What Windows software is still in use?

Seth Anderson wrote:
> Apologies since I'm a little late to this thread, but the only reason
> I have Parallels and XP installed on my MacBook Pro is to run MapInfo
> (an overly sophisticated, crappy, expensive GIS program with a
> horrible interface that as far as I know has no comparable OS X
> counterpart).

Is GRASS an option. Says he with almost no GIS experience.

David

At 5:04 AM -0700 7/1/08, Seth Anderson wrote:
>Apologies since I'm a little late to this thread, but the only reason
>I have Parallels and XP installed on my MacBook Pro is to run MapInfo
>(an overly sophisticated, crappy, expensive GIS program with a
>horrible interface that as far as I know has no comparable OS X
>counterpart). I don't need to run the software very often, but when I
>do, it is essential. My company used to have a cheapo PC box
>dedicated to running just that software, we were happy when Apple
>transitioned to Intel chips so we could ditch the PC machines and
>their headaches.

With the demise of MFworks (formerly Map Factory) and the
fossilization of iMap (which isn't serious grade anyway) Geographic
Information Systems software is now all about ESRI's ArcGIS, which
runs on Windows or linux. Yes, there is GRASS, but that has a fairly
substantial set of user ability requirements just to get started.

The company that bought MFworks/MapFactory really botched the whole
thing, ended up quickly driving away the original developers, stopped
developing new code for Mac (it was cross platform) and tried to
maintain old code with no coders, did terrible marketing with a
terrible marketing droid and poor senior management decisions, and
eventually went out of the software business entirely.

ESRI did ArcView for MacOS years ago, and they've looked at
re-entering the OSX market a few years ago but Apple was not
interested.

[I'm catching up on some past threads.]

Thanks to both npann and Paul for posting about ComicBase. I've been
almost-buying it for years, with the intent of cataloguing and
tracking my comic collection. At present I'm waiting until the home
Mac clips to an Intel machine, then I'll run ComicBase inside Fusion.

It's very interesting to hear that ComicBase is still regarded at the
top of the heap. There seems to have been an expansion of this kind
of app in the Windows world, but nothing has taken its place on the
Mac platform.

Meanwhile, a friend of mine steadfastly refused to buy it for years
because he just couldn't see paying that much money for a Hypercard
stack. :-)

-Andrew