Why can't people just make their apps Universal?!

[GPSJane]

I am sick and tired of downloading applications that don't work on my computer just because I have a PowerPC.

Apple has made Universal available so why are the developers too lazy to just compile their software to run on both Intel and PPC? It's ridiculous.

Ok that was my tirade at those idiots. What I actually want to know is if anyone knows how to run Intel-only apps on PPC? Surely someone must have done an emulator?

 

[d0b33]

Universal and PPC is being phased out so time to get an intel if you're not stuck with a PPC only app/setup.

 

[GingerBeer]

There's always a performance trade-off for apps that
can run on any computer.

Running anything on an emulator always runs slower
as well.

 

[koffiejunkie]

I am sick and tired of downloading applications that don't work on my computer just because I have a PowerPC.

Apple has made Universal available so why are the developers too lazy to just compile their software to run on both Intel and PPC? It's ridiculous.

Because many developers don't have PPC machines any more to test it on. Testing it in some emulation mode is no guarantee that it will run on the real thing.

Ok that was my tirade at those idiots. What I actually want to know is if anyone knows how to run Intel-only apps on PPC? Surely someone must have done an emulator?

No. Which apps are you having trouble with?

There's always a performance trade-off for apps that can run on any computer.

There isn't with Universal Binary. The term "Universal Binary" is a lie, actually. It's not one binary, it's two. It may be packed into a single file, but ultimately only one half of it wil be loaded into memory and executed. That may affect start-up time by a fraction, but there's no reason for it to actually run slower.

 

[GreGorGy]

Apple has made Universal available so why are the developers too lazy to just compile their software to run on both Intel and PPC? It's ridiculous.

Not quite - some stuff at the higher end of Objective (read: lots) is simply out of range of PPC. I think ( I stand corrected) open gl is one of these technologies.

Take an example - Parallels. It is not emulating a windozer - it is a windozer and is integrating the environments. It cannot do that on PPC, cos it would need to emulate intel.