[voodoo]

A good take on the Adobe/Apple relationship and some reasoning for this move by Apple:

/dev/why!?! - /dev/why!?! - Its all about the�framework…

An excerpt:

What Apple does care about is their ability to control their own development cycles. iPhoneOS runs on extremely tight schedules, with a very high degree of secrecy, and at a pace completely controlled by Apple. I know it is popular to claim that maintaining binary compatibility is easy, that is the argument du jour made by people claiming Apple should just support developers using private APIs. Well, they are just wrong. Ask anyone who has been involved with a couple of releases of Mac OS or Windows about the amount of effort involved in keeping old apps working, especially those using private APIs. There is a reason why the majority of current and former framework engineers who comment on the issue come out really strongly against any use of private APIs. To really delve into what it takes would be an entire blog post.

...

So, if you will indulge my claim that backwards compatibility is hard (even absent the private API issue) it is pretty easy to see why supporting other runtimes is ceding a lot of control to a 3rd party. Imagine if 10% of the apps on iPhone came from Flash. If that was the case, then ensuring Flash didn’t break release to release would be a big deal, much bigger than any other compatibility issues. Since Apple doesn’t have access to Flash CS5’s runtime library code or compiler frontend, they might be put in a position where they would need to coordinate with Adobe to resolve those issues. Shipping a new release where Apple breaks any specific application, even a top seller, is not an issue if the release is compelling, most apps work, and Apple has the option of working with the vendor to help them fix their app. Shipping a release where they break a large percentage of apps is not generally an option. Letting any of these secondary runtimes develop a significant base of applications in the store risks putting Apple in a position where the company that controls that runtime can cause delays in Apple’s release schedule, or worse, demand specific engineering decisions from Apple, under the threat of withholding the information necessary to keep their runtime working.

...

This isn’t some perceived risk, I can think of incidents where Apple reverted OS changes, dumped new APIs, or was forced to committing massive engineering resources to something it did not want to do because a Must Not Break™ app vendor told them to. Apple does not want to give anyone that sort of influence over them. So ultimately, preventing Flash on the platform is about control, but is not control over the user experience of the Flash applications, or even the languages used. It is about the runtimes they bring on to the system, and Apple's control over future releases of iPhone OS.

Originally Posted by Wiskedjak 

I'll be more interested to see if Adobe reacts by dropping some Apple support (we all know how Apple would react if the shoe were on the other foot).

Uhm... Why would Adobe forgo a sizable chunk of their revenue. Adobe and Apple are businesses, not hormone-crazed teenagers. Decisions are based on their market and the effect on their bottom line. Dropping Apple support of their products just because of a media-created spat is not very smart.

Originally Posted by Wiskedjak 

are you suggesting that Apple isn't moving towards dominating the smartphone market?

So what? That's irrelevant - there's nothing wrong with dominating a market, and there's nothing wrong with controlling your products. It's when you use your dominant market position to move toward domination in other markets that you start to get into trouble.

Just like Heinz is perfectly within their right to dictate the terms in which their ketchup is sold. (Must be on the eye-level shelf, etc.) But if they say "you can't stock other brands of ketchup in your store if you want to sell Heinz," then they're in legal hot water.

Originally Posted by besson3c 

I see this sort of argument as one-sided. Apple needs developers to make the iPhone what it is, Apple sells more iPhones because of these apps existing. It is not simply a "you should be happy to have the privilege to develop for our device, and because we are granting you this privilege we are dictating the rules" sort of relationship, or at least it shouldn't be... That is a pretty arrogant attitude to take.

Maybe, but recall, that this is how it went. Apple released the iPhone more than a year before they allowed developers to develop for the platform. Developers begged to be able to make apps for a device that was already selling well.

You made a good point about a particular programming language not ensuring a good quality app too. I'm okay with x and y features only working properly using certain APIs, and I'm okay with Apple not supporting these other APIs/languages, but to ban them?

All Apple is doing is, we don't want you to spoil the iPhone brand by putting sub-par quality apps on the device because you use a cross platform system that outputs lowest-common-denominator software. Anyone who remembers MS Word 6 on the Mac will certainly see why Apple is thinking this way.

[imitchellg5]

Originally Posted by hayesk 

Uhm... Why would Adobe forgo a sizable chunk of their revenue. Adobe and Apple are businesses, not hormone-crazed teenagers. Decisions are based on their market and the effect on their bottom line. Dropping Apple support of their products just because of a media-created spat is not very smart.

No doubt. If Adobe dropped support for Apple products, it'd kill the company.

Originally Posted by starman 

Because Obj. C is just as "real" as .NET

You missed the point. That point was a real developer knows that the skill set of producing good algorithms and understanding memory management, etc. is what makes a good developer. They'll select and learn the frameworks and development environment that best suits the target platform. In other words, a real developer would use .NET if making Windows apps, and Obj.C/Cocoa when making iPhone/Mac apps.

Cross-platform environments and construction kits are too often used as crutches that sub-par developers use when they don't want to put the effort into making a solid product targeted at a specific platform. The obvious exceptions to that is when you are making a product where you want to control the entire environment that doesn't interact with the OS at a user level and offers a unique experience that isn't similar to other products. (e.g. a game, public kiosk, etc.) It doesn't much matter what development product you use if the user isn't interacting with the platform itself, but exclusively inside your product that is not similar to other products on the platform.

[besson3c]

Originally Posted by hayesk 

All Apple is doing is, we don't want you to spoil the iPhone brand by putting sub-par quality apps on the device because you use a cross platform system that outputs lowest-common-denominator software. Anyone who remembers MS Word 6 on the Mac will certainly see why Apple is thinking this way.

Perfectly understandable, but where is the line drawn?

What if you create a crappy app using all of the right tools? If Apple is really going for quality, maybe they should make this a little more clear and start rejecting bad apps in general? Apple would, however, have to share their criteria for these assessments.

The tools that are used seems like a sort of imperfect form of criteria.

[Laminar]

Originally Posted by besson3c 

If Apple is really going for quality, maybe they should make this a little more clear and start rejecting bad apps in general?

They don't?

[besson3c]

Originally Posted by hayesk 

You missed the point. That point was a real developer knows that the skill set of producing good algorithms and understanding memory management, etc. is what makes a good developer. They'll select and learn the frameworks and development environment that best suits the target platform. In other words, a real developer would use .NET if making Windows apps, and Obj.C/Cocoa when making iPhone/Mac apps.

Cross-platform environments and construction kits are too often used as crutches that sub-par developers use when they don't want to put the effort into making a solid product targeted at a specific platform. The obvious exceptions to that is when you are making a product where you want to control the entire environment that doesn't interact with the OS at a user level and offers a unique experience that isn't similar to other products. (e.g. a game, public kiosk, etc.) It doesn't much matter what development product you use if the user isn't interacting with the platform itself, but exclusively inside your product that is not similar to other products on the platform.

Or, you want to develop a cross platform product and don't want to invest the resources that would be needed to make it a model citizen on each platform, and instead want to focus on consistency between OSes both for supportability and maintenance of code. See Mozilla Firefox.

[besson3c]

Firefox is an interesting example, because many would say that it is still better than IE on Windows, and definitely beat the pants off of IE during the days of IE 6. The Mozilla apps use all of that XUL stuff, making IE far more of a model app on Windows than Firefox ever has been.

Using all of the right tools does not assure you anything.

[imitchellg5]

Originally Posted by Laminar 

They don't?

We went over this on the last page...

[angelmb]

CS4 is released and to everyones surprise it doesn't offer support for 64 bit for the Mac version.

CS5 is released and users are left wondering wtf happened to the "Adobe CS5 on Mac to be Intel-only, Cocoa, 64-bit native" headlines.

[Laminar]

Originally Posted by imitchellg5 

We went over this on the last page...

No. You posted your irrelevant impressions of the process.

[torsoboy]

Well, it seems like Apple might be bowing under pressure to make at least a small change in their approval policy. They accepted Opera Mini yesterday, after a 20 day acceptance review period. Opera was being very public about its submition to the App store, and it looks like Apple caved to the PR gods.

I know some of you are going to say "No, they didn't cave, they let it in because of blah, blah, blah." But, you're wrong.

[starman]

Originally Posted by torsoboy 

Well, it seems like Apple might be bowing under pressure to make at least a small change in their approval policy. They accepted Opera Mini yesterday, after a 20 day acceptance review period. Opera was being very public about its submition to the App store, and it looks like Apple caved to the PR gods.

I know some of you are going to say "No, they didn't cave, they let it in because of blah, blah, blah." But, you're wrong.

And where's Google Voice?

[voodoo]

Originally Posted by angelmb 

CS5 is released and users are left wondering wtf happened to the "Adobe CS5 on Mac to be Intel-only, Cocoa, 64-bit native" headlines.

Wait, CS5 isn't 64-bit Cocoa? It's still 32-bit Carbon??! (Sure it's Intel only now, but that's not exactly a feature..)



I don't see anything about this on Adobe's website, except that CS5 is Intel-only.

[jokell82]

Originally Posted by torsoboy 

Well, it seems like Apple might be bowing under pressure to make at least a small change in their approval policy. They accepted Opera Mini yesterday, after a 20 day acceptance review period. Opera was being very public about its submition to the App store, and it looks like Apple caved to the PR gods.

I know some of you are going to say "No, they didn't cave, they let it in because of blah, blah, blah." But, you're wrong.

They changed their unwritten rule about duplicating functionality. Not much of a change. I bet if it did client-side JavaScript parsing it would have been rejected.

[jokell82]

Originally Posted by besson3c 

Perfectly understandable, but where is the line drawn?

What if you create a crappy app using all of the right tools? If Apple is really going for quality, maybe they should make this a little more clear and start rejecting bad apps in general? Apple would, however, have to share their criteria for these assessments.

The tools that are used seems like a sort of imperfect form of criteria.

They have rejected "low quality" apps before, and recently did a purge of apps like that that had been approved already.

[macaddict0001]

Originally Posted by hayesk 

So what? That's irrelevant - there's nothing wrong with dominating a market, and there's nothing wrong with controlling your products. It's when you use your dominant market position to move toward domination in other markets that you start to get into trouble.

Just like Heinz is perfectly within their right to dictate the terms in which their ketchup is sold. (Must be on the eye-level shelf, etc.) But if they say "you can't stock other brands of ketchup in your store if you want to sell Heinz," then they're in legal hot water.

Isn't that what happens with soft drink companies? at least when it comes to vending machines? or Schools? or something?

[angelmb]

Originally Posted by voodoo 

Wait, CS5 isn't 64-bit Cocoa? It's still 32-bit Carbon??! (Sure it's Intel only now, but that's not exactly a feature..)



I don't see anything about this on Adobe's website, except that CS5 is Intel-only.

Only three apps are 64-bit Cocoa: Photoshop, After Effects and Premiere Pro which doesn't compute as the whole suite.

Illustrator is still 32-bit, albeit now it comes with new major features like the Artboard panel and the perspective grid, a pity FreeHand had this 10 years ago.

Same goes for InDesign CS5, 32-bit and they might have christianized it again as InDesign Flash.

And where is that amazing new app not even the most Adobe die-hard fans would even think of?.

[voodoo]

Originally Posted by angelmb 

Only three apps are 64-bit Cocoa: Photoshop, After Effects and Premiere Pro which doesn't compute as the whole suite.

Illustrator is still 32-bit, albeit now it comes with new major features like the Artboard panel and the perspective grid, a pity FreeHand had this 10 years ago.

Same goes for InDesign CS5, 32-bit and they might have christianized it again as InDesign Flash.

And where is that amazing new app not even the most Adobe die-hard fans would even think of?.

Well Adobe has only had NINE years to prepare to the move to Cocoa

... they're a shining beacon of progress, aren't they?

[Spheric Harlot]

Originally Posted by angelmb 

And where is that amazing new app not even the most Adobe die-hard fans would even think of?.

It's the Apple's-Never-Gonna-Dare-To-Tell-Us-To-****-Off-In-Public-Because-That-Would-Force-Them-To-Piss-Off-Developers Flash-to-iPhone-App-Converter, of course.

Not even the most die-hard Adobe fans would have dreamed of that.

[Eug]

Originally Posted by voodoo 

Well Adobe has only had NINE years to prepare to the move to Cocoa

... they're a shining beacon of progress, aren't they?

So, when was the Finder Cocoa'ized again then?

BTW, I find this particular quote of Gruber's particularly funny in this context.

"Cocoa is just an API. It is not some sort of magic technology where you just sprinkle a ton of square brackets in your source code and you instantly get a better UI."

[voodoo]

Originally Posted by Eug 

So, when was the Finder Cocoa'ized again then?

I wasn't aware Apple cared one way or another what happened to the Finder. I would assume Adobe cares more about their flagship products than Apple about it's orphaned Finder.

Originally Posted by Eug 

BTW, I find this particular quote of Gruber's particularly funny in this context.

"Cocoa is just an API. It is not some sort of magic technology where you just sprinkle a ton of square brackets in your source code and you instantly get a better UI."

Well it's an API that allows for 64-bit memory addressing - something that, when sprinkled, allows just that. One would quite rightfully assume that memory hogs like Adobe apps would benefit from such a thing.

Either way, this isn't about Carbon vs. Cocoa - this is about Adobe being lazy and not looking to the future. Whatever the other merits of the respective APIs, only one of them offers 64-bit computing. And it isn't Carbon.

[imitchellg5]

Originally Posted by Laminar 

No. You posted your irrelevant impressions of the process.

How was it irrelevant? Since Apple won't talk about it, it's not like there is a solid piece of evidence that says anything otherwise.

[Laminar]

Originally Posted by imitchellg5 

How was it irrelevant? Since Apple won't talk about it, it's not like there is a solid piece of evidence that says anything otherwise.

So if there's no evidence, it's okay to make up whatever we think sounds good?

Either way:

http://news.cnet.com/8301-13579_3-10315328-37.html

Apple says it receives 8,500 new applications and updates to existing ones every week. There are 40 people responsible for reviewing every application submitted and each app gets reviewed by two people. Eighty percent are approved as submitted with no changes necessary, and 95 percent of applications are approved in two weeks or less. In total, since the App Store was opened last year, Apple says it has evaluated 200,000 apps and updates.

If you do the actual math, the task is sort of mind-boggling. Forty people looking at 8,500 apps and updates during a regular five-day work week comes out to approximately 212 apps per week. But since each app gets evaluated by two different people, that doubles the load to 424 apps per week, or about 85 apps per day. Assuming a standard eight-hour workday (which, let's be honest, is probably not what these employees are getting away with), that comes out to each member of the App Store team reviewing an app every six minutes. So, it's understandable that some apps that violate the rules might accidentally get by the reviewer.

For the controversial or otherwise special cases, Apple has established an App Store "executive review board." While there's no mention of how many members there are, we do know it's made up of senior management responsible for the App Store who meet weekly to determine review process policy as well as take a look at applications that "raise new or complex issues."

The things the reviewers check for when apps are submitted: buggy software, apps that crash too much, use of unauthorized APIs (Google, apparently, excepted), privacy violation, inappropriate content for children, and anything that "degrades the core experience of the iPhone."

What were you saying again?

[Eug]

Originally Posted by voodoo 

I wasn't aware Apple cared one way or another what happened to the Finder. I would assume Adobe cares more about their flagship products than Apple about it's orphaned Finder.

Which is pretty sad IMO. The Finder is the Mac "app" I need and use the most, and that's probably true for a lot of Mac users, including Apple's own employees. Unfortunately, it's not the Mac app I like the most, and that's probably true for most of Apple's own employees too I'd guess.

[imitchellg5]

Originally Posted by Laminar 

So if there's no evidence, it's okay to make up whatever we think sounds good?

What were you saying again?

"Degrading the iPhone experience" is something open to interpretation. Probably 95% of the apps in the App Store don't do anything to add on to the experience, and there are some very crappy apps out there.

[Laminar]

Originally Posted by imitchellg5 

"Degrading the iPhone experience" is something open to interpretation. Probably 95% of the apps in the App Store don't do anything to add on to the experience, and there are some very crappy apps out there.

Still trying to hang on?

[imitchellg5]

What do you mean? Is there a dictionary definition for something that "degrades the core experience?" I doubt it. Thus it's clear that Apple doesn't reject every single app that may be viewed as crappy or not well-made, which was the original point being made.

[Laminar]

Originally Posted by imitchellg5 

which was the original point being made.

Nope.

[imitchellg5]

What the heck? That's almost word-for-word what I said.

[Laminar]

But you weren't the one making the original point. I wasn't even responding to you until you butted in thinking you knew what you were talking about.

[voodoo]

Originally Posted by Eug 

Which is pretty sad IMO. The Finder is the Mac "app" I need and use the most, and that's probably true for a lot of Mac users, including Apple's own employees. Unfortunately, it's not the Mac app I like the most, and that's probably true for most of Apple's own employees too I'd guess.

I couldn't agree more. It is a shame Apple doesn't make more effort into the Finder. They've already proven many times over that they're capable of it - which makes it all the more bitter.

[imitchellg5]

Originally Posted by Laminar 

But you weren't the one making the original point. I wasn't even responding to you until you butted in thinking you knew what you were talking about.

I was referring to my original post. As a registered and paying iPhone dev, I've read what's on the forums and what other developers are saying about the approval process.

[Laminar]

Originally Posted by imitchellg5 

I was referring to my original post.

And I wasn't. Try and keep up.

[torsoboy]

This sounds like a great solution for flash video on the iPhone. The company takes your streaming flash video and converts it to the format supported on the iPhone/iPad/iPod in real time. It all happens on the server side, so there is no rules to get around to make it work in iPhone applications.

RipCode Brings Streaming Flash Video to iPhone & iPad

[voodoo]

Originally Posted by torsoboy 

This sounds like a great solution for flash video on the iPhone. The company takes your streaming flash video and converts it to the format supported on the iPhone/iPad/iPod in real time. It all happens on the server side, so there is no rules to get around to make it work in iPhone applications.

RipCode Brings Streaming Flash Video to iPhone & iPad

This is similar to what Opera is doing to browsing, no? Either way if this isn't rendered locally by Flash, well the Flash isn't sucking up the battery and processor. Which is good.

We'll see how this pans out, but it seems a little far fetched at the moment. One thing is for it to work and then another that it works well - and then another that people actually use it. Though I applaud the effort.

[Eug]

IT World: Rumours of a lawsuit

"Usually I write about security here, but Apple's iron-bound determination to keep Adobe Flash out of any iWhatever device is about to blow up in Apple's face. Sources close to Adobe tell me that Adobe will be suing Apple within a few weeks."

Could just be rumour mongering, but who knows. Like I said before, if someone sues (and even if that someone is Adobe), I won't be surprised.

[OreoCookie]

I'd be interested to know on what ground Adobe will sue Apple: does anyone have a clue?

[Spheric Harlot]

Originally Posted by torsoboy 

This sounds like a great solution for flash video on the iPhone. The company takes your streaming flash video and converts it to the format supported on the iPhone/iPad/iPod in real time. It all happens on the server side, so there is no rules to get around to make it work in iPhone applications.

RipCode Brings Streaming Flash Video to iPhone & iPad

Interesting as a stopgap solution.

Adobe will have as little interest in becoming dependent on the whim of that external service as Apple does in making iPhone/iPad as dependent on Adobe's whim as the Mac has been.

[Spheric Harlot]

Originally Posted by OreoCookie 

I'd be interested to know on what ground Adobe will sue Apple: does anyone have a clue?

They won't. It's just hype.

[turtle777]

Originally Posted by OreoCookie 

I'd be interested to know on what ground Adobe will sue Apple: does anyone have a clue?

I'm sure they're going to try to invoke some obscure "monopoly" claim.

-t

[Eug]

Originally Posted by OreoCookie 

I'd be interested to know on what ground Adobe will sue Apple: does anyone have a clue?

This is what I posted before regarding this:

Originally Posted by me 

IANAL but I have to wonder if someone out there might actually take them to court on this using the monopolistic practices argument.

Using Gartner's numbers, some claim that Apple currently owns over 99% of the paid mobile app market.

However, I have not yet seen any reasoned argument from an actual lawyer either way about this.

[turtle777]

Well, they own 100% of the iPhone market, so there you go, MONOPOLY!!!1!1!11oneone

-t

[Wiskedjak]

Originally Posted by turtle777 

Well, they own 100% of the iPhone market, so there you go, MONOPOLY!!!1!1!11oneone

-t

Everyone keeps telling us how dominating the iPhone is ... until the conversation turns to monopoly, and then Apple is the underdog again.

[-Q-]

Originally Posted by Wiskedjak 

Everyone keeps telling us how dominating the iPhone is ... until the conversation turns to monopoly, and then Apple is the underdog again.

Dominating =/ monopoly. Nokia and RIM have sold a lot more phones than Apple. And according to the Android supporters, they're going to be dominating the smartphone market any day now.

[Eug]

Originally Posted by Wiskedjak 

Everyone keeps telling us how dominating the iPhone is ... until the conversation turns to monopoly, and then Apple is the underdog again.

Heh. That's exactly what I was thinking when I saw that post.

Originally Posted by -Q- 

Dominating =/ monopoly. Nokia and RIM have sold a lot more phones than Apple. And according to the Android supporters, they're going to be dominating the smartphone market any day now.

I"m sure they'd want to be in Apple's position. And if they were, I'm also sure they'd want Adobe out of their hair. But they're not.

However, it does seem that Apple has an effective monopoly on phone application sales. That's something that AAPL investors are overjoyed with, but it does introduce sticky issues as we're seeing now.

Like I said, I wish someone with some real insight into the legal issues would be interviewed about this. Everything I've seen so far is just from developers or geeks like us, and tech writers and bloggers.

[OreoCookie]

Originally Posted by Eug 

This is what I posted before regarding this:

However, I have not yet seen any reasoned argument from an actual lawyer either way about this.

But the iPhone does not hold a monopoly over its competitors in the smartphone business, it's market share is ~30 % if I remember correctly with other strong competitors. Android doesn't force software vendors to go through some officially sanctioned app store.

[Eug]

Smartphone hardware sales are not the same thing as smartphone software sales.

It's true that it's harder to track software sales for other smartphones, but nonetheless it does seem that Apple dominates the software side of paid sales. The questions here are:

1) Is the domination enough to make it a near monopoly in paid software sales?
2) If it is a near monopoly, is that good enough to get the regulators involved?

The fact that Apple most definitely isn't a monopoly in terms of hardware sales is beside the point.