ACP What you get.

The following ACP builds are available to ACP subscribers.

1. ACP for Mac OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard. Current build. This build runs only on 64-bit Intel machines. It is not compatible with previous versions of Mac OS X. Its source code has now officially branched from previous builds. This build is highly recommended for users with 64-bit Intel computers and Snow Leopard.

2. ACP for Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard. Current build. This build will work on all 10.5 systems running up to 10.5.8 (and presumably all 10.5 systems thereafter). It is not compatible with 10.3 (Panther) or 10.2 (Jaguar) systems and will not run on 10.4 systems but its source code is officially identical with that used for the 10.4 (Tiger) build. This build is also currently supported and has been tested successfully on 10.6 Snow Leopard. This build is recommended for adopters of Snow Leopard who are not yet running 64-bit Intel computers.

3. ACP for Mac OS X 10.4 Tiger. Current build. This build will work on all 10.4 systems running up to 10.4.11. It is not compatible with 10.3 (Panther) or 10.2 (Jaguar) systems but it does include additional enhancements and additional programs added to the distribution after the introduction of OS X 10.5 Leopard. This build is currently supported.

4. ACP for Mac OS X 10.3 Panther. Legacy build. This build will work on all 10.3 systems running up to 10.3.9. It is not compatible with 10.2 (Jaguar) systems and does not include additional enhancements or additional programs added to the distribution at a later time. This build is no longer being supported.

5. ACP for Mac OS X 10.2 Jaguar. Legacy build. This build will work on all 10.2 systems running up to 10.2.8. It does not include additional enhancements or additional programs added to the ACP at a later time. This build is no longer being supported.

6. ACP Portable for Mac OS X 10.6, 10.5, and 10.4. Current build. The source tree for this distribution is officially identical with those for 10.4 (Tiger) and 10.5 (Leopard) and will run on both those systems as well as 10.6 (Snow Leopard). ACP Portable is a dedicated subset of the ACP for system administrators and others on troubleshooting assignments. It runs directly from USB flash drives.

The following Xfile builds are available to Xfile subscribers.

1. Xfile for Mac OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard. Current build. This build runs only on 64-bit Intel machines. It is not compatible with previous versions of Mac OS X. Its source code has now officially branched from previous builds. This build is highly recommended for users with 64-bit Intel computers and Snow Leopard.

2. Xfile for Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard. Current build. This build will work on all 10.5 systems running up to 10.5.6 (and presumably all 10.5 systems thereafter). It is not compatible with 10.3 (Panther) or 10.2 (Jaguar) systems and will not run on 10.4 systems but its source code is officially identical with that used for the 10.4 (Tiger) build. This build is also currently supported and has been tested successfully on 10.6 Snow Leopard. This build is recommended for adopters of Snow Leopard who are not yet running 64-bit Intel computers.

3. Xfile for Mac OS X 10.4 Tiger. Current build. This build will work on all 10.4 systems running up to 10.4.11. It is not compatible with 10.3 (Panther) or 10.2 (Jaguar) systems but it does include additional enhancements and additional programs added to the distribution after the introduction of OS X 10.5 Leopard. This build is currently supported.

Despite the considerable additional workload Rixstep continue to support and create new software for both Mac OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard, 10.5 Leopard, and 10.4 Tiger. Changes here on out to builds for 10.5 and 10.4 will be infrequent (but have already occurred) and the focus will instead be on 64-bit computing with Mac OS X 10.6.

All nine builds come with accompanying 'MD' files so users can easily see which builds have been updated and should be downloaded. MD files are only 262 bytes in size; they're compared with a utility such as Rixcomp; keeping the latest MD files and using them to compare means ACP and Xfile users can quickly check if new builds are available without waiting for change log notifications.

The ACP is not shareware; users get updates approximately once per week; it is sold only as a unit: despite it now having over ninety Cocoa applications and command line tools it is a system and built as one. Purchase of an ACP licence entitles the user(s) to free updates, new programs, and free mail support for one year - renewable.