[geeks] More Fun with Leopard

[Michael Parson]

On Thu, 14 Feb 2008, Mark wrote:

> On 13 Feb 2008, at 23:09, Jonathan C. Patschke wrote:
>
>> 10.5.2 fixed almost all of my X11 complaints.  The system deals
>> with monitor detach/attach events as gracefully as 10.4 did.  X11
>> doesn't drop/regain focus nearly as often as before (once or twice
>> a day instead of once every 5 or 6 minutes).  X11 window management
>> is actually sane now--I don't have windows getting stuck under the
>> menubar anymore.
>
> And how much of it was documented in the patch notes? Non...

I've been on the x11-users list pretty much since 10.5 came out.  The
core developers read and post there, a lot of progress has been made.
There was a lot of pain that revolved around moving X11 to be managed by
launchd (a decision I'm still not 100% convinced was the right way to
do it), and moving from XFree86 code to X.org.  The 'current' version
distributed on macosforge.org is 2.1.3-a10, the version shipped in the
10.5.2 update was 2.1.1.  The X11 that shipped with 10.5 was horrible
and bordered on unusable, 2.1.3-a10 hasn't given me any headaches yet,
but I've only been running on this latest binary for a day or so.

<snip>

> Does anyone know if Parallels is working A-OK in 10.5? I haven't got
> around to re-installing it yet to try it since I put Leopard on (shows
> how much I need Windows in a VM :P). I haven't heard anything dire
> Re: Parallels...

I use Parallels pretty heavily every day, running Windows (2000, XP,
and 2003), Linux (mostly RH FC 8), and Solaris 10.  It's been pretty
painless.

> Still - non of that conjecture helps you, and I would roll back too.
>
>> I have a growing pile of Win32 code I absolutely -have- to churn out
>> today, and Apple's extended beta-test program that they seem to call
>> a production release isn't helping me shrink it.
>
> You'll be unsurprised to know I haven't installed 10.5.2 yet, I'm
> still on my customary '1-week hold for issues' cycle atm. I'd suggest
> to anyone else running Mac OS X that this is a very good policy,
> Apple's reputation is far from solid with releasing OS X updates. I
> believe 10.5.1 went up, then down, then up, then down again and then
> re-appeared as 10.5.1 version 1.1 before it settled down. I could
> use a lot of expletives at this point, but Brother Bradford would
> probably kick my ass ;) Like I said above though, the VMWare issue
> doesn't sound to be totally Apple's fault. Blame could in this case be
> split evenly at the very least, it's been obvious from your previous
> machinations that 10.5.x and VMWare have fundamental issues working
> together.
>
> If you are using anything, other than a Mac Pro, with Firewire then a
> Carbon Copy Clone onto an external disk, then wipe and install on your
> internal is your best bet. Mac Pro solution is just throw another SATA
> disk in and install 10.4.11 on that.

For the record, this is all on a Macbook w/2 GHz C2D & 2 gigs of ram,
the VMs are installed on an external 2.5" firewire drive.  This was also
a 10.4.10 -> 10.5 upgrade system, I didn't do the format->install route.

-- 
Michael Parson
mparson at bl.org