photographer too much.

[ctein]

Dear Keith B,

Okay, that's a VERY interesting post. Assuming it's accurate. (Not everything I read in the Apple support discussions is, even from highly ranked users; the signal-to-noise ratio is surprisingly poor.)

But taking it on face value, then I was wrong; recoding Rosetta for Lion would be a major job.

I'll still stand by the mean and stupid part for Apple not letting people virtualize the OSs as a work-around.

~~~~~~

Dear Kevin,

Thanks for those informative technical posts.

I've encountered an interesting reliability problem with sandboxing: if something corrupts an application so that it needs to be reinstalled, you lose any data that application was sandboxing. This violates a prime tenet of reliable backup and archiving: keep your data archived independent of your programs.

pax / Ctein
==========================================
-- Ctein's Online Gallery http://ctein.com
-- Digital Restorations http://photo-repair.com
==========================================

[robert harshman]

Technology moves on, the house supported and built by creative professionals has become too popular perhaps for it's most ardent supporters. Valued at over $500 billion today it's clear that Apple has become a slave of the consumer market. The consumer market needs you to upgrade at least once a year - forget the past. And it needs to be simple and easy to use. This is not the world of the professional. Goodbye MacPro, goodby any creative professional tools, goodby creative professional...?

A new opportunity for the Next level for creatives?

Cheers,

Robert

[ctein]

Dear folks,

Kevin just reminded me why I didn't have any success installing a virtual copy of Tiger. It's because Tiger never shipped in a retail version, only in a machine-specific version with the computer. The installer looks at the virtual machine and not-too-surprisingly says to itself, “Hmmm, this isn't right.”

This doesn't mean it can't be done. Folks have hacked their way through that in the past. But it requires some command-line messing around.

Anyway, mystery solved. Thanks Kevin!

pax \ Ctein
[ Please excuse any word-salad. MacSpeech in training! ]
======================================
-- Ctein's Online Gallery http://ctein.com 
-- Digital Restorations http://photo-repair.com 

[DavidB]

When Apple announced Lion last year I knew it was time to upgrade. I purchased a new MacPro to replace my aging PowerPC G5. The new computer runs Snow Leopard.

I then reverted the G5 back to Tiger so I could, once again, have access to the Classic environment. And I still have an older PowerBook G3 that runs OS 8 and 9 and has a SCSI port.

So now I can run Classic, PowerPC, and Intel apps. But only until something breaks...

But none of this hardware gets security updates except for the ones running Snow Leopard. And that may end real soon.

[Daniel Francisco Valdez]

I had the same issue as Will; when I upgraded to Lion I could not reinstall Final Cut Studio (the one with FCP 6.) After much gnashing of teeth and raging against the price of progress I found a solution in an Apple Support forum thread. The Rosetta installer resides on the Snow Leopard DVD and it WILL install and work on Lion, at least for the sake of running Apple's PowerPC installer from many previous universal apps. I have not needed it for anything else so I can't comment on its suitability for your purpose, but all you need is the Rosetta installer from the Snow Leopard DVD to test it. Good luck and please feel free to email me if you need help.

[Oskar Ojala]

I've never really understood Apple's stance on running OS X on virtual machines. It's an annoyance for software developers too, since they need actual physical Macs to test things with. And from a technical perspective, the difference between a real and virtual machine is not such a clear distinction (how does SW know it's in a virtual and not a "real" machine? It doesn't).

The whole EULA thing is interesting from a legal point -- would the part about virtual machines be enforceable in all countries? And what's the liability of VM SW providers if they turn a blind eye to Apple? I guess that no one wants to try to challenge Apple on this point.

[J]

So when do the rants start on the Nikon D4 with the new memory card style and new battery type? New gear that does't suppory floppy disks and audio cassettes? Programs that run on DOS? Leaded gas? Horses and a buggy?
C'mon, things change. I wanted some of the new Apple apps but was suspicious of the consequences of the latest upgrade. There were plenty of ways to research what was involved in the upgrade including the lack of support for PPC programs. I had to find several new programs to replace legacy applications and, you know, most were better!
But I was cautious and upgraded one non-critical Macbook first and ran it for a few weeks to see what happened. Now we have upgraded all our Macs happily!
I dont like obsolescence any more than most of you-I have scanners, useless printers, old monitors, disk drives, a color calibration system, and a lot of other useless @&$)(;:/ sitting in the barn waiting for the next hazardous waste day in town. I don't miss all that crap because the stuff that replaced it is so much better.
But having been a tech entrepreneur who has paid the bills for software development for our hardware, I understand something you don't seem to understand -economics. Recovering the cost of developing software updates for a product you no longer sell for the few people who would use it is basically impossible. Would you pay $hundreds or $thousands for that update? I reckon not!

[Dennis Ng]

I do not understand as Ctein point out why 10.6 to 10.7 is so hard to support some "old" hardware even if they are Intel based.

Got some issues as the LION does not support some old hardware. Do not throw away the iMac and portable that seems functional. Hence not upgrade until it is a must.

[Boris]

I don't agree that dropping Rosetta cheap or mean. I doubt it was stupid. It may be arrogant. It's a little sad.

If you have some inside information about how much maintaining Rosetta actually would cost Apple, let's hear it. If you have some real technical details that prove maintaining Rosetta would not make adding any new Mountain Lion features more complicated and expensive (a different matter than just keeping Rosetta itself going), let's hear it. If you don't have this info, I say it's easy to say things like "there are only modest issues involved in ensuring Rosetta compatibility." We don't really know and can only guess what all is involved. Apple made this decision only to piss you off and cost you money?

You wrote "'Why should all users have to pay for something only a minority need?'" But you didn't really answer your strawman. You just said that all big software products have so many features nobody uses them all, and you asserted again that maintaing Rosetta low-cost for Apple. In real life all users of a program don't pool thier money together for a big group buy, some getting cheated because they don't use as many features as others. Users decide individually if they're getting the their money's worth.

I think a more interesting question is "How does a smart company prioritize adding new features over maintaining legacy features, decide what to cut and keep, and still appeal to lots of customers?" I don't think the cost of doing (or not doing) something necessarily has to be "huge" to justify making a rational decison to cut, keep or add a feature. Is this "greedy?" Maybe it depends on the case in question, but I don't think Apple's sucess—and they are a much richer compaany than they were when they last sold PowerPC Macs—obliges them to be more generous to their customers or to be poorer business people. I do believe Apple owes their customers some loyalty, but one could argue that at this point ($542.44 a share) Apple owes much more love to the millions of new customers they have attracted over the post-PowerPC years than to those who've been using Rosetta since 2005.

Maybe Apple is arrogant or stupid? Arrogant believing they can keep adding "magic" to new products that will delight customers old and new more than aggressive deprecation of legacy features will piss off customers old and pro who feel Apple's increasingly absent affections right in their pocketbooks, and also in thier hearts. Stupid if they actually do piss off enough people they kill the goose laying the golden eggs. We'll see.

Nobody should be surprised that people who still want to run PPC binaries just aren't as important to Apple as people whose first Apple product was an iPhone and wouldn't know a G5 from an Quadra 950. For creative people it's a little sad that Apple's grown and we don't have their undivided attention anymore, but if you've ever loved their products, it's hard to really hate them for being successful.

If dropping Rosetta is mean to anyone, it's probably mean to third-party software developers. I'd bet most users are gong to blame them and not Apple when they hit problems. These developers can no longer avoid incurring the cost of making new Intel binaries. Do they give the Intel binaries away for free or do they decide to like more of a bad guy asking for more money from their customers in a "forced upgrade" to a new version.

[Michael]

At the software firm where I work, Apple's habit of eventually breaking any and all backward compatibility has forced us to move from developing on Macs to developing on Windows. The logical conclusion will be to move away from Apple's "Web Objects" java platform (on which the itunes website is still based) to something else. The only thing that precipitated this was hardware compatibility with Apple's own development tools. We'd have to buy used hardware to continue developing software for the platform because the newest Macs don't support the development tools. Incredibly.

I realize that Apple has essentially abandoned both their java platform, the desktop computer, and any ambitions Jobs may have had for the enterprise. And I realize that we may be the last shop outside of Apple using their java platform. But Apple once charged $50,000 for their java development and application server environment and they have since simply walked away.

[John Driggers]

Gee, after your aged scanner rant, this column is no surprise. You could save yourself (and all of us) some time by just posting a list of all the technology items and software you have that are two years old or older. Then, once a year you just post a short list of those items that have become obsolete.

Honestly, your expectations are unrealistic that all software will be supported forever and that all hardware will be repairable forever.

In fact, it seems as though your got real value and a long useful life from the items you complain about.

[Matt]

"Tiger never shipped in a retail version, only in a machine-specific version with the computer."

No, there was a retail version of Tiger. If you're looking at spending a significant amount of time hacking around the command line, it might be worth your while to find a copy on eBay or wherever. This would also leave you the option of buying any compatible hardware at some point.

I also have an unneeded 10.6 Server disc, but it's misplaced. I will contact you privately if I can locate it. Unless you post saying you don't want it.

[Kevin Purcell]

A fourth post (I know I shouldn't ... ) but this is about security issues around using older unsupported Macs, especially PowerPC Macs, to workaround issues of newer Macs.

Some people above have commented that they've moved to an older unsupported version of the OS to support a particular task. This is fine so long as you understand the risks of doing this.

I recommend that if you are using an older older unsupported version of the OS you limit its use to the particular purpose that you are keeping that system so that you reduce your potential exposure to malware. The obvious example by not directly connecting the machine to the 'net. Keep it behind a firewall/router on your secured local network.

Even more importantly for on Power PC Macs: avoid using web browsers. If you must use a browser turn off flash and all the other plugins and only use the only currently supported PowerPC browser.

The biggest security problem of all is Adobe Flash. There are no updates for Adobe Flash for Power PC beyond 10.1. This version is known to have remotely exploitable cross site scripting issue (i.e. "could be used to take actions on a user's behalf on any website or webmail provider, if the user visits a malicious website."). Flash will have more security issues and they will never be fixed on Power PC Mac.

http://arstechnica.com/business/news/2012/02/exotic-xss-bug-in-adobe-flash-exploited-to-control-users-web-accounts.ars

Currently there is only one actively supported browser for Power PC Macs: TenFourFox. Surprised? Never heard of it? It's free and open source.

http://www.floodgap.com/software/tenfourfox/
http://code.google.com/p/tenfourfox/wiki/AAATheFAQ

If you are still using an old version of Safari (on Tiger or Leopard) it has unfixed security issues. TenFourFox uses exactly the same open-source code as Firefox ESR 10 and is kept updated in lockstep with it by some dedicated volunteers. I use it on a couple of my old PowerPCs: it works well. Another feature is it doesn't support plugins (by design) so a bad plugin can't cause a security issue. Finally it speeds up Javascript(!) and you can still use Firefox extensions (like AdBlock Plus and NoScript).

http://code.google.com/p/tenfourfox/wiki/PluginsNoLongerSupported

There is a difference in viewpoint between "ordinary"** users who expect one machine to do everything for them and "developers/hackers/sysadmins" types who have no problem keeping and using multiple machines each with a particular role: laptop for email and documents and perhaps development or PP on the move; desktop for main development or PP work with redundant drives; dedicated file servers for reliable file storage, print serving and backup. I'm used to working that way but that's because I've always lived in an environment like that (even when we had punched cards ...). In fact, I prefer it.

If a "developer/hacker/sysadmin" has to leave one bit of hardware on Leopard or Tiger or whatever for a particular task it's no problem for them (usually they have some old hardware) but a hardship to the ordinary user with a single Mac.

In fact I think there are photographers who think of their camera equipment in the same way. Some are minimalist "one camera people" whereas others keep particular kit for specific tasks. There's no reason why this shouldn't extend to your computing equipment you use for post-processing, file storage and printing.

If you need to keep an old unsupported system consider using some old dedicated hardware and do most of your browsing on supported system.

** I don't mean this in any pejorative way

[Crabby Umbo]

BTW, Leigh Youdale is wrong with the analogy...Being mad at Mac isn't like being mad at GM because they don't make 6 volt batteries and applications any more, it's like being mad at GM because 2-3 years after you buy the car, you can't buy replacement tires, batteries, or oil filters for it anymore and just have to buy a new car!

[Mike Johnston]

John Driggers,
You think that's bad, I still have a friend who's running System 9. Now he really has compatibility issues.

Mike

P.S. He also uses a camera that is many decades old, and grieved when Kodachrome went away.

[ctein]

Crabby, you rock!

pax / Ctein

[Earl Dunbar]

@Ctein: If Thomas' scenario is at all plausible, then you have to admit that it is not necessary that this particular issue qualifies as "planned obsolescence."

(Not to be seem flippant or cute, but: Second noble truth.)

[Thomas]

Ctein -

Thank you for your response. In it, you said, "If, and I emphasize if, Apple had no choice in this matter, then Apple could ameliorate this with the stroke of the pen, by changing their EULA. That's just policy, not engineering."

Um, no: they can't give away what isn't theirs to give.

I have no inside information, but I wonder if it is a coincidence that the same release which saw the removal of Rosetta also is the release with which Apple now also allows their OS to be virtualized.

After all, rather than limiting their OS to running on Apple-branded machines before out of spite, it is possible that they never allowed the non-server version to be virtualized before because they didn't have the right to do so. If you owned Rosetta and you wanted to provide a license to Apple while leaving yourself a market to sell into (as opposed to selling the entire bundle of code to Apple), limiting Apple's license to Rosetta (which Apple sub-licensed to you and me with its EULA) to Apple-branded hardware would be a natural way to do it.

--Thomas

[ctein]

Dear Thomas,

Ummm, do you in any way know this to be fact, or is this just wild supposition?

Even if so, the EULA could still require that the virtualized product be run on Apple hardware. And the companies that make the virtualization software can enforce that, the same way they enforce the current Apple EULA.

pax / Ctein

[ctein]

Dear Earl,

I have no idea if Thomas' scenario is plausible, let alone likely. I certainly have no reason to think that (a) Apple could not relicense Rosetta and (b) Apple could not obtain a license that would allow virtualization of the old client OS's on Apple hardware (espcially when noting that this has been allowed for server versions of the OS's).

If you want to truly, deeply believe in all of that, be my guest and think apple is the innocent victim in all this.Many things in the world are possible. It doesn't mean they're especially likely. I know where I'd place my bet.

pax / Ctein

[Rob Morris]

I did not read all of the post on this subject so if others have brought this up forgive me. So here is my 2 cents. The new rage in the corporate world today is how green the companies are becoming and acting. So my question is how green is it to make me throw away perfectly good products because your new product broke all or some of my old product and now it goes to the land fill because know it is basically useless.

RM

[Francis E]

As far as the peripherals are concerned, the real problem is with manufacturers who don't use open, documented protocols. In many cases, there was nothing special about a device that required it to have its own closed-source driver. In others (such as photo inkjet printers), the market did not value longevity enough to accept the increased cost of extra processor power in the device to let the manufacturer embed their "secret sauce".

Devices that ought, at best, to have needed a simple portable file with parameters include film scanners, laser printers, and faxes.

Such a standard exists for laser printers in the form of the IPP and Laserjet protocols and Adobe PPD files. Mine's still working after 11 years and through several OS switches.

I can't leave the subject without mentioning that Canon have orphaned their "professional" 5D camera for tethered support on Mac OS X.

[[email protected] Driggers]

Mike,

I think it's great that your friend uses System 9. For years I kept an SE 30 running System 7 --and I made several archive copies of the system software for fear that I wouldn't be able to download it from Apple software archives at some point. (I keep archived copies of IOS for my 3G iPhone and my iPhone 4 for the same reason.) I just loved entering and editing text on the old MACs. I had two machines, in case one died. I kept an old printer so I could output drafts. And I'd love an old copy of Wordstar 3.3 (I loved dot commands!) to run in a dos bootcamp on my MacBook Pro. Jeez, it would be fast!

But, I certainly didn't expect Apple to maintain backward compatibility as it moved to better OS's and hardware after a reasonable lifespan from the earlier systems and harware.

I kinda' think about this Rosetta thing like cars and unleaded fuel. We had both for a long time, but we were told at some point, leaded fuel would go away--just like Rosetta. And they both did too.

Apple has made many customer unfriendly decisions (Final Cut Pro version update being a classic example), but targetting Rosetta as being an insidious scheme is really not fair. We were fortunate to have it to bridge the gap between OSs for so many years--actually longer than would have been considered by most to be a reasonable time.

I just don't get this rant. It's simply not fair to want to run old software forever while still wanting to claim all the benefits from the new OSs at the same time.

[Mike Johnston]

John,
I hear ya. My favorite WP was WriteNow, which died as the 680x0 architecture slowly went kaput.

Ironically, given the topic of Ctein's column, the only thing that Lion minus Rosetta broke for me was the ability to open old WriteNow files.

Anybody know a workaround?

WriteNow was the lean and mean WP! I loved it. AppleWorks and now Pages WP have been serviceable substitutes, but not as good as the original.

Mike

[Scott Lightner]

Tired of Apple's sh*t! All I've ever used is Apple. I have two towers under my desk, both close to obsolete. The constant churning out of new OS with limited backward flexibility, requiring continuos (re)purchases of hardware. The upgrades really don't add much earth shaking new utility to many professionals workflow - just more 'Angry birds' bling.

Apple is becoming synonymous with LANDFILL. We live on a finite overburdened planet, this model is not sustainable, and certainly not green. Apple can do better!

For awhile now Apple seems to be alienating those loyal professionals who built the brand, in favor of mainstream ('oh it's shiny') consumers.
However, Apple's customer service -especially at stores- is very good. Can't say the same for Adobe - on hold for a sales rep for 2 hours, 38 minutes, 15 seconds - still haven't bought the upgrade.

[ctein]

Dear John,

No, your response is built on the false premise that it is absolutely necessary to break your old tools to give you new ones. It's an either/or that's been pushed by the corporate apologists. It's untrue.

It's cheaper. For them. It's more convenient. For them. It's more profitable. For them.

It is none of those. For us.

It's a lie, that benefits them and hurts us.

I would hardly call that "fair."

pax / Ctein

[Frank Hamsher]

Just a thought for Will and his problems with trying to install a program that is compatible but the installer isn't.

I recently was forced to upgrade my Snow Leopard MacBook Pro to a new Lion MacBook Pro as the old one died when I spilled a mug of coffee across the keyboard! The merging of the old with the new had some similar difficulties.

If he has the old program on Time Machine from an earlier version of the OS, or an older machine running Snow Leopard with the program working, he may be able to copy the actual program file from the old application folder to an external disk (or across a network) to the Lion Applications folder.

He might also be able to accomplish this from an old system backup (non-time machine).

I have done this with several programs that were initially problematic in Lion. I pasted the older application files into Lion's applications folder and I got a window that asked me if I was just copying the program or moving it. When I told Lion I was moving it, Lion did something under the hood and happily accepted the moved program as its own. The moved program runs fine.

(Sorry about the anthropomorphic language, but I'm not a programmer!)