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> I don’t understand why people are expecting day one support for applications like Homebrew.

I'm not paying the Homebrew developers anything so I've got no right to expect anything or criticise whatever they choose to do with their time and their project.

But if they did want compatibility it's not true that they're 'at the start of Apples two year transition to ARM CPUs' - you have been able to access development machines for many months. I got one and I don't maintain anything nearly as important as Homebrew.

The reason Apple do developer previews, betas, and early access to hardware is so that you can have day-one support, if you want it.

Homebrew does not control the software that it helps distribute. There are hundreds of pieces that need to work together for this to work, so Homebrew developers can at most prepare their infrastructure, which I don't think is a big issue here. Moreover, the number of developers with access to an M1 chip until last month was very small. For most of these people, the M1 transition process is just starting.

> the number of developers with access to an M1 chip until last month was very small

I don't think you needed M1 - I think A12Z was fine and widely available for many months.

The number of developers with access to an A12Z running macOS was also pretty small, so I don't see how calling out the model number of the chip changes OP's point.

Apple weren't giving anyone I know access to M1, but they were giving anyone who asked access to a A12Z running macOS.

For certain developers... for a $500 fee. I doubt that many of the developers of packages on homebrew had access to the kit nor the inclination to buy it even if they did. They don't have the userbase nor the financial incentives to be ready for apple silicon day 1.

It's apparent Homebrew devs got early versions too from reports like https://gcc.gnu.org/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=96168#c11

Actually, Homebrew developers have been working on this for months (in their spare time, too, given that they are all volunteers); but the reality is that this is a gargantuan task, 6 months simply wasn't enough.

So no, I don't think "you can have day-one support, if you want it" is accurate at all.

> Adobe’s customers almost certainly make up a bigger portion of Apple’s revenue than developers

Do we have any actual numbers on that? I feel like developers (and power-users generally) have internalized this notion that we're a rounding error compared to the general public (perhaps a holdover from the old days, when regular folks didn't use the internet or computers at all). But in 2020, software development is a massive portion of the economy, and Macs seem to be disproportionately popular with startups and developers.

A little lazy googling puts the graphic design industry at $12.7 billion, and the software development industry at $388.98 billion.

Money aside, far more people care about Photoshop than care about Homebrew. Optics-wise, it makes more sense.

I hope this next year shows Apple helping out pivotal projects like Homebrew. If they expect their own developers to be using their own hardware, then they will certainly have to make it work.

I was only a student when they switched to Intel, so I wasn't aware of any issues facing developers back then. I'm guessing they'll follow the same playbook, though.

There is a reason why designers, photographers, video editors and influencers are the prioritised. Get them on your side and it's free marketing for you.

> I don’t understand why people are expecting day one support for applications like Homebrew.

Because an important segment of Apple's customers--developers--rely on Homebrew for critical functionality.

Of course it's difficult to move an entire ecosystem to a new architecture, and Apple may have made the right move here. But it's not very hard to understand why people who stand to gain so much from the new architecture, but can't use it yet because the ecosystem isn't there yet, are a little annoyed.

A segment of that segment relies on homebrew.

Plenty of us develop just fine without it.

I never needed it, XCode + UNIX is more than enough.

> We’re at the start of Apples two year transition to ARM CPUs. If important thing X doesn’t work right, and it’s important to your workflow, then buy an Intel Mac.

> Otherwise have patience and wait for people work through the issues. Besides in a years time Apple are undoubtedly going to release the M2, M3 etc with a whole slew of “pro” devices better suited for developers.

There's also, arguably, a pretty pronounced bleeding-edge trend over the past 12-18 months or so, across a number of device categories: foldables everywhere, new game consoles, multiple open-spec Linux phones, M1 Macs, etc.

And if you're not itching to early adopt, the timing for all of these is actually kind of great. Because parallel to this, there are multiple ecosystem-level changes hitting over the next several months that should translate to big usability jumps for any of the ones that get a next version. (Though probably not the consoles, since those tend to run longer lifecycles by design.)

Of particular note: by the time the M2 or M3 has ironed out the macOS ARM ecosystem, you can also reasonably expect high-end devices as a category to have 6GHz WiFi and a modern spec for Bluetooth audio.

If I were apple I would of shipped a dozen developer transition mac minis to them free of charge at least a few months ago, as part of developer relations, to kickstart the process if they haven't done something similar.

> The general public hasn’t even heard of Homebrew, never mind understands how impressive it would be to get such software working on day 0.

Sure, but making it easy for developers to use your platform is good because then it's easier to develop big fancy things like Photoshop.

Photoshop doesn't need anything Homebrew related.