This is a great feat and it creates a somewhat ironic situation: When I want to run an app on Catalina that happens to be 32-bit only, I'm practically forced to use the Windows version. I can't see how that was a smart move on Apple's side.
I think you meant “thunk”.
It's apparently straightforward to install - an old - macOS in a VM. This can then be used to obtain the dylibs
It’s like removing the floppy drive, there will be a bunch of people complaining (probably the 1%) who still use it but in the end everyone is better of without it and it will be replaced by something better.
Almost nobody of the general users would know a difference between 32 / 64 bit as they just use new apps or use web apps. It’s a very small group that’s affected by this change.
Take Mathematica for example. The first 64-bit version is 12.0, released April 2019. So a year-old permanent v11 license is useless on Catalina now. It would have cost me a couple hundred bucks to upgrade my v9 permanent license if I didn't happen to have an institutional license.
You seem to think that would be a bad thing. Why?
The operating system is there to support applications.
If you want to see how badly this can go wrong - look at Windows. Over a decade ago there were over a half a dozen different ways to represent a string in Windows and depending on which API you called, you had to translate between them.
Also, one of the earliest widespread vulnerabilities was caused by IIS not checking all of the different types of string encodings. You could literally pass DOS commands via the url bar just by encoding them and they would run on the server.
Also, anyone using Adobe software in a professional setting (meaning actually getting paid for using the software) can easily pay the monthly fees. Staying on an antiquated version of software means they can no longer open files that are created on recent versions of software (thinking Premiere). I have not met one professional that is still holding on to the perpetual license fallacy. The maths just don't add up.
That said, freelancers I know using Adobe software have to keep old versions around because clients don't upgrade. People are even now skipping or lagging versions, because they'd rather stay with a version they know works than invite new bugs by upgrading.
And on Mojave, by the way. It's only this stupid 32 bit thing that's killing it in Catalina.
> but I agree that going all the way back to that today is not really something you'd do for regular professional use.
Why? Adobe hasn't added anything particularly significant since CS6.
(And I don't think it's a coincidence that they moved to a subscription model around the same time they stopped making significant improvements.)
Hobbyists, though, are in a bad spot.
If you use the thing in a given month, you autopay the monthly subscription fee — if you don’t use it at all in a given month — you pay nothing.
people who use the software regularly pay basically the current subscription pricing model — but if you only use it very occasionally — you pay much less.
I think this kind of pricing model could really help drive adoption of subscription pricing for professional tools ... I’d be willing to maintain a subscription to several expensive infrequently used by me tools with this kind of pricing model — and I might occasionally use those tools which would be better for the developer than me never using their tool at all ...
Even if I were getting paid for my photography, why would I want to pay extra fees?
Staying on an antiquated version of software means they can no longer open files that are created on recent versions of software (thinking Premiere).
In the case of Lightroom the only thing that's going to "upgrade" your file format is a new camera body, and that's not something I do all that much. I don't need to open files from people with newer cameras. And, let's face it, if I really need to open newer raw files I can use Adobe's DNG converter.
Lightroom 6 is a 64-bit app with a 32-bit installer. Newer versions of LR offer up a ton of cloud shit I don't want, bundled with more seamless integration for newer cameras I don't own. What am I getting out of monthly payments to Adobe?
The past few upgrades to Lightroom that I've bought were around $80. Well less than a year of the cheapest CC subscription.
Sorry I meant Mojave or whatever 10.14 is called.
There is very little important software outside of iOS development software that is Mac only. People who care about backwards compatibility would never buy Macs.
So true; it feels like every Mac app is Electron these days.