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macOS Mojave (10.14) Compatibility


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3 hours ago, SVA Architects said:

So having read most of the posts now on this subject - what most are saying amounts to the fact that a Service Select subscription is a bad idea for Mac users.  Having paid for another year, the temptation is to download the latest version of Vectorworks right away.  The advice seems to be not to do so but rather to wait until it works well with the latest version of OSX (which based on 2019 and Mojave takes almost one year.)

 

I disagree with this sentiment. I waited until SP3 or SP4 to convert the office to v2019 but I've converted the office to v2020 SP0 on day one. There's no hard and fast rule.

 

The reason for the difference is that the stability of each release of Vectorworks depends on many factors, including the invasiveness of Apple's (or Microsoft's) own OS updates, how well beta testing goes, Vectorwork's priorities, etc.

 

Some of it can be out of Vectorworks' hands (like the OS provider dropping an invasive upgrade) but after the release of v2019 I think Vectorworks balanced the scales a bit by putting more focus on making sure v2020 is stable. It's always a balancing act between stability, performance and capability. Personally I also made a decision to beta test Vectorworks 2020 on the pre-release version of macOS Catalina in a production environment because I wanted to help avoid what happened with the release of v2019 where we had to wait until a later service pack before it was ready to roll on Apple's latest OS.

 

P.S. I would note that there are some small but noticeable speed issues using both v2019 and v2020 in macOS Catalina; I'm told Vectorworks are in contact with Apple working on this so hopefully it will be resolved by the time Catalina is released. Hasn't particularly slowed me down on the machine I'm using.

Edited by Christiaan
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I agree with @Christiaan on this. Different versions are going to launch with more or less compatibility. Now throw a non-gold-master OS update into the mix and the number of variables starts to go up dramatically fast.

 

With ANY software, you shouldn't upgrade without testing. You shouldn't switch in the middle of a project unless you've tested it. You can also run in parallel with older versions. 2019 sp5 working great? Awesome. Install 2020 next to it and try things out. 

 

This is standard practice in post-production. The new version of Nuke came out? Too bad. Stick with the version we started with until it's been tested out. Similarly with the entire AVID software line... updating on day one is not recommended (mostly about updating to the new OS). There are so many permutations of hardware, software, and plugins that it's de facto impossible for the company to test every single configuration. 

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13 hours ago, SVA Architects said:

So having read most of the posts now on this subject - what most are saying amounts to the fact that a Service Select subscription is a bad idea for Mac users.  Having paid for another year, the temptation is to download the latest version of Vectorworks right away.  The advice seems to be not to do so but rather to wait until it works well with the latest version of OSX (which based on 2019 and Mojave takes almost one year.)  Otherwise we are paying for an upgrade which is not yet compatible with the Mac OS of a similar period of time.  Having chosen this year not to renew Service Select I am looking longingly at the email links VW have sent me extolling the virtues of VW 2020.  However does it work with Mojave as well as the latest version of VW 2019?  How long will it be before either work with Catalina?

 

Since you quoted my post, I hope you didn't get any of that from me.

 

Here's what I'm hearing in this forum:

 

          Apple: Catalina is so buggy, delay the release from Sep to Oct.

 

          Vectorworks users: Service Select is a bad idea. I'm switching to Windows.

 

I pick my battles with VW, so when it comes to holding them responsible for delivering an issue-free product on day 1 of Apple's release day, I'm not going to die on that hill.

 

As a Mac user since the 80's (with the exception of 99-04), I test drive the new release of VW each year on the side until my colleagues, designers, vendors, etc. are all ready to turn the proverbial keys at the same time (usually sometime between SP 2 and 3). As for macOS, I typically wait until .3 or .4 (Mojave was such a mess, I waited until .6). It's all relative, so I'm still on an annual upgrade cycle with both products. Therefore, I don't feel like I'm missing out on anything (except frustration).

 

For the record, I love that VW releases are in sync with macOS releases because that's the smallest window of waiting for me. Common sense: give them both a couple months to squash bugs now that they're in the wild. It's software not hardware.

 

My only gripes about Service Select are:

  • Getting hammered with a $700 bill every March instead of pro-rating it (with an annual contract)
  • I want single sign-in with my other sign-in name (not the one that my 2013 boss gave me)

 

Edited by Mark Aceto
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I wasn't only quoting you Mark - just acknowledging that your post got me thinking again.  I think we are all swaying from a love of Mac and VW and memories of rock solid stability and security to persistent and increasingly recent reality checks.  Most ( me for sure) bought into Apple many years ago as Windows 3.1 was such a poor Mac clone and a wind up and Autocad just was not intuitive for architects.  

We bought into VW as it was a Mac program back in the 80s and Apple was great.

What we had and still want is fading into the past.  We have such a legacy of VW CAD files that we just have to somehow make it work rather than be switchers into the unknown...

Edited by SVA Architects
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On 9/11/2019 at 8:14 AM, SVA Architects said:

I wasn't only quoting you Mark - just acknowledging that your post got me thinking again.  I think we are all swaying from a love of Mac and VW and memories of rock solid stability and security to persistent and increasingly recent reality checks.  Most ( me for sure) bought into Apple many years ago as Windows 3.1 was such a poor Mac clone and a wind up and Autocad just was not intuitive for architects.  

We bought into VW as it was a Mac program back in the 80s and Apple was great.

What we had and still want is fading into the past.  We have such a legacy of VW CAD files that we just have to somehow make it work rather than be switchers into the unknown...

 

All good. I had a handful of conversations yesterday with colleagues that use VW on a Mac (and Windows), and they all said, "I love using my MacBook Pro for day-to-day stuff but I need a Windows workstation dedicated to Vectorworks and my other 3D software."

 

But I think that's our sad workaround for Apple having a beef with NVIDIA and a Faustian bargain with Intel. Neither of which is VW's fault. Plus VW isn't the one that screwed up the Mac Pro for 6 years (and then offered an insanely overpriced "solution") and the MacBook Pro for 4 years (and presumably will offer an insanely overpriced "solution"). It's Apple's race to lose.

 

That's mostly hardware though. And the thing with hardware is that it has to ship without issues (or at the very least, a 4-year keyboard warranty) because Apple can't release a software update to fix a hardware problem. And that's why macOS and VW (and literally every other software) will always be buggy on release day. And there's nothing wrong with that.

 

I'm just really glad that VW has aligned their release schedule with macOS, and offers us cool features like Dark Mode, especially when that meant creating all new icons and other UI elements for us Mac users. They could be like Lumion and tell us all to go f**k off.

 

Now if only VW would stop adding Russian doll dialogs nested inside menu items and palettes with more tabs, and more buttons to click and click and click and click into... and then click back out of click click clickity click click... with every single new release. Free the palettes!

 

Edited by Mark Aceto
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BTW I'm experiencing a handful of bugs on Mojave with Mail and Safari that I've spent hours on the phone with Apple senior level tech support trying to fix. By creating a guest user account, it seems like most of those bugs could not be replicated.

 

For perspective, this 2014 MacBook Pro shipped with macOS 10.9 Mavericks, so the macOS version history is:

  1. 10.9 Mavericks
  2. 10.10 Yosemite (don't even get me started)
  3. 10.11 El Capitan
  4. 10.12 Sierra (my personal favorite)
  5. 10.13 High Sierra
  6. 10.14 Mojave

Keep that in mind when someone in this forum says, "I'm not having any issues on my 1-year old computer..."

 

Now imagine VW beta-testing v2020 on a feature-limited beta version of Catalina, and everything is working wonderfully but they know - they know - they're about to unleash this on every random config of who-knows-what people have done to their 2012 MacBook Pro with 8GB RAM and 1GB VRAM ... 

 

That's what the next 3 SP's are for (and whatever Apple continues to break with each of their subsequent updates).

 

Edited by Mark Aceto
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20 minutes ago, Andrew Pollock said:

1925057519_VW2020Dark.thumb.jpeg.79b31a3ec0e994c9d5f3ef5b4dc8d950.jpeg

Despite the fact that this is a 2012 iMac, I can navigate around the model without any lag. Almost as well as my iMac Pro. Hmmm. No crashes or glitches yet.

 

 

Your 2012 iMac's 3.4GHz base clock speed is faster than 90% of Apple 2019 lineup :/

 

BTW gorgeous design!

 

Edited by Mark Aceto
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A huge amount of problems were caused by Mojave with many apps. A lot of this was due to changes in the graphics APIs, many due to OpenGL support or lack of it. Many of us involved in app development had similar problems to VW.

 

I don't think that excuses VW entirely though. If I was VW I would not time my annual release to be exactly when the Mac OS was released. They could have seen from the Mojave betas that there were going to be problems and alerted users. 

 

These days, there's a lot of nonsense talked about 'Pro' users… I mean, who apart from a politician would be a 'Pro' phone users. Nevertheless, many of us depend on software like VW for our income and it shows a lack of understand and respect for their user base to dump known buggy software onto the market. It reminds me of……… MS Word 3.01.

 

On the other hand, we've tested our apps with Catalina and there appear to be far less problems… well none so far as we can see. That being said, I'm not going to rush to upgrade because I am sure there are lots of 32 bit things I use on a regular basis.

 

D

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1 hour ago, Robin Mair said:

I would love to unsubscribe from this thread but unfortunately, there does not appear to be away to do it. When clicking on the link in the email that is sent out you end up on a 404 page!

That 404 page should be sent to Vw @JuanP, but if you click on the ‘Follow’ link at the top right of this page, it should give you a button to ‘Unfollow’ this thread.

HTH.

 

1D12DDE0-317A-41DB-B820-797F3F1F6BB6.jpeg

Edited by rDesign
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On 9/11/2019 at 7:19 AM, Christiaan said:

 

P.S. I would note that there are some small but noticeable speed issues using both v2019 and v2020 in macOS Catalina; I'm told Vectorworks are in contact with Apple working on this so hopefully it will be resolved by the time Catalina is released. Hasn't particularly slowed me down on the machine I'm using.

 

How about VW 2020 with Mojave?? Its really hard to know what versions of VW work well with the versions of Mac OSX.  We are thinking about making the move to 2020 and updating all Macs to Mojave.  

Edited by HEengineering
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Mojave and 2019 are probably as stable as it gets right now. There may be some additional tweaks and security patches, but it's moving to LTS (long term support) and we won't see new features on the platform, except in Catalina and VW2020

 

I'm running on Mojave with 19 SP5 and 20. No problems yet, but I'm also not pushing VW to its limits. If you have ane extra mac sitting around, give it a whirl and really kick the tires. Get an external drive and install the OS there if need be. There will be some performance lag, but better than finding out something critical to your business is hosed. 

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We kinda avoided 19 due to some issues with terrain modeling. We use that feature quite often.

 

Right now were running with High Sierra and 17 if you can believe that.  We sat out during all the VW19 craziness and 18 didn't really offer anything better than 18.  Crazy to think 2 new versions have gone unused for us.  We see some things we really like in 2020 tho so that is why I asked. Anyone else that is running 2020 on Mojave please share.  Thanks John!

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