The shiny new OS for my Macs — “Lion” — was dropped this week. Through a weird quirk of timing, I was able to get it gratis from the Kids at Cupertino. You see, I bought my new MacMini just a few into an as-of-that-time-unannounced window where you could get Lion for free because your machine shoulda shipped with it… or something like that. Anyway, one redemption code in the AppStore later, and Lion was on the MacMini, and was installable on my other two Macs as well. Woohoo!
The first wart I discovered with was Microsoft’s Remote Desktop Client. I had to “Force Quit” the app a few times, and even bounced the machine before it would finally work. I have no idea what it was doing, but it eventually was functional. Yippee!
The next wart was one I knew about — Quicken. Quicken 2007 for the Mac was a PPC-only app, and with the dropping of Rosetta, PPC apps aren’t supported. Makes sense — it’s been almost six years since the Apple switch to Intel. So one quick online purchase later, and Quicken Essentials — the only version available for the Mac — was on the iMac and purring along. Hooray!
Today, I went on a quest to see what other PPC-only pieces of code I had out there. Surprisingly, there were some. There was The Sims, which I really hadn’t played since I installed it. I evicted ’em.
And then I noticed a bad one: EyeOne.
I bought my EyeOne at DLWS in the fall of 2005 for use in profiling my monitors. It’s a cool tool, and code has been carried along for quite a while, with no big changes. That means the functionality didn’t change, which is good, but with the advent of Lion, the old PPC codebase simply won’t fly. From what I’ve been able to see here and there on the ever-truthful internet, it appears that the new owners of the codebase don’t seem to be real interested in updating the code for us loyal EyeOne users. Bummer. That probably means that a new profiling package is in my future. I had to have to do that, but I don’t know any way around it.
With all that in mind, the upgrade to Lion has cost me $50 for Quicken, and who-knows-how-much for a new profiler … maybe a few hundred bucks?
As for functionality, Lion has a few new things, a redesigned Mail application, and some pretty visual changes that are pleasant to watch. Are there gobs of new things I see as I use my machine for scanning, Aperture, or other things? Not really. I do hate the fact the scrolling is now backwards — now, you “push” or “pull” the content in the direction you want, kinda like a physical piece of paper. Definitely backwards, and makes my transition from work (Windows-centric) to home (Mac-centric). I know you can change that behavior, but if that’s the way Apple’s headed, I kinda wanna go that way too, lest I get caught later needing to learn this new behavior, but under some pressure to get something done!
So for me, Lion’s less of a big cat, and more of kitten. Like with any kitten though, it’s inflicted a little pain that I’m just gonna have to figure out how to heal.
CORRECTION/ADDITION : It appears that X-Rite (who now owns the codebase for the EyeOne) are planning to include support for my device in a new piece of code to be released in September. Of course, it won’t be a free upgrade, and I will have to live without my profiler for a few months. Color me hopeful that this gets resolved both quickly and correctly!