3 ms·

The story with Adobe on Mac in the 1990s is that their apps were so important to the platform that they practically had a veto on the API for Apple’s next-gen O

by pavlov 3y ago

The story with Adobe on Mac in the 1990s is that their apps were so important to the platform that they practically had a veto on the API for Apple’s next-gen OS. When Apple acquired NeXT, the original plan was for the NeXT API (now called Cocoa) to become the only way to build apps on the new Mac OS. But Adobe made it clear they were not going to port everything to Objective-C. In response Apple came up with Carbon, which was a port of essential plain-C APIs from Classic Mac OS to the new environment. Apple retaliated pretty hard in 2007-2010 by first knifing 64-bit Carbon when it had already shipped in Leopard betas, and later strangling Flash.

deepsun 3y ago
Well, asking to rewrite all your stuff, especially such large platforms as Photoshop is a very big undertaking and resource investment. Don't see where the grudge comes from. E.g. if someone comes to our organization and ask to rewrite half of what we do in their new language, we won't move. Should that someone hold a grudge against us?
kelnos 3y ago
I think Apple was the one who was unreasonable here, not Adobe. I loathe the idea of giving Microsoft credit for anything, but one thing they got right was their focus on backward compatibility. Certainly that has frayed at times here and there, but MS generally doesn't ask their developers to completely rewrite their applications to use a new application framework.
- ack_complete 3y ago
  Except for UWP, where they are doing just that. Some OS features, such as multi-layer swap chains, are exclusive to UWP apps.
- scarface_74 3y ago
  And because of that, even as far back as 2005, there were 10 ways to create a string in C and depending on which Windows API you were using, you had to convert between them constantly. Considering how Microsoft has failed to move past Windows while Apple uses the same OS more or less for watches, phones, tablets, monitors, set top boxes, etc without having to support legacy crap.
  - deleted 3y ago
    [deleted]
  - qwytw 3y ago
    > less for watches, phones, tablets, monitors, set top boxes, etc without having to support legacy crap. That's pretty easy when you have no qualms whatsoever about breaking support for software which is older than 2-3 years and offer very limited support for third party software on all of your platforms except one.
    - scarface_74 3y ago
      Very limited support for third party software? The only device running a variant of iOS that doesn’t have third party software are the displays.
      - qwytw 3y ago
        Well maybe the "very" part is debatable since it applies some more areas more than other. > The only device running a variant of iOS that doesn’t have third party software are the displays. That seems to be the case, yes.

by pavlov 3y ago

deepsun 3y ago

Well, asking to rewrite all your stuff, especially such large platforms as Photoshop is a very big undertaking and resource investment. Don't see where the grudge comes from. E.g. if someone comes to our organization and ask to rewrite half of what we do in their new language, we won't move. Should that someone hold a grudge against us?

kelnos 3y ago

I think Apple was the one who was unreasonable here, not Adobe. I loathe the idea of giving Microsoft credit for anything, but one thing they got right was their focus on backward compatibility. Certainly that has frayed at times here and there, but MS generally doesn't ask their developers to completely rewrite their applications to use a new application framework.

ack_complete 3y ago
Except for UWP, where they are doing just that. Some OS features, such as multi-layer swap chains, are exclusive to UWP apps.
scarface_74 3y ago
And because of that, even as far back as 2005, there were 10 ways to create a string in C and depending on which Windows API you were using, you had to convert between them constantly. Considering how Microsoft has failed to move past Windows while Apple uses the same OS more or less for watches, phones, tablets, monitors, set top boxes, etc without having to support legacy crap.
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
- qwytw 3y ago
  > less for watches, phones, tablets, monitors, set top boxes, etc without having to support legacy crap. That's pretty easy when you have no qualms whatsoever about breaking support for software which is older than 2-3 years and offer very limited support for third party software on all of your platforms except one.
  - scarface_74 3y ago
    Very limited support for third party software? The only device running a variant of iOS that doesn’t have third party software are the displays.
    - qwytw 3y ago
      Well maybe the "very" part is debatable since it applies some more areas more than other. > The only device running a variant of iOS that doesn’t have third party software are the displays. That seems to be the case, yes.