If you could bring back classic Mac OS software, what would it be?

[Phipli]

They did release some of their stuff for OS X, but support wasn't maintained and I don't believe they released any 64-bit binaries of their apps? Stuff like Bubble Trouble X can't run on modern macOS since Apple removed support for running 32-bit binaries.

I... Think the / one of the Devs for bubble trouble lived in my town growing up. At least, I was lead to believe based on mutual acquaintances and the names line up and other incidental evidence like they were where lots of the hacked software came from

 

[joshc]

Control Panel (System 6 version)

the modern macOS control panel is a lot closer to this than it's ever been, there's just... a lot more settings these days.

ResEdit, too.

GitHub - andrews05/ResForge: Resource editor for macOS

Resource editor for macOS. Contribute to andrews05/ResForge development by creating an account on GitHub.

github.com

 

[Juror22]

Snial (WindowShade) and LaPorta (Stable, Unbloated, Simple Mac OS) took both of my wishes!

 

[mikes-macs]

You can play it on modern macOS, see this: https://stratagus.com/

Thanks for the tip. I'll check this out.

People mentioning multi-platform games: most of these it's easier to run them on Windows.

I won't run Windows in my house.

 

[adespoton]

multi-platform games:
Strategic Conquest
NetRisk
NetTrek
Spectre (pretty much all of them)
Bolo

Those are the ones that I'd like to have playable off the top of my head. Of course, most of them already have equivalents or are network playable under emulation.

 

[aladds]

Not quite the same. Today’s macOS is a kludge of useless bloat. I prefer the cleaner OS 9 and below interface.

Haiku is probably the closest modern OS which has the cleanliness of OS 9 yet the stability and feature set we have come to expect. I'd argue it's very nearly usable as a daily OS now, too

 

[VMSZealot]

Well, I'm happy with OpenType fonts today, but I'd really love a built-in font editor again. A real one, that could do splines, kerning, ligatures, etc.
So maybe a Mac version of Fontographer? It used to exist, now Fontographer and FontLab are Windows-only :\

Are you sure about that? FontLab looks like a Mac app to me… https://www.fontlab.com/font-editor/fontlab/

That said, one of the reasons I keep an old Mac(s) (other than because I like them) is that, back in the nineties, I bought a Microtek scanner and it came with a bundle of software. One of those packages was Fontographer. I'm too cheap to buy a new license, so when I design a typeface for some software I'm writing, I do it on my LC475 or SE/30. How many modern Mac and iOS apps can claim to have be partially developed on hardware more than 30 years old!?

See that Segment typeface? Made with Fontographer on 68k! (the game is Innecto Everywhere - not released just yet - and that's the Intel / Silicon macOS version. The 68k version is discussed elsewhere on this forum, and (currently) uses an obscene 64k of memory - is that low enough to run on a 128k Mac I wonder? And, if it is, I wonder if the app built by Think C is compatible with ancient versions of System? I'll keep you posted…)

 

[luRaichu]

I won't run Windows in my house.

UNIX bigot...

 

[joshc]

I won't run Windows in my house.

ok

 

[ObeyDaleks]

Spaceward Ho was my Fav game from back then, still play on occasion. Wish the source code could be had.

I played the s**t out of Spaceward Ho! on my SE/30 in the early 90s. Probably my 3rd most hours spent back then after Curse of Azure Bonds and Pool of Radiance.

 

[s_pupp]

WriteNow for word processor
ColorIt 4 (better yet would be Enhance 4) for graphics
Microsoft QuickBasic for programming
Cricketgraph for graphing
Microsoft Multiplan for spreadsheet

I agree 100% with LaPorta’s comments regarding OSX, and it’s only getting worse with time.

 

[Juror22]

UNIX bigot...

You betcha!

...a chance to trot out one of my favorites from Scott Adams.

 

[CC_333]

TextEdit is close enough to SimpleText...

I'd like to see the ability to customize the OS return. Seems like, as OS X got older, Apple removed the ability to do such. As an example, there used to be the CandyBar app. Used that to hack in the classic rainbow Apple menu icon on 10.4.11. Also reset the menu font to Chicago 12, etc. With my original MacBook, I was able to hack 10.6.8 to have the old aqua Apple menu icon.
View attachment 95175

Haha, there's a thread posted by me in that screenshot ("Considering Switch To T-Mobile. Opinions?")

I'll agree that I would like to see AppleWorks again. While AW 5 is my favorite version, but 6 would do just as well (plus, with it having already been carbonized, refactoring it for Intel would probably be somewhat easier, I would think).

I've tried iWork, and it's just not the same.

c

 

[Snial]

I won't run Windows in my house.

This is mostly true for me too, being of the 1984-Big Brother ad era of Mac user, I strongly advocate Macs and try to avoid using Windows. I've never bought a PC; and the 3 hand-me-down PCs that have come my way have been turned into Linux PCs. Unfortunately, nearly all my workplaces have been totalitarian PC environments, which means I've had to bring Windows PCs into the house from time to time - I must confess, @luRaichu , I am one of those 'bigots' in this regard! However, my one bit of hypocrisy is that I have a bonafide copy of SoftWindows 3.1 running on my PowerBook1400/166, with a copy of Turbo C++ 4.5, IAR C for the H8, and ClarisWorks 1.0 (to bring it back to the main thread). It's a bit of a giggle!

 

[VMSZealot]

CC_333 - Carbon is no longer supported, and even the nibs (UI definition XMLs) won't work anymore. It would be easier to rewrite from scratch. The route I'd take would be to reimplement MacWrite, write a reasonable simple spreadsheet, a simple flat file (early) version of FileMaker, a reimplementation of MacDraw and MacPaint 2, and then look at integrating them later. It wouldn't be a simple job.

 

[volvo242gt]

Haha, there's a thread posted by me in that screenshot ("Considering Switch To T-Mobile. Opinions?")

I'll agree that I would like to see AppleWorks again. While AW 5 is my favorite version, but 6 would do just as well (plus, with it having already been carbonized, refactoring it for Intel would probably be somewhat easier, I would think).

I've tried iWork, and it's just not the same.

c

lol, yep. Was wondering if you'd notice...

 

[robin-fo]

Carbon is no longer supported, and even the nibs (UI definition XMLs) won't work anymore.

Probably AppleWorks still used Resources and not NIBs, even after it was Carbonized.

 

[Snial]

CC_333 - Carbon is no longer supported, and even the nibs (UI definition XMLs) won't work anymore. It would be easier to rewrite from scratch. The route I'd take would be to reimplement MacWrite, write a reasonable simple spreadsheet, a simple flat file (early) version of FileMaker, a reimplementation of MacDraw and MacPaint 2, and then look at integrating them later. It wouldn't be a simple job.

There's a massive temptation for developers to begin with a contemporary wish list of functionality and then spend years and years in Alpha & Beta while their project goals shift to meet moving targets.

Instead, I figure the 'easiest' way to approach this, IMHO (and here I'm assuming that we're aiming for applications that can be compiled for both macOS and System 6-7), is to start by defining the size of the application we'd end up with under classic Mac OS. This limits the functionality and the development effort.

For example, the word processor. I'd implement the functionality and style of WriteNow 2.0, since it really is so much better than MacWrite, but not much bigger. WriteNow 2.0 was 100kB (of assembler), so a 'C' version with a decent compiler would probably have been about 150kB, which is 15k lines of code. At 50 lines/day, that's a developer year's worth of effort.

The same applies to all the other basic applications. Pick an application size first, that's comparable with the era we're targeting, and implement that. Once that's done, add functionality just like it was done originally (except we have the benefit of hindsight).