Anyone have a clue on when to expect Director 9/MX

[l0ungeb0y]

This seems to be the only outstanding issue I have left with a Mac purchase, I would assume Macromedia is working on it based on this technote from their site:

Support for Director in OS X
Created: March 29, 2001

The Director 8.5 Shockwave Studio is not supported on Macintosh operating system version OS X (10). This holds true for both the standard OS X and the "Classic" mode. Authoring on this platform has proven unstable and will result in slow performance and unpredictable results.

Macromedia is actively working to resolve this outstanding issue.

This technote is over a year old however and Apple has announced that as of January 2003, their new hardware models and versions of OSX 10.3< will __not__ boot into OS9 (yay... light some fire under some arses).

I'm actually a bit suprised at the time it has taken for Macromedia to address this, with only shockwave playback, CD-ROM creation with Director seems a bit lost for the Mac
...and Director is the tool of choice for CD-ROM production. And this is a serious issue for me since I plan on doing quite a bit of work with Director+Lightwave starting around November. However, I have a gut feeling that we wont be seeing a new Director release anytime soon.

For me, this is a major issue as I was planning on dumping the G4 TiBook when Apple releases a G5 TiBook with gigawire (salivates... 64-bit native processing+Velocity Engine+massive system bandwidth=scream machine)

...so if no Director for OS X, I'll have to either wait to get into new eqpt or hold on to the G4 if I do, which sucks since I was planning on selling it to subsidize the upgrade.

Anyone here have word on this issue?
Any guys at Macromedia lurking around itching to leak a crumb of info?

Thanks.

[nucleuz]

Originally posted by l0ungeb0y

For me, this is a major issue as I was planning on dumping the G4 TiBook when Apple releases a G5 TiBook with gigawire (salivates... 64-bit native processing+Velocity Engine+massive system bandwidth=scream machine)

<me>want one badly!!!</me>

I don't have any info on the Director issue, but I'm so looking forward to the day they do put Director on OSX!!!
There have been some rumors on merging Flash and Director, but that would be the worst thing MM could do, Director is a wonderful tool that rocks (but just not on OSX....)

[SJT]

Nah, MM make so much from selling the two seperately i doubt they'll merge for a long time coming, and both are fundamentally different anyway; Flash is a vector based engine, Director a bitmap (with vectors bodged on top).

Anyway, rumour has it that the reason it's taking MM so long to release a version of Director for X is because of all the legacy classic code in it.
It pretty much needs a re-write from the ground up from what i've heard; which i believe they already did with D7, so probably aren't too happy about doing it again and are taking their time...

The person to ask is Mike Chambers, Mike, are you there? Anything you can tell us?

[l0ungeb0y]

Originally posted by SJT
Anyway, rumour has it that the reason it's taking MM so long to release a version of Director for X is because of all the legacy classic code in it.
It pretty much needs a re-write from the ground up from what i've heard; which i believe they already did with D7, so probably aren't too happy about doing it again and are taking their time...

Ya, I had that feeling... OS X is just too different a beast for such an OS dependant app such as Director.

And no... merging Flash and Director makes about as much sense as taking the engine out of a tractor and putting it in a Porsche... that would pretty much shoot Macromedia in the foot and place Adobe firmly in center stage.

But, I do expect great things from Director for OS X, especially for 3D now that OS X has native support for Open GL.

[jerryday]

I think Director is dying

[SJT]

I think you couldn't be more wrong.
It is the app for CD presentations, standalone kiosks and high control bitmap animation and always has been

[gerbick]

I think they've been reworking the workflow and possibly the programming underpinnings of Director and getting it ready for OSX, and honestly, more streamlined.

I haven't heard anything... but I would suspect an announcement before Christmas.

[SJT]

Ooh, but you could be bluffing us gerbs...what makes you say christmas hmm? Got me all excited now