FlexRadio and Apple OSx

Peter Bentley

I know this question has been asked several times before, but an update from the FlexRadio management would be helpful.

The Windows operating systems are under increasing attack worldwide.

We know OSx is not totally immune but its a whole lot more secure and it works reliably most of the time.

I know more and more people in the U.K. are abandoning Microsoft and loving the move to Apple.

I would be very happy to pay FlexRadio for an OSx version of SmartSDR, and I am sure I am not alone worldwide....

Flex management.

What is the possibility of this software becoming available from FlexRadio and roughly when??

Apple is not going to go away soon...

Thank you

G4BIM

Ron W4RDM

Peter,
 How about this https://www.dogparksoftware.com/dogparkSDR.html
Looks like they have a try before you buy.

73,
Ron W4RDM

Steve G1XOW

No thanks. I wouldn't switch to an Apple machine even if you gave me one.

Ken - NM9P

There are many users of Dogpark for Apple. Reports have been good.

Alex_KM5YT

Amen to this reminder.  Apple now ASAP -- and LINUX soonest possible afterwards.  I - a retired systems and security admin. - recently went to Apple and while I appreciate (some aspects of) the (~openness and) configurability of Windoze, I use it less and less for daily chores.

Jim Gilliam

A better solution is the make the Flex a standalone that will work regardless of the OS.

Jim, K6QE

Ken Hansen

"The Windows operating systems are under increasing attack worldwide." Both OSes are under attack roughly in proportion to their end-user market share. "We know OSx is not totally immune but its a whole lot more secure and it works reliably most of the time." The way to avoid last week's ransomware attack, was to have a March 2017 Microsoft patch installed, the machines patched to that level were immune to the attack. Windows is stable enough for literally millions of businesses around the world to rely on it 24x7. OS X clearly has it's merits, but it's high cost of ownership has kept it's market share very low. Support of the OS X platform would require a near doubling of the development and testing teams Flex currently has supporting Windows. The iOS app demonstrates that a quality program can find commercial success independent of the Manufacturer.

Ken Hansen

Check the website, 'M' stands for 'Maestro glued to the front'... of course, the Maestro is (I believe) running Windows on a built-in tablet....

Ken Hansen

Native support for Linux would require a near doubling of the Dev/test staff, as would natively supporting OS X. Natively supporting all three would require a near-tripling of the current dev/test team.

Steve K9ZW

Not exactly. The front is all new on the M models. May still be windows inside but hardware architecture appears completely different than the Maestro. 73 Steve K9ZW

Bob K8RC

G4BIM:  90% of the world rejects your premise.

As of April 2017 there are more desktops still using Win XP than are using OS X.

https://www.netmarketshare.com/operating-system-market-share.aspx?qprid=10&qpcustomd=0

Ken Hansen

Please define "completely" different.

Maestro:


Flex-6400M:
To be clear, there is absolutely NOTHING wrong with Flex simply bolting a maestro on the front of a radio, it's a very logical thing for them to do, but it isn't completely different - at least they used the same knobs, faceplate, and software, they may have replaced the tablet with an x86 motherboard and display panel.

Peter Bentley

90% of the world rejects your premise

Well Bob Craig, that is a pretty dumb unintelligent comment....

For a Company that apparently has only 10 per cent of the world market, 250 billion IN THE BANK is not a bad effort, what are they doing wrong ???

Best wishes

Ken Hansen

Ignoring the business market and selling over-priced hardware manufactured in modern-day sweat shops. They are making a fortune off the backs of musicians and game designers thru the iTunes Store - not computer sales. Oh, and cellphones.

Bob K8RC

Peter...

Ken says it all about the source of Apple's success.

If you'll actually READ the link I posted, that 90% of the world is using WINDOWS variants ALL of which run SmartSDR.

And it was awfully nice of you to go personal.

I rejected your premise. I didn't attack YOU.

Peter Bentley

Oh and by the way Bob and Ken, since you are good at quoting statistics.

Tell me how many people worldwide have given up on Microsoft and bought Apple iPads and Applemacs and Apple laptops and then rejected them and gone back to Windows ???

Now that really would be interesting.

Quality and reliability always commands a premium.

Just look at FlexRadio...!!!

Bob K8RC

My XYL, for one.

Ken Hansen

Peter, you've put forth a request for SmartSDR on a totally new platform, and I simply put forth actual reasons why such a decision may not go your preferred direction. If SmartSDR was originally released on OS X, it would have been a limiting factor, and a large number of potential customers would likely balk and needing to buy a different computer to support their new radio. Since it was instead released on Windows, there are a number of potential buyers that balk, but that is a much smaller number of potential buyers. If you would notice, I never once argued against Apple Technology, I pointed out the high cost of their computers and the source of their quarter billion dollars in the bank (iTunes), you have chosen to start ad hominum attacks against people citing facts. We're done.

Doug Hall

Peter,

I'm one who has largely given up on Mac OS X. Or MacOS as they now call it. I started using it in 2001 with 10.0 and have purchased a dozen different Macs (desktops and laptops) for myself and my family since then. I have written Mac applications and used the Mac extensively for video editing and photo management. But in recent years Apple has made it clear (at least to me) that I am not an important customer to them. iOS is what Apple cares about, and they make a lot of money on it. Good for them. But I'm not buying anymore Apple computers.

If I owned Flex I would not invest in MacOS development because I don't think the investment would be recovered.

73,
Doug K4DSP

Andrew Holman2

Not entirely true (from a financial level). Leveraging a language that would allow cross OS support would be good. There is also the opportunity to leverage open source and allow the community to build and maintain the software, make improvements, find security holes etc., all while not paying them a dime.  The doubling of staff would be mostly in trying to maintain a hardware and software engineering team.  I had thought about building a platform using Electron and NodeJS that would work on Linux, Mac and Windows and be a common interface, problem was I was too lazy to write the entire VITA-49 protocol in JS.

Ken Hansen

"Not entirely true" - correct, that's why I used words like 'nearly' Of course, rewriting the code base into a new language/framework could mitigate the support effort on multiple platforms, but the initial rewrite would be a massive, massive effort.

Mike VE3CKO

Put it this way, if Flex introduced their product line on just OSx I for one would not have thought for a second to venture into Flexradio and it would be safe to say if FRS did that, they would not have sky rocketed to where they are today using the Window platform. I'm just so sick of the Apple people up there on their high pedestals telling us what we should use, cuz their solution is so much better. You have what you have and we are happy using what we have so lets just learn to live with it.

Ed Tyler

The folks in the OSX/Mac world represent a significant market.  It is a bit insulting to listen to the Flex  Windows users hammer the Mac folks that are requesting software support that would allow them to fully explore the Flex-Radio capabilities.   I use OSX.  I have been a Mac user for over 30 years.  I am not interested in buying a new computer, I want to spend my money on Radios.  The problem can be solved by encouraging aftermarket developers to develop complete solutions and then marketing them thru Flex Radio.  There might even be an extra buck to be made thru that process.

Ria

They already do this (have third party developers develop clients). This is how we have SmartSDR for iOS which is developed by Marcus, DL8MRE and the price of $50 is quite reasonable with a trial of the GUI so you can see how the experience is. The APIs are there and the rest is not too hard to figure out. The SmartSDR client can't simply be ported over because it is developed in C# and .NET. I tried WINEing it but that didn't work either. So if someone has the time and wants to make a client, they can.

That said, Windows is the dominant market and it makes sense to primarily develop for Windows. I have an iMac and Macbook pro and I wish I didn't have to use boot camp or parallels.

Ken Hansen

The folks in the OS X/Mac world represent about 8% of non-server users... iOS users account for a much, much larger proportion of users than OSX, and thus 3rd-party support found a market. Adding a platform multiplies the development/testing/support effort, I'd find it doubtful the number of hams willing to pay hundreds of dollars for an OS X client would cover the expense, let alone find an 'extra buck' from the offering. I'd be happy to be proven wrong, but the potential revenue wouldn't cover the associated costs, I suspect.

Mike va3mw

I use a Mac and Windows all day, every day.  Neither is perfect, both have significant daily issues.  Both are under attack.  

I really enjoy how I have to cold power cycle my NEW Mac everyday to get it to boot.  Every Day!

Pick your poison.

Mike va3mw

All

FlexRadio supports a perfectly amazing Mac Client developed by DogPark software out of Toronto.

Read about the 5.0 rating on eHam  http://www.eham.net/reviews/detail/12515

You can order it here.  Today.  It supports SmartLink.  Away you go!
https://www.dogparksoftware.com/dogparkSDR.html

No more whining!  LOL

Mike

KC9NRN

I love it when people post about how "immune" OSX is, when OSX got hit a few years back Apple denied it was possible or that it even happened and they ate that one big time. No OS, not even one that's embedded is immune.

Ken nailed it, market share, why go after OSX when it has such low market share, it has always had very low market share compared to Windows and the half wits that write viruses and the script kiddies that copy insert name of virus or code to create havoc have little interest in OSX.

People talk as if Windows is inherently vulnerable, of course it is when people ignore best practices and patch rarely or run free junk anti-virus (not all free ones are junk) or none at all and God only knows how many ad infused ad based games they install or software they got from a friend etc etc etc.

Apple is a closed system, they gain more stability simply because script kiddies and the like want to hit as many computers as possible, OSX isn't worth the effort to most of them. Yes it's more difficult to hit OSX, being a closed system helps.

Windows is only as stable as the person who built the computer, it's only as stable as the software installed and it's only as stable as a person uses it. 99.9% of the time I get called for a Windows issue (not counting Millennium and in some cases Vista) the issue related directly to the user using the computer or felt that rebooting was for wussies because "up time".

The response from the user "I didn't do anything, it just happened" and they never seem to pick up on the fact most times we can figure out what they did to crash their computer and this is Windows or OSX.

People who complain the most about Windows issues should probably look in the mirror for their real problem. This will not win me any popularity points but it's a cold hard fact.

Ria

MacOS is far from being a closed system. It is closed in the sense that you can only run MacOS on Apple labeled hardware with the TPM module but the system is POSIX compliant and runs a kernel based on open source. Apple also makes XCode available for free so you can write code for MacOS without even paying any money. 

KC9NRN

Peter,

Apples' bank amount has much more to do with the mobile market than the PC market. Their current crop of Pro gear is anything but. When he said market share he meant OS market share. Apple long ago realized they would never catch Microsoft in OS share and Apple closing the clone market guaranteed that position would be permanent.

The answer of course was music and phones then tablets and they can thank Steve Jobs for that, how innovative has Apple been since Steve died, not very. Late to market with wireless charging, late to market with OLED, the list goes on. They have the gall to hold back because they know the masses will show up to buy because "Apple".

I look forward to when the results of their lack of real innovation starts to show. I think without somebody like Steve Jobs they will return to the lack luster company they once were. They can only "Bank" on the current crop of gear that is barely a true upgrade. The iPhone 10 should have been the iPhone 8 but Apple wants to keep on banking on people showing up, in this case I think they were sent a message, we'll see if they pick up on it.

KC9NRN

Ed,

Apple OSX market share is around 8 to 10% , this is not a significant share and is only a tiny increase after decades. Asking a company to develop for such a small market makes zero sense. Mac users can run Windows, it runs very well on all Mac's no matter how much it's hated by Mac users.