Snow Leopard takes a bite out of support for legacy Palm OS devices
By Donald Melanson 
posted August 25th 2009 4:32PM
posted August 25th 2009 4:32PM
posted August 25th 2009 4:32PM
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Palm PalmPilot
Apple Mac OS X Snow Leopard
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@jordan
Really? Command+Shift+3 Is that hard? Who knew. OS X even is nice enough to make a jpeg for you!
Cmd+shft+3...or the print screen key, which then allows you to paste directly into any program instead of having to import. It really is fewer steps. Or if you have Vista/7 you can use the snipping tool which allows you to select any section of the screen and then instantly saves a picture of the file format you choose. Yeah you can do this somewhat on a Mac, but again it's another long key sequence. I say again, the long key sequences in osx are cumbersome, hard to remember, and way too numerous.
Even switching between different windows of a program. The dock makes this difficult. You can do it through a key sequence..but why? Look at Windows, it's all seperated all on the taskbar and has been since 95.
@ Ryan: We could tell you were a commoner; you write like one.
Print screen on a Mac is sooo much easier.. it creates a file of the image! Do you know how many amazing webcam flashes I missed out during my youth using windows because I had to open a new file and paste the print screens??? With a mac I just keep hitting the shortcut and never miss a thing!
Well I guess if porn is your angle and you want to instantly create images of pre-teens flashing themselves to get off to later on, then I guess a Mac is the way for you.
David @ Aug 25th 2009 5:46PM
"You bought a Mac.. but hate OS X. How does that make any sense?????"
It makes sense if you love your palm gadgets. And you could choose to install linux on it, which supports palm devices, problem solved.
it's sad to see that for such a gadget freaks that post here are crying foul over this. I would though that most of you would have brain implants by now. What palm os is what 10-15 years old....move on people my pilot it's been in desk drawer for 7 years, oh wait I think it's time to have a garage sale...any of you want to buy an original palm pilot and a treo 650...:-))
Why is anyone using Mac OS X anymore... honestly, NeXTSTEP came out what, 10-15 years ago? Move on, people...
Oh and the latest release of Mac OS X is out in a few days... Move on man... By the way, have you heard of Windows 7?
For god's sake, people, Apple rewrote just about every application in Snow Leopard to 64-bit compatibility. I can't verify whether it is or not, but chances are iSync was one of those rewritten and Apple made the decision to to rewrite support for an actively declining userbase. Even if the Centro is still for sale, more people are leaving Palm OS than joining it.
lol @ you thinking it takes rewriting complete applications to make them "64-bit compatible".
@briankun
Actually, most of the applications had to be re-written cause of the move from Carbon to Cocoa. plus there was the whole process of removing all of the PPC code that slowed the applications down. So a re-write was in order. You don't just go in and delete several hundred lines of code and re-compile it and expect everything to be perfect.
"so lol @ you"
@Epsilon-Not, you are correct sir NexSTEP came out in 1992 but guess what when Apple got it they took it to the next level and yes they're moving on as well as technology should. It's not like windows (what ever version) which is a repackage of DOS and that my friend it's even older....Apple is moving on it is time to join the 21 Century
Cheers
Just to correct- Modern Windows is not a repackage of DOS- the consumer OS was fully transitioned onto the NT kernel (which is newer than NEXTSTEP / OS X's BSD kernel, though that hardly matters) with the release of Windows XP, the business OS had been moved over earlier. Any DOS remnants are solely for legacy support.
Forgive my ignorance but I need to be explained something: AFAIK Mac OS X is an Operating System, and iTunes is a "part of it" ( I know it's available standalone, but as it's THE media player delivered with my Mac, as a Mac user I think considering it a part of my O.S isn't really wrong ).
Now I'd expect my O.S, as to connect to heterogeneous networks, to recognize some "standard" file format, and to allow me to use any kind of hardware device. ANY.
So what's next ? Apple making input devices, TVs, Cameras.... Will I have to throw my Wacom, and all my A/V hardware because the next Mac OS X, Final Cut Pro, whatever refuse to use those ugly, inferior, non-Apple devices ? Will I have to jailbreak Mac OS XI to use the software I want ?
Haven't people switched from Windows to the Mac because when Microsoft has similar practices, it's way evil ?
If that is something you need, you need to keep looking. OSX and iTunes have never been known for supporting sync with just any MP3 player, for instance. It is part of this whole Pre sync issue.
What you are saying is fundamentally flawed. You say you expect to have OSX work with any hardware out there, work with any file type and format etc. I'd say it does just that. All you have to do is write a driver for it and it should work, just the same as you can write a driver for Windows or Linux to do the same. If you are saying you just expect Apple to write support into the OS for every possible combination of devices and file formats out there then you are sadly mistaken. Windows does not do that, Linux does not do that. I'd venture to guess that no OS has even come close to supporting all devices and hardware out of the box. Exactly like windows or Linux, it is up to the company or software maker that comes up with a new format or device to make it available to the public and those OS they choose to support. Them choosing to not support some legacy device that the manufacturer never really supported in this manner on their OS to begin with is not their responsibility. If it required the device driver to be re-written due to the removal or legacy code and the move to 64-bit then that is completely Palms responsibility to do. Apple should not spend any time working on drivers for 3rd party devices. Does Windows or any other OS out there do so?
I'm sure this planned long before the Pre/iTunes kerfluffle... but it's one more epic move by Jobs and Co. to flip the bird to people that irritate them.
PR Win.
Tech Win.
The last functionality I expect in Snow Leopard is iSync for POS Palm devices.
All of this time and Palm hasn't developed their own synching software? Perhaps it's not the most helpful tidbit for consumers, but it certainly should get the message across to Palm.
There is Palm Desktop, but it worked through iSync. Interestingly, Palm Desktop on the Mac comes from 3Com's purchase of Claris Organizer, which was developed by Claris... a spin-off of Apple.
I have to agree with everyone who says Apple is not to blame.
Palm doesn't work with Windows Vista out-of-the-box, why should it work with Leopard? Talk to Palm about maybe writing their own Mac software if they want that section of the market. Maybe they can include music syncing in there that LEGALLY uses the iTunes XML file...
Bunch of goddamn fascist apple lovers. I am not against apple, i don't care enough about the company, but as someone who reads this blog daily its tiresome. I wouldn't low rank people just because they express a view different from my own. the way some of you get a hard on for apple i hope you work for them or own stock in the company!
The same people who suppoirt Apple and look down on Windows and its users are the same people who have too much misguided ambition for their own good. Like the selfish kin of rich billionares who think the world is theirs by birth right. Their arrogence is astounding. Come down to earth with the rest of us. We like to play checkers, not war of the roses.
I ditched my Palm device after getting an iPod Touch. The Tungsten T3 I had was great, but not quite as amazing.
That sh*t never worked right with my treo 650 anyway.. good riddance,
BLASPHEMER!!!!!!!! Apple software works perfectly with everything it is supposed to connect to. PERFECTLY YOU HEAR ME??????????????
People seem to be a little confused... What Apple did was they wrote a conduit that let Apple software like iCal and Address Book talk to Palm Desktop. Palm abandon Palm Desktop on the Mac about 3 years ago, so my guess is Apple finally gave up on writing a conduit for software that Palm themselves don't support anymore.
You can still install Palm Desktop and sync your Palm. Apple just isn't supporting Palm's dated SDK anymore.
Apple = passive agressive.
If you are someone who wants to use older Palm devices, go ahead, don't buy Snow Leopard, clearly there aren't enough of you to effect Apple's decision making. People on the consumer end like to think of companies "fighting" with each other, "well if Palm is going to hack iTunes for Pre support, we are going to drop Legacy support." But remember, Apple is here to sell people operating systems (and other things, but thats not the point) and make money. If they thought it would hurt their sales because of the number of people who used OLDER PALMS, MAC OS X, and DESIRED TO UPGRADE were significant enough to hurt sales, they would definitely support it.
'Nough Said.
This is no loss, Palm OS Sync on Mac OS felt like a hack anyways, I will just sync my centro with my windows desktop. Time marches on, Apple and Palm are rather hostile now, this is expected. And plus, Palms software was not even universal, but PPC, slowing down sync by a little.
Does anyone even consider for a moment that with the move to 64-bit and removal of the legacy code from snow-leopard that the iSync module for Palm devices did not function correctly anymore? Therefore it may have been removed out of necessity plain and simple. Apple has no responsibility to right a new driver for it on their own. That is 100% Palms responsibility to do so.
I don't own a Palm or Apple product but I do know when Microsoft does any OS revisions or hell even during allot of service packs or even simple windows updates, that they often break the drivers for 3rd party products and they never, ever fix them for the 3rd party. I can't even begin to count the number of times i've had hardware drivers broken by Microsoft code changes and had to suffer through graphics or sound glitches and blue-screens until the hardware vendor could fix the problem. So why is it anytime Apple doesn't do the work for 3rd parties or anything similar they are the root of evil in all the world of computers and steve jobs is the friggin anti-christ?
I would think that as long as you make sure to choose and install Rosetta the Palm applications should play just fine. Rosetta is not installed by default in Snow Leopard like it was in Leopard.
Why the hell do this? Smells like Apple being a bunch of dicks because the Pre is a competitor to their phone.
I was a big fan of Palm products until the T/X. The lousy digitizer and poor Palm support killed it for me. I actually went back to my Tungsten T3 until I got my iPod Touch, and THAT'S a PDA on steroids!