Warning Messages About Apple Silicon

[bleachga]

MacOS is popping up a warning message that my copy of MacDown will eventually stop working because it's not native to Apple Silicon, and that I need to upgrade. I'm running the latest version. Can I ignore these messages?

[kg4zow]

Duplicate of #1348.

The message you're seeing is because the Macdown (or other) executable you're running was built for Intel x86_64 processors. Apple has announced that the "Rosetta" system, which runs x86_64 executables on ARM processors, will be present in macOS 27, but will not be present in macOS 28.

https://support.apple.com/en-us/102527

This means there is at least another year before it's going to be a real problem, but Apple has started showing this message early, to encourage people who are using x86_64 apps to start bugging the developers of those apps to build ARM versions already. It should just be a case of compiling the same source code, using the ARM compiler built into the current versions of XCode.

Macdown has basically been abandoned, it's been over five years since any updates were made. If you depend on it, you may want to start looking for an alternative.

• I've switched over to Obsidian (think Macdown plus Evernote with plugins). The "transition" took about five minutes - I created a new Obsidian vault and used a single cp command to copy my existing markdown files from one directory to another. I also use a plugin which commits and pushes my notes to a git repo, making it VERY easy to have the same Obsidian vault on multiple machines. It's free but not open source, and more importantly here, it's actively developed and supported.

• I've also seen messages from somebody who forked Macdown and is fixing a bunch of long-standing bugs. I think they're calling it "Macdown 2000" or something? hrmmmm... close. It's called Macdown 3000, source on Github.

Again, you've got some time to figure out what you want to do, but the sooner you start, the more time you'll have to get used to your new solution.

Apple Support

Using Intel-based apps on a Mac with Apple silicon - Apple Support

Rosetta enables a Mac with Apple silicon to run Intel-based apps. Support for Rosetta will end in a future version of macOS, so check with the app's developer for an updated version.