[Lafgr8]

When will Rim realize that people w/macs need to updat their OS's on their BB's as well
Is this ever going to become a reality

[xxfire]

When will Rim realize that people w/macs need to updat their OS's on their BB's as well
Is this ever going to become a reality

I THINK it's been talked about here before lol

[ScandaLeX]

It's actually been talked about a lot & it's been rumored that RIM is working on a desktop manager for Mac. Frankly, I'll believe it when I see it.

[UncleSmurf]

So far from what I've seen here it is going to be a long time

Posted from my CrackBerry at wapforums.crackberry.com

[Pete6]

As Zrb0529 said, the real problem is the OSs themseleves.

Writing a Desktop Manager for a Mac should be fairly simple and there are a couple of programs (Missing Sync s one) for the Mac that allow syncing. Backups to the Mac need addresing too.

I do not think that OS updates on a Mac will ever happen. I have said it before and I will say it again. The task of release management for any software company is a huge one. There really is a massive amount of work to get a new product, or a revison, out the door in perfect condition. RIM's OS is no different. They have multiple OSs for multiple phone models and to make this work for a second platform would not double the work load but it would increase it considerably.

The graph below shows that Macs have slightly less than 10% of the market share


Source: Operating system market share


However about 30% of that 10% is taken up with vertical applications such as recording studios and graphics apps. So this leaves about 7% of the total market share that owns a Mac. So, how many of this remaining 7% have a BlackBerry? My guess is not that many.

On top of this, Mac sales are currently falling Apple Watch - Channel - Mac Sales Growth Falls Below PCs

Who knows what will happen to Mac sales when Windows 7 hits the market or when netbooks really start to take off? You can buy a Windows portable for $299 Dell Inspiron Mini 9 Laptop / Netbook and that is a powerful argument. Apple does not have a low priced netbook even announced today.

I say all the above to illustrate that RIM may well feel that providing OS updates on Macs may well take a back-seat when compared to launching a new phone that takes sales away from the iPhone and the G-1

A more likely scenario is that OTA OS upgrades will become the norm for all of us. Remember here that RIM does not consider the installation of beta OSs to be a valid passtime.

[Keirkhaart]

In the same way that many blackberry owners bemoan the lack of apps that iphone has, the Mac is suffering because it is deemed not big enough to warrant the work. It may get something, but not anytime soon. Just one of those extra things you need to consider when buying devices that need to be linked.
Would it be possible to write something at the Mac end that would talk to the blackberry, rather than waiting for RIM?

Posted from my CrackBerry at wapforums.crackberry.com

[Pete6]

It would be easy enough to have a Mac programmer write something but, what would they write? There is already Missing Sync for synchronising to Outlook or, whatever else is used. A utiliy to Backup the BlackBerry to an .ipd file as it used with Windows Desktop Manager would be possible and I suspect that RIM would be helpful to whomeever wrote this app.

The real problem comes with the OS which contains PC excecutable programs as well as the .cod files that form the OS to be loaded. The apps are distributed as part of each OS and I know that the apps are updates from time to time. Additionally the apps interact with files on the PC and make choices based upon the phone type and vendor. All this would need to be replicated.

Clearly this could be done but it would be quite a big development efforts for what would almost have to be a free application for the Mac.

[hagosrush]

Kudos to Pete6. RIM has been talking about this for quite a while its just that...well...we are Mac users and in the workplace Windows reigns as King of the hill. I guess that we will have to as Scandalex put it so poetically "Believe it when we see it".

Personally, I doubt that it will be anytime in the near future.

[thinkamp]

RIM seriously needs to hook up the bb mac users too!!

[Pete6]

RIM seriously needs to hook up the bb mac users too!!

You are hooked up as far as RIM is concerned. You have Missing Sync to sync your phone to the Mac and with OTA (official) OS upgrades, you can upgrade your phone.

As far as RIM is concerned, their job is pretty much done. The only missing part is the Backup which many people make much of but personally I think takes a back seat in day to day runnign to syncing to Outlook (which is what I use).

As I said earlier RIM does not consider loading and customizing beta OSs to be a valid operation. I have heard that RIM themselves make minor use internally of my programs CrackMem and CrackUtil but I do not think that they really want to support their use for official users.

Remember too that CrackBerry has 750 000 members and RIM has shipped more than 50M phones. So, in totality - PC users an' all, CrackBerry does not even constitute 2% of RIM's user base.

I have been trying to find some real sales number for PC installed base, Mac installed base and RIM non-corporate sales NUMBERS, not percentages in 2008/9. From that we could take a shot at finding out just how many Mac owners are Blackberry owners too but, I cannot find a meaningful set of numbers that I trust on Google, although I have tried hard.

I anyone has access to such numbers then please post them up so's we can try to find a number AND then you guys can hit RIM with the final number. Maybe ths will help.Of course, it could do just the opposite but let's get the numbers first.

[ScandaLeX]

You are hooked up as far as RIM is concerned. You have Missing Sync to sync your phone to the Mac and with OTA (official) OS upgrades, you can upgrade your phone.

As far as RIM is concerned, their job is pretty much done. The only missing part is the Backup which many people make much of but personally I think takes a back seat in day to day runnign to syncing to Outlook (which is what I use).

As I said earlier RIM does not consider loading and customizing beta OSs to be a valid operation. I have heard that RIM themselves make minor use internally of my programs CrackMem and CrackUtil but I do not think that they really want to support their use for official users.

Remember too that CrackBerry has 750 000 members and RIM has shipped more than 50M phones. So, in totality - PC users an' all, CrackBerry does not even constitute 2% of RIM's user base.

I have been trying to find some real sales number for PC installed base, Mac installed base and RIM non-corporate sales NUMBERS, not percentages in 2008/9. From that we could take a shot at finding out just how many Mac owners are Blackberry owners too but, I cannot find a meaningful set of numbers that I trust on Google, although I have tried hard.

I anyone has access to such numbers then please post them up so's we can try to find a number AND then you guys can hit RIM with the final number. Maybe ths will help.Of course, it could do just the opposite but let's get the numbers first.

Hooked up as far as RIM is concerned- Have ya'll read the countless threads; not just here, but throughout the internet? PocketMac & Missing Sync are the 2 applications for Mac that dont get rave reviews like Desktop Manager for WINDOWS!!

The latest release of Missing Sync is pratically useless for many that have forked over $40. Apparently there isnt a trial version; at least none that anyone has ever talked about & if they did talk about it, then I must have missed it due to it being surrounded by all the post that it doesnt work.

Can you imagine how much money Mark/Space would NOT have gotten had the users of Missing Sync known before hand that it was junk?

Support from Mark/Space has been pitiful at best. So, if this is RIMs idea of being hooked up, then all that says to Mac users is that having a windows based PC or running windows on your Mac is a must. That point alone negates the purpose for many of us who choose Macs to be away from windows.

Now I am not saying this for all the Mac running window zealots to come out of the closet & bash my opinion. All I am saying in this regard is that Mac OS is by no means some 1/2 azz system that doesnt need its own support. If I wanted to run windows on my Mac, I would have saved myself at least $1000 and gotten a much cheaper windows laptop.

Personally, I hope Apple takes over the world cause frankly, I am sick to death of having to do so much- take so many precautions with windows so that I dont end up with a virus that sends me off looking for a fix here and a fix there.

How many times does your Mac crash?

[fcortese]

One more thing that Pete6 did not add to his thorough explanation (he has done this in several other threads by the way) is the fact that the newer Macs have the capability of running Windows so you could load DM on your Mac. Some Mac-BB users got this route, others are reluctant to go any where near Windows on their Mac because, well, that's why they have a Mac! (see above^^^) So they use an old PC or one at work. So although, we Mac users would just love RIM to push out a Mac DM, the reality is that it may never happen.

[hagosrush]

That is a very good point. I am running windows via bootcamp and vmwarefusion. For me it is not that big of a problem but as fcatese pointed out RIM probably won't be goiing our route soon. Whenever someone gets a mac they take a silent vow to be unable to do certain things. For example...outlook. How hard would it have been for microsoft to port the program over? In all reality not that much but instead they created a subpar "Entourage" program that barely holds a candle to anything. Get used to this unfortunate fact but, we long time users have been without a lot for a while. And it probably will not change anytime soon even though we beat the windows users creative Genes by a 4:1 ratio. (Some of us).

Posted from my CrackBerry at wapforums.crackberry.com

[Pete6]

I am aware that Windows may now be run on the Mac hardware and I deliberately avoided saying this for two reasons:

- it seemed like a cop out to say this. You need to buy a Windows license.
- we were talking about OS updates on Macs which I took to mean OS/X

I also have no desire to start Mac wars in these forums. I have used Macs since the Apple II and know them well. However from preference, I use PCs exclusively. I just go and fix my customer's Macs when they break. Which is not much less often than the PCs do, in truth. Users can mess up a Mac just as easily as the do a PC -hehe. It's all billable.

The point here, for me, is to produce the definitive thread to which people may be pointed whenever this subject comes up in the future AND to try and find some numbers that could be possibly used to convince RIM to produce a working program for you guys.

I was unaware, until Lex said it, that Missing Sync and PocketMac were not good performing programs. I knew that they were sometimes hard to make work but, once this had been done, they stayed working.

Since this is not the case, then I have leaarned something today and something needs to be done to find a better solution if at all possible.

To do the above we need figures and we need to try and get some provable figures on just how many Mac owners are also BlackBerry users.

There are just over 1 billion (yes) PC users out there which makes roughly 100 000 000 Macs (10% of 1 000 000 000) too. Take my number of 7% in end user hands and you have 7 000 000 Macs in homes and small businesses.

How many of those people own BclackBerrys? I do not know bt if you guys can come up with a demonstrable set of figures to take to RIM then we are on the right track.

I am tired (in a nice way) of hearing this little community say "RIM has gotta do summat about Macs 'n Berrys." So, DO SUMMAT. Get some hard numbers and send 'em to RIM.

[SaraBear]

I happen to think that RIM is concerned with appealing to Mac users. After all, 7%-10% of the extraordinary number of computer users is still a VERY large number to a global product like Blackberry phones. If it were an insignificant percentage, Microsoft wouldn't have recently launched an ad campaign targeting those numbers specifically (instead of a generic growth campaign). Take it from a business person--in a super competitive market like the mobile phone field is, you don't ignore ANY market share. If enough Mac users defect and the number of Mac users continues to grow (and it is still growing, just at a slower pace), then RIM WILL do something.

I do suspect that Pete is right concerning the OS upgrades. I am sure they will be OTA in the near future, and we may never be able to use our Mac's to deal with the Blackberry OS. However I would suggest that sometime before the year is out there will be a "real" RIM tool for syncing, backing up, and installing apps. I just don't expect it until October or later. The RIM folks would have to be blind and deaf to think that Missing Sync or Pocket Mac is a viable solution.

[westcoaster]

i for one, am a mac user trying to decide whether or not to buy a bb because of the compatability problems. if there weren't any problems, there would be no hesitation to buy a bb. so to get current numbers right now of mac/bb users may be one thing, i bet a lot of mac users are holding off on buying bbs because of the problems. so if there weren't any issues, rim might see a SMALL spike in sales.

[xxfire]

Maybe we all need to email BB and ask... Tel them there is a huge demand...

I am sending a email now..

[hagosrush]

I am aware that Windows may now be run on the Mac hardware and I deliberately avoided saying this for two reasons:

- it seemed like a cop out to say this. You need to buy a Windows license.
- we were talking about OS updates on Macs which I took to mean OS/X

I also have no desire to start Mac wars in these forums. I have used Macs since the Apple II and know them well. However from preference, I use PCs exclusively. I just go and fix my customer's Macs when they break. Which is not much less often than the PCs do, in truth. Users can mess up a Mac just as easily as the do a PC -hehe. It's all billable.

The point here, for me, is to produce the definitive thread to which people may be pointed whenever this subject comes up in the future AND to try and find some numbers that could be possibly used to convince RIM to produce a working program for you guys.

I was unaware, until Lex said it, that Missing Sync and PocketMac were not good performing programs. I knew that they were sometimes hard to make work but, once this had been done, they stayed working.

Since this is not the case, then I have leaarned something today and something needs to be done to find a better solution if at all possible.

To do the above we need figures and we need to try and get some provable figures on just how many Mac owners are also BlackBerry users.

There are just over 1 billion (yes) PC users out there which makes roughly 100 000 000 Macs (10% of 1 000 000 000) too. Take my number of 7% in end user hands and you have 7 000 000 Macs in homes and small businesses.

How many of those people own BclackBerrys? I do not know bt if you guys can come up with a demonstrable set of figures to take to RIM then we are on the right track.

I am tired (in a nice way) of hearing this little community say "RIM has gotta do summat about Macs 'n Berrys." So, DO SUMMAT. Get some hard numbers and send 'em to RIM.

...what he said

[Blue Shift]

There are just over 1 billion (yes) PC users out there which makes roughly 100 000 000 Macs (10% of 1 000 000 000) too. Take my number of 7% in end user hands and you have 7 000 000 Macs in homes and small businesses.

How many of those people own BclackBerrys? I do not know bt if you guys can come up with a demonstrable set of figures to take to RIM then we are on the right track.

I am tired (in a nice way) of hearing this little community say "RIM has gotta do summat about Macs 'n Berrys." So, DO SUMMAT. Get some hard numbers and send 'em to RIM.

You've made, and continue to make some seriously dubious assumptions - that every single PC sold runs windows, and that each and every one of them is an actual workstation, and not a server. The graph you provided is NOT OS Market share, it represents the Operating System that ran the browser which hit whatever group of servers the host aggregated the data from. Similarly, your 7% of macs being in users hands is absolutely, positively ridiculous.

I'm not going to bother making up my own statistics to refute your claims. What is a fact is that Apple has been constantly eroding PC sales, IS gaining market share (see this table from the site you got your numbers from: OS market share) I know you quoted a blog entry saying Mac sales are down - but two months is hardly a trend.

Ignoring the growing Mac user population would be about as good business sense wise as ignoring the iPhone.

[hagosrush]

You've made, and continue to make some seriously dubious assumptions - that every single PC sold runs windows, and that each and every one of them is an actual workstation, and not a server. The graph you provided is NOT OS Market share, it represents the Operating System that ran the browser which hit whatever group of servers the host aggregated the data from. Similarly, your 7% of macs being in users hands is absolutely, positively ridiculous.

I'm not going to bother making up my own statistics to refute your claims. What is a fact is that Apple has been constantly eroding PC sales, IS gaining market share (see this table from the site you got your numbers from: OS market share) I know you quoted a blog entry saying Mac sales are down - but two months is hardly a trend.

Ignoring the growing Mac user population would be about as good business sense wise as ignoring the iPhone.

Here is the just of the situation. Wether or not that graph represents PC/Servers is irrelevant. I believe what he (Pete6) is trying to get across is that Machines other than Mac's run the workplace and are even more dominant in the home. It is not to start a war or to say what the percentage is in regards to Servers V. PC's.

It is simply to say that if PC's are my bread and butter and macs are simply the curd (useful but now the biggest sales) that they are going to focus on the bread ad butter with an afterthought to the curd (Mac Users).

[fcortese]

Here is the just of the situation. Wether or not that graph represents PC/Servers is irrelevant. I believe what he (Pete6) is trying to get across is that Machines other than Mac's run the workplace and are even more dominant in the home. It is not to start a war or to say what the percentage is in regards to Servers V. PC's.

It is simply to say that if PC's are my bread and butter and macs are simply the curd (useful but now the biggest sales) that they are going to focus on the bread ad butter with an afterthought to the curd (Mac Users).

Also, what Pete6 was trying to establish is how do you estimate the number of bb users who also use Macs. How do you get at a reliable number. CB is only a tiny piece of the bb/Mac universe. Pete6's premise is that if you could get a reliable number and bring it to RIMs attention, RIM might become more interested in the curd-to borrow hagosrush's analogy.