3 ms·

In other words Microsoft kept crap that could have been refactored or implemented in a better way altogether, for the sole purpose of saving the likes of Adobe

In other words Microsoft kept crap that could have been refactored or implemented in a better way altogether, for the sole purpose of saving the likes of Adobe the "effort" to have to fix their dirty hacks. Given this helpful Microsoft attitude, one really wonders how did they get in the jam they are in today?

mahmud 17y ago
It's not unusual for partner companies to accommodate each other, specially when their interests are so overlapped as Adobe's and Apple's are. You say re-factoring and I say it makes perfect business sense for Apple to make sure Adobe's stuff works first and foremost; CS showcases the Apple platform better than any other app suite I can think of, not only that, but it also pushes sale of Apple products like crack. Adobe's bloated stuff sells macs, plain and simple; it's one of the main anchors that keeps the creative and media industries on Apple (though they could have CS on Win32 as well.)
- lurch_mojoff 17y ago
  For one, Adobe's tools are much less important for Apple than they used to be. We are far from the days when the most significant market for Macs was desktop publishing and graphic design. Apple were very smart to diversify - on the pro side, in the last few years they have gained significant penetration in photography, videography, music, software development and science markets, to name a few; on the consumer side, they grew their marketshare and their mindshare significantly - so much so in fact that I'd wager they are making more money selling consumer level computers than pro machines. On top of that, Mac OS X has evolved to be very nice and usable operating system and as a result, if Adobe were to discontinue their Mac products today, there would be a good number of creative professionals who'd rather switch software than switch away from the Mac. And for two, Apple have been accommodating Adobe's needs for years, with little to no reciprocity. The sole reason for the existence of Carbon is so Adobe and Microsoft wouldn't have to make significant changes to their products overnight. In return, Adobe dragged their feet with Carbonization, the switch to OS X, the switch to x86, and now the switch to 64-bit. In the last nearly 10 years Adobe had not put one iota effort into transitioning their core products to Cocoa. They had put the bare minimum of effort into optimizing their products for Mac OS X (in some cases, like the Flash plugin not even that). Why should Apple go out of their way to ensure compatibility with Adobe's CS, when Adobe don't seem to care enough to test and fix things on their end? (There is an apocryphal story about the reason for the rift between the two companies - back in the early days of Rhapsody Apple had a three way meeting with Adobe and Microsoft in which they discussed Apple's API plans and in which Apple tried to push the two biggest software vendors to port their products to Cocoa (née NextStep). Surprisingly, it supposedly was Adobe not Microsoft, who although not thrilled at the idea were ready to find a compromise, that put the kibosh on Apple's plans. They outright told Apple to go pound sand - they didn't intend to put effort and money in such a port, regardless of the fact that Adobe had a version of Illustrator for NextStep, meaning they had both the expertise and the code base to do it. Therefore Carbon.)
ars 17y ago
It worked for an extremely long time. It's causing them problems now, but it's the basis for their successes. So overall it was the right thing to do. (Despite, me, and every programmer who hears about it, cringing at the idea.) For way, way more on the topic: http://www.joelonsoftware.com/articles/APIWar.html http://www.joelonsoftware.com/articles/APIWar.html and for the gritty specifics of many of the hacks: http://blogs.msdn.com/oldnewthing/ http://blogs.msdn.com/oldnewthing/

mahmud 17y ago

It's not unusual for partner companies to accommodate each other, specially when their interests are so overlapped as Adobe's and Apple's are. You say re-factoring and I say it makes perfect business sense for Apple to make sure Adobe's stuff works first and foremost; CS showcases the Apple platform better than any other app suite I can think of, not only that, but it also pushes sale of Apple products like crack. Adobe's bloated stuff sells macs, plain and simple; it's one of the main anchors that keeps the creative and media industries on Apple (though they could have CS on Win32 as well.)

lurch_mojoff 17y ago
For one, Adobe's tools are much less important for Apple than they used to be. We are far from the days when the most significant market for Macs was desktop publishing and graphic design. Apple were very smart to diversify - on the pro side, in the last few years they have gained significant penetration in photography, videography, music, software development and science markets, to name a few; on the consumer side, they grew their marketshare and their mindshare significantly - so much so in fact that I'd wager they are making more money selling consumer level computers than pro machines. On top of that, Mac OS X has evolved to be very nice and usable operating system and as a result, if Adobe were to discontinue their Mac products today, there would be a good number of creative professionals who'd rather switch software than switch away from the Mac. And for two, Apple have been accommodating Adobe's needs for years, with little to no reciprocity. The sole reason for the existence of Carbon is so Adobe and Microsoft wouldn't have to make significant changes to their products overnight. In return, Adobe dragged their feet with Carbonization, the switch to OS X, the switch to x86, and now the switch to 64-bit. In the last nearly 10 years Adobe had not put one iota effort into transitioning their core products to Cocoa. They had put the bare minimum of effort into optimizing their products for Mac OS X (in some cases, like the Flash plugin not even that). Why should Apple go out of their way to ensure compatibility with Adobe's CS, when Adobe don't seem to care enough to test and fix things on their end? (There is an apocryphal story about the reason for the rift between the two companies - back in the early days of Rhapsody Apple had a three way meeting with Adobe and Microsoft in which they discussed Apple's API plans and in which Apple tried to push the two biggest software vendors to port their products to Cocoa (née NextStep). Surprisingly, it supposedly was Adobe not Microsoft, who although not thrilled at the idea were ready to find a compromise, that put the kibosh on Apple's plans. They outright told Apple to go pound sand - they didn't intend to put effort and money in such a port, regardless of the fact that Adobe had a version of Illustrator for NextStep, meaning they had both the expertise and the code base to do it. Therefore Carbon.)

ars 17y ago

It worked for an extremely long time. It's causing them problems now, but it's the basis for their successes. So overall it was the right thing to do. (Despite, me, and every programmer who hears about it, cringing at the idea.) For way, way more on the topic: http://www.joelonsoftware.com/articles/APIWar.html http://www.joelonsoftware.com/articles/APIWar.html and for the gritty specifics of many of the hacks: http://blogs.msdn.com/oldnewthing/ http://blogs.msdn.com/oldnewthing/