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When Apple discontinues . . .
There’s been some concern about whether certain aspects of FCStudio will be discontinued. I think one should observe their past behavior to at least make a reasonable guesstimate about what and how they might handle things.
With XSan, XServe, Shake, Apple was not quiet about ending them, as painful as such public statements were. In the case of Shake it remained available for considerable time and at a lower cost after the End of Life announcement.
LiveType did quietly disappear but that was because Motion actually had absorbed most of the features including the fonts themselves.
More broadly during the times of radical transition, Apple always accounted for some form of legacy support. products like FCP ran on OS9 and OSX for a time. Classic mode existed for OS9 for a time. Programs were written in “Universal” to support both PPC and Intel for a time and Rosetta was built in as well. Both 32bit and 64bit have had methods of running on the same computer. With Quicktime X, Quicktime 7 Pro remains available.
In the last decade Apple has always been forthcoming when discontinuing something and in the case of software, always allowed for a fairly long transition.
Given the history, if Apple were to drop the other ProApps in the suite they may remain available for some time as they did with Shake or, otherwise, integrated in as LiveType was done with Motion. Personally I don’t expect this to be any different.
My own speculation based on the above is that if DVDStudioPro is EOL it may be available separately at a low price for some time. The other parts such as Motion, SoundTrack Pro, Color may either be integrated or possibly purchased as advanced sets with direct communication rather than round tripping. There is no history that Apple would quietly drop major software features/products.
BTW if anyone has examples of Apple dropping a major software product without announcing or extending it for some time, please do post an example.
The only area that is not clear enough to me is what happens to products that include large amounts of elements that would make downloading from the App Store difficult. Think in terms of the Motion elements such as LiveType fonts or the SoundTrackPro loops or DVDStudioPro elements. The only equivalent I can think of is GarageBand which has “packs” that aren’t in the App Store. I haven’t noticed iDVD in the App Store either but it’s still in the boxed set. iWeb also isn’t in the App Store but in the boxed set.
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26 Replies
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How do you get the packs for GarageBand now? There’s 7.9G of stuff plus another 1.9G of loops with GarageBand. The app itself is 184MB according to the App Store. 10G of stuff is a honking big download.
All the best,
Tom
Class on Demand DVDs “Complete Training for FCP7,” “Basic Training for FCS” and “Final Cut Express Made Easy”
Author: “Final Cut Pro 5 Editing Essentials” and “Final Cut Express 4 Editing Workshop” -
XSan and Osx server are not discontinued.
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GarageBand Jam Packs are still available in Apple’s Online Store.
https://store.apple.com/us/search?find=garageband+jam+pack&mco=MTA4MTkyMjYSo it may seem that anything too big to download may still be a traditional online order.
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Apple’s XSAN hardware was discontinued.
Example
https://news.softpedia.com/news/ActiveSan-Replaces-Apple-s-Discontinued-Xsan-181869.shtml
The software is still available and works with third party hardware.Apple’s XSERVE hardware was discontinued.
Example
https://www.afp548.com/article.php?story=xserve
The server software is being incorporated into Lion. -
Maybe that’s what they’ll do for Motion. Download the software and purchase the components from the online store on a disc. You could use the app without the content if you wanted. I think DVDSP’s gone as a standalone. Probably the only disc burning will be the basic menus built into Compressor. Maybe I’m wrong about that, but Apple seems so adamantly anti-disc.
All the best,
Tom
Class on Demand DVDs “Complete Training for FCP7,” “Basic Training for FCS” and “Final Cut Express Made Easy”
Author: “Final Cut Pro 5 Editing Essentials” and “Final Cut Express 4 Editing Workshop” -
[Tom Wolsky] “Maybe that’s what they’ll do for Motion. Download the software and purchase the components from the online store on a disc.”
Motion as well as SoundTrackPro loops . . . which may as well be JamPacks though sort of.
[Tom Wolsky] “I think DVDSP’s gone as a standalone. Probably the only disc burning will be the basic menus built into Compressor.”
But has Apple every killed something without allowing it to linger on for some time. That’s why I mention Shake. I could see DVDSP being an online store purchase for $99 for example even though development has ended. iDVD and iWeb are still part of the online store box even if they’re not in the App Store. Development stopped on iDVD a long time ago. It seems Apple allows things to linger for what may even be a few years. At least that’s been their pattern. I can’t think of exceptions. Of course things can change but their track record so far is to allow EOL software to go on a few years.
[Tom Wolsky] “but Apple seems so adamantly anti-disc.”
I’ve always found their ant-disc position a bit of a hole in they’re thinking. I understand the position but they haven’t offered a replacement. Apple’s H.264 codec is about the worst in the industry for one thing. I don’t mind using online services to deliver client screeners but why not have a MobileMe Professional for that? I’m left to look for 3rd party services or Vimeo, etc. What do I use for long form if not a DVD or Blu-ray especially if I need some basic menus for navigation ease? I can understand “anti-disc” but the lack of a coherent Apple branded alternative is a gap in their thinking IMHO.
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[Tom Wolsky] “Maybe that’s what they’ll do for Motion. Download the software and purchase the components from the online store on a disc. You could use the app without the content if you wanted. I think DVDSP’s gone as a standalone. Probably the only disc burning will be the basic menus built into Compressor. Maybe I’m wrong about that, but Apple seems so adamantly anti-disc.”
Honestly, downloading 8 GB of content (or whatever it is) for Motion wouldn’t be that big a deal for a lot of people. The 4.25 GB Xcode is already sitting right there in the App Store. (And yes, I’d expect developers to have faster than average Internet connections, in general, but I’d expect the same of media pros.)
It would be a good idea to make provisions for users who don’t have access to connections that can handle this sort of thing, but Apple appears to have no particular objection to making this the primary distribution mechanism even for fairly large software.
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Digital Workflow/Colorist, Nice Dissolve.You should follow me on Twitter here. Or read What is FCP X’s relationship to iMovie? on our blog.
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[Chris Kenny] “Honestly, downloading 8 GB of content (or whatever it is) for Motion wouldn’t be that big a deal for a lot of people.”
I usually get my peak download speed from Apple’s servers. I always use Apple’s OS Combo Updater which tends to be on the large side At my 30Mbps download speed an 8GB download would be just under 40 minutes. Someone with 5Mbps would be just under 4 hours. On the other side there may be the issue of Apple’s servers getting hit very hard on an initial release.
Large downloads are technically possible but keep in mind that the GarageBand JamPacks are not available in the App Store so they do seem to avoid large downloads at this point.
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Does the Xcode download install components? All the apps seem to go directly to the Apps folder, no installer. Not sure what FCP X is going to do about this either. Where will the codecs live and how do they get installed? Or will FCP X be the first app that downloads an installer.
All the best,
Tom
Class on Demand DVDs “Complete Training for FCP7,” “Basic Training for FCS” and “Final Cut Express Made Easy”
Author: “Final Cut Pro 5 Editing Essentials” and “Final Cut Express 4 Editing Workshop” -
[Tom Wolsky] “Does the Xcode download install components? All the apps seem to go directly to the Apps folder, no installer. Not sure what FCP X is going to do about this either. Where will the codecs live and how do they get installed? Or will FCP X be the first app that downloads an installer.”
I haven’t downloaded Xcode from the App Store, but it would have to install components; it’s not just an app it’s a new release of the whole developer tool chain. I don’t know how it handles this. There are basically three approaches, that I can see: download an installer that the user manually runs, download an installer than runs automatically, or just download an app to the Applications folder, and have it install components where they need to go the the first time it’s launched.
As far as I know under the App Store rules Apple applies to third-parties only the last of these is currently possible, but as I said before, it’s Apple’s store; they can do what they like.
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Digital Workflow/Colorist, Nice Dissolve.You should follow me on Twitter here. Or read What is FCP X’s relationship to iMovie? on our blog.
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