This news can be taken in one of two ways…
As we noted a couple of months ago, Apple has deprecated OpenGL and OpenCL on macOS and iOS. They want developers to write their software in Metal, which allows them to have more control over the whole stack (and this makes it slightly more difficult to port to competing platforms).
Citing this decision, Autodesk has dropped support for Alias and VRED on macOS. You will be forced to use 2019.0 on High Sierra, at the latest, unless you switch to Windows.
On the one hand, Autodesk is a big company to act against Apple’s decision. On the other hand, they are doing it with Alias and VRED, which are more for industrial users. Should they follow this up with, let’s say, deprecating Maya, then that would be a huge blow to Apple’s core professional audience. But they aren't, and the macOS version of Alias and VRED might have been on the fence for a while, particularly with Autodesk’s ongoing losses.
So it might not be a big deal, but it’s a clear, explicit example of a product team packing up in response to Apple’s demands.
Things like this, and better
Things like this, and better desktop-class cpus in a custom build, are why I gave in an switched to Windows a couple of years ago.
Look at Apple’s revenue
Look at Apple’s revenue stream and PCs/Laptops do not figure in as much. Apple does not appear to care and it looks like the Professional Graphics Software Makers had better start Investing in moving over to Vulkan and maybe going the Linux Route before it’s too late for the professional users that really need stability and long term support. They should develop for Vulkan as that will represent the only true cross platform option if OpenGL/OpenCL is being deperciated on Apple’s PCs/Laptops.
Apple’s is being foolish in doing anything to its professional customers but Apple’s METAL is close enough to Vulkan that there can be translation easily achieved.
It really looks like there will be only mobile workstation options going forward for many that have made use of Apple’s laptops in the past and maybe Linux based Laptops can begin to take up some of the users that Apple is abandoning. All the professional Graphics Software makers had better get together and get with a Linux Distro of Choice and maybe there will be longer term support for OpenGL/OpenCL there while there will be time for the Graphics software houses to adopt Vulkan over a longer period of time. There is active development of a Vulkan to Metal wrapper/translation abstraction layer.
MoltenVK(1) is now opensource and developed via Khronous’ Portability Initiative(1).
(1)
“Portability Initiative Overview”
https://www.khronos.org/vulkan/portability-initiative