future of PPC

[LINCOLN RUTLEDGE]

Hi Larry,
Maybe I wasn't gentle enough in my previous message, I didn't mean to flame anybody, even Apple :)  I apologize.

And I can see the point that if Terrasoft is interested in the small boutique market of providing software for old Macs, then they should.  I guess I interpreted the original message as saying that Terrasoft would be foolish to stop supporting old Macs, which I think is questionable.  But if they have found their niche market, then that's very cool.  Nobody else is doing it!

I will leave the question of Apple's product pricing and model lifetimes alone :)

As far as models supported by alternative operating systems, that is something that will largely be determined in the old Open Source Darwinian fashion.  When nobody is fixing bugs to make stuff work on big endian machines or making sure stuff not only builds but links and works on PPC, then their practical usability will start to fade like the 68k's did.  Luckily there are still folks making sure things work on such machines (YellowDog, NetBSD, OpenBSD, Debian).

And maybe someday I will have had it and ship Larry my sputtering iBook :)  I hope you like stickers!

Linc

Date: Mon, 30 Apr 2007 11:42:46 -0700
From: "Larry Cafiero" <larry.cafiero at gmail.com>
Subject: Re: future of PPC
To: "Discussion List for New Yellow Dog Linux Users"
<yellowdog-newbie at lists.terrasoftsolutions.com>
Message-ID:
<7a0d56080704301142r68c2735dif7596f7f70d8cec8 at mail.gmail.com>
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That may be, Peter. The point that seems to be lost in this discussion is
that Apple hardware, unlike the flimsy hardware of other manufacturers (and
go ahead and flame me, but it's true), tends to work -- even Lincoln's
"sputtering Clamshell" (hey, if it's too "sputtering" for you, I'll take it
off your hands . . . ) will outlast any Wintel-based laptop of the same age,
assuming that he uses it normally.

With this hardware still working -- maybe not with all the flashy bells and
whistles that are coming down the pike -- it seems criminal to just dump a
dependable, working hardware just because you can't access YouTube (yet). So
again, in my opinion, someone -- TerraSoft, since it has a history with
Macs, especially -- has an opportunity to take the reins here and keep a
slew of PowerBook G3s and G3 desktops running for years to come on
GNU/Linux.

Lincoln makes some poignant, albeit misguided, observations. I do remember
the 680x0 to PPC migration, Lincoln, and I do remember that Apple, for the
longest time (to an extent, even today) had support for the 68k machines.
The second coming of Steve Jobs in the latter part of the '90s, which
ushered in a degree of "success" for the platform where previously Mac users
were essentially circling the wagons, also ushered in a corporate mindset
where hardware sales were of paramount importance. It wasn't always that
way, Lincoln, I'm sorry to inform you -- Apple was never "notorious for
leaving customers with 3-month-old outdated machines," as you say; the truth
is that it has been quite the opposite at Apple regarding support. At least
not until now with Leopard, which I understand is no longer supposed to work
with non-Intel based Macs.

Larry Cafiero