Apple to Phase Out 32-Bit Mac Apps Starting in January 2018

[sudo1996]

Even though this article is about ending support for 32 bit Applications, NOT a switch to ARM, I will answer this as if you were commenting about that, for the edification of others...

If you are talking about Windows on Mac, then it is up to the GUEST OS (Windows) to decide what the GUEST OS will Support.

So, as long as Windows keeps supporting 32 bit Applications, then so should a Mac running Windows under BootCamp or a VM environment.

Emulation has nothing to do with it.

By the way, there IS another way: It is LEGAL to run OS X Server 10.6.8 under Virtualization. If you don't have access to the proper Installation DVD, you can actually CALL Apple Support at 1-800-CALL-APPLE and tell them you want to Order the 10.6.8 SERVER Installation Disc. Part Number for the US version is MC588Z/A

MC588 is the important part of the part number. Different countries have different suffixes after that part of the part number.

They will not know what you are talking about, but keep spouting the "magic" Part number MC588Z/A, and eventually, they will ask their Supervisor, and $20 and a few days later, you will have a nice, shiny Snow Leopard Server Install DVD in your hot little hands, ready for you to install in your favorite Virtualization environment.

There is even a way to get it to install Rosetta (normally not installed with OS X Server). There are a bunch of installation guides about this on the web.

I'm actually surprised that a Technician familiar with Apple wouldn't have heard of this...

A Mac with an ARM processor wouldn't be able to run 10.6.8 or any other non-ARM-based OS inside Virtualbox or anything similar. You'd need CPU emulation. And I asked above, but I'm bringing it up again: Will 32-bit software run in Virtualbox on a host OS that doesn't support 32-bit? I would think not.

 

[MacsRuleOthersDrool]

Now I don't look so stupid when I said that Apple needs to throw older Mac hardware and iPhones under the bus.
A 2017/18 MacOS should only be supported up to four year old hardware. Otherwise it's a nightmare for Apple to maintain support.
I know how Apple can nix all this legacy code and hardware, drop intel support and move on to Desktops and Laptops that only run on the A12xFusion chipset. Problem solved for Apple.
Maybe 10.13 should be the last macOS for the intel platform. They should make this announcement and get it over with. Let the old hardware and iPhone die from obselesence incompatible LTE versions and expired certificates so it just stops running in the next four years. Just as the original iPhone stopped working last year as Att nixed it from their networks.

Not going to happen.

Apple just jumped back into the Intel pool HARD with the CPU choice in the iMac Pro. It will be awhile before ARM catches up with THAT level of Architecture!

And the new Mac Pro is likely to use the same CPU family.

That doesn't preclude Apple with messing around with an ARM-based Air, though...

 

[MrChurchyard]

Goodbye Carbon APIs, hello Cocoa-only future. This provides a great opportunity to do some final platform cleanup, and allows to focus more on rewrites in Swift, too. Probably a great move for platform health long-term.

 

[oldmacs]

I think that is only for paid Extended Support.

Not it isn't. Mainstream support (which is service packs with new features etc) ended in 2015. Extended support lasts to Jan 2020 and is all the security and vulnerability patches. So Microsoft offers a good 5 or so years of service packs, where as Apple does 1 year (of 10.x.x updates), Apple offers around 3 years of security support, Microsoft offers 11 in this instance.

 

[bkkcanuck8]

Anyone else find it annoying how quickly Apple obsoletes older software on their platforms?

Even annoying-as-hell Windows can often run 20 year old binaries. TWO DECADES ago.

Right now the oldest binaries MacOS can run are from the PowerPC -> Intel switch era, circa 2006. Whatever macOS comes after High Sierra will probably obsolete 32 bit x86 binaries, which will pull the date even more forward.

They don't seem to care about preserving the functionality of legacy software. Some apps will never be updated because the developers no longer care about it, went out of business, etc... This software is lost to time. This is even MORE the case on iOS where you can't even GET the software anymore. At least on macOS you can keep archives of old apps around.

I looked at all the apps I have installed on my Mac, and came up with 3 applications (other than poker and Adobe Flash) that were 32 bit apps. All these apps had not been updated forever - or I feel are not worth updating to be bothered to buy new versions. I don't really see it as a big deal.

Apple has had a history of deprecating stuff and forcing developers to fix/move to newer cleaned up APIs. This allows Apple to clean up old crap that is there only for backwards compatibility, but usually with some for knowledge by developers. This results in core code running more efficiently, using less resources.... less code that developers are afraid of - and don't know what the heck it is doing or why it is there other than removing it would be bad. It removes more avenues for security holes since code that is there because developers are afraid to change / update it means less maintainable code with more security holes. With all Mac platforms being 64-bit at it's base for 10+ years before this is deprecated -- it gives more than enough time to have moved.

Being migrate-able is important but compatibility for the sake if it just ends up with more pain than it is worth.

 

[vmachiel]

Do we get our money back for our old apps that don't run ?

You don't have to upgrade to High Sierra or beyond.

 

[oldmacs]

You don't have to upgrade to High Sierra or beyond.

You do if you want continued security and compatibility as they're rubbish at long term support. Apple is (for example) fantastic at dropping iwork support a day after their new OS release and changing the file format so you have to upgrade.

 

[MacsRuleOthersDrool]

Add me to the list of unhappy users. I write books professionally, and I have just used Pages 4.3 (which is 32-bit) to do the layouts for ten highly illustrated books (because the 'new' Pages is so dumbed down that it is useless for the task). I also do conference presentations, and use Keynote 5.3 (which is 32-bit) because the new Keynote lacks features and comparabilities I need. I maintain a 10.5 GB website using iWeb (which is 32-bit) because no other website app yet has such a great good a combination of power and ease-of-use. I use MS Office (Word and Excel, which are 32-bit) because I refuse to be sucked into subscription apps. The easy solution is not to upgrade my OS when 32-bit compatibility is killed, but unfortunately even Macs aren't immortal and they need replacing eventually.

Then, if you purchase a brand new Mac next year running High Sierra (assuming it will be the last 32 bit macOS), you will have at least another DECADE before that Mac is ready for replacement to find another Toolset. And if you wanted to get stupid about it, you should be able to get another two decades or so replacing your worn out Vintage (by that time) Mac with a barely-used eBay unit. So, maybe, by 2049 or so, you MIGHT have to find another way to create your books.

Sounds pretty safe to me...

 

[The Mercurian]

Add me to the list of unhappy users. I write books professionally, and I have just used Pages 4.3 (which is 32-bit) to do the layouts for ten highly illustrated books (because the 'new' Pages is so dumbed down that it is useless for the task). I also do conference presentations, and use Keynote 5.3 (which is 32-bit) because the new Keynote lacks features and comparabilities I need. I maintain a 10.5 GB website using iWeb (which is 32-bit) because no other website app yet has such a great good a combination of power and ease-of-use. I use MS Office (Word and Excel, which are 32-bit) because I refuse to be sucked into subscription apps. The easy solution is not to upgrade my OS when 32-bit compatibility is killed, but unfortunately even Macs aren't immortal and they need replacing eventually.

The one guy I know who writes books sweats by Scrivener: http://www.literatureandlatte.com/index.php

 

[bkkcanuck8]

Then, if you purchase a brand new Mac next year running High Sierra (assuming it will be the last 32 bit macOS), you will have at least another DECADE before that Mac is ready for replacement to find another Toolset. And if you wanted to get stupid about it, you should be able to get another two decades or so replacing your worn out Vintage (by that time) Mac with a barely-used eBay unit. So, maybe, by 2049 or so, you MIGHT have to find another way to create your books.

Sounds pretty safe to me...

If he wanted to run all old apps -- why would you bother spending money on a new machine or upgrading the OS.... Seems like the new stuff sucks for him....

Of course he could install VMWare and install Mac OS High Sierra after the new OS comes out.

 

[MacsRuleOthersDrool]

No, that's the point, they don't have a long history of this sort of thing.

There are programs written in 1984 that would still run on a Mac running a current OS in 2006. No, not all of them, but some of them absolutely would. Programs written in the early to mid '90s weren't even likely to be a problem then.

Now? They've broken everything in the mid '90s, everything in the early '00s, and they're now talking about breaking things written as late as a few years ago.

I used to use MacProject (ported from LisaProject by Apple) as my "Will it still Run?" test.

It has been since System 7 (1990) that it worked completely. And of course, the demise of Classic did it in completely.

 

[bkkcanuck8]

I used to use MacProject (ported from LisaProject by Apple) as my "Will it still Run?" test.

It has been since System 7 (1990) that it worked completely. And of course, the demise of Classic did it in completely.

People talk about macOS now as if it is a version update from earlier versions. It is not even the same operating system at all. It is like Windows to OS/2, OS/2 would allow you to run Windows programs as a migration path... but they were not the same OS. Current macOS now really only dates back to NeXT.

 

[kiwipeso1]

It is amazing that so many Apple fanboys come out in droves to shout down anyone who expresses dissatisfaction with something Apple is doing.

At risk of being called "an idiot" or "a troll" for expressing my view, here are a few problems that I have with this conversion to 64-bit only iOS:

1. Whenever I launch an iOS 32-bit app I get presented with the message "Such and such app needs to be updated. This app will not work with future versions of iOS. The developer needs to update it to improve its compatibility". I wonder if Apple is contacting the developers?
2. Many of my favorite legacy apps may disappear forever, especially cherished games such as: Tetris, Missile Command, Wolfenstein, wonderful pinball games Cyrstal Caliburn II and Tristan by Littlewing, Chess Quest, and many others, etc.
3. The "reasons" many of the so-called experts here give for not supporting 32-bit apps seem to be made up reasons: takes up too much space, it will slow down the device, we need a modern architecture, it's too much work for Apple to make sure every app works with new iOS updates, get with the program, etc. It is all nonsense - excuses and guesses with no facts whatsoever to back up any of them.
4. I'm on a fixed income. So the choice presented to me is to retire my current iOS devices frozen in time with iOS 10 or upgrade the iOS and lose some of the reasons I enjoy using my iPad.

I am hoping that all of the developers will make the updates before iOS 11 is released - that would be ideal! But some of these developers aren't around anymore. In that case it will be a sad loss.

And why? Apple could easily work around this. After all, Apple is a $trillion company and can afford it. We customers are what made Apple so wealthy, and many of us old timers stuck with Apple when it was just about to go belly up. How about showing a little more loyalty towards us?

1. Contrary to popular opinion, Apple does not monitor every app you run on every iOS device. That is against their privacy principles.
2. Tetris was never copyrighted by the soviet union, so it is open to anyone to make a clone. Missile Command is either from the late 70s or early 80s, and likewise has many similar apps. Pinball games are reasonably widespread also, and only differ in table layout (I even have a real pinball machine out in the garage).
3. These are legitimate technical reasons that are verified mathematical fact.
4. I'd suggest that you get a new iPad on a telco's cellular data plan, as it would be paid off in 2 years. This would let you keep the old iPad, and use the new one for current iOS versions and have it handy when you go out and about.

As above in 2, the original developers may have retired for some applications, however that just leaves it to younger developers to create clones or get inspiration from the original works on new apps.

 

[Trusteft]

What will happen with all the many games that are only 32 bit without a developer team working on them to upgrade it to 64?

 

[vmachiel]

You do if you want continued security and compatibility as they're rubbish at long term support. Apple is (for example) fantastic at dropping iwork support a day after their new OS release and changing the file format so you have to upgrade.

Ok, but come on: every piece of software becomes outdated sooner or later. Developers should have updated their app to run in 64-bit mode by now. They could since snow leopard.

 

[Jeaz]

Wow, I just checked my apps in the system information app. I have quite a few apps that are 32bit, and nearly every single game I have installed is 32bit. Steam, many steam games, the Blizzard app, and some of its games are 32bit.

edit: Wait - does this 32bit constraint only apply to apps in the App Store? That would make the most sense...Apple would be nuts to drop support for all 32bit apps.

I'd say it's only relates to MAS for now. But a drop of support for 32-bit in macOS is coming eventually, quite certainly.

 

[djalice]

Damn! This will break one of my favourite iOS apps, AutoStitch.

Anyone know a similarly great pano making app?

The makers of AutoStitch have dropped the iOS app but it still works (although you can't choose photos from the photo library anymore)

 

[curtvaughan]

People, you have a choice. You've had this choice since DAY 1...

Windows:

Pros - Backward compatibility, works with almost everything ever made. A system that lasts for pretty much forever.

Cons - Bugs and security holes, slow progress forward due to being strapped to the past, clunky UI to accommodate everyone and their grandma.

Mac:

Pros - A seamless experience from the hardware to the software. Easy controls, smooth UI, limited amount of baggage code (security holes, etc).

Cons - Very little backward compatibility, works with pretty much Apple-only stuff, third party software needs to stay current. Can be expensive and some features get left behind.

It's been this way since the original Macintosh in 1984.

Often times we don't realize until a few years later why Apple did what they did. There could be a technological reason for some future feature or idea that we aren't aware of just yet.

I guess I'll figure out why all the dongles, inferior music interfaces, and missing headphone jacks in a few years. In the meantime, just upgraded my 6+ to the last jacked iPhone the 6s+, bought a Dell XPS 13 instead of a MBP. I do look forward to buying one of the new iMacs sometime this year, though I do miss having the built-in DVD drive in previous iMacs and MBP's. You are correct about the floppy drives, though, and I finally gave up on 16-bit support sometime in the early 90s, though I still get teary eyed about my last PDP-11. I'm up too late/early.

 

[bkkcanuck8]

A Mac with an ARM processor wouldn't be able to run 10.6.8 or any other non-ARM-based OS inside Virtualbox or anything similar. You'd need CPU emulation. And I asked above, but I'm bringing it up again: Will 32-bit software run in Virtualbox on a host OS that doesn't support 32-bit? I would think not.

It would be up to the VM software on what they support. The OS in the VM is not exposing any of the main OS's APIs for the guest inside the VM - it is just allowing the guest OS to share hardware.... and Intel CPUs still support 32 bits.

 

[kiwipeso1]

Add me to the list of unhappy users. I write books professionally, and I have just used Pages 4.3 (which is 32-bit) to do the layouts for ten highly illustrated books (because the 'new' Pages is so dumbed down that it is useless for the task). I also do conference presentations, and use Keynote 5.3 (which is 32-bit) because the new Keynote lacks features and comparabilities I need. I maintain a 10.5 GB website using iWeb (which is 32-bit) because no other website app yet has such a great good a combination of power and ease-of-use. I use MS Office (Word and Excel, which are 32-bit) because I refuse to be sucked into subscription apps. The easy solution is not to upgrade my OS when 32-bit compatibility is killed, but unfortunately even Macs aren't immortal and they need replacing eventually.

And the question is, have you ever heard of VMware fusion ? Very simple to create a virtual MacOS, and simple to transfer documents from your folders to the virtual machine.

 

[potatis]

Is there technically any disadvantage of running 32-bit apps on 64-bit system?

 

[WatchFromAfar]

So you want modern support for huge amounts of RAM or legacy support for all of your obsolete applications?

It's not an "either, or" situation. You can still have huge amounts of RAM; it's just that 32-bit applications won't be able to access all that RAM but your 64-bit applications can still access it just dandy.

 

[macs4nw]

Anyone else find it annoying how quickly Apple obsoletes older software on their platforms?

Even annoying-as-hell Windows can often run 20 year old binaries. TWO DECADES ago.

Right now the oldest binaries MacOS can run are from the PowerPC -> Intel switch era, circa 2006. Whatever macOS comes after High Sierra will probably obsolete 32 bit x86 binaries, which will pull the date even more forward.

They don't seem to care about preserving the functionality of legacy software. Some apps will never be updated because the developers no longer care about it, went out of business, etc... This software is lost to time. This is even MORE the case on iOS where you can't even GET the software anymore. At least on macOS you can keep archives of old apps around.

Progress sometimes causes casualties. If we had to worry about 20 or more years of backward compatibility, we might lose by potential progress-never-realized. It really is a balancing act and a case of fairness to both legacy users and those desiring the latest features. See also garirry's post below.

At least it's better than the phasing out of PowerPC apps, Lion decided to just drop support for them out of nowhere without any warning, when Snow Leopard was the first system that was only compatible with Intel. Considering that Lion and newer systems require a 64-bit Mac, I think we got plenty of time to phase out 32-bit apps.

 

[M2M]

A Mac with an ARM processor wouldn't be able to run 10.6.8 or any other non-ARM-based OS inside Virtualbox or anything similar. You'd need CPU emulation. And I asked above, but I'm bringing it up again: Will 32-bit software run in Virtualbox on a host OS that doesn't support 32-bit? I would think not.

Yes will. Have run windows XP in virtual box on Solaris x86 (a 64bit OS).

 

[bkkcanuck8]

Is there technically any disadvantage of running 32-bit apps on 64-bit system?

The 32 bit app is not using any of the new processors improvements over the last decade.

And I believe when you allow for both 32 bit and 64 bit apps to run at the same time seamlessly - the OS will have to use up more memory resources .... hence the often ridiculed iOS warning about 32 bit apps affecting performance. It might not "affect" performance individually, but the OS will use up more resources and cause more swapping etc.

The OS is more bloated with dead unused code not being cleaned out.