Do we need a list of apps incompatible with Rosetta?

[dasjati]

I use ScreenFlow a lot for screencasts, but also for general video editing. I just discovered this on their website:

We are actively updating ScreenFlow to be compatible with the new Apple Silicon hardware. The completion of this work depends on several of our integrated partners updating their applications as well.

At this time, ScreenFlow does not work under Rosetta emulation. If ScreenFlow is a critical application, we recommend holding off on transitioning to the new Apple Silicon hardware until we have a more concrete release date.

 

[chabig]

There is a good internet list, which is crowdsourced. Also, Rosetta is not emulation. Emulation would be pretending to be an X86 processor. Rosetta is translation from X86 code to ARM code.

roaringapps.com

 

[Lucifer666]

Post to this thread I guess. As we stumble upon them. Good question.

 

[chabig]

It is a good question. I would expect very few apps to be incompatible. There are probably more apps incompatible with Big Sur than with the M1.

 

[dasjati]

Also, Rosetta is not emulation. Emulation would be pretending to be an X86 processor. Rosetta is translation from X86 code to ARM code.

I know. I just quoted from their website. And someone should also tell MacRumors, because they also keep calling it an emulation...

 

[dasjati]

It is a good question. I would expect very few apps to be incompatible. There are probably more apps incompatible with Big Sur than with the M1.

I am still on Mojave on my MBP 15, because I didn’t have the time and nerve to update

It would be perfect to have an app that just checks all installed applications...

 

[Erehy Dobon]

In principle, Apple should be the ones maintaining a list of apps incompatible with Rosetta 2.

In practice though, the reality is that the end user needs to verify that any mission critical applications they use work with Big Sur from the application developer themselves, not a third party source like a crowd-sourced list which has zero responsibility for being accurate and truthful.

Ideally one would make a clone of their Mojave boot drive to an external SSD, upgrade the latter to Big Sur and test their various applications before deciding when to pull the trigger.

I have done this with every single release of macOS Catalina and I never found any convincing reason to upgrade my Mac mini 2018's internal system drive to Crapalina. It remains on Mojave today.

Note that a few years ago, I used to be a user who would upgrade to the major new macOS within a day or two of release. With their now p--- poor software QA, Apple has squandered my trust.