Adobe Updates Leopard Compatibility Info

Some time ago, Adobe warned users that there might be problems with their applications running under Leopard as they did not have enough time to properly test everything. Now, with Leopard out, Adobe has updated their information, but user reports are telling a slightly different story.

Adobe did the right thing in warning users that there may be unforeseen problems with their applications running under Leopard. Whether or not the company should be in this situation is debatable. Apple finalized the Gold Master version of Leopard merely weeks before the launch, giving developers very little time to work with the actual final version. On the other hand, the company has been churning out developer preview versions for a very long time now, so there was no reason whatsoever not to be just a step or two behind Apple.

Adobe's recently released PDF details what problems users might encounter while running the CS3 suite under Leopard, and according to it, the vast majority of CS3 components will work fine. There are of course a few exceptions noted, such as workflow problems with After Effects/Premiere and some unspecified problems with Acrobat 8.1. While this might sound very good as the majority of application should work fine, actual users are reporting all kinds of quirks and issues, from rendering problems to inconsistencies and less than functional dialogue inputs. While all in all, these problems are minor at best, they can be annoying and people who rely on these applications should be aware of them. More importantly, a few users are reporting that certain Adobe applications are not working at all for them. So far, it is unclear whether these are issues caused by conflicts between Leopard, the application and other third party software of some sort.

The recommended approach for testing to ensure that your Adobe applications will work fine under Leopard is to create a dual boot system so that you can still have Tiger to fall back on if everything else fails.