I can understand Autodesk not wanting to bother with Mac development any more. Apple's aggressive and inconsiderate moves make it a pain to even maintain existing app projects on the Mac.
Its a shame as the macos application packaging system makes makes for an easy way distribute and run applications.
The lack of a pro-level machine... except for the pro-level machine that they do have.
Then they made announcement they are going to do a redesign, 4 years after it first released, and the redesign won't be coming out til 2019, 2 years after they made the redesign announcement.
A total of 6 years. That is the amount of care they have for "pro" users.
They then went to release an iMac Pro which many call it an interim solution. An iMac Pro capable of having two 250W chip cooled, Something the community has been calling for years for the iMac ( For so long everyone abandoned the hope already ) and some said was not possible due to cooling requirement. Turns out it wasn't a technical barrier, simply Apple won't make it.
And as rumours goes, it wasn't until a very large studio decide to abandoned the Mac platform due to Mac Pro, and someone who had connection with Apple SVPs and told hem about it, before they realise how much care they have given to the pro users.
Apple forgot that while it was Steve jobs bumping put new strategies and initiative that changed Apple in the long run. It was these pro users whom bleed six colours that kept Apple alive in the first place.
And as rumours goes, it wasn't until a very large studio decide to abandoned the Mac platform due to Mac Pro, and someone who had connection with Apple SVPs and told hem about it, before they realise how much care they have given to the pro users.
I doubt very seriously that one studio abandoning a product line that makes less than 10% of thier revenue made Apple panic.
Apple forgot that while it was Steve jobs bumping put new strategies and initiative that changed Apple in the long run. It was these pro users whom bleed six colours that kept Apple alive in the first place.
Things change. The Mac is no longer at the center of Apple’s universe. As far as what Steve thought that Apple’s direction of the Mac should be....
“If I were running Apple, I would milk the Macintosh for all it’s worth – and get busy on the next great thing. The PC wars are over. Done. Microsoft won a long time ago”
https://www.wired.com/2011/08/money-quotes-steve-jobs-style/
If you think Jobs was tied to the Mac on his return, you weren’t paying attention.
Not Xeon or EEC Memory, but 150W+ CPU + 150W+ GPU combination on an iMac. iMac could have been powerful, but it never was. Not because we have invested new cooling solution to cool the CPU and GPU, because the iMac were never positioned as such. Steve Jobs wanted the Desktop to be completely silent. And it is still shipping with a HDD as default.
>I doubt very seriously that one studio abandoning a product line that makes less than 10% of thier revenue made Apple panic.
Not a product line, but the whole Mac Ecosystem. Try Disney telling you they are throwing Mac Pro away from their production system. And it is not even 10%, likely 1% of their revenue.
>If you think Jobs was tied to the Mac on his return, you weren’t paying attention.
And the quote was from... 1996? How about a more recent quote.
"Truck" PCs weren't going to go away, Jobs predicted, but "car" tablets would find a place among a larger number of users.
"This transformation is going to make some people uneasy," Jobs said. "People from the PC world, like you and me. It's going to make us uneasy."
If you think Jobs wasn't tied to the Mac on his return, you weren’t paying attention.
Before the iMac Pro, the Mac Pro was the computer for professionals. They made a major mistake with the 2013 Mac Pro. Apple never shipped good GPUs in Macs compared to Windows PCs.
Not a product line, but the whole Mac Ecosystem. Try Disney telling you they are throwing Mac Pro away from their production system. And it is not even 10%, likely 1% of their revenue.
If Apple’s missteps were hurting Mac revenue you would see it in their quarterly revenue where they break down the amount of revenue they make on Macs. Looking at the numbers, it hasn’t hurt Mac revenue. I would love to see a more compelling Mac Mini for instance, but I can’t honestly say that not having updated it in 4 years has hurt Apple.
And the quote was from... 1996? How about a more recent quote.
Jobs told people what he would do with Apple and he mostly did just that.
- He milked the Mac and used it as a cash cow
- He gave up competing with Microsoft and made a deal with them.
- He introduced iTunes, iPod, iPhone, and the iPad.
- He even took “Computer” out of the name of the company.
- He delayed the OS release that was suppose to come out in 2007 and moved engineers to the iPhone.
- The only slightly industry changing thing he did with the Mac after 2001 was the MacBook Air and that was overpriced and underpowered for the first two years.
As far as being “tied” to the Mac, he didn’t even use a Mac until 2001 when OS X was introduced. His primary computer was a Dell running Next.
Plus they make a ton more money on Apps on from the store in mobile.
It is all economics, they do not care about the pro user anymore because the pro user is not where they make money
Like with cars, the used market supports the selling of new devices. This is something Android manufacturers need to figure out.
But either way, that Apple updates phones for years contradicts the statement that Apple wants you to replace your phone every two years.
With all the political influence, brand awareness, and metric assloads of cash Apple has, it should be the best company in the world. But every day brings more headlines that make it seem like Apple's best days are behind it. It keeps stumbling -- publicly and unnecessarily.
I'm not going to jump on the "Apple was better under/because of Steve Jobs" bandwagon. But this race is Apple's to lose. And the number of small cracks appearing everywhere is becoming disturbing.
My next computer will be a Mac - at the looks of things now, probably an iMac - but if Apple loses the high end Mac market, does it really matter? Around 10% of Apples revenue comes from Macs and even less from high end Macs. If Apple becomes an iOS company and makes the iPad more computer like, it would be a win.
Yes. Because there is far more to life than market share and revenue.
Especially at Apple, where the last two people in charge (Cook and Jobs) have both stated in public that they're committed to making better products, and that money is secondary.
It's very sad that your experience is so limited. There are plenty of companies that actually care about things other than profit. I had the pleasure of working for one once, and through that was introduced to others.
At the end of the day, every company is beholden to their investors - who don’t put their money into a company for any other reason besides getting a return.
I know nothing about how WeWork or Starbucks operate because I have never been involved with the management of those companies.
I have been involved with the management of other companies which are truly altruistic. Just because you haven't doesn't mean they don't exist.
The idea that companies exist only to make profits by any means possible is the most anti-capitalist, nihilistic concept I can imagine, and I have never been clear on whether anyone sincerely believes it or if it is just a straw man.
How much of a change of direction did the activist shareholders actually influence over the corporation? How much did they raise employee wages? Get a benefits increase? Keep people from being laid off?
There was even a freakonomics episode citing a study that companies that do “virtue signaling” can get people to work harder for less money.
This just helps cement Microsoft's relative monopoly on the business pro market outside software development.
- releasing new OS versions every year
- announcing publicly they are working on a new Mac Pro.
- announcing publicly that they are merging iOS and MacOS frameworks over the next year or two to make cross platform development easier.
- developing new custom chipsets for the Mac (the Tx line of chips)
Apple is notoriously secretive. The "public announcement" of the new Mac Pro was a whole lot of nothing. Not one substantive detail. Am I supposed to wait until its 2019 release before making any commitment to support it? It might be terrible, and there's no information about its specifications. "Waiting in hope" is no good for business and product planning. The hype train might work for phones, but for computer hardware it's a bit pathetic, and leaves me doubting they have a serious plan for it (as if the existing Mac Pro left us in any doubt at all).
The merging of frameworks isn't of the slightest interest if you only develop for MacOS. And the new chipsets aren't particularly noteworthy either; they are just details. As a cross-platform software developer, I really couldn't care less. But I do care about their support for industry-standard APIs.
How much has Windows and Linux changed during that time? I’m not going to read off the change log of everything that Apple has changed since 10.6
Apple is notoriously secretive. The "public announcement" of the new Mac Pro was a whole lot of nothing. Not one substantive detail. Am I supposed to wait until its 2019 release before making any commitment to support it?
So exactly what do you have to do to support the Mac Pro specifically? Of course they didn’t have any details. They hadn’t started on it st the time. But it still contradicts the narrative that where Apple is headed with the Mac is “unclear”.
It might be terrible, and there's no information about its specifications. "Waiting in hope" is no good for business and product planning.
I can give you hint. It’s going to be a multi core Intel chip. What are you thinking you need to do to support the Mac Pro specifically.
The hype train might work for phones, but for computer hardware it's a bit pathetic, and leaves me doubting they have a serious plan for it (as if the existing Mac Pro left us in any doubt at all).
Seeing they admitted they made a huge mistake with the current Mac Pro.
The merging of frameworks isn't of the slightest interest if you only develop for MacOS.
So the direction of the Mac APIs is of no interest to a Mac developer as is the fact that they are moving away from AppKit? Whether the fact they are merging the frameworks of IOS and MacOS are of interest to one random person on HN doesn’t mean their direction “isn’t clear”. The direction they are moving MacOS - the APIs is clear.
that they are And the new chipsets aren't particularly noteworthy either; they are just details.
So first it’s not clear and now “just the details” don’t matter.
As a cross-platform software developer, I really couldn't care less. But I do care about their support for industry-standard APIs.
So you’re a “cross platform developer” and you’re overly concerned about the Mac Pro - a tiny sliver of a tiny sliver of the market. But you just said that you didn’t care about the merging of iOS and MacOS as a “Mac only developer”. A “cross platform developer” has much bigger issues than the graphic APIs unless you plan to do something like Electron and anyone should avoid those apps anyway.
What do I need to do to support the Mac Pro specifically? Well, it's a wider question than that. It's more like: will I drop MacOS support entirely, or will this have sufficiently decent specification that it's worth re-evaluating dropping it entirely. For that, I would need to know about its GPU and VRAM, max RAM, storage options, connectivity, etc. The CPU itself isn't too exciting. And on top of that, what the software support for the GPU would be like. Such as how well supported it would be by MoltenVk, and the existing deprecated OpenGL drivers. Since I will not be using Metal, I need to know if the workarounds are acceptable, or if the result will be awful.
I'm a cross-platform developer in the typical meaning of the word: cross-platform for desktops/workstations of all common operating systems. Serious visualisation software isn't for phones. If "cross-platform" means MacOS and iOS, then lord help us. iOS devices are toys in this realm. Poor GPUs, not enough memory, storage, or power. Most of Apple's Macs are also woefully underpowered, and that's the big reason for abandoning the platform, because they don't actually make a system worth having for high end usage. While they admitted they made a mistake with the Mac Pro, there's zero information about whether their replacement will be adequate for high end needs, or yet another hot mess. Will they be able to return to function over form? I'm doubtful. But without some concrete and sensible information from Apple, it's looking like complete abandonment from over here.
Still quite vague....
I've been increasingly running into portability problems, from missing or non-functional commands and associated command-line options, to long-fixed bugs which they haven't bothered to update.
So you’re writing software that depends on the shell commands...
Well, it's a wider question than that. It's more like: will I drop MacOS support entirely, or will this have sufficiently decent specification that it's worth re-evaluating dropping it entirely. For that, I would need to know about its GPU and VRAM, max RAM, storage options, connectivity, etc.
You’re basing your software road map on what may appear on the hardware landscape 2 years from now? I hope you didn’t base your development on Intels road map for the last few years....
Since I will not be using Metal, I need to know if the workarounds are acceptable, or if the result will be awful.
If you’re basing your roadmap on a deprecated API, that doesn’t say much about your product planning....
I'm a cross-platform developer in the typical meaning of the word: cross-platform for desktops/workstations of all common operating systems.
So you’re a “cross platform” developer complaining about Unix support on the Mac? How is that Unix support working out on Windows?
Apple's plans are entirely unclear. Things are deprecated or broken without notice. Surprises were tolerable when they were 90% positive. Now, when most of the surprises involve breaking keyboards, removing USB ports, removing the GC runtime entirely, etc., surprises are utterly unacceptable.