By Chuck Moozakis
Editor-in-Chief

Newspaper production executives are casting a wary eye on Apple Computer Inc.’s decision to amass its technical and marketing support around Mac OS X — possibly at the expense of prior OS releases.

Apple last summer said new machines sold after Jan. 1, 2003 would only boot into OS X as the start-up operating system, although the machines would retain the ability to run most Mac OS 9x applications through OS X’s “Classic” mode.

Apple last month slightly modified that hard-line stance, announcing it would allow certain models of its current product line to boot up OS 9 through June 2003. That concession, aimed primarily at the educational market, also includes a single high-end Power Macintosh model suitable for design professionals, Apple said.

“To accommodate a minority of our professional customers still running [certain] Mac OS 9 applications, Apple will continue to offer a 1.25 gigahertz dual processor Power Mac that will boot into Mac OS 9 until June 30, 2003,” a spokesman said.

Worries continue

Despite Apple’s shift, newspaper production managers and designers continue to worry that Apple will ultimately abandon support for any OS other than X, leaving them in a precarious position.

Equally worrisome: Key vendors such as Quark Inc. have yet to publicly broadcast when — or if — they will release OS X-native versions of their software.

“Apple’s desire to move over to OS 10.2 is understandable as it is a superior operating system and offers a great number of features relating to security, desktop management and software distribution,” said Allan Marshall, group technology director at Associated Newspapers in the United Kingdom. But, he added, “the planned removal of previous versions of the operating system by January 2003 is too soon.”

Playing close to vest

Apple declined to comment on any plans it may have to end technical support of earlier versions of its OS.

“Apple doesn’t comment on rumor,” said a corporate spokesman. “Classic is the best way Apple can support those applications that are not native to Mac OS X while we make the transition.”

Apple said all new Macs sold since January 2002 have had Mac OS X factory-set as the default operating system. The company estimates there are more than 5 million OS X users today — more than 20 percent of its installed base.

Apple’s move to force users to upgrade to OS X comes as the vendor continues to battle dwindling market share. According to Framingham, Mass.-based research firm IDC, Apple’s share of the client-server market has shrunk by more than half — from 6 percent to 3 percent — within the last five years. And while Apple still maintains a solid niche among print production users, that chokehold might weaken if users find more flexibility and less expensive software from other vendors.

“Apple may be relying on its friends in the media to be the foundation of their business while they try to [attract new customers],” said Dan Kusnetzky, IDC’s vice president of system software research.

But that strategy could backfire, he said, particularly if Microsoft and developers of the open Linux OS move aggressively to add new customers.

“Apple’s strategy has always been to compete on the basis of its unique higher value. But as that value begins to be available elsewhere the Apple model is more difficult to support,” he said.

Kusnetzky said the technological superiority of Unix-based OS X — which he labeled “very powerful and very secure” — might not be a strong enough lure to overcome the objections of business managers who now control the purse strings at many newspaper headquarters.

The drive to upgrade

Software developers are always trying to entice their users to upgrade to more current versions. What varies is how long vendors will support previously released offerings. Microsoft, for example, is still supporting 1996-vintage NT server software, although the vendor recently notified information technology managers that support for NT will end in late 2003.

What troubles users about Apple’s announcement is that it’s still unclear how long the company will support 9x and earlier versions.

“Apple said 9 is dead,” said one industry executive who attended Apple’s worldwide developers conference last year. “There will be some support for education, but for the enterprise, there will no longer be support.”

If indeed, Apple abandons support of 9x versions, users will have to quickly develop alternative plans — either to upgrade all software and hardware to OS X or, if feasible, to begin examining rival platforms such as Windows or Linux.

Without support, users will no longer receive technical help over the phone. More troubling, some users could even run into legal liabilities running unsupported software.

The uncertainty over what Apple plans to do is particularly troubling to newspaper publishers, analysts say.

“Newspapers are so deadline-intensive it’s difficult to find time to re-engineer workflows,” said Dominick D’Acquisto, a Wisconsin-based independent analyst and consultant.

One of D’Acquisto’s newspaper clients is reassessing its plans to buy new Macintosh workstations in light of Apple’s announcement.

“They budgeted to buy eight workstations and planned to transfer their software to the new boxes,” he said. “Now, they can’t do it.” That may result in the publication eliminating any purchase of Macintosh equipment.

“This is where Apple may be cutting its nose to spite its face,” he said.

The Quark conundrum

Meantime, users are waiting to see what Quark intends to do with future versions of QuarkXPress. The Denver-based vendor still dominates the electronic pagination marketplace and has thus far neutralized Adobe Systems Inc.’s efforts to knock it off its perch. But Adobe’s InDesign and InCopy applications are OS X compliant, while Quark has yet to issue a firm timetable regarding when it will release an OS X version of QuarkXPress.

“We are working on a native Mac OS X version of QuarkXPress,” said Glen Turpin, Quark’s communications manager, adding that much of what’s been published about Quark’s allegedly deteriorating relationship with Apple is “flat out wrong.”

Turpin said the version, QuarkXPress 6, “is far along in its development cycle, but there is still a lot more testing to do before we release it.”

Companion applications, meanwhile, such as the word processing offering QuarkCopyDesk, will also be upgraded to run on OS X, Turpin said. But Quark has yet to determine whether its Quark Publishing System server offering, QuarkDispatch, will be upgraded.

“Keep in mind that QuarkXPress 5 will run in the Classic environment under OS X,” Turpin said. “Many users report even better performance in Classic than in OS 9 itself.”

Still has faith

Despite the potential for turmoil, some newspaper executives downplay any problems.

“I have a lot of faith in Apple’s management and they don’t do these things lightly,” said Andy Ritchie, vice president of production at The (Toronto) Globe and Mail. “One reason they made this move is because it’s needed,” he said, to force users to move quickly.

Ritchie said OS X’s architecture should prove attractive to users.

“It’s a good system and seems to be very compatible and well thought out,” he said.

Ritchie expects suppliers such as Quark and Baseview to move quickly to make all of their offerings run on OS X.

“We want them to come to the table, and we expect they will,” he said.

Still, Ritchie is hedging his bets. He said The Globe and Mail (daily, 317,138; Saturday, 401,287) recently purchased copies of InDesign to run with its CCI Europe editorial system.

“We pushed that because Adobe does seem to be more adaptable,” he said.

Marshall at Associated Newspapers, meanwhile, said the publisher has replaced and standardized all of its Macintosh desktops to G4s, running OS 9.2.

“This provides continued stability for the current editorial and publishing system,” he said. “We cannot make a decision to upgrade the OS or move to an alternative publishing system within the time scales released by Apple.”