Tag: Microsoft Office

Why Siri

[From The iPhone Blog][tipb]:

> Equally interesting is what [[Siri][siri]] portents for Apple. Just like the App Store began the intermediation and exclusion of Google by offering users a better experience interacting with data in apps than via a web search, Siri continues it by theoretically making it easier and more enjoyable to engage in query/response with Siri than with Google. In typical fashion, Apple isn’t building a search engine to compete with Google, they’re building something to obsolete the current conception of search engines. And they’re not doing it by becoming a walled garden — there’s no profit in that. They’re doing it by becoming a walled gate with a multi-directional toll system.

Great observation. Reminds me also of how Apple got out from under the [Microsoft Office Sword of Damocles][microsoft 150] with [Safari][safari] and [iWork][iwork].

[tipb]: http://www.tipb.com/2011/10/12/ios-5-iphone-ipad-walkthrough/ “iOS 5 for iPhone and iPad walkthrough—TiPb”
[microsoft 150]: http://www.apple.com/ca/press/1997/08/AppleMicrosoft.html “Microsoft and Apple Affirm Commitment to Build Next Generation Software for Macintosh. The $150 million was a smokescreen to avoid the obvious anti-trust move of bundling Explorer in order to keep Microsoft continuing to develop Office for the Mac.”
[safari]: http://www.apple.com/safari/ “Safari: Browse the web in smarter, more powerful ways—Apple”
[siri]: http://www.apple.com/iphone/features/siri.html “Ask Siri to help you get things done—Apple”
[iwork]: http://www.apple.com/iwork/ “iWork: Documents, spreadsheets, and presentations. The Mac way—Apple”

Posted on by tychay 0

How Apple rolls (for newbies)

I read this old comment about recently-released Mac OS X Lion:

…but really it’s the lack of Rosetta that has me most annoyed. I admin 120 users who still use Office 2004 on G5s. This just pushed up the cost of upgrading them by $200 each.

Actually, no. The cost of that particular upgrade is zero because you can’t. Apple dropped operating support on the G5 in Snow Leopard. So you can’t even install Lion on this computer, you must leave the computer on Leopard. He would have an issue if he has Intel-based Macintoshes that are still using Office 2004 (or earlier-Office 2008 introduced in 2008) or Adobe Creative Suite 2 (or earlier—Adobe CS3 introduced in 2007). But he should leave those people with Snow Leopard, just as he left the G5’ers a few years back with Leopard.

This is just another indicator of how Apple rolls when they want to introduce something new:

Apple and the Motorola 68000 processor:

  1. 1984 68k Macs introduced with 68k processor
  2. 1994 first PowerPC Macintosh introduced with “System 7” (specifically 7.1). Applications fork into three categories: 68k applications, PowerPC-only, or “Fat binaries” (which run on but 68k and PowerPC Macs). PowerPC Macs can run 68k-only applications via emulation.
  3. 1998 MacOS 8.5 drops support of 68k computers.
  4. 2006 Intel-computers cannot run 68k applications.
  5. 2007 Mac OS X 10.5 (Leopard) drops Classic-mode, and with it, all support for 68k applications.

Continue reading about Apple and backward compatibility after the jump (or just to watch their Infomercial)

Posted on by tychay 1