Apple Quietly Discontinuing Support for Leopard already?

[HyperZboy]

Apple Quietly Discontinuing Support for Leopard already?

I've noticed that bug report submissions for Mac OS X Leopard are being denied by Apple the last week.

So far, this has affected Mac OS X Leopard itself on a system crash, Safari crashes, and even the Mail program crashing.

I can't think of any other reason Apple would be denying these bug reports nor have I read that support for Leopard has been discontinued already.

I would think this would be premature considering Lion has not been released and Snow Leopard is basically an INTEL only Leopard release with a few tweaks and deletion of PPC coding.

I'm going to attempt to test this on other Macs in the coming days if any programs crash. At first I thought maybe it was just a server or internet error, but this no longer appears to be the case.

Anyone have any ideas or more confirmation of this?

 

[Intell]

I think that since Snow Leopard came out, Leopard has only been getting security updates. Other bug fixes and such some out with the 10.5.X updates, which Leopard no longer gets.

 

[chrismacguy]

Apple Quietly Discontinuing Support for Leopard already?

I've noticed that bug report submissions for Mac OS X Leopard are being denied by Apple the last week.

So far, this has affected Mac OS X Leopard itself on a system crash, Safari crashes, and even the Mail program crashing.

I can't think of any other reason Apple would be denying these bug reports nor have I read that support for Leopard has been discontinued already.

I would think this would be premature considering Lion has not been released and Snow Leopard is basically an INTEL only Leopard release with a few tweaks and deletion of PPC coding.

I'm going to attempt to test this on other Macs in the coming days if any programs crash. At first I thought maybe it was just a server or internet error, but this no longer appears to be the case.

Anyone have any ideas or more confirmation of this?

Snow Leopard, while only evolutionary, is a lot more than a Intel Build of Leopard stuck on a disc without PowerPC code. It also contains a large amount of work underneath the UI - The internals have a lot of base code in for the features coming in 10.7 Lion, such as Grand Central Dispatch etc. Apple has probably stopped accepting the reports as 10.5.8 is the end of the road for Leopard apart from Security updates. Id even go as far to say that Apple probably now has only got PowerPC machines in very few places inside the company (Namely their Compat Labs and the probably single Team with responsibility for keeping 10.5 vaguely secure until the Summer) <- Idle Speculation, but judging by how efficient Apple is its also highly likely in my books, so their unlikely to want to take crash reports for something theyll never fix.

 

[HyperZboy]

I'm not unaware that updates to Leopard itself have sort of come to a close except for anything severe as in security updates.

I'm more concerned about the lack of further support for SAFARI.

If Apple seriously wants to increase usage of Safari across the board, discontinuing support for it in Leopard is a serious problem in my opinion.

This will only make me switch to Firefox, which still supports Leopard.

It should be noted that SAFARI is also no longer being updated for the original iPhone.

Add the numbers of users of both of those operating systems and you have quite a large number of people.

If this is true, this is bad news for Safari and Apple in my opinion and makes Apple look bad.

Can you imagine if a car company had such a poor support record?

 

[GGJstudios]

I'm more concerned about the lack of further support for SAFARI.

If Apple seriously wants to increase usage of Safari across the board, discontinuing support for it in Leopard is a serious problem in my opinion.

What are you talking about? Safari works fine on Leopard. What makes you think Safari isn't being supported on Leopard, or that Leopard isn't being supported? Because neither statement is true.

 

[HyperZboy]

What are you talking about? Safari works fine on Leopard. What makes you think Safari isn't being supported on Leopard, or that Leopard isn't being supported? Because neither statement is true.

WRONG!

You can no longer submit a SAFARI bug report in Leopard when it crashes, at least not since this past week. This is also true for MAIL and Mac OS X itself, but those aren't my major concerns. I'm more concerned that SAFARI is still kind of bug-ridden on Javascript (Facebook) and Flash (but I won't get into that whole argument because I know where Apple's heading in that respect, so there's no point in discussing that part.)

It's more the issue that you can no longer submit a crash/bug report for SAFARI in Leopard.

I can still submit a bug report for FIREFOX in Leopard.

There's the difference.

Hopefully, this is a temporary issue, but if not, I'm switching to FIREFOX.

I still haven't heard a valid explanation from anybody for this Apple policy/support change.

 

[GGJstudios]

You can no longer submit a SAFARI bug report in Leopard when it crashes, at least not since this past week.

Not accepting bug reports doesn't mean it's not supported. It just means they're not doing any new development on that version.

 

[HyperZboy]

Not accepting bug reports doesn't mean it's not supported. It just means they're not doing any new development on that version.

I have the latest version of Safari, duh. That's my point.

It possibly means SAFARI for LEOPARD is now EOL'd!

If so, bad decision by Apple.

 

[GGJstudios]

I have the latest version of Safari, duh. That's my point.

It possibly means SAFARI for LEOPARD is now EOL'd!

If so, bad decision by Apple.

Of course, rather than Apple's management and development team, you would be in a better position to know what decisions are best for Apple!

 

[HyperZboy]

Of course, rather than Apple's management and development team, you would be in a better position to know what decisions are best for Apple!

If you think that Apple discontinuing SAFARI for Leopard is a good thing, fine.

We'll just agree to disagree.

 

[mac2x]

I love when users like you come onto a site called Macrumors and expect there not to be a lot of people who actually kind of like Macs.

 

[HyperZboy]

I love when users like you come onto a site called Macrumors and expect there not to be a lot of people who actually kind of like Macs.

I love my Apple products, Macs, iPhones and iPod.

Why else would I have purchased so many since 1982?

I just don't belong to a cult and give criticism where I think it's due.

Discontinuing SAFARI for Leopard & the original iPhone is a mistake in my opinion. It's still buggy.

Thank You.

 

[GGJstudios]

If so, bad decision by Apple.

A statement that you're not qualified to make, since you don't have access to all the facts that Apple management uses to make decisions, and you don't even know what decisions they've made, until they make them public.

Discontinuing SAFARI for Leopard & the original iPhone is a mistake in my opinion.

Far more accurate. You should have said this from the beginning. It's your uninformed opinion, not a fact.

I'm not a fanboy, or any kind of boy. People who resort to name-calling are usually those who have run out of intelligent responses and lack the maturity to respond in a more suitable fashion. I have no allegiance to Apple or any other company or product. I also am not naive enough to think that I'm in a better position to know what's best for a multi-billion dollar company than those who spend all day, every day, managing such a company.

 

[thejadedmonkey]

This is why Apple is not like Microsoft.

 

[HyperZboy]

A statement that you're not qualified to make, since you don't have access to all the facts that Apple management uses to make decisions, and you don't even know what decisions they've made, until they make them public.

Far more accurate. You should have said this from the beginning. It's your uninformed opinion, not a fact.

I'm not a fanboy, or any kind of boy. People who resort to name-calling are usually those who have run out of intelligent responses and lack the maturity to respond in a more suitable fashion. I have no allegiance to Apple or any other company or product. I also am not naive enough to think that I'm in a better position to know what's best for a multi-billion dollar company than those who spend all day, every day, managing such a company.

Well get back to me when FIREFOX grows in popularity and SAFARI stagnates.

Oh, nevermind, that already happened.

This is not about criticizing Apple as a whole. It's about a simple decision that will affect Safari marketshare.

And we don't even know if it's true yet. This is simply a Page 2 rumor. It could be a technical glitch.

If not it's a mistake by Apple and a slap in the face to their customers in my opinion.

 

[GGJstudios]

Well get back to me when FIREFOX grows in popularity and SAFARI stagnates.

Oh, nevermind, that already happened.

Unlike Microsoft, Apple doesn't appear to be as worried about which browser people use. Apple's profit is over a billion per month, and how much of that comes from Safari? Hmmmm! Of course, if they cater to a single poster in a MR forum and spend millions to continue developing Safari for an older OS version, they'll increase their future profit by how much? Hmmmm!

 

[HyperZboy]

Unlike Microsoft, Apple doesn't appear to be as worried about which browser people use. Apple's profit is over a billion per month, and how much of that comes from Safari? Hmmmm! Of course, if they cater to a single poster in a MR forum and spend millions to continue developing Safari for an older OS version, they'll increase their future profit by how much? Hmmmm!

The average person OR business does not live in the 1 year purchase cycle bubble that so many people here do.

Mozilla will just increase its marketshare of Firefox if Apple discontinues SAFARI for Leopard before Mozilla does.

You heard it here first. That's my last thought on this.

Good Night.

 

[GGJstudios]

Mozilla will just increase its marketshare of Firefox if Apple discontinues SAFARI for Leopard before Mozilla does.

Who cares? Apple doesn't. Apple sells computers, iPhones, iPads, Mac OS X, etc. They don't sell Safari. They're not fighting for supremacy over Firefox, since there's no profit in that race. Browsers are free. If you don't like Safari, use Firefox or Chrome or whatever you like. Why should Apple care which you choose? Your rant over Apple not doing things to suit you is pointless. It won't accomplish anything. Your continued reference to others as "fanbois" is ironic, considering your signature.

 

[Intell]

Your views are very narrow. All you seem to look at is Safari and Leopard. Why not look at Tiger?

Safari on Tiger is still being updated. Its the last of the Apple made software products on that platform that is. iTunes, another long lived product, was recently killed off with the release of iTunes 10.

How does this effect Leopard and Safari? It means that Leopard's Safari will continue to be supported up to the release of Mac OS 10.8, if the current trend continues. Right now Tiger's Safari is on what Microsoft calls "Extended Support", same thing as Windows XP. In this phase of the product's life, all they receive are security updates. No more bug fixes.

And why on Earth do you think most people of the MR community live in a 1 year replacement cycle? I'd say less then 10% of the active members do. My newest Apple computer is a 2007 iMac. It came with Tiger, but the Snow Leopard Update DVD is only US$29. If you are so cheap as not buy a $29 OS upgrade, then how did you afford your various Apple products?

 

[chrono1081]

OP, not being able to submit a bug report simply means for that version, nothing more. A new version of Safari could be right on the horizon and once it is then you can submit bug reports again for that version.

As for your insane love of Firefox its not the best browser out there. Its rather slow. Use some different browsers and you will see what I mean.

 

[johnnyhands]

Could Flash be the reason for no Safari/Leopard crash reports?

Since the major reason for Safari crashes, for me anyway, has been Flash (and when a crash has occurred, I've looked at the crash report's computer programmer backtraces in the "Problem Details" section - or whatever it's called - and it's just about always Flash.)

So I went to look to find which version of Flash I had on my Leopard system by going here:

http://tinyurl.com/6mbc36w

It says I have version 10.3.183.5, and it also says that for Tiger and Leopard, 10.3 is the most recent version. For Snow Leopard and Lion it's, at the time of this writing, version 11.1.102.55.

I've also noticed way less crashes on Safari on my other machine, a Snow Leopard system with 11.x on it. So does this mean in Flash 11.x, Adobe's fixed many of the bugs that crashed Safari with Flash 10.3? It sure seems like it.

So I'm guessing that Apple was getting tons of crash reports on Leopard systems for users of Safari/Flash 10.3 and decided to move on. So Adobe/Flash might share the blame for the discontinuation of crash reports with Safari/Leopard.

All that said, it's still kind of slippery for Apple to give you a message like this when denying your crash report: "Can't submit your report at this time. Try again later."

 

[Mal]

[snip long post]

You do realize that you're responding to a year-old thread, right?

jW

 

[ixodes]

This is why Apple is not like Microsoft.

Just curious, (I'm not being critical) are you being humorous, or sarcastic? I'm interested in what the point of this comment is. Forgive me if it's obvious but I've missed it

 

[thejadedmonkey]

Just curious, (I'm not being critical) are you being humorous, or sarcastic? I'm interested in what the point of this comment is. Forgive me if it's obvious but I've missed it

I'm actually being serious. Microsoft is still supporting Windows XP, 11 years later. Vista is going to be supported until 2013 or something, which is about 6 years. Windows 7 will probably be supported until forever, as well. I don't plan on using the same OS for 6 years - far from it - but if my computer takes a crap and I have to use an old one, it's at least nice knowing that I can still use it without worry that it'll have more holes than swiss cheese.

Compare that to Apple: I bought a MacBook Pro in early 2007. By 2009 Apple stopped supporting my hardware. In 2010, iTunes (which was required for an iPhone) would install on a PC from 2001, but not on a MBP from 2007 unless I upgraded to Leopard.

 

[Mal]

Compare that to Apple: I bought a MacBook Pro in early 2007. By 2009 Apple stopped supporting my hardware. In 2010, iTunes (which was required for an iPhone) would install on a PC from 2001, but not on a MBP from 2007 unless I paid $69 to upgrade the OS.

Actually, Apple didn't stop supporting your hardware. They stopped supporting your software, which is a big difference. Apple's hardware is usually good for at least 4-5 years of software upgrades, though you of course have to pay for the major updates in there (usually at least 2 during the useful life of the machine). Once you reach the point where you cannot update the software anymore, then machines then typically work fine for at least several more years without significant incompatibility. The switch to Intel threw off a few of those calculations, of course, but that was a one-time event most likely, so that won't be an issue for current purchasers.

jW