new and old system software

Since I had backed up everything for the hard drive upgrade, I decided to upgrade to OS X 10.5 (Leopard) while I was at it. I’d been waiting to upgrade, just to see what everyone else’s problems and gripes were, and to wait for the instabilities to settle down, and to copy over some data I still had in a HyperCard stack. That’s right, HyperCard! The unfortunate thing is that Leopard no longer supports Classic, which means there’s no way to run older programs.

Or is there? It turns out that SheepShaver can actually emulate a PowerPC running System 7.5 - 9.0.4. So perhaps all is not lost. I installed it using an all-in-one prepackaged installation I found through google, and to my delight in runs all the oldie-but-goodies: HyperCard, WriteNow, Pathways into Darkness. Along with other gems such as Polytris, Beehave Beehive, and the amusingly named Save a BNDL. And it’s fast, your emulated PowerMac is up and running in ten seconds. Ah, just listening to the default Simple Beep brings me back….

Unfortunately M$ Office 98 and 2001 don’t seem to work, which might put a hamper in my LTBA pdf-ification project, but at least Word 5.1 works…

If you’d like to install, the nicest guide I found is by GimmeSlack12:

http://www.alkemic.com/music/travis/Mac%20Emulator%20Tutorial/MacEmulator.html

So, my impressions of Leopard… Aside from the stupid new Dock, and the Finder still needing a major overhaul, I really like 10.5. It’s fixed so many things… big things like spotlight, traditional chinese input, Tibetan fonts that work and that you can actually read without squinting… little things like not selecting the file extension when renaming, the print dialog, the Network prefs… and i think Spaces is very well done. I never thought I needed virtual desktops, but I like it now.

And finally, there’s slideshows from the Finder, which are actually usable now. Select some photos, and hit cmd-opt-Y. Damn. Gives Phoenix Slides a run for its money.