Posted on 08/12/2005 8:55:36 PM PDT by minus_273
Does anyone else remember there was a rumor just before the OSX x86 announcement that Steve Jobs was willing to give up a bit of profit for more market share? Well, it looks like that is exactly what is happening and more. If you haven't heard already, the developer kit for OSX on Intel has been leaked and thousands of people all over the world are running OSX on their PCs right now. Now, there are a few different types of people running this pirated version of OSX. The curious type who just want to play with OSX, those who already have OSX on a PPC machine and want it on their x86 PC as well and finally those who just want to install OSX on VMware and play around with it and have no intention of ever getting a real Mac. If this leak strategy was intentional, I think it was one of the most brilliant marketing moves ever. Keep in mind that the OSX being installed isn't the real thing, it is basically a demo. It can't be upgraded and it doesn't run all the PPC software (last I heard Rosetta wasn't working). In essence it lets you use the GUI,safari, the iapps and develop software for it. People always want what they can't get or what they think they should not have. By putting some rather weak locks on the software, Apple just got everyone excited about and downloading the demo of OSX. The only thing that is not demo is the development tools and I highly doubt a flood of new applications is going to make Apple lose any sleep.
(Excerpt) Read more at dragonstear.blogspot.com ...
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Yes, it is working... but in a limited fashion. However, recompiling OSX native code is extremely simple. The publisher of a new vertical application for Dental Offices announced this week that they recompiled their entire package for OSX.4-86 in under two hours... and have found no differences in operation.
Apparently Rosetta will be needed only for apps that are unecenomical to recompile... or are orphaned.
Rosetta (software)
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.
Rosetta is a lightweight dynamic translating emulator for Mac OS X developed by Apple to enable applications compiled specifically for the PowerPC family of processors to run on Apple systems based on Intel processors. It is based on Transitive Corporation's QuickTransit technology. It is a key part of Apple's strategy for the transition of their Macintosh line from PowerPC to Intel processors, in that it enables existing Mac OS X software to run on the new platform without modification. (The name is presumably a reference to the Rosetta stone, whose discovery made it possible to comprehend and translate Egyptian hieroglyphs.)Rosetta can only translate G3 instructions, so software that requires the G4, G5, or AltiVec features of later Apple systems can not be emulated, and will have to be modified by its developers to work on Intel-based Macintoshes. However, applications that take advantage of these features are usually coded to fall back to the less efficient G3 instruction set when they are unavailable, so most application software available for OS X will at least be functional without modification. According to Apple, applications with heavy user interaction but low computational needs (such as word processors) are well suited to translation via Rosetta, and applications with high computational needs (such as raytracers) are not.
Rosetta does not run the following:
Applications built for Mac OS 9 or below
Code written specifically for AltiVec processors
Code that inserts preferences into the System Preferences pane
Applications that require a G4 or G5 processor
Kernel extensions and applications that depend on them
Bundled Java applications or Java applications with JNI libraries that can’t be translated
Java applets in applications that Rosetta can translate. That means a web browser that Rosetta can run translated will not be able to load Java applets.
Well, if the anti-Mac crowd is correct, and there are only three Mac users in the world, then three pirate software crackers loading a stolen copy of OSX.4-86 is a 100% increase... a surge!
Well, technically, since every internet computer has a Media Access Control Address, then the marketshare of MAC is 100%
LOL!!! Didn't even think of it ... good catch!
At 1.3 gigs, I would imagine a lot of those "downloads" are "do overs".
Still, 3000 downloads is hardly a SURGE, don't you think? Actually, it's barely a ripple.
you dont do over torrents they dont get corrupted own download and you can resume them. Also, I just took a glance at some sites and on those alone its at 3000. One of the main torrents is in the tens of thousands of peers downloading right now and has been consistently since yesteday.
Okay. Well, we will soon see how much this affects the market share for Apple. Personally, I don't think it'll do too much, but you never know.
BTW, does downloading Bit Torrents really count as part of the market share?
Shiver me timbers. May have to learn more about Unix/Linux/OS X.
The biggest bonus to the proliferation of the OS X Intel demo is that UNIX Info Tech people who have ridiculed the Mac OS for their entire professional careers will be among those installing the kit on their PC's... and discovering to their delight that as a UNIX, OS X is good... very good.
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