Talk:Classic Mac OS

In many ways System 7 can be considered the worst mistake in Apple's history. By defining a new and very large set of OS features, the possibility of running the Mac OS on top of a kernel became impossible for years.

Huh? --Brion

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argh. too many non-existent subpage links. also: someone who actually uses a Mac want to add something on OS X 10.2? --AW

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You left out System 7.5.2, quite possibly the worst computer operating system in history. I'm sure Apple thanks you for it, though. John

Dates

Some dates for the various releases would be nice. Dan100 16:59, Apr 10, 2005 (UTC)

I agree, I opened this page to suggest it, and found it already had been... anyone out there have a reliable source for these? I'm happy to add them to the article. Graham 05:08, 19 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Shameful

This is pretty shameful when compared to History of Microsoft Windows, we should all try and improve it to that standard. — Wackymacs 15:53, 23 October 2005 (UTC)

• OK, well having said that not long ago, I decided to do some major edits myself. I've added screenshots of the major versions of the OS, added two lead paragraphs, added the Mac OS classic logo, added more details in the first history section and the System 7 section, added a see also section. I think its much better now, but there's still quite a bit of work left to do. — Wackymacs 17:25, 23 October 2005 (UTC)

OS 9 version bump

From the section on OS 9

In fact the only reason that the version was increased from 8 to 9 was to pave the way for the upcoming Mac OS X, rather than leave a gap in the version numbers which might have discouraged some to make the eventual transition from classic Mac OS to Mac OS X

I thought it was widely understood that the version bump from OS 8 to 9 was a way to get out of the cloning market. It was thought that all the cloners had rights to "MacOS 8", so Apple bumped the version to 9, so they wouldn't have to distribute it to the third party computer manufacturers. Nonetheless, the stated reason doesn't even make sense to me. All sorts of apps skip versions with impunity - and I can't think of why anyone wouldn't transition to OSX because there wasn't an OS 9 — Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.177.128.131 (talk • contribs)

It wasn't cloners; the cloning program cut off with Mac OS 8, not 9. Nevertheless, you're right in pointing out the speculation. I've removed it and plan on giving the article a closer look. -- Steven Fisher 05:32, 18 June 2006 (UTC)

System 5 did not technically exist

The section of "System 5" is I believe is technically inaccurate. No system named "System 5" was ever released by Apple. What has been referred to as System 5 was only ever referred to as "System Software 5.0" by Apple. It combined System 4.2, Finder 6.0 and MultiFinder 1.0. I think this section should be rewritten to clarify this situation. It does seem though that some people refer to System Software 5.0/5.1 as System 5, though I can find no instance where Apple ever used the name. As such it probably should be made clear that their was no system kernel version 5. --Cab88 18:16, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

Well, the same applies to System 6. It only started to get called that when System 7 was on the horizon, and as far as I know not by Apple, but only by users. Apple released system releases as e.g. 'System 6.0.3' which included various different system and Finder versions, but this was no different from the earlier System 5 releases. However it's a convenient term to use in retrospect anyway. Graham 04:57, 6 March 2006 (UTC)

I've gone and change the refernces to "System 5" (and 6) "to System Software 5" (and 6) as it's the official name Apple used. While their does not seem to be an official Wikipedia policy on this, I think we should stick to the offical names of software used by the manufucaturers and not use nicknames or shortened names, even if commonly used by the software's users. --Cab88 19:11, 3 April 2006 (UTC)

System 7 paragraph

I am a Mac user but afraid I don't know quite enough about this period to rewrite the following paragraph in the System 7 section that really needs sorting:

Systems 7.1 and 7.5 introduced a large number of "high level" additions, considered by some to be less well thought-out than they could have been. Some of the most confusing were the reliance on countless System Enablers to support new hardware (which plagued the Mac OS all the way to version 8.1, after when the iMac introduced the New World architecture. Although the iMac itself requires a system enabler with Mac OS 8.1, as other Macs released at that time, Macs released after the iMac do not require a system enabler, and of course the iMac system enabler was included as part of version 8.5.) and various System update extensions with inconsistent version numbering schemes. Overall stability and performance also gradually worsened during this period which introduced PowerPC support and 68K emulation.

• What are "high level" additions?
• Who exactly considered them to be "less well thought out"?
• What "could they have been"?
• Were those System Enablers literally "countless"? I doubt it!
• Did these System Enablers "plague" the Mac OS??
• What is the New World architecture? The wikilink given for New World goes to something completely un-technology related
• Although the iMac itself requires a system enabler with Mac OS 8.1, as other Macs released at that time, Macs released after the iMac do not require a system enabler, and of course the iMac system enabler was included as part of version 8.5.) - this sentence is a mess, unfortunately I'm not sure I know enough about the subject to fix it. Why was the iMac system enabler included "of course" in 8.5??
• Also there's a lot to do with Mac OS 8 when this section is about System 7
• Overall stability and performance also gradually worsened during this period which introduced PowerPC support and 68K emulation. - citation needed? Which period is being talked about?

Sorry if this is a bit negative - I just feel this whole section needs a good going over but I'm not the one to do it (though I'll happily provide constructive criticism!) Heycos 21:19, 23 August 2006 (UTC)

Atari port?

I seem to have stumbled across an image of an Atari port[1] of Mac OS 2. I can't find any more information about this, though. --StuartBrady (Talk) 14:21, 11 September 2006 (UTC)

As I understand it, Amigas and Ataris were able to run fairly speedy Mac emulators because they used the same CPU architecture. What you saw is probably not an official port, but Standard Mac OS running under some sort of emulation. You usually needed a card for the Mac ROMs to make these things work. See, for example: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spectre_GCR -- Forkazoo 21:28, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

Odd focus on Microsoft in introduction

Is it just me, or is the second paragraph bizarre:

In 1984, Apple partnered with Microsoft, in an agreement where Microsoft would create versions of Word and Excel (then named MultiPlan) for the Mac OS. For the majority of the 1980s, the Mac OS lacked a large amount of compatible software.

Compatible...with what? Now, I know this is original research, but personally, I found the "large amount" of Mac software I had to be fairly compatible with my Macintosh. For the majority of the 1980s. I guess that would be 1984 to 1989. Or, in my case, 1985 to 1989. Dammit, maybe he's right.
As for MultiPlan, Excel, et al, I do suppose it's a good thing that Apple somehow convinced Microsoft to make tons of money in WYSIWYG office software for the Mac instead of releasing exclusively on Windows Zero. ~ RVJ 21:16, 15 March 2007 (UTC)