Free Software for Intel-based Macs
I’ve been considering getting a new MacBook Pro - the specs are very nice, it’s a real desktop replacement, and even though there are some weird things like a slower DVD drive and a lower-res screen it would be a good computer.
But there’s one thing that’s ruled it out - the lack of support for Java embedding in Rosetta, the PowerPC translation engine for Mac on Intel.
So, Java embedding sounds sort of obscure doesn’t it? But what it means is that lots of free software I depend on for my workflow won’t work. Firefox won’t work unless you can give up Java and Flash. 3 months ETA on that. NeoOffice/J, the OpenOffice platform for Mac won’t work either, and there’s no ETA on that.
Apple has a large following among Open Source geeks and they like to court the Alpha Geeks. Maybe they should reevaluate their support level for Java in Rosetta and get these things working. I remember when Steve Jobs said the Mac was going to be the premiere Java development and deployment platform.
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