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Developers Begin to Update Apps With Retina Support

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Apr 12, 2001
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Just three days after the announcement of the new MacBook Pro, developers have begun updating their software packages with support for the new Retina display. Until software is updated, text and images are generally pixel doubled, making everything displayed within those apps look somewhat fuzzy on the ultra-high resolution display.

Google has built Retina support into the nightly build of Chrome -- a continually updated beta release -- but says in a blog post that the Chrome team has "further to go over the next few weeks."

NewImage17.png



Retina support will also be added to multi-format video player VLC in the next release of the software, version 2.0.2.
This way, both video and subtitles or other overlays will be rendered at the display's native resolution leading to a greatly improved viewing experience.

If you're one of the lucky guys to have a MacBook Pro with Retina Display already, you're welcome to check out tomorrow night's nightly builds (CEST).
Click to expand...
When the MacBook Pro with Retina Display was announced, Apple disclosed that it had been working with major developers like Adobe, Autodesk, and Blizzard to enable Retina support in their apps, but it will likely take some time for major apps to gain Retina support.

Article Link: Developers Begin to Update Apps With Retina Support
 
Article Link
https://www.macrumors.com/2012/06/14/developers-begin-to-update-apps-with-retina-support/
applesith

applesith

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Macs are in the minority for PC marketshare and this new MBP is a minuscule part of that small percent. But it's making everyone jump.

Not many companies can create knee-jerk reactions like this. #leader
 
clukas

clukas

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great to see such a fast response from google. Im sure other developers will respond over the next year pushing updates. Retina is definitely the new standard and a preview of all future macs adapting this standard, I think its quite likely that the next iMac (in 2013) might come with a retina, if not we will most likely see it in 2-3 years.

As for current mac owners, this will mean that soon (2-3 years time, or when more retina devices are available) new apps will no longer be supported, as they will feature super high resolutions which will not look good on current mac screens.
 
GenesisST

GenesisST

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Funny, because I remember someone criticizing Google because Chrome didn't get the instantaneous benefit for text because of their rendering engine...

<sarcasm>But I guess it was because it is Google... </sarcasm>

EDIT: I guess I wasn't clear. I meant that their rendering doesn't benefit from built-in text rendering, but they added support for retina fast enough.
 
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R

rmwebs

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Apr 6, 2007
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GenesisST said:
Funny, because I remember someone criticizing Google because Chrome didn't get the instantaneous benefit for text because of their rendering engine...

<sarcasm>But I guess it was because it is Google... </sarcasm>
Click to expand...

The sad thing is, you're spot on. Theres a silly 'must hate Google' approach now!
 
G

G5isAlive

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Aug 28, 2003
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applesith said:
Macs are in the minority for PC marketshare and this new MBP is a minuscule part of that small percent. But it's making everyone jump.

Not many companies can create knee-jerk reactions like this. #leader
Click to expand...

True enough but they will get great customer loyalty and buzz for doing so... not to mention that the rest of the hardware industry will play catch up.. and the companies that do this now will be ahead of the game. Not a bad place to be.
 
GenesisST

GenesisST

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wikus said:
Kind of the LAST application that would be on your list for 'retina' capability...

Your videos arent going to be sharper which is 99% of the reason why you use VLC.
Click to expand...

The retina display will actually double the resolution of the source material... Missing pixels will basically be pulled the pixels from the NSArse class from the SDK.

----------
JasonElise1983 said:
They didn't. Look at how fuzzy the text is on the left. They had to UPDATE their app to be able to have sharper text

-je
Click to expand...

I guess I wasn't clear. I meant that their rendering doesn't benefit from built-in text rendering, but they added support for retina fast enough.
 
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deannnnn

deannnnn

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applesith said:
Macs are in the minority for PC marketshare and this new MBP is a minuscule part of that small percent. But it's making everyone jump.

Not many companies can create knee-jerk reactions like this. #leader
Click to expand...

Don't you think that eventually all computers across all brands will move to very high resolution screens like this? Enhancing the apps now only makes good sense for the future.
 
L

LastLine

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deannnnn said:
Don't you think that eventually all computers across all brands will move to very high resolution screens like this? Enhancing the apps now only makes good sense for the future.
Click to expand...

Very true, but you have to ask, if Acer, HP, or Samsung put this out - would everyone have jumped as quick? :)
 
applesith

applesith

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deannnnn said:
Don't you think that eventually all computers across all brands will move to very high resolution screens like this? Enhancing the apps now only makes good sense for the future.
Click to expand...

Yes, but no one did any of it before this MBP came out. Apple is usually a leader in the industry towards the future. But Apple's actions are the ones that actually get the ball rolling. I never meant that it would not have happened without Apple- but Apple's product is what made Google, Adobe, etc. start pushing out these updates.
 
B

benpatient

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applesith said:
Yes, but no one did any of it before this MBP came out. Apple is usually a leader in the industry towards the future. But Apple's actions are the ones that actually get the ball rolling. I never meant that it would not have happened without Apple- but Apple's product is what made Google, Adobe, etc. start pushing out these updates.
Click to expand...

You really don't know what you're talking about, do you?

Windows 7 has a whole architecture set up to let apps use HiDPI elements and display at any arbitrary DPI you might choose.

See this.

If the developer has chosen to include calls to the HighDPI user interface (which were available in Windows Vista, too), then their programs will run with high-res visual elements. If not, then Windows will scale low-res screen elements the exact same way that 10.7 does on a new MBP Retina display.

The difference is that you can pick whatever DPI you want in Win7. There are some defaults (the highest default is 144dpi), but you can edit those to be anything (including 220). Windows 8 will apparently be just fine with the Retina MBP out of the box, per AnandTech.
 
B

bhtooefr

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benpatient said:
If the developer has chosen to include calls to the HighDPI user interface (which were available in Windows Vista, too), then their programs will run with high-res visual elements. If not, then Windows will scale low-res screen elements the exact same way that 10.7 does on a new MBP Retina display.
Click to expand...

Except only WPF apps get that fully - GDI apps just get the whole thing blown up, the OS renders text before magnification. And most stuff is GDI, still. (Even though Microsoft backported WPF to WinXP, specifically so that devs would write WPF apps.)

Or are OS X apps getting blurry text on HiDPI, even when the OS is rendering the font?
 
Don Kosak

Don Kosak

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wikus said:
Kind of the LAST application that would be on your list for 'retina' capability...

Your videos arent going to be sharper which is 99% of the reason why you use VLC.
Click to expand...

Well, their point was for subtitle rendering, and owning lots of foreign films and anime, I'm pretty happy to see that. Subtitles will be the proper size and look really crisp to read.

There is also a movement away from "old" Blu-ray 1080p material to new 4k material that will make better use of the new high density displays. I'm sure VLC will lead there as well.

Now all I need to do is get my hands on one of the new MB Pros. :D
 
JD92

JD92

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Apr 14, 2005
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wikus said:
Kind of the LAST application that would be on your list for 'retina' capability...

Your videos arent going to be sharper which is 99% of the reason why you use VLC.
Click to expand...

Actually it's perfectly reasonable to want retina-enabled video applications. Right now if you display a 1080p video in VLC in a window of height 1080 pixels on a retina display, only half of the pixels will actually be rendered, because non retina applications will be rendered as if they're being displayed on a 1440x900 display.
 
B

benpatient

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bhtooefr said:
Except only WPF apps get that fully - GDI apps just get the whole thing blown up, the OS renders text before magnification. And most stuff is GDI, still. (Even though Microsoft backported WPF to WinXP, specifically so that devs would write WPF apps.)

Or are OS X apps getting blurry text on HiDPI, even when the OS is rendering the font?
Click to expand...

So what you're saying is that Microsoft went out of their way to give developers the tools they needed to make High-DPI apps, and developers ignored it and kept doing things the old way.

Reminds me of the companies that were still using PPC-dependent installers for printer drivers or OS X apps for 10.6!
 
GenesisST

GenesisST

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deannnnn said:
Don't you think that eventually all computers across all brands will move to very high resolution screens like this? Enhancing the apps now only makes good sense for the future.
Click to expand...

Love your signature... sounds like:
Bugatti Veyron / BMW bike / Ford Model T

:-D
 
doobybiggs

doobybiggs

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that a huge difference in their comparison shot up there.

Can't wait for retina stuff to become the norm from apple and they drop the price because it is "old" to them :)
 
P

pmz

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I'm sure the secretion will be limited. The iPad's Retina Display has had a horribly slow adoption rate.

Even the iPhone has taken 2 full years to get to more than 50% retina content, and even that is a lie as developers hide low quality graphics all throughout their apps.

Support for Retina Displays Has Been Dismal At Best. Apple, Why Are You Not Encouraging Devs?
 
E

eyehop

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Oct 31, 2005
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So Adobe will have retina apps in what, a decade? They still don't support full-screen in CS6. Wake up Adobe!!!
 
A

arya123

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Sep 20, 2009
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wikus said:
Kind of the LAST application that would be on your list for 'retina' capability...

Your videos arent going to be sharper which is 99% of the reason why you use VLC.
Click to expand...

Not needed for 'retina' MBP, but definitely needed for HiDPI mode, which is the same thing. HiDPI mode on a 1080p TV has a 540-point vertical resolution, which is lower than a lot of videos you'd want to watch on a 1080p TV. So yeah, Chrome and VLC and anything that you'd want to use on a TV screen are at the top of my list.
 
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