3 ms·

why is dropping 32-bit support even a consideration?

by tmaly 7y ago

atroche 7y ago
Maybe Cogmind depends on libraries which don’t support 64 bit? I agree though, it’s a bit weird. Maybe it’s harder for game-related libraries to switch, compared to the ones I’m used to using in my apps.
- dmix 7y ago
  Does this mean they are using unmaintained gaming libraries? Or is it just turtles all the way down of people not wanting to take responsibility to switch to 64bit because some random thing they depend on didn’t upgrade so they aren’t to blame? And this chain of side stepping of an obvious issue went on for well over a decade? I know it’s in human behaviour to delay things until they absolutely have to do something. Like we all learned in school doing less important homework. But in software there are always dialing pressures to modernize while supporting backwards compatibility. 10yr timeframes are sufficient here and from there if you want to use old stuff then it’s on both the user or the publisher to use some virtualization solution to provide long term support beyond this.
kunai 7y ago
People will mention new libraries requiring 64-bit or to reduce the installed size of macOS but I think both of those explanations are (mostly) BS. Microsoft has an unhealthy obsession with backwards-compatibility due to their enterprise market base. Apple has the opposite problem, where they consistently remove legacy features (in many cases, features that are not even "legacy" in nature but required for normal usage scenarios) without giving users a chance to catch-up. Sometimes this is warranted, as it is with removing optical drives, other times, it is not -- such as dropping 32-bit support when neither Windows nor Linux have any intention of doing so in the near future. This philosophy been accelerating in absurd fashion lately, whether it's dropping the headphone jack from the iPad Pro, the "butterfly keyboard," or leaving the MacBook Pro with no USB-A ports or SD card slot -- two extremely well-adopted technologies that are still ubiquitous nearly half a decade from the release of the all USB-C MacBook Pro.
stordoff 7y ago
Old game, potentially (you can't continue to sell them without updating them).
- crooked-v 7y ago
  Cogmind dates to 2015, it's hardly 'old'.
EricE 7y ago
And people like to make lite of the "Y2K fiasco" - here's how Y2K happened...

why is dropping 32-bit support even a consideration?

by tmaly 7y ago

why is dropping 32-bit support even a consideration?

Maybe Cogmind depends on libraries which don’t support 64 bit? I agree though, it’s a bit weird. Maybe it’s harder for game-related libraries to switch, compared to the ones I’m used to using in my apps.

dmix 7y ago
Does this mean they are using unmaintained gaming libraries? Or is it just turtles all the way down of people not wanting to take responsibility to switch to 64bit because some random thing they depend on didn’t upgrade so they aren’t to blame? And this chain of side stepping of an obvious issue went on for well over a decade? I know it’s in human behaviour to delay things until they absolutely have to do something. Like we all learned in school doing less important homework. But in software there are always dialing pressures to modernize while supporting backwards compatibility. 10yr timeframes are sufficient here and from there if you want to use old stuff then it’s on both the user or the publisher to use some virtualization solution to provide long term support beyond this.

kunai 7y ago

People will mention new libraries requiring 64-bit or to reduce the installed size of macOS but I think both of those explanations are (mostly) BS. Microsoft has an unhealthy obsession with backwards-compatibility due to their enterprise market base. Apple has the opposite problem, where they consistently remove legacy features (in many cases, features that are not even "legacy" in nature but required for normal usage scenarios) without giving users a chance to catch-up. Sometimes this is warranted, as it is with removing optical drives, other times, it is not -- such as dropping 32-bit support when neither Windows nor Linux have any intention of doing so in the near future. This philosophy been accelerating in absurd fashion lately, whether it's dropping the headphone jack from the iPad Pro, the "butterfly keyboard," or leaving the MacBook Pro with no USB-A ports or SD card slot -- two extremely well-adopted technologies that are still ubiquitous nearly half a decade from the release of the all USB-C MacBook Pro.

stordoff 7y ago

Old game, potentially (you can't continue to sell them without updating them).

crooked-v 7y ago
Cogmind dates to 2015, it's hardly 'old'.

EricE 7y ago

And people like to make lite of the "Y2K fiasco" - here's how Y2K happened...