Mac OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard

[m88kbuff]

As a PowerPC firmware engineer and PowerPC Mac user, I wanted to clear up a few apparent misconceptions:

Originally Posted by Teno

Eventually Motorola stepped out of the computer processing business which left IBM as Apple's sole partner.

I think this is misleading. The Motorola division responsible for semiconductors (including PowerPC products) was spun off as Freescale Semiconductor. Even before the spinoff, Motorola had been mostly focused on the PowerPC embedded system marked for some time, though Apple was still a significant customer and the driving force behind the 74xx (G4) processor family. I think the parting of ways with Freescale/Motorola was mostly Apple's doing (brought on by Motorola's failing to meet Apple's expectations).

PowerPC is an extremely small business for IBM, they mostly used their relationship with Apple for bragging rights but they weren't making much profit from it.

Also misleading. PowerPC is a huge business for IBM--just not in the desktop market. IBM is all about PowerPC (now called Power Architecture) in the embedded and high-end server markets. According to a Register article from a while back, IBM had hoped to push Apple toward the PowerPC-based Cell Broadband Engine.

IBM was unwilling to compete, so Apple switched to Intel.

IBM wasn't unwilling; they just weren't living up to Apple's expectations, so Jobs got impatient and decided to teach them a lesson.

PowerPC and Intel x86 are two completely different processing architectures, which means software applications have to be completely rewritten to run on both of them.

PowerPC & x86 are very different architectures, but portable software applications do not have to be completely rewritten to run on both of them. This should be obvious from the existence of Universal binaries on 10.4 and 10.5. Most well-designed applications can run on either architecture without source code modification--they simply need to be compiled for each architecture. Only the lowest-level software (or software that was designed without considering portability issues) needs to be rewritten to run on a different architecture. For many applications, writing a program that runs on both architectures is as simple as selecting a checkbox in the Xcode GUI. The more significant support issue is having to test your program on both platforms.

OS X was originally written to run on PowerPC, Apple had to rewrite OS X to run on x86, which also means all of the applications that run on OS X need to be rewritten for x86.

OS X has always ran on x86--this version just wasn't released until the big switch. Apple actually had to port OPENSTEP (which already ran on x86) to PowerPC in order to create Rhapsody, which became Mac OS X. However, Mac OS X never lost its legacy x86 support (though it wasn't kept fully up-to-date and had to be updated to make it ready for "prime time").

Rosetta allowed applications written for PowerPC to run on an Intel Mac. That gave software developers time to rewrite their apps for x86 and give consumers time to repurchase applications written for x86.

Again, in most cases, applications merely need to be updated and/or re-compiled (and tested) to run on x86; most do not need to be significantly rewritten.

For the past three years Apple has written every OS X update to support both x86 and PowerPC to continue to support the older PowerPC Macs and give people time to buy new Intel Macs.

True, but much of the effort to support PowerPC comes "for free" due to the abstractions in Mac OS X. The main costs to supporting PowerPC would be maintaining the PowerPC development tools, the low-level components of the OS (including device drivers), and most importantly, the testing involved to ensure that it runs correctly on all legacy systems.

Without the need to support PPC, Apple could completely optimize and fine tune OS X to run on Intel machines. Which allows them to make OS X faster, leaner, and more efficient. Without the need for PPC code Snow Leopard is also smaller. Apple promises to free up at least 6GB of hard drive space, I've seen some reports that as much as 10GB of hard drive space being freed.

This is mostly marketing spin. Given enough resources for development & testing, Apple could have supported PowerPC in Snow Leopard without sacrificing any performance on the x86 machines, and they likely could have also improved performance on PowerPC machines. As much as Apple tried to spin that 6-10GB freed by removing the PowerPC support, this is not a significant amount of disk space in an age where low-end machines have 250GB of disk space. Anyway, at the cost of convenience, OS X could still have been made "smaller" by having separate (non-Universal) x86 and PowerPC install disks, as was the case for Mac OS 10.4. Apple simply decided that they wanted to spend their resources on activities that would be more profitable. Unfortunately for those of us with G5 machines that still perform excellently, the PowerPC OS upgrade market is relatively small compared to the potential market for new x86 Macs.

[Teno]

Originally Posted by m88kbuff

I think this is misleading. The Motorola division responsible for semiconductors (including PowerPC products) was spun off as Freescale Semiconductor. Even before the spinoff, Motorola had been mostly focused on the PowerPC embedded system marked for some time, though Apple was still a significant customer and the driving force behind the 74xx (G4) processor family. I think the parting of ways with Freescale/Motorola was mostly Apple's doing (brought on by Motorola's failing to meet Apple's expectations).

I'm not sure how what I said was misleading. Motorola got out of the semiconductor business, the details of how or why they got out wasn't important to my story.

Also misleading. PowerPC is a huge business for IBM--just not in the desktop market. IBM is all about PowerPC (now called Power Architecture) in the embedded and high-end server markets. According to a Register article from a while back, IBM had hoped to push Apple toward the PowerPC-based Cell Broadband Engine.

Yes I know the Power Architecture is a much larger business for IBM, I wasn't talking about the chips used in the Playstation 3 or XBox 360. None of that was important to my story.

PowerPC is for PC's. Apple was the only personal computer company that used IBM's PowerPC chips. That was not a large enough business for IBM to spend the money needed to compete against intel.

IBM wasn't unwilling; they just weren't living up to Apple's expectations, so Jobs got impatient and decided to teach them a lesson.

PowerPC was working out fine for the PowerMac G5. The problem is that Apple did not have competing processors in its other machines. In late 2005 the PowerBook was stuck using the six year old G4 running a single core processor at 1.67GHz. With the introduction of the MacBook Pro in early 2006 it was running intel dual core processors at 2GHz and 2.16GHz.

Over four years the PowerBook G4 went from 400MHz to 1.67GHz. Over two and a half years with intel the MacBook Pro Duo Core went from 2.0GHz to 3.06GHz. After four years with intel the MacBook Pro will be using quad core processors.

How long was Apple supposed to wait while getting left behind in its portable machines?

PowerPC & x86 are very different architectures, but portable software applications do not have to be completely rewritten to run on both of them.

That was my error, you are right.

OS X has always ran on x86--this version just wasn't released until the big switch. Apple actually had to port OPENSTEP (which already ran on x86) to PowerPC in order to create Rhapsody, which became Mac OS X. However, Mac OS X never lost its legacy x86 support (though it wasn't kept fully up-to-date and had to be updated to make it ready for "prime time").

My point is that a version of OS X had to be written for x86, I felt no need to go into the full backstory, it wasn't important to my point.

Again, in most cases, applications merely need to be updated and/or re-compiled (and tested) to run on x86; most do not need to be significantly rewritten.

A big part of this was because Apple made dramatic API changes and further pushed everyone off of Carbon onto Cocoa development.

The effort required depended on the application. Most of the newest applications that came after 2006 were intel only and were never made universal binary. It took Microsoft and Adobe a couple of years to rewrite their applications for x86.

This is mostly marketing spin. Given enough resources for development & testing, Apple could have supported PowerPC in Snow Leopard without sacrificing any performance on the x86 machines, and they likely could have also improved performance on PowerPC machines. As much as Apple tried to spin that 6-10GB freed by removing the PowerPC support, this is not a significant amount of disk space in an age where low-end machines have 250GB of disk space. Anyway, at the cost of convenience, OS X could still have been made "smaller" by having separate (non-Universal) x86 and PowerPC install disks, as was the case for Mac OS 10.4. Apple simply decided that they wanted to spend their resources on activities that would be more profitable. Unfortunately for those of us with G5 machines that still perform excellently, the PowerPC OS upgrade market is relatively small compared to the potential market for new x86 Macs.

Why would Apple want to continue supporting an architecture it is abandoning. Apple has supported it for three years, the PowerPC user base is shrinking, the x86 user base is growing exponentially, no new software is being created for PPC. There has to be some cut off point.

Even if you have a 500GB hard drive in your machine, what would be the use of having 6GB of instructions for an abandoned architecture you will never use?

Unfortunately for G5 users (and PowerPC firmware engineers) Apple has abandoned PowerPC. Its no surprise that three years later they would stop supporting it all together.

[Teno]

And about the technical sophistication of Mac users. Windows Vista was introduced on January 2007, Mac OS 10.5 was introduced on October 2007.



This chart shows that the majority of Mac users upgraded to 10.5 while the far majority of Windows users continue on with the eight year old XP.

The chart also shows Mac users having a healthy adoption of Mac OS 10.6, its expected the majority of Mac users will be running 10.6 by next year.

[Ninjahedge]

XP works.

So what are you saying?

Oddly enough, Vista was M$'s attempt to be more like Apple.

It sucked in many ways.

Have you even tried 7 yet? Again trying to be more crunchy and fluffy, but a LOT more stable and a lot more flexible.

But whatever. Somehow people staying loyal to an older OS means nothing to you. I guess earlier versions of the Mac OS sucked so bad people NEEDED to upgrade!

[Teno]

I'm saying that Mac users are not as technically inept as you keep wanting to claim.

What ever MS was doing with Vista seemed to not work that well.

No I haven't tried Windows 7, I've made no critique of Windows 7. I rarely ever use Windows.

I think people sticking with XP says a lot about people's trust in MS. They are saying that MS got it right enough with XP, I don't trust that MS can get it right with new OS upgrades.

That is a problem because eight years is ancient in computer years. Everything about computers has changed in eight years. MS is hampered in delivering new OS technology if most of its user base is stuck in XP.

The reason Mac users upgrade to the newer OS isn't because their was anything inherently wrong with the previous one. Its the same principle as buying anything new. The newer model has improvements over the previous model.

Originally Posted by Ninjahedge

XP works.

So what are you saying?

Oddly enough, Vista was M$'s attempt to be more like Apple.

It sucked in many ways.

Have you even tried 7 yet? Again trying to be more crunchy and fluffy, but a LOT more stable and a lot more flexible.

But whatever. Somehow people staying loyal to an older OS means nothing to you. I guess earlier versions of the Mac OS sucked so bad people NEEDED to upgrade!

[Teno]

Originally Posted by Ninjahedge

Oddly enough, Vista was M$'s attempt to be more like Apple.

One of the things that people say an awful lot about the Apple Mac is that the OS is fantastic, that it’s very graphical and easy to use. What we’ve tried to do with Windows 7 – whether it’s traditional format or in a touch format – is create a Mac look and feel in terms of graphics. We’ve significantly improved the graphical user interface, but it’s built on that very stable core Vista technology, which is far more stable than the current Mac platform, for instance.

Microsoft's new vision

[Fabrizio]

^ From today's Hufpost.... truth or damage control?:

Simon Aldous: Windows 7 'Inspired' By Mac, Microsoft Manager Admits

In an interview with PCR, Simon Aldous, Microsoft's partner group manager, went on the record acknowledging that Microsoft's new Windows 7 software was inspired by the company's major rival, Apple.

Aldous told PCR that the graphical style of Windows 7 was influenced by Macs:

One of the things that people say an awful lot about the Apple Mac is that the OS is fantastic, that it's very graphical and easy to use. What we've tried to do with Windows 7 - whether it's traditional format or in a touch format - is create a Mac look and feel in terms of graphics.

We've significantly improved the graphical user interface, but it's built on that very stable core Vista technology, which is far more stable than the current Mac platform, for instance.

Aldous isn't the first to highlight the influence.

In one of his early Windows 7 reviews, Walt Mossberg also noted some similarities between the two operating systems, writing that the new Windows 7 taskbar, "is a concept borrowed from Apple's similar feature, the Dock."

Microsoft responded quickly to Aldous' 'admission' with a statement on its blog intending to 'clarify' his comments.

Titled "How we really designed the look and feel of Windows 7," the blog states:
An inaccurate quote has been floating around the Internet today about the design origins of Windows 7 and whether its look and feel was "borrowed" from Mac OS X. Unfortunately this came from a Microsoft employee who was not involved in any aspect of designing Windows 7.
The blog, which links to 'authorized' posts discussing the design process of Windows 7, goes on to say,
I hate to say this about one of our own, but his comments were inaccurate and uninformed.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/1..._n_355043.html

[Alonzo-ny]

What is the big deal? He only said what everyone already knows.

[lofter1]

And ^ what MS is now trying to deny

Just makes them look desperate and fearful.

[Ninjahedge]

If an aesthetic vein works, someone will try to copy it.

The key is to try and make it different enough to fill in whatever gaps people were looking for.

SOME of the changes 7 put in irritate the hell out of me. Ironically, most of those are very similar to the "fuzzy apple" way of doing things.

[lofter1]

Ninja's nightmare ...

[Teno]

Here is potentially the biggest threat Microsoft has ever faced. Far more of a threat than Apple has ever been. MS knew this could be a problem and is the reason why MS killed Netscape and attempted to control the internet.

Google Chrome Operating System



What is Google Chrome OS