Fascinating, not a single feature I care about. Several programs I use regularly will stop working (32bit) and the new photos app looks like a disaster (please, please, please, don't let "AI" make...
Fascinating, not a single feature I care about. Several programs I use regularly will stop working (32bit) and the new photos app looks like a disaster (please, please, please, don't let "AI" make actual decisions on how to order views, I already hate the endless list of photos in iOS 13). It seems like they're running out of ideas and somehow do updates, anyway.
Apps running on iPad and macOS will inevitably be bottlenecked by the iPad version and I hope that won't become a serious focus for Apple (who am I kidding, they want people to drop MacBooks and move to iPads in the long term).
I'm worried, now. I kinda want to leave Apple but there's no real competitor in their quality/UX-focused segment.
Honestly, this reads like (yet another) variant of "Apple is doomed", which we've been pretty much hearing since the days of "less space than a nomad, lame". I don't think it matters if you...
It seems like they're running out of ideas and somehow do updates, anyway.
Honestly, this reads like (yet another) variant of "Apple is doomed", which we've been pretty much hearing since the days of "less space than a nomad, lame". I don't think it matters if you specifically care about any features. Is there any requirement for Apple to deliver groundbreaking changes every year? Why can't OS changes be iterative?
That being said, finally getting rid of iTunes is something I care massively about. Finder is absolutely the better place for iPhone and iPad device management. iTunes has been a hog for so many years now and to see its control over so many OS functions relinquished is great.
I don't have a personal use for Sidecar, but the changes to keep macOS in sync with iOS are needed: new reminders app with a new backing schema, Find My, Screen Time makes its way to Mac. What's wrong with these changes?
The 32-bit train has now sailed to be honest, if developers haven't updated their apps to 64-bit in the decade+ that they've had to do so, then that's on them, and while I feel for the users, it's not Apple that should be blamed here.
who am I kidding, they want people to drop MacBooks and move to iPads in the long term
What? Apple has been very clear on the distinction between iOS and macOS. Don't believe for one second that Apple employees don't sorely love the mac.
Just to drive home this point, this is the longest transition time Apple has ever given us for any processor change ever. When they switched to Intel, they only supported their PPC translation...
The 32-bit train has now sailed to be honest, if developers haven't updated their apps to 64-bit in the decade+ that they've had to do so, then that's on them, and while I feel for the users, it's not Apple that should be blamed here.
Just to drive home this point, this is the longest transition time Apple has ever given us for any processor change ever. When they switched to Intel, they only supported their PPC translation software (Rosetta) for about 5 years.
Well, maybe everyone has their own pressure points but I've traditionally defended Apple through a lot of really weird decisions. You're probably right in that, after having to swallow some bitter...
Honestly, this reads like (yet another) variant of "Apple is doomed"
Well, maybe everyone has their own pressure points but I've traditionally defended Apple through a lot of really weird decisions. You're probably right in that, after having to swallow some bitter pills (32bit drop is probably my biggest), I'll come crawling back.
What I'm worried about aren't so much individual features but their long-term philosophy.
What? Apple has been very clear on the distinction between iOS and macOS. Don't believe for one second that Apple employees don't sorely love the mac.
It would seem so, yea. iPadOS is probably a step towards cementing having custom OSs for each product line, even if their desktop and mobile apps start looking more similar on the surface. I also heard them say they have no plans on dropping the Mac line but that were mostly corporate statements.
I think what originally worried me was some offhand remark, a while ago (was it Tim Cook in an interview, maybe? I don't remember) that could be interpreted as "if you want a functional, portable Apple device, get an iPad". There's also rumors of dropping Intel chips in favor of some custom ones which would further break any touch they have with realityother platforms.
I believe Apple's best products are the iPhone and their MacBook line and I'd be completely lost if they did something to the latter that turns them from "basically a PC, but small" to "basically a really, really fast iPhone with a mouse". Maybe there's nothing to interpret that way in their latest macOS release, I'm probably just paranoid. Point is: They make me paranoid.
The fact that macOS hasn't allowed you to uninstall iTunes in the past has always pissed me off greatly.
That being said, finally getting rid of iTunes is something I care massively about. Finder is absolutely the better place for iPhone and iPad device management. iTunes has been a hog for so many years now and to see its control over so many OS functions relinquished is great.
The fact that macOS hasn't allowed you to uninstall iTunes in the past has always pissed me off greatly.
I mean, it makes sense you couldn't—iTunes was so deeply woven into the fabric of macOS with things like device management, audio management, etc. that it really wouldn't have been possible to...
I mean, it makes sense you couldn't—iTunes was so deeply woven into the fabric of macOS with things like device management, audio management, etc. that it really wouldn't have been possible to uninstall without breaking something else.
That's bad design of course, but that's the reason why at least.
Ugh this is conflicting for me. Crusader Kings 2 and Homeworld Remastered are both going to get nixed by this and they're not even that old. I'm also a bit sad that I'm losing some history here....
Ugh this is conflicting for me. Crusader Kings 2 and Homeworld Remastered are both going to get nixed by this and they're not even that old. I'm also a bit sad that I'm losing some history here. The old LucasArts Jedi Knight games and Escape Velocity: Nova will be gone too. In the latter case, the company that made it doesn't even exist anymore so there's no way it's getting updated.
Does anyone have advice about salvaging some 32 bit games once the update happens? Do I just maintain a "vintage Mac gaming" partition where I run high sierra forever? Fortunately most of this stuff is too old to need an always online connection so I can keep it safe from the predations of security vulnerabilities.
Apple doesn’t (and never did) care about gaming on Mac and I’m afraid they’ll never make an exception for retro 32-bit games. Maybe someone can write an emulator to let them run in a window, but...
Apple doesn’t (and never did) care about gaming on Mac and I’m afraid they’ll never make an exception for retro 32-bit games. Maybe someone can write an emulator to let them run in a window, but I’m not sure how practical that is.
If Apple didn’t care about supporting game developers, why would they have bothered to invest in their Metal API? Why would they have bothered to launch a subscription gaming service in Apple...
If Apple didn’t care about supporting game developers, why would they have bothered to invest in their Metal API? Why would they have bothered to launch a subscription gaming service in Apple Arcade? Why would they make a Game Controller framework?
You’re allowed to not be interested in the offerings available on Apple platforms, and about five years ago or so, I might have agreed with you. But saying that Apple doesn’t care about gaming today doesn’t ring very true to me.
I discovered this game during a period of deep depression and it really helped me get through it. It’ll always have a special place in my heart just by virtue of timing.
I discovered this game during a period of deep depression and it really helped me get through it. It’ll always have a special place in my heart just by virtue of timing.
I was a huge fan of Ambrosia Software in its heyday, and EV:N was at the top of my list of favorites from them. Didn't realize until just now though that the company is no more. They had a good...
I was a huge fan of Ambrosia Software in its heyday, and EV:N was at the top of my list of favorites from them. Didn't realize until just now though that the company is no more. They had a good run, better than most Mac shareware publishers. They'll be missed.
Sidecar looks amazing, and I might end up buying a decent iPad just to use that feature when I'm on the go. Lots of other interesting things here - I'm not going to get Apple Arcade, but it will...
Sidecar looks amazing, and I might end up buying a decent iPad just to use that feature when I'm on the go.
Lots of other interesting things here - I'm not going to get Apple Arcade, but it will be interesting to see what the results of them getting into this will be.
I've only been using it for ~24 hours, but it runs very well on my 2018 retina air -- I might even say better than Mojave, which I had found to be generally sluggish. Sidecar works flawlessly on...
I've only been using it for ~24 hours, but it runs very well on my 2018 retina air -- I might even say better than Mojave, which I had found to be generally sluggish. Sidecar works flawlessly on my 11' air and will be a nice little second screen when I'm traveling for work.
As an aside: Everyone seems to have something negative to say about this release (i.e. every comment on this thread...) but I think it's a solid, incremental step forward. Probably a topic for a new submission entirely, but I've noticed an annoying trend over the last 4/5 years where every OS release -- regardless of platform -- turns into an anti-Windows/Android/iOS/OSX circlejerk. I'm not sure what the right solution is, but these attitudes drown out all other relevant discussion and have a tendency to leak into other non-tech topics as well.
I disagree. It just depends on what discussion platform you're on. And I think a lot of the people complaining are complaining because they like the OS so much that they're finding little things...
[...] every OS release -- regardless of platform -- turns into an anti-Windows/Android/iOS/OSX circlejerk.
I disagree. It just depends on what discussion platform you're on. And I think a lot of the people complaining are complaining because they like the OS so much that they're finding little things to nitpick about.
And I think it's going to take months (if not a full year) before we feel the full effects of this release. A lot of developers seem to be taking it very slow with Catalyst.
I tried to avoid any negativity; hope you're not including me in that! I find that most Apple related things specifically get the anti-apple team out en masse to talk about the things that suck...
I tried to avoid any negativity; hope you're not including me in that!
I find that most Apple related things specifically get the anti-apple team out en masse to talk about the things that suck about Apple. While there are lots of things I dislike about Apple, I find it pretty easy to delight in the hardware and software that they put out, and I try to focus on that. I don't understand the top comment or why it's popular:
Fascinating, not a single feature I care about.
Then... shut up and just not care about it? Lots of us do care about the things. I attempted to write something that I was excited about; Sidecar is actually a "make it" feature for me, and I'm super excited about it.
Not at all! When I checked Tildes this morning, yours was the only normal, well-balanced parent comment. I responded to yours precisely because it was good!
hope you're not including me in that!
Not at all! When I checked Tildes this morning, yours was the only normal, well-balanced parent comment. I responded to yours precisely because it was good!
I think you'll find the most savage critics are also the most dedicated fans. It's totally legitimate to critique the release of a new, high-profile product. I don't see any evidence of a troll...
I find that most Apple related things specifically get the anti-apple team out en masse to talk about the things that suck about Apple.
I think you'll find the most savage critics are also the most dedicated fans.
It's totally legitimate to critique the release of a new, high-profile product. I don't see any evidence of a troll brigade in here. Honestly, the most annoying thing about Apple fans is their thin skin. I don't say that because I'm a hater, I own and use several Apple products. But if you're concerned about trolls, maybe overreacting to any criticism is not the way to go. That's the sort of thing that actively attracts trolls, like flies to a lightbulb.
I find it pretty easy to delight in the hardware and software that they put out, and I try to focus on that.
You're free to delight in whatever you want. But this is a consumer product, and it's natural that people would discuss negatives they see. How can we have a real conversation if we only focus on the upsides?
I want to preface this by saying that I wasn't speaking only about this thread, but about Apple related news in general here and other places, which I will straight up admit is unfair to this...
I want to preface this by saying that I wasn't speaking only about this thread, but about Apple related news in general here and other places, which I will straight up admit is unfair to this thread in particular. I was perhaps slightly annoyed by the top voted comment, which I think is just noise, but in general there isn't much of what I was talking about in this thread.
I think you'll find the most savage critics are also the most dedicated fans.
I don't think that's the case. Loads of people critique things about Apple products all the time that wouldn't be caught dead owning an Apple product. They're the most savage critics.
Honestly, the most annoying thing about Apple fans is their thin skin
If you're lumping me in with the thin skin crowd, feel free not to. I just don't really understand broadcasting "I don't care about this" messages. If I don't care about something, I don't post about it.
it's natural that people would discuss negatives they see. How can we have a real conversation if we only focus on the upsides?
I certainly didn't say that all posts need to be positive, or that we only have to talk about upsides.
At the risk of getting too meta: I think case in point is that this sort of discussion ends up popping up in the majority of Apple-related threads I see. That timeless "Apple sucks for these...
Loads of people critique things about Apple products all the time that wouldn't be caught dead owning an Apple product. They're the most savage critics.
At the risk of getting too meta: I think case in point is that this sort of discussion ends up popping up in the majority of Apple-related threads I see. That timeless "Apple sucks for these reasons" followed by a few back-and-forths of disagreement. I think it's not a coincidence we see this on Tildes often (actually, I'm unfairly ragging on Tildes' users here, we're not that bad compared to some other places on the internet).
Furthermore, I just find so many of the negative reasons brought up really... unrefined? I don't know. They may not be bad faith disagreements, but generally the reasoning behind them is faulty, lacks context, or just shows that person has poor taste. Take Gruber, Snell, or Arment for example: they're good examples of how to disagree with Apple's decisions. They actually have contextual knowledge of the situation to enforce their opinions, and tend to have more elegant constructs for their disagreements.
Anyway, I won't say anymore on this topic, but yeah, my 2¢.
Gruber is a terrible example, because he buys into almost everything Apple does unconditionally. I honestly can't stand his writing, because I've rarely seen a greater degree of rationalization....
Take Gruber, Snell, or Arment for example: they're good examples of how to disagree with Apple's decisions.
Gruber is a terrible example, because he buys into almost everything Apple does unconditionally. I honestly can't stand his writing, because I've rarely seen a greater degree of rationalization. He also has a very condescending attitude to anyone who disagrees with Apple's decisions, of exactly the sort that the stereotypes against Apple users portray. If "how to disagree" means rarely ever disagree with anything, that's like the definition of an echo chamber.
I mean, just today Gruber tweeted an 8 piece long rant on the silence of Apple's error messages, which he labelled "one of the worst aspects of today’s Apple", trashed Apple's Catalyst efforts as...
Gruber is a terrible example, because he buys into almost everything Apple does unconditionally.
I mean, just today Gruber tweeted an 8 piece long rant on the silence of Apple's error messages, which he labelled "one of the worst aspects of today’s Apple", trashed Apple's Catalyst efforts as "madness" and "absurd" ("Catalyst remains woefully incomplete and woefully under-documented."), and called it "disappointing" that Apple has missed another iCloud feature they intended to ship this year.
Yesterday, he chided Apple for not approving that Hong Kong app that allowed users to avoid police aggression: "If Apple wants to avoid any suspicion that the company is kowtowing to China, they need to avoid any inadvertent screw-ups in a case like this.", and called them out for kowtowing to China by not including the Taiwanese flag in Hong Kong.
If I'm honest, I think you've got a preset opinion on Gruber that isn't entirely correct.
EDIT: Just to really hit home the point, Gruber has in fact probably one of the longest histories of trashing Apple of any modern tech journalist, like when he disparaged Apple's macOS Finder application all the way back in 2003 with a post that was aptly titled "Steaming Pile".
16 years later, and Finder remains issue ridden. I agree with emdash, I do think that Gruber is a fair critic. Sure, when Gruber agrees with Apple, he really rides the party line, and his writing...
when he disparaged Apple's macOS Finder application all the way back in 2003 with a post that was aptly titled "Steaming Pile".
16 years later, and Finder remains issue ridden.
I agree with emdash, I do think that Gruber is a fair critic. Sure, when Gruber agrees with Apple, he really rides the party line, and his writing can sound like he's rehashing prepared statements in his own writing style at times. But in the time I've been reading his work, I've known him to be a fair columnist: Fairly positive in days of yore, but duly critical of Apple while it has been in the weeds these past few years.
I've found in general that the apostate and the person who's too invested to leave, but also deeply critical of the direction something is going, are among the harshest critics. I wasn't speaking...
I've found in general that the apostate and the person who's too invested to leave, but also deeply critical of the direction something is going, are among the harshest critics. I wasn't speaking purely about Apple.
If you're lumping me in with the thin skin crowd, feel free not to. I just don't really understand broadcasting "I don't care about this" messages. If I don't care about something, I don't post about it.
Well, you're freaking out over a single negative comment, and also generalizing about haters when most people in this thread are being civil. I wasn't addressing you specifically, but I do think you should take a step back. I think you should reread the comment you're so upset about, because it essentially amounts to this: "This update introduces no features I care about, while removing features I depend on. I wish I could bring myself to leave, but there are still benefits to the platform that I can't get anywhere else." That's my paraphrase as a neutral third party. It wasn't just "broadcasting indifference". This is clearly a person who does care, because they are invested in the system, and that's why it matters to them that, in their view, the new update is taking a step back in some areas while failing to take a step forward in others.
It would be pretty silly of us to continue the discussion here, when it would be better suited as a series of replies to the original comment. But when you so clearly misrepresent what is, whether you agree with it or not, clearly a sincere critique from an invested user, and also say you prefer to focus on the positives, it did sound like you were saying that we shouldn't be talking about negatives.
I feel like we might have wildly different opinions on what "freaking out" and "upset" mean. In no way does the comment have any emotional impact on me. I'm mostly just replying because I want...
Well, you're freaking out over a single negative comment
I do think you should take a step back. I think you should reread the comment you're so upset about
I feel like we might have wildly different opinions on what "freaking out" and "upset" mean. In no way does the comment have any emotional impact on me. I'm mostly just replying because I want tildes to have more comments, and I'm in the middle of testing our build pipeline which is a long series of "build, wait, test".
I reread it the original comment, and you're correct and I was unfair in my initial reaction - it isn't just broadcasting indifference. I still don't find it to be a particularly worthwhile comment (the misunderstanding of Catalyst and Photos aren't particularly helpful, and the 32-bit support has to be dropped at some point, so it's not really a fair assessment of this particular update), but I'll admit I was more dismissive than I should have been.
Well, I certainly didn't mean to imply you were going absolutely ballistic or anything. However, it seems like you took one look at a comment, disliked its tone, and went on to unfairly...
Well, I certainly didn't mean to imply you were going absolutely ballistic or anything. However, it seems like you took one look at a comment, disliked its tone, and went on to unfairly characterize that comment in general, and also reached for some generalizations that didn't really apply to this thread. In short, an overreaction. I can't claim to know your emotional state, but I know when I overreact, it tends to be because I see something, and it reminds me of something else, and that thing pisses me off, and so I transfer those emotions onto a target that might not be entirely deserving.
I upgraded. Process was painless (because I had already checked that I don’t have any 32bit apps). Removal of iTunes and moving to the new Music, TV, and Podcasts apps is refreshing. The thing...
I upgraded. Process was painless (because I had already checked that I don’t have any 32bit apps). Removal of iTunes and moving to the new Music, TV, and Podcasts apps is refreshing. The thing that took me by surprise was the change of the default shell from bash to zsh. (I had read about this change a while ago, but totally forgot.) I took it as an opportunity to set up a .zshrc to my liking. I have this inkling that some script or something of mine is going to break due to my unfamiliarity with zsh, but so far smooth sailing.
What’s the point of depreciating 32-bit apps? Is it purely to drop those APIs and not have to maintain them any longer? I mean, it doesn’t really speed things up and having those apps doesn’t slow...
What’s the point of depreciating 32-bit apps? Is it purely to drop those APIs and not have to maintain them any longer?
I mean, it doesn’t really speed things up and having those apps doesn’t slow things down, does it?
64 bit doesn't really provider more "speed" or anything, it's just more modern (and you can eliminate old APIs) and the apps can access more memory. I don't see why there's such a crusade against...
64 bit doesn't really provider more "speed" or anything, it's just more modern (and you can eliminate old APIs) and the apps can access more memory. I don't see why there's such a crusade against 32 bit in MacOSX, it makes a bit more sense for Linux.
Edit: Technically, on certains CPU architectures you can see performance speedup, and there are some security benefits (although I'm mostly just parroting that last point - I don't know much about security)
See it from Apple's perspective: 64-bit is the modern de facto standard for developing applications, 32-bit applications have memory accessibility limits attached to them, so why should they spend...
See it from Apple's perspective: 64-bit is the modern de facto standard for developing applications, 32-bit applications have memory accessibility limits attached to them, so why should they spend organizational money and time maintaining a second, inferior set of 32-bit APIs when they have 64-bit APIs available?
I totally get their perspective - and Apple has always followed a policy of "We'll do what's best practice, and developers will have to follow". That's not a bad policy - but I am biased against...
I totally get their perspective - and Apple has always followed a policy of "We'll do what's best practice, and developers will have to follow". That's not a bad policy - but I am biased against it because I use a mac and use 2 tools that are currently only 32 bit, so Catalina will mess up my workflow a bit.
Yeah, I feel your pain. But given the inordinate amount of transition time that Apple have given developers, especially developers with lots of resources and time available, I can't help but feel...
Yeah, I feel your pain. But given the inordinate amount of transition time that Apple have given developers, especially developers with lots of resources and time available, I can't help but feel the blame here lies with the developers who refuse to keep their applications modern.
And you know what, these developers knew this is how Apple operates when they invested the resources and research in developing for Mac. They knew macOS is a platform that will happily leave people in the past behind. Saying they couldn't see the writing on the wall when they started is a massive cop-out from them.
But yeah, none of this helps you (or me)—us users—who are left with unsupported applications. Probably your best bet if it's a P1 blocker is to just not upgrade for now, or actively look for workflow alternatives.
Would it not be possible to keep 32-bit support as an unsupported feature (i.e. you can enable this feature, knowing it won't get further security/feature updates from us) - at least then their...
Would it not be possible to keep 32-bit support as an unsupported feature (i.e. you can enable this feature, knowing it won't get further security/feature updates from us) - at least then their users wouldn't be stuck with software that developers have abandoned and stopped updated.
Oh, sorry. Apple is really big into doing things "right" rather than what might consider more pragmatic. Lots of *NIX flavors are going 64 bit only because it's "right". But there are benefits -...
Oh, sorry. Apple is really big into doing things "right" rather than what might consider more pragmatic. Lots of *NIX flavors are going 64 bit only because it's "right". But there are benefits - if you refuse to deprecate an API you might end up like windows where everything is basically a facade on Windows NT :P
Yeah, pretty much that. Apple's modus operandi with macOS is nearly directly in opposition to Microsoft's approach with Windows: deprecate early and frequently. So yeah, getting rid of 32-bit is...
Yeah, pretty much that. Apple's modus operandi with macOS is nearly directly in opposition to Microsoft's approach with Windows: deprecate early and frequently. So yeah, getting rid of 32-bit is one of the steps Apple is taking to remove its now outdated Carbon API from the platform. So while having 32-bit support doesn't slow the OS down per se, it does slim down the OS size itself, and probably more importantly, it keeps organizational technical debt to a minimum—which permits Apple to move faster and have less maintained knowledge about increasingly irrelevant parts of the system.
That scares me. Remember when they tried to rewrite their DNS system and it resulted in people ending up with 30 versions of their computer showing up on the shared computer list?
I mean, I don't entirely see how that's a good rebuttal against accumulated organizational & technical debt? Bugs happen, that doesn't seem like a reasonable excuse to not ditch legacy functionality.
I mean, I don't entirely see how that's a good rebuttal against accumulated organizational & technical debt? Bugs happen, that doesn't seem like a reasonable excuse to not ditch legacy functionality.
It wasn’t a response to the technical debt part. It was a response to the fact that it would enable them to move faster. They’ve been doing more of that lately and it hasn’t resulted in good software.
It wasn’t a response to the technical debt part. It was a response to the fact that it would enable them to move faster. They’ve been doing more of that lately and it hasn’t resulted in good software.
Many Linux flavors are also ditching 32 bit support. Ubuntu tried, and got backlash, but less main-stream ones already have. Of course, some distros are made for embedded systems, and those likely...
Many Linux flavors are also ditching 32 bit support. Ubuntu tried, and got backlash, but less main-stream ones already have. Of course, some distros are made for embedded systems, and those likely aren't even on a 64-bit architecture, so they have no reason to deprecate anything.
I don't have any evidence to support it, but I'm guessing it might have to do with security. It's probably easier to ensure your platform is secure if you don't have fifty different legacy ways of...
I don't have any evidence to support it, but I'm guessing it might have to do with security. It's probably easier to ensure your platform is secure if you don't have fifty different legacy ways of running code.
Fascinating, not a single feature I care about. Several programs I use regularly will stop working (32bit) and the new photos app looks like a disaster (please, please, please, don't let "AI" make actual decisions on how to order views, I already hate the endless list of photos in iOS 13). It seems like they're running out of ideas and somehow do updates, anyway.
Apps running on iPad and macOS will inevitably be bottlenecked by the iPad version and I hope that won't become a serious focus for Apple (who am I kidding, they want people to drop MacBooks and move to iPads in the long term).
I'm worried, now. I kinda want to leave Apple but there's no real competitor in their quality/UX-focused segment.
Honestly, this reads like (yet another) variant of "Apple is doomed", which we've been pretty much hearing since the days of "less space than a nomad, lame". I don't think it matters if you specifically care about any features. Is there any requirement for Apple to deliver groundbreaking changes every year? Why can't OS changes be iterative?
That being said, finally getting rid of iTunes is something I care massively about. Finder is absolutely the better place for iPhone and iPad device management. iTunes has been a hog for so many years now and to see its control over so many OS functions relinquished is great.
I don't have a personal use for Sidecar, but the changes to keep macOS in sync with iOS are needed: new reminders app with a new backing schema, Find My, Screen Time makes its way to Mac. What's wrong with these changes?
The 32-bit train has now sailed to be honest, if developers haven't updated their apps to 64-bit in the decade+ that they've had to do so, then that's on them, and while I feel for the users, it's not Apple that should be blamed here.
What? Apple has been very clear on the distinction between iOS and macOS. Don't believe for one second that Apple employees don't sorely love the mac.
Just to drive home this point, this is the longest transition time Apple has ever given us for any processor change ever. When they switched to Intel, they only supported their PPC translation software (Rosetta) for about 5 years.
Well, maybe everyone has their own pressure points but I've traditionally defended Apple through a lot of really weird decisions. You're probably right in that, after having to swallow some bitter pills (32bit drop is probably my biggest), I'll come crawling back.
What I'm worried about aren't so much individual features but their long-term philosophy.
It would seem so, yea. iPadOS is probably a step towards cementing having custom OSs for each product line, even if their desktop and mobile apps start looking more similar on the surface. I also heard them say they have no plans on dropping the Mac line but that were mostly corporate statements.
I think what originally worried me was some offhand remark, a while ago (was it Tim Cook in an interview, maybe? I don't remember) that could be interpreted as "if you want a functional, portable Apple device, get an iPad". There's also rumors of dropping Intel chips in favor of some custom ones which would further break any touch they have with
realityother platforms.I believe Apple's best products are the iPhone and their MacBook line and I'd be completely lost if they did something to the latter that turns them from "basically a PC, but small" to "basically a really, really fast iPhone with a mouse". Maybe there's nothing to interpret that way in their latest macOS release, I'm probably just paranoid. Point is: They make me paranoid.
The fact that macOS hasn't allowed you to uninstall iTunes in the past has always pissed me off greatly.
I mean, it makes sense you couldn't—iTunes was so deeply woven into the fabric of macOS with things like device management, audio management, etc. that it really wouldn't have been possible to uninstall without breaking something else.
That's bad design of course, but that's the reason why at least.
Ugh this is conflicting for me. Crusader Kings 2 and Homeworld Remastered are both going to get nixed by this and they're not even that old. I'm also a bit sad that I'm losing some history here. The old LucasArts Jedi Knight games and Escape Velocity: Nova will be gone too. In the latter case, the company that made it doesn't even exist anymore so there's no way it's getting updated.
Does anyone have advice about salvaging some 32 bit games once the update happens? Do I just maintain a "vintage Mac gaming" partition where I run high sierra forever? Fortunately most of this stuff is too old to need an always online connection so I can keep it safe from the predations of security vulnerabilities.
Apple doesn’t (and never did) care about gaming on Mac and I’m afraid they’ll never make an exception for retro 32-bit games. Maybe someone can write an emulator to let them run in a window, but I’m not sure how practical that is.
If Apple didn’t care about supporting game developers, why would they have bothered to invest in their Metal API? Why would they have bothered to launch a subscription gaming service in Apple Arcade? Why would they make a Game Controller framework?
You’re allowed to not be interested in the offerings available on Apple platforms, and about five years ago or so, I might have agreed with you. But saying that Apple doesn’t care about gaming today doesn’t ring very true to me.
I discovered this game during a period of deep depression and it really helped me get through it. It’ll always have a special place in my heart just by virtue of timing.
I was a huge fan of Ambrosia Software in its heyday, and EV:N was at the top of my list of favorites from them. Didn't realize until just now though that the company is no more. They had a good run, better than most Mac shareware publishers. They'll be missed.
Sidecar looks amazing, and I might end up buying a decent iPad just to use that feature when I'm on the go.
Lots of other interesting things here - I'm not going to get Apple Arcade, but it will be interesting to see what the results of them getting into this will be.
I've only been using it for ~24 hours, but it runs very well on my 2018 retina air -- I might even say better than Mojave, which I had found to be generally sluggish. Sidecar works flawlessly on my 11' air and will be a nice little second screen when I'm traveling for work.
As an aside: Everyone seems to have something negative to say about this release (i.e. every comment on this thread...) but I think it's a solid, incremental step forward. Probably a topic for a new submission entirely, but I've noticed an annoying trend over the last 4/5 years where every OS release -- regardless of platform -- turns into an anti-Windows/Android/iOS/OSX circlejerk. I'm not sure what the right solution is, but these attitudes drown out all other relevant discussion and have a tendency to leak into other non-tech topics as well.
I disagree. It just depends on what discussion platform you're on. And I think a lot of the people complaining are complaining because they like the OS so much that they're finding little things to nitpick about.
And I think it's going to take months (if not a full year) before we feel the full effects of this release. A lot of developers seem to be taking it very slow with Catalyst.
I tried to avoid any negativity; hope you're not including me in that!
I find that most Apple related things specifically get the anti-apple team out en masse to talk about the things that suck about Apple. While there are lots of things I dislike about Apple, I find it pretty easy to delight in the hardware and software that they put out, and I try to focus on that. I don't understand the top comment or why it's popular:
Then... shut up and just not care about it? Lots of us do care about the things. I attempted to write something that I was excited about; Sidecar is actually a "make it" feature for me, and I'm super excited about it.
Not at all! When I checked Tildes this morning, yours was the only normal, well-balanced parent comment. I responded to yours precisely because it was good!
I think you'll find the most savage critics are also the most dedicated fans.
It's totally legitimate to critique the release of a new, high-profile product. I don't see any evidence of a troll brigade in here. Honestly, the most annoying thing about Apple fans is their thin skin. I don't say that because I'm a hater, I own and use several Apple products. But if you're concerned about trolls, maybe overreacting to any criticism is not the way to go. That's the sort of thing that actively attracts trolls, like flies to a lightbulb.
You're free to delight in whatever you want. But this is a consumer product, and it's natural that people would discuss negatives they see. How can we have a real conversation if we only focus on the upsides?
I want to preface this by saying that I wasn't speaking only about this thread, but about Apple related news in general here and other places, which I will straight up admit is unfair to this thread in particular. I was perhaps slightly annoyed by the top voted comment, which I think is just noise, but in general there isn't much of what I was talking about in this thread.
I don't think that's the case. Loads of people critique things about Apple products all the time that wouldn't be caught dead owning an Apple product. They're the most savage critics.
If you're lumping me in with the thin skin crowd, feel free not to. I just don't really understand broadcasting "I don't care about this" messages. If I don't care about something, I don't post about it.
I certainly didn't say that all posts need to be positive, or that we only have to talk about upsides.
At the risk of getting too meta: I think case in point is that this sort of discussion ends up popping up in the majority of Apple-related threads I see. That timeless "Apple sucks for these reasons" followed by a few back-and-forths of disagreement. I think it's not a coincidence we see this on Tildes often (actually, I'm unfairly ragging on Tildes' users here, we're not that bad compared to some other places on the internet).
Furthermore, I just find so many of the negative reasons brought up really... unrefined? I don't know. They may not be bad faith disagreements, but generally the reasoning behind them is faulty, lacks context, or just shows that person has poor taste. Take Gruber, Snell, or Arment for example: they're good examples of how to disagree with Apple's decisions. They actually have contextual knowledge of the situation to enforce their opinions, and tend to have more elegant constructs for their disagreements.
Anyway, I won't say anymore on this topic, but yeah, my 2¢.
Gruber is a terrible example, because he buys into almost everything Apple does unconditionally. I honestly can't stand his writing, because I've rarely seen a greater degree of rationalization. He also has a very condescending attitude to anyone who disagrees with Apple's decisions, of exactly the sort that the stereotypes against Apple users portray. If "how to disagree" means rarely ever disagree with anything, that's like the definition of an echo chamber.
I mean, just today Gruber tweeted an 8 piece long rant on the silence of Apple's error messages, which he labelled "one of the worst aspects of today’s Apple", trashed Apple's Catalyst efforts as "madness" and "absurd" ("Catalyst remains woefully incomplete and woefully under-documented."), and called it "disappointing" that Apple has missed another iCloud feature they intended to ship this year.
Yesterday, he chided Apple for not approving that Hong Kong app that allowed users to avoid police aggression: "If Apple wants to avoid any suspicion that the company is kowtowing to China, they need to avoid any inadvertent screw-ups in a case like this.", and called them out for kowtowing to China by not including the Taiwanese flag in Hong Kong.
If I'm honest, I think you've got a preset opinion on Gruber that isn't entirely correct.
EDIT: Just to really hit home the point, Gruber has in fact probably one of the longest histories of trashing Apple of any modern tech journalist, like when he disparaged Apple's macOS Finder application all the way back in 2003 with a post that was aptly titled "Steaming Pile".
16 years later, and Finder remains issue ridden.
I agree with emdash, I do think that Gruber is a fair critic. Sure, when Gruber agrees with Apple, he really rides the party line, and his writing can sound like he's rehashing prepared statements in his own writing style at times. But in the time I've been reading his work, I've known him to be a fair columnist: Fairly positive in days of yore, but duly critical of Apple while it has been in the weeds these past few years.
I've found in general that the apostate and the person who's too invested to leave, but also deeply critical of the direction something is going, are among the harshest critics. I wasn't speaking purely about Apple.
Well, you're freaking out over a single negative comment, and also generalizing about haters when most people in this thread are being civil. I wasn't addressing you specifically, but I do think you should take a step back. I think you should reread the comment you're so upset about, because it essentially amounts to this: "This update introduces no features I care about, while removing features I depend on. I wish I could bring myself to leave, but there are still benefits to the platform that I can't get anywhere else." That's my paraphrase as a neutral third party. It wasn't just "broadcasting indifference". This is clearly a person who does care, because they are invested in the system, and that's why it matters to them that, in their view, the new update is taking a step back in some areas while failing to take a step forward in others.
It would be pretty silly of us to continue the discussion here, when it would be better suited as a series of replies to the original comment. But when you so clearly misrepresent what is, whether you agree with it or not, clearly a sincere critique from an invested user, and also say you prefer to focus on the positives, it did sound like you were saying that we shouldn't be talking about negatives.
I feel like we might have wildly different opinions on what "freaking out" and "upset" mean. In no way does the comment have any emotional impact on me. I'm mostly just replying because I want tildes to have more comments, and I'm in the middle of testing our build pipeline which is a long series of "build, wait, test".
I reread it the original comment, and you're correct and I was unfair in my initial reaction - it isn't just broadcasting indifference. I still don't find it to be a particularly worthwhile comment (the misunderstanding of Catalyst and Photos aren't particularly helpful, and the 32-bit support has to be dropped at some point, so it's not really a fair assessment of this particular update), but I'll admit I was more dismissive than I should have been.
Well, I certainly didn't mean to imply you were going absolutely ballistic or anything. However, it seems like you took one look at a comment, disliked its tone, and went on to unfairly characterize that comment in general, and also reached for some generalizations that didn't really apply to this thread. In short, an overreaction. I can't claim to know your emotional state, but I know when I overreact, it tends to be because I see something, and it reminds me of something else, and that thing pisses me off, and so I transfer those emotions onto a target that might not be entirely deserving.
You got something there. I am not a huge fan, updated because its there.
No complaints. It works.
I upgraded. Process was painless (because I had already checked that I don’t have any 32bit apps). Removal of iTunes and moving to the new Music, TV, and Podcasts apps is refreshing. The thing that took me by surprise was the change of the default shell from
bashtozsh. (I had read about this change a while ago, but totally forgot.) I took it as an opportunity to set up a.zshrcto my liking. I have this inkling that some script or something of mine is going to break due to my unfamiliarity withzsh, but so far smooth sailing.What’s the point of depreciating 32-bit apps? Is it purely to drop those APIs and not have to maintain them any longer?
I mean, it doesn’t really speed things up and having those apps doesn’t slow things down, does it?
64 bit doesn't really provider more "speed" or anything, it's just more modern (and you can eliminate old APIs) and the apps can access more memory. I don't see why there's such a crusade against 32 bit in MacOSX, it makes a bit more sense for Linux.
Edit: Technically, on certains CPU architectures you can see performance speedup, and there are some security benefits (although I'm mostly just parroting that last point - I don't know much about security)
See it from Apple's perspective: 64-bit is the modern de facto standard for developing applications, 32-bit applications have memory accessibility limits attached to them, so why should they spend organizational money and time maintaining a second, inferior set of 32-bit APIs when they have 64-bit APIs available?
I totally get their perspective - and Apple has always followed a policy of "We'll do what's best practice, and developers will have to follow". That's not a bad policy - but I am biased against it because I use a mac and use 2 tools that are currently only 32 bit, so Catalina will mess up my workflow a bit.
Yeah, I feel your pain. But given the inordinate amount of transition time that Apple have given developers, especially developers with lots of resources and time available, I can't help but feel the blame here lies with the developers who refuse to keep their applications modern.
And you know what, these developers knew this is how Apple operates when they invested the resources and research in developing for Mac. They knew macOS is a platform that will happily leave people in the past behind. Saying they couldn't see the writing on the wall when they started is a massive cop-out from them.
But yeah, none of this helps you (or me)—us users—who are left with unsupported applications. Probably your best bet if it's a P1 blocker is to just not upgrade for now, or actively look for workflow alternatives.
Totally, which is why I don't blame Apple.
Would it not be possible to keep 32-bit support as an unsupported feature (i.e. you can enable this feature, knowing it won't get further security/feature updates from us) - at least then their users wouldn't be stuck with software that developers have abandoned and stopped updated.
I know the difference between 32-bit and 64-bit. I’m asking what the benefit of killing 32-bit support is.
Oh, sorry. Apple is really big into doing things "right" rather than what might consider more pragmatic. Lots of *NIX flavors are going 64 bit only because it's "right". But there are benefits - if you refuse to deprecate an API you might end up like windows where everything is basically a facade on Windows NT :P
Yeah, pretty much that. Apple's modus operandi with macOS is nearly directly in opposition to Microsoft's approach with Windows: deprecate early and frequently. So yeah, getting rid of 32-bit is one of the steps Apple is taking to remove its now outdated Carbon API from the platform. So while having 32-bit support doesn't slow the OS down per se, it does slim down the OS size itself, and probably more importantly, it keeps organizational technical debt to a minimum—which permits Apple to move faster and have less maintained knowledge about increasingly irrelevant parts of the system.
That scares me. Remember when they tried to rewrite their DNS system and it resulted in people ending up with 30 versions of their computer showing up on the shared computer list?
I mean, I don't entirely see how that's a good rebuttal against accumulated organizational & technical debt? Bugs happen, that doesn't seem like a reasonable excuse to not ditch legacy functionality.
It wasn’t a response to the technical debt part. It was a response to the fact that it would enable them to move faster. They’ve been doing more of that lately and it hasn’t resulted in good software.
Many Linux flavors are also ditching 32 bit support. Ubuntu tried, and got backlash, but less main-stream ones already have. Of course, some distros are made for embedded systems, and those likely aren't even on a 64-bit architecture, so they have no reason to deprecate anything.
I don't have any evidence to support it, but I'm guessing it might have to do with security. It's probably easier to ensure your platform is secure if you don't have fifty different legacy ways of running code.
The deep-dive from Ars Technica is in, if you're interested in further reading.
It's a short one, too. Only 13 pages.