Rosetta 2

[Yebubbleman]

Now that M1 Macs are out there, is there any more information of how Rosetta 2 works? Does it produce a translated app? If it does, does that mean that translated app will thereafter run without Rosetta 2? So that when Rosetta 2 is no longer included in MacOS that translated app will still run?

A few of things:

1. Rosetta 2 was detailed completely at WWDC20. Nothing new about it has surfaced other than performance benchmarks on M1 Macs.

2. Rosetta 2 does not modify the application binary itself. I'm not 100% sure as to whether the translation is stored somewhere else if it is translated at install time, but it IS part of the environment (such that Apple removing Rosetta 2 as they did with its PowerPC-to-Intel predecessor will mean that your Intel app won't be able to load).

3. While Apple did remove the original Rosetta some five and a half years after the first Intel Macs shipped, it's not guaranteed that they'll do the same as soon. They'll probably still be supporting Intel Macs in five years from now (meaning that we have even longer with Rosetta 2). Those buying the first Apple Silicon Macs will likely be considering replacements before that happens.

4. If you're worried about Rosetta 2 going away, I'd give thought to an Apple Silicon native virtual machine solution (of which Parallels and VMware have already announced plans to produce and sell) and/or dual-booting your Mac with a version of macOS that has Rosetta 2 still (down the road when it becomes more obvious that Apple is going to remove Rosetta 2 from a future macOS release).

5. Better answers to your questions exist here: https://developer.apple.com/documentation/apple_silicon/about_the_rosetta_translation_environment

 

[EugW]

Not all native apps run faster than Rosetta.

Apple M1 ARM Performance With A 2020 Mac Mini Review - Phoronix

www.phoronix.com

I’m told this is because the Intel version is heavily hand optimized, and Rosetta 2 has translated those optimizations, but the native Arm version has no optimizations at all.

 

[Birkan]

This aged like old milk.

Honestly, I was expecting more progress to be done by now. But still, so far we saw Chrome, Edge(coming soon according to official Twitter account), Slack(beta), VS Code(beta), Electron getting released for Apple Silicon systems. At least Rosetta 2 is working much better than I hoped for so it's not a big problem as of now. And it'll only get better from here on.

PS: For more comprehensive lists, check these out:

Universal and Native Apple Silicon Apps

Moderator Note: Please note you need 20 posts before you will be able to edit the wiki. --------------------- Wiki to document universal and native Apple silicon apps as they are released. Currently, IsAppleSiliconReady.com has the most comprehensive database. Another tracking site that's...

forums.macrumors.com

macOS 11 Big Sur compatibility on Apple Silicon · Issue #7857 · Homebrew/brew

Latest news on native ARM compatibility (2020-12-26) We currently have 3168 formulas bottled for Apple Silicon in homebrew-core. At this point, the table below is probably not really relevant anymo...

github.com

 

[sananda]

A few of things:

Thank you; that’s very helpful.

 

[MichaelLAX]

I guess it makes sense that Apple is going the Rosetta route again, this time with version 2.

I hope it’s less buggy than applications were under the original Rosetta, but I’m not optimistic. Nonetheless, I’m still thinking this transition will be smoother than the first one...

Which apps ran buggy for you in the original Rosetta?

Why do you say the original Rosetta transition was not smooth?

I thought that the original transparent operation of Rosetta somewhat miraculous!

I still reboot into Snow Leopard on my 2011 Mac mini (or in Parallels) as needed to access Rosetta.

 

[MichaelLAX]

Rosetta 1 lasted 4 years, IIRC. Snow Leopard in 2009 killed it.

Lion killed Rosetta 1 and I still reboot into my Snow Leopard partition on my 2011 Mac mini (or boot it in Parallels), as needed to access Rosetta.

 

[EugW]

Which apps ran buggy for you in the original Rosetta?

Why do you say the original Rosetta transition was not smooth?

I thought that the original transparent operation of Rosetta somewhat miraculous!

I still reboot into Snow Leopard on my 2011 Mac mini (or in Parallels) as needed to access Rosetta.

Rosetta 1 was impressive, but still pretty buggy with more complex applications. For example, Photoshop was pretty glitchy for me and I didn’t even use it much.

 

[MichaelLAX]

I used to advise Aldus Freehand users on how to maintain Snow Leopard on post-2011 Macs so that they could access their libraries. Rosetta was their only hope!

Adobe kept upgrading Photoshop to work with post-Snow Leopard Mac OS's so that there was no real need to run Photoshop using Rosetta by just buying a more modern Mac.

 

[dhazeghi]

I used to advise Aldus Freehand users on how to maintain Snow Leopard on post-2011 Macs so that they could access their libraries. Rosetta was their only hope!

That's pretty impressive given that Aldus ceased to exist in 1994! But Macromedia etc. kept Freehand alive for a good while after.

Adobe kept upgrading Photoshop to work with post-Snow Leopard Mac OS's so that there was no real need to run Photoshop using Rosetta by just buying a more modern Mac.

The problem now is that you can no longer buy Photoshop, you can only rent it. And the last 'perpetual' version of Photoshop is not compatible with Rosetta 2 (some 32-bit pieces).

 

[MichaelLAX]

My comment was about the robustness of Rosetta 1 not 2, and yes, my memory slipped about the publisher of Freehand and those who needed Rosetta 1 to continue to access their library of Freehand files, for which there appears to be no conversion to any other "modern" similar program

To help with your Photoshop problem, which is the latest version of OS X that will run the purchased copy of Photoshop and install that OS X version in Parallels and continue to run it there.

That is the modern day solution for running PPC programs: Run Snow Leopard (Server) in Parallels and continue to operate most PPC software there.

 

[dhazeghi]

My comment was about the robustness of Rosetta 1 not 2, and yes, my memory slipped about the publisher of Freehand and those who needed Rosetta 1 to continue to access their library of Freehand files, for which there appears to be no conversion to any other "modern" similar program

To help with your Photoshop problem, which is the latest version of OS X that will run the purchased copy of Photoshop and install that OS X version in Parallels and continue to run it there.

That is the modern day solution for running PPC programs: Run Snow Leopard (Server) in Parallels and continue to operate most PPC software there.

It's a reasonable solution (though lack of accelerated graphics is annoying) for PPC.

Point is we don't have that luxury for 32-bit Intel applications. Neither Rosettas will do the trick, so no option for non-rental Photoshop (or really Lightroom) on an ARM Mac.

 

[MichaelLAX]

I am not a graphics designer and have used Photoshop sparceley over the years, but when MacWorld offered me a copy of Adobe Photoshop Elements 2020 for a deep discount, I purchased it and installed it in my High Sierra Mac mini. I don't think it requires any rental fees.