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I'm planning to buy Mac OS Lion, but I would like to know some informations. - Are Snow Leopard's apps compatible with Lion? - Are apps compiled with Xcode for Lion compatible with Snow Leopard? What if these app uses popovers/fullscreen which are features of Lion?

Erik Funkenbusch
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Aick
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  • I'd particularly like to hear if upgrading requires reinstalling dev tools, libraries, etc, as it has in past OSX releases. I really want to upgrade, but if I'm going to have to spend hours redoing xcode, ruby, etc, etc, I might put it off a few days – stephan.com Jul 21 '11 at 02:01
  • How about weeks. So they can fix the big issues that they missed in beta. :-) – Warren P Jul 21 '11 at 02:59

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xCode requires a full download (the full 5*ish GB) and if you are a Java guy you will have to re download Java as it is not included (this was my experience when opening eclipse for the first time in Lion).

Some of Snow leopards apps are compatible, not all (ppc apps will not work). It is probably best to check with the software vendor first.

Another thing your Library folder disappears on an upgrade among some others where Lion is trying to 'Protect' its users. To get round this simply enter the command into terminal. (replace username with your username and foldertoreveal with the hidden foldername)

chflags nohidden /Users/Username/FolderToReveal

The upgrade process other wise has been fine. For reference I am an Obj C /C++ /C and Java developer. Hope this helps

Also will link you to this post about Developing Java on Lion: Stack Overflow post on Java in Lion

Community
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Candyfloss
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A very good list of compatible applications is available at RoaringApps. I highly recommend checking for your favorite editors/IDEs/etc there.

Of note:

As far as developing with the new APIs in Lion, you can explicitly target a specific version of OS X for compatibility. When building for 10.6, those new APIs will not be exposed during compilation and you will get warnings about unrecognized selectors if you try to use them.

mbauman
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So far what I've noticed : - make sure you install XCode 4.1 (not the same as 4.0, it's a free separate download), which fixes the Python includes mess - go to terminal and type "java", this will trigger the download of the Java runtime

But I chose to avoid the burden of fixing all libs by going with a clean install of Lion (from a USB key)

Julien Chappuis
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cvs stopped working for me, but downloading Xcode seemed like an unnecessarily heavyweight fix. Adding /Developer/usr/bin to my PATH fixed it for me.

npdoty
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