Re: Intel Inside!!!

Woody <usenet@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

> Rowland McDonnell <real-address-in-sig@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
>
> > Woody <usenet@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
[snip]
> > > I really don't believe that. I can run some dos programs from the mid
> > > 80s on my windows machine. I can even boot my AMD64 3500+ machine with a
> > > dos disk.
> > >
> > > However, I can't boot my powermac from a mac floppy,
> >
> > So what? What's that got to do with application software?
>
> nothing. It has something to do with backward compatibility.

No it doesn't. You run a computer with the OS it was meant to run.
Backwards compatibility is all about the user data and application
software end of thing.

>Anyway, the
> bit above the bit you responded to was about application software - the
> bit about running mid 80s dos programs.

Yeeessss.... So what've OSes got to do with it?

> > You boot off
> > the right OS for the machine and don't complain when an OS that wasn't
> > written for it doesn't work, surely?
>
> I am not complaining, however when it comes to compatibility, my new PC
> does run the old software.

Under what circumstances? It seems that you're saying you can run the
old software on your new PC by booting off the old OS and you can't do
it while running the current OS?

> > > even if I had a
> > > floppy drive and last time I tried to run a system 6 program it fell
> > > over in a big heap.
> >
> > So what?
>
> So what? So that is your point - it is better than the dark side. So it
> isn't better than the dark side.

Hmm... It needs measuring, is more to the point, I think.

> > If that software had been written to Apple's guidelines, it
> > would work.
>
> So you are saying that most system 6 applications written to apples
> guidlines would work?

Yes. As I understand it, all old Mac apps will work under Classic if
they were written according to the guidelines and I'm going back to pre
System 6. I've got a text editor - Anarcho - which runs on my 512Ke
(with System Software versions old enough that it's hard to work out
what the hell they are - System Software 2.0.1 seems to be one version
I've got) and claims that it'll run on a 128K thin Mac. Anyway, Anarcho
and MacWrite II are running under Classic as I type.

One problem is that many Mac apps were not written according to Apple's
guidelines - such as MacPaint, MacDraw, Hypercard, and so on. Yes,
that's right, apps from Apple didn't obey Apple's guidelines.

> I don't know if that was even true back in the
> system < 10 days.

It was specified for the System 6 to 7 transition, and anything which
made that jump without trouble probably still works under Classic.
MacWrite v4.5 runs under Classic on this MacOS X 10.3.9 2G4.

[snip]

>
> > >Yes - I am sure there is *some* software you can
> > > find, but I have never found older software (ie, pre system 7) that
> > > would work.
> >
> > I've got plenty. MacWrite v4.5 runs under Classic on this 10.3.9 2G4.
> >
> > [snip]
> >
> > > The view that it is better for compatibility on this side of the fence
> > > is very misguided.
> >
> > Not in my experience.
>
> It is in mine, so I guess this is a case of YMMV.

Yeah, but... I can see a difference here. There's nothing I
particularly want to run that's ancient software at all - but I've
played around with the Mac stuff and got things to work and found out
about it. You seem to have done something similar on the Dark Side. So
what we have is a situation where `Some of the old stuff still works' on
both sides of the fence but no clear idea how the two sides compare.

Rowland.


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