Tony Spencer wrote:
Well this doesn't make sense. The big boys already very clearly stated
that they would go UB when they did their next version upgrade, and
not before. This is probably why Apple unusually released MacIntel on
consumer machines first rather than high-end. It still doesn't explain
why they left-fielded everyone with a six months early release, and I
can't see this rushing MS, Adobe, Quark etc.
Quark's current beta is already UB. Supposedly, it is finally a product
that can outshine InDesign again. We'll have to see -- I haven't seen
Quark in at least four years, now. The MacBU team is likely to ship a UB
version of Office when the Windows upgrade ships. Again, not a problem.
Only Adobe is stuck with a huge CW albatross. They should have been
dealing with that three years ago.
And Apple has made clear that the "Big Boys" aren't in any danger of
being pulled from promotion on either Web or retail shelf space.
Considering how quickly smaller companies had UB applications in the
wild, I don't think this is an issue outside of the CodeWarrior and RB
developers.
Already, FreePascal, GNU Pascal, Eiffel, Scheme, and a number of other
compilers support UB development. In fact, they have for some time. If
you are a CW junkie, Apple has done a pretty decent job providing tools
for converting to Xcode. Adobe's complaints are with version control and
huge project libraries, which I think Apple will have to address.
REALbasic is also not an "ideal" tool for large teams. This is a glaring
hole in the Apple developer community, it seems. I'm assuming version
control is a priority for Apple and Real. In fact, if Real did some
things to really support teams and code reuse, it would be a boon to
REALbasic. One of the reasons VB did so well was the ease of sharing
controls and code.
To be honest I really can't understand what they're doing here. This
hurried advance could be the worst decision they've ever made. The XP
hackers are making great strides. There's a good likelihood now that
all those "killer" apps will run faster under XP than they will under
Rosetta OS X, damaging the perception of OS X. If that occurs to any
significant degree, then OS X will die, as will XCode, Rb and any apps
made with them.
I think the number of UB apps already available shows this isn't a
concern at all. Apple will do what they have done in the past and create
or buy applications to fill any holes in the product lines. But, even in
a niche market, like POS, there are already six applications in UB. For
those of us in RB-land, it means we have no UB version, limited OPOS
support (or even full HID as a compromise), and a handful of other
competitive challenges.
But, no UB version of an application can and will matter, now. Apple is
making sure of it. The UB logo program is proof of the importance Apple
places on the transition. I think the transition will go well and most
Apple customers will be pleased. Small developers might not be as happy.
- Scott
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