Mac OS X Lion and Freehand

[koehler]

Damn.......
I just watched the Apple Keynote from WWDC.

Lion has a few great Features.
And iCloud is great.

But i have to start Freehand for the next few years.......
Thats such a bad situation.....
So i can't upgrade to lion.



But that isn't all:
I can't buy a new Mac in a few Weeks - because since they will be shipped with Lion they won't boot in SnowLeopard anymore.



What can we do?

Do you think there will be any Chance or any Hack to start Freehand in Lion anytime?

[Snaptophobic]

I'm torn.

I want to keep FreeHand running, but I also want to keep up with all the improvements the new OS can bring.

I'm lucky that I have a couple of machines here where I could run FreeHand on a legacy OS. I think that's what I will have to do, while moving my main working machine to Lion.

Of course, the joke would be if my rapidly ageing copy of Adobe CS3 also failed to work on Lion. I shall await the results of the early adopter beta testers before I make any final decisions.

Sad times, in many ways.

[FFH Mark]

What can we do?

Do you think there will be any Chance or any Hack to start Freehand in Lion anytime?

If you have read the legal Complaint filed against Adobe, this situation is called "imminent obsolescence" with the release of Lion this July. Adobe must reply to our Class Action Complaint and the charges made by our attorneys which include this harm,
"Members of Free FreeHand will be harmed by the actions detailed in this Complaint because Adobe's failure to update FreeHand will cause it to become incompatible with future versions of computer operating system software. Not only are Free FreeHand members threatened by the imminent obsolescence of the software, but they are also threatened by the loss of their designs because images created in FreeHand are not useable when imported into Illustrator."

Class Action Complaint And Demand For Jury Trial: http://www.courthousenews.com/2011/05/05/Freehand.pdf

[FFH Mark]

I just find it amusing that a group of people fighting for a choice in drawing programs don't even consider a choice in operating systems. Nobody is forced to use Mac OS X exclusively. FH still runs fine on the latest version of Windows.

I want to be sure I understand what you are saying, spamjim. Using Emulation or switching OS Platforms are indeed options as FreeHand MX ages. Having a discussion of the merits of those ideas is well and good.

But if you are saying to give up on a Future for FreeHand than you are in the wrong place. This isn’t about FreeHand being better than Illustrator but that FFH wants a future for FreeHand to continue development as it did under Macromedia. That future means FreeHand 12.

As a FreeHand user yourself, what are you thinking here?

– Mark

[FFH Mark]

I worry that the statement that "images created in FreeHand are not useable when imported into Illustrator" will harm the credibility of FFH before a court. There is no requirement to bring FreeHand files into Illustrator and there are plenty of export options in FreeHand to supply file formats for various purposes in various programs (including AI).

OK, I understand where you are going here.

As a FFH staff member, I can't legally comment on the particulars of the case. I can refer you to the complaint itself which goes into the answers you are asking about. http://www.courthousenews.com/2011/05/05/Freehand.pdf

Also Adobe specifically says this on their website as their solution for FreeHand users:

While we recognize FreeHand has a loyal customer base, we encourage users to migrate to the new Adobe Illustrator CS5 software which supports both PowerPC and Intel-based Macs and Microsoft Windows XP and Windows Vista.

also:

No updates to FreeHand have been made for over four years, and Adobe has no plans to initiate development to add new features or to support Intel-based Macs and Windows Vista.
Note: Freehand does not work with Mac OS X 10.6 or higher.

The Mac community thing is a whole other enchilada that goes into decades old competition with Microsoft. I, for one, don't grab the latest and greatest but prefer to wait till bugs are worked out. I'm still using Leopard, for that matter, as FreeHand in Snow Leopard is workable but somewhat more buggy.

[daveleo76]

But that isn't all:
I can't buy a new Mac in a few Weeks - because since they will be shipped with Lion they won't boot in SnowLeopard anymore.

Really? Is this true? Snow Leopard won't install on new Macs shipped with Lion?

[koehler]

Yes, all NEW Macs presented after official release of Lion wonÄt boot with another OS, because Drivers etc. are only built in the OS which is shipped with the mac.

[daveleo76]

Does that mean I'm stuck with my late 2009 iMac unless Freehand gets updated or something?

[Pixero]

I havent seen anyone talk about using the free, opensource VirtualBox http://www.virtualbox.org to run an alternative/older system.
It says it runs also on OSX hosts and also with OSX client(virtual OSX install).
I'm a PC user so I havent tested running on a Mac but on a PC it's a great way of running a older version of the OS for old apps.

[Pixero]

What I meant was that with Virtualbox it might be possible to run an virtualised older version of OSX with Freehand on a newer OSX host.