Please release me, let me go.

Mike Bonner bonnmike at gmail.com
Sat Apr 4 07:05:04 EDT 2015


Its not the operating system, its the hardware.  Well, ok its a
combination.  xp runs on intel hardware, so does win8. Software that runs
on xp and intel hardware, has a decent (though not perfect) chance of
running on win8, on intel hardware.  However, the same piece of software
won't run on windows rt.  different hardware, which forces adjusted os,
which would force a whole separate build requirement for a piece of
software.  You'd have to maintain, develop, and debug 2 separate code bases.

Same goes back to the windows on alpha days.  Yep, you could get a version
of windows to run on an alpha box, but you'd also have to find software for
windows compiled for windows alpha.

Even the 64 bit change can be problematic.  On linux, one must install the
ia32 support libraries to be able to get 32 bit compiled software to run on
a 64 bit os. And you can't run 64 bit compiled software on 32 bit only os.
Windows has built in support (in 64 bit windows) so that you can run 32 bit
applications, and even separates out the binaries into different "program
files" folders.

So, comparing the cost of supporting ppc on mac, and building for windows
8, which just happens to still work on xp isn't a valid comparison. MS has
put a lot of effort into keeping things backwards compatible, on similar
hardware.  Despite my distaste for windows and its random "features", its
kinda remarkable that it runs as well as it does. Layered patches,
compatibility layers, security fixes, hardware from a ton of different
manufacturers for vid, storage, etc created by companies with in house
programmers who may or may not write good driver software... above, I said
it's remarkable that things work as well as they do, I'd like to upgrade
that to a flippin miracle.   (you mentioned xp, but I suspect many many
things that are will run on win8 will also go back all the way to win95. At
least things that are not too complex.)



On Sat, Apr 4, 2015 at 3:03 AM, Richmond <richmondmathewson at gmail.com>
wrote:

> Just to be awkward (for a change . . . no irony intended), if 6.7.4 is
> built so that it will run
> on Windows XP [ a system released in 2001 ] why is it not built so that it
> can run on
> Mac OS 10.4 PPC [ a system released in 2005 ], or, for that matter, Mac OS
> 10.4 Intel?
>
> It is, also, interesting to note that the first alpha build of LC 8 is
> also capable of running on Windows XP.
>
> The reply will, inevitably, consist of stuff about market share . . .
> which is probably due to a bad
> case of not thinking one's way through a load of statistics.
>
> The rationale behind dropping support for an out-dated operating system,
> surely, should not
> be based on the global installed base of that operating system, but the
> globally installed base
> of that operating system who use LiveCode for software development, and
> the clients to whom
> they sell/give their standalones for deployment.
>
> ------------------
>
> I have no particular beef with Windows XP [in fact, if truth be known, I
> have a dual boot
> machine that runs Win XP and Win 7 - on two 40 Gig Hard drives] for
> software testing.
>
> I do have big beefs with Windows 95, 98, Millennium and Vista . . . but I
> think quite a lot of other
> people do as well.
>
> ------------------
>
> This posting is NOT to try to pursuade RunRev to dig out all their PPC
> code and spend donkey's ages
> compiling PPC builds while softly chanting "bloody, bloody Richmond" sotto
> voce.
>
> It IS, again, again, again, a request to make available these:
>
> 1. The last version of RR/LC to run and/or build Mac OS 9 standalones.
>
> 2. The last version of RR/LC to run and/or build Mac OS X PPC standalones
> on Mac OS 10.4.
>
> either for free or for a modest fee, with some legal disclaimer that
> paraphrases as
> "you're on your own, mate".
>
> -------------------
>
> Richmond.
>
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