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It's always true that software must have a maintenance budget due to changing user markets. My point is that compared to Windows or Linux, Mac is very expensiv
by vortico 7y ago
It's always true that software must have a maintenance budget due to changing user markets.
My point is that compared to Windows or Linux, Mac is very expensive to maintain software for. If your software has mostly cross-platform code, I would estimate based on my experience that the Mac-specific work is 10x that of the others.
Let's just say thank God that `com.apple.security.cs.disable-library-validation` exists, so the 150 plugin developers for VCV Rack don't have to go through the notarization nonsense that I do. That would truly kill the software, or would force users to disable GateKeeper altogether (with `sudo spctl --master-disable`) to use.
- scarface74 7y agoYou really think that Microsoft or Adobe spends 10x as much to support the Mac? If the ROI on Macs is so horrible compared to Linux then why wouldn’t Adobe or MS be dropping Mac support and instead support Linux?
- vortico 7y agoYes, platform-specific expenses are 10x on Mac vs. Linux and Windows. I said nothing about ROI. You're confusing that with platform-specific expenses. ROI of platform = number of platform users * price - "platform-specific expenses" Hopefully you can see why even if "platform-specific expenses" is high, the ROI of the platform can be higher than another platform, because the number of platform users is much higher.
- scarface74 7y agoIf it is so much more expensive to support the Mac than Linux, why won’t the major software vendors support Linux? Are you going to drop support for the Mac?
- vortico 7y agoBecause the "number of platform users" is very low (say 0.2-2% for professional users). I explained that above. >Are you going to drop support for the Mac? Probably not, but I might begin charging 20% more for Mac versions of the software.