Any Apple APFS Worries?

General
1

I’ve read that Apple will soon come out with a new MacOS update that incorporates a new file system called APFS. Are there any guidelines or provisos (from Apple or Xojo) to help ensure that any Xojo-developed Mac apps will function correctly with the new APFS, or is it almost a non-event, at least in terms of requiring changes to developed apps? Will APFS compatibility be a function of whether your apps are 32-bit or 64-bit? Also, I’m still using Xojo 2016r3 to build my apps. Are there new APFS compatibility fixes in the Xojo environment in the newer releases? What should I be on the look out for? Thanks for any thoughts!

2

You can test basics in your app by creating a volume with a Case-sensitive HFS+ filesystem. Unless you have crazy things like mixed up string encodings, you should be in pretty good shape.

For anything else, you’ll need to install the 10.13 public beta and check against your specific code.

3

Thanks Tim. I understand. What I was hoping for was to be able to find some guidelines that Xojo might have published on how best to anticipate and fix any possible problems that Apple’s move to APFS might create.

4

https://forum.xojo.com/39651-apfs-and-xojo-folderitem-issues-may-be-very-serious-issue/

5

Thanks Gavin. That’s a great thread. I think the bottom line, of course, is TEST IT! But, that said, I sure have to hope that Xojo is well aware of any possible conflicts with the upcoming APFS and will address any problem soon. And, as to FolderItem itself, well, all of my programs use FolderItem!! I don’t know how you can write any kind of program that creates, saves, opens files without using FolderItem. So, that there might be a problem with FolderItem is a terrifying thought. I would think Apple (and Xojo) expect that programs that were written WITHOUT APFS in mind, will still function normally…or maybe in at least 99% of the cases. And you just want to make sure your program is not in that 1%! Anyway, thanks for the pointer…still learning…

6

The hope is that there won’t be any now that enough folks have reported back to Apple what we don’t like. I understand that there are changes being implemented and that the default will be non-case-sensitive instead of what we saw in the first betas making APFS feel more like the current HFS+.

7

Thanks Tim. I’m hoping the transition progresses like it did with iOS…where most people didn’t even know the file system changed! And I hope your hope is right. Hard to believe Apple (or Xojo) would allow a situation where thousands of existing programs would suddenly break. Fingers crossed (and still learning!))