Snow Leopard (OSX 10.6), Shockwave, and Director
September 2nd, 2009
Apple has released the latest version of their operating system which is commonly referred to as Snow Leopard (OSX 10.6). What does this mean to users that want to see Shockwave-based content? What does this mean to those that author with Director MX 2004 or newer? What does this mean for projectors from Director MX 2004, 11, or 11.5?
Here is the scoop based on my observations.
For Shockwave things will run fine if you run in 32-bit mode in Safari. To do that you can select the Safari icon and Get Info. Then select 32-bit mode. You can read that in greater detail on this ExploreLearning blog post.
Safari in 32-bit mode
For authoring I’ve tested Director 11.5 and have not noticed any problems. However, Director MX 2004 is a different story. For some strange reason it is one of just seven programs in the entire world that are restricted from opening by Apple and the new operating system (read the Apple Technote). Out of all the programs in the world, what on Earth does Director MX 2004 do on a computer that causes Apple to ban the app?
Director MX 2004 Restricted!
Somewhere Apple is storing information that causes this message to appear. If anyone knows where that is I’d love to know 🙂 I tried opening the Director MX 2004 package and changed the CFBundleIdentifier in the info.plist from 2004 to 2005 just to see what would happen. When I did that the program began to launch, the icon would bounce in the dock a few times, and then it would crash. I got the standard crash message at this point where I could report it to Apple or cancel. I canceled. I edited the info.plist once again and set it back to 2004. At this point it would always crash and I wouldn’t get the “restricted” message again. I’d say I broke something. Oh well…seems at this point it is impossible to run Dir MX 2004 on Snow Leopard.
For older projectors (that could run under 10.5 with Rosetta) things are both good and bad. The projectors will still run, but unfortunately Apple has decided that Rosetta is an optional installation now, so it doesn’t get installed by default. When I tried to launch a projector I got a message that Rosetta was needed.
Rosetta Needed Message
I agreed to install it and the 2 meg download took place. The next time I launched the projector it worked normally.
Rosetta Download
You must always remember that the first time you launch something that needs Rosetta it will take 15 or more seconds. On subsequent launches it will just take a few seconds.
Projectors created with Director 11+ will run as expected without Rosetta.
I’m still shocked that Director MX 2004 is one of just seven apps that are officially restricted by Apple. I basically use the older version of Director all the time to edit older content that I don’t want the files to have to be updated with the new unicode text. I guess I’ll now have to keep one computer running 10.5. I’m bummed. If anyone does find a way to get MX 2004 running on 10.6, please drop me a line.
Update: I forgot to mention the Shockwave installation issue. When I tried to install Shockwave I got the following message saying that it only works on 10.4 and 10.5. I clicked OK and then ran the installer. It properly installed the plugin. On the other hand, the uninstaller seemed to run for a long time and not really do anything. I waited about five minutes and then force quit it, so not entirely sure if it was doing anything or not.
Shockwave Install warning message on Snow Leopard.
Entry Filed under: Adobe,Apple,Director 10,Director 11,OSX Leopard,Quick answer,Shockwave
12 Comments Add your own
1. Daevad | September 3rd, 2009 at 8:39 am
FYI – I just attempted to run the Shockwave player installer on OS X 10.6 and the installer will not run, says it only installs on OS X 10.4/10.5
2. Raman | September 3rd, 2009 at 9:25 am
Oh yeah, I forgot about that issue. I just ignored the message, ran it again, and the installation did work. I also used the the full installer (not sure if that makes any difference).
3. bpds | September 10th, 2009 at 11:21 am
Very curiously DIRECTOR MX runs correctly on Snow Leopard, while DIRECTOR MX 2004 does not.
4. Sanjiv Malkan | September 15th, 2009 at 11:00 pm
Director 11.5 is terrible. I converted files from 8 to 11.5 and nothing seems to work. The sound drops from one movie to another. I transferred files to my server but html does not load the dcr files.
5. valentin | September 22nd, 2009 at 5:31 pm
“what on Earth does Director MX 2004 do on a computer that causes Apple to ban the app?”
I don’t think it’s a ban, but for some reason DMX2004 just doesn’t run in 10.6. You can test this yourself, just change the application name inside in info.plist inside the director mx 2004.app, then director isn’t blocked anymore, it starts to load, but then crashes immediately. So the question is rather: what on earth did the developers of Director MX 2004 do to create an app that crashes, while all those other old ppc apps work just fine?
6. Director @ Night » &hellip | November 3rd, 2009 at 6:17 pm
[…] This is definitely friendlier than the prior message. […]
7. Xavier Flores | February 15th, 2010 at 12:00 pm
I have the same problem. I work on the mx 2004 version. If u find the way, please drop a line
8. Adam Crute | April 1st, 2010 at 12:09 pm
I’m getting mighty annoyed at this same problem. For all the talk of Director 11.5’s all-new unicode text engine it’s utter rubbish! Embedded fonts don’t render properly and the antialiasing sucks. You end up with text that looks almost entirely, but not completely, unlike what you intended.
Worse still, but bringing in this new text engine Adobe have, at a stroke, rendered 90% of Xtras unusable – I’ve lost access to some exceptionally useful (not to mention expensive) Xtras, and there’s little chance of them being updated because the developers have long-since shut-up shop.
It’s all very frustrating!
9. Frank | May 8th, 2010 at 6:54 pm
Ehm I’m running MX v9 fine under 10.6.3.
BUT my downloaded 11.5 trial is crashing constantly!
I want to try out Unifeye therefor I need D11.
But D11.5 crashes even before I start it, just hitting rewind. This is sad. I have to move to a PC, I guess.
10. Mark Larson | May 11th, 2010 at 4:44 pm
11.5 crashes on me about once every 45 minutes. This is the worst product Adobe has ever produced.
11. Raman | May 11th, 2010 at 9:07 pm
I haven’t really noticed many crashes running Director 11.5 with OSX 10.6.
Is it crashing when you try to edit/update older movies or just when working on new movies? If your movie includes embedded fonts, 3rd party Xtras, or anything along those lines you might have to make some changes to prevent the crash.
12. jorge | August 17th, 2010 at 1:34 pm
i have a trial on adobe director 11.5 with my mac os x 10.6 and i cant publish it on a windows or mac projector and a message appears about missing plug-in. please help me
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