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Reprieve for Booting New Macs With Mac OS?
MatthewRothenberg writes "Apple has announced that as of January, new Macs will boot with Mac OS X only, but now MacInTouch reports that there might be a reprieve in the works for booting with Mac OS. According to one reader, a Quark representative has been calling pro publishers to ease their worries about the lack of a Mac OS X-native version of its QuarkXPress DTP program; after talking it over with Quark, Apple has agreed to move back the Mac OS X-only deadline until June." I can imagine that conversation with Jobs: "Why don't you just finish porting your freaking product already?"
FYI, Quark 5.0 has been released for almost half a year now. You're thinking of the (possibly) soon-to-be released Quark Xpress version 6.0 which will be fully carbonized and (maybe) ready for OS X. Only time will tell on this one... :)
I wish my lawn was emo, so it would cut itself.
We ran a story about that on eWEEK a couple months back ... From what Quark's been saying at Seybold San Francisco and other gatherings, XPress 6.0 will represent a whole new code base, not just an upgrade optimized for Mac OS X's Carbon APIs.
I can hardly imagine that everybody is only waiting for Quark so they can switch to X.
That's exactly what's happening in a lot of print and design shops, though. They're buying brand-new dual-processor G4s and running OS 9 on them full-time just for Quark. Every other program they'd need runs under OS X-- even though a few of them only run in Classic-- but they have to stay on OS 9 for Quark.
And it's not even that Quark is that great. InDesign has it beat in almost every category. But there are millions of Quark files out there that people still need to use. Dropping Quark completely just isn't a practical option.
What about existing workflows and applications for scanning, printing, ripping etc. that either don't exist on X or cost a fortune to update
Virtually everything you'd need to run a print shop has been ported to OS X. Practically everybody's using a PDF workflow these days, and OS X has better PDF support than any other OS. As for ripping and printing, all of that is being done with Windows. The Windows RIP just sits there in the corner, humming to itself, and chews through PDF all day and night. The interactive tools, though, are all on OS X except for Quark.
I write in my journal
Quark 6.0 better had be carbonised, because it's only going to support Mac OS X!
I think they may actually be doing a proper number on it this time, instead of Adobe's carbonisation. At least that's what Quark's people told me.
They also sold me a bridge.
Just hold the Option key pressed while booting up (if you're using a "new-world" mac; i.e. a mac since about 2000). You'll get a nice boot device selector which also supports Linux. Note that Mac OS 9 and OS X have to be installed on separate partitions.
Exactly 100% of the Mac-based publishing pros that I know personally (1 local tabloid and 2 unrelated freelancers) are indeed sticking with OS9 solely because of Quark. They really want to come over to crash-free OSX, but QXP is their livelihood.
I've suggested InDesign, but they don't want to risk problems with converting their old files.
Now, I was all like, "Quark is, like, so committing corporate suicide by not releasing an OS X version of Xpress and InDesign, despite its many flaws, will, like, kick their asses and stuff," but not I think that perhaps Quark may be correct in waiting a wee bit. Despite no carbonized competition, InDesign has made almost no headway against Quark on the corporate side where it counts and, should Quark release a X-native version of Xpress in the first half of 2003 which Just Works, they may pull off quite a coup.
My take on InDesign: while it has some nice features, it has no killer feature.
I am a believer of momentum and curves.
Second half of 2003, perhaps, like "2002 2Q" means second quarter? I don't know, just a guess.
Apple has two such changes that affected backwards compatability in over 18 years. Windows breaks something at every version, which happens almost yearly now it seems. Apple did have to abandon old outdated code and processors.
The OS X was a novel transition for me ... I had to upgrade several apps to work under the new OS.
But by now most OS9 apps need upgrading anyway for compatibility with others. And if you have the latest version of a modern title, then it is probably both OS9 and OSX compatible.
many of us have funky old programs that will never ever be updated
I have not yet run into a program that won't run in classic and has no replacement. Especially since the Open Source community has filled the ranks once occupied by the sharewarers. The costs I've incurred replacing software have been limited to Photoshop 7 (to replace version 3, which actually ran really well in Classic) and InDesign (to replace Quark, which was nice in Classic so long as I hid it to switch apps). Thanks to Apple software deals I paid around $400 and both. Not to shabby really.
I can appreciate the benefits of things like abandoning the 68K
Classic Mode is not a panacea!
I'd comment, but I'm going to play a game of Keys to the Castle right now.
omnia tua castra sunt nobis
The statement about the UI being proprietary is sheer ignorance. The UI for version 4 is based on the OS 7 Appearance manager. Keep in mind that version 4 was released in 1997, when the Mac market was split between OS 7 and OS 8. Quark didn't adopt the OS 8 Appearance manager because that would have meant abandoning OS 7. Granted, using Quark version 4 today looks a little funny
Version 5 of Quark runs in only 8.6 and higher...and does comply with the OS 8 Appearance Manager. My guess is you are one of the people that didn't upgrade to 5 because it wasn't carbon (or Quark's insane pricing scheme was a drawback). I can understand that, but don't fall into the trap of comparing software written in 1997 with software written today.
On another note...I've never had any problems with Quark's shortcuts. To each his own I suppose
Try BootCD from CharlesSoft.
For Jaguar
For Puma
I'm a loner Dottie, a Rebel.
Look, the Carbon, Cocoa, and BSD APIs are *all* native APIs. They all sit right on top of the microkernel. None of them go through any other APIs (other than Quartz and Quicktime). Classic is the only non-native API on OS X because it is an emulated API. Thats what non-native means, emulated. Just like 68K code was non-native on PPC machines, it had to run through the 68K emulator in the Mixed Mode Manager.
oh and if any of you hard core old school mac geeks want to still put os 9 on a machine here is what you can do.... given that the firmware on new macs wont let you boot to os 9 and apples firmware is now actually on the boot sector of the macs harddrive you can do a low level format of the drive and then install os 9 as it will put on the old firmware