Someone pointed this out to me today, and I hadn't thought about it
before. Imagine this scenario. You've been working your butt off
getting your 64-bit Carbon application ready for simultaneous release
with Leopard. You have it nearly done. It's building and working, and
all that remains is for Apple to clean up a few bugs. You can't wait
to release this wonder when Apple releases Leopard in the second
quarter of 2007. Your customers are going to snap it up.
Then Apple announces that Leopard's release is being pushed back
until October because Mac OS X engineers were needed for their new
cell phone, so you can just sit on your slick 64-bit Carbon
application for another four or five months while Apple readies the
phone. A four or five month delay in a product release isn't a big
deal, right? You didn't need those revenues that much anyway, right?
Then June rolls around and, oh, by the way, that Carbon 64-bit stuff
we promised last year? Bertrand nixed it. If you really want 64-bit
support, rewrite your application in Cocoa.
Some people don't have to imagine this scenario because they're
living it. Still boggles my mind to think Apple could do something
this crummy and, IMO, strategically stupid.
