Running Sophie on a Mac
Sophie should run on computers that have either Java 5 or Java 6. On a Mac, if you have a 32-bit system, you need to have at least OS 10.5, running at least Java 5. If you have a 64-bit system, you need to have at least OS 10.5.6, running at least Java 5. You can download the latest Sophie here. While Sophie will run on a PowerPC Mac, it is prone to many more problems (when dealing with media, for example) than on Intel machines; we recommend using Sophie on an Intel Mac.
Installing Sophie on a Mac
- Unzip the application files by double-clicking sophie-2.0.9-author-mac32i.zip, sophie-2.0.9-reader-mac32i.zip, or sophie-2.0.9-server-mac32i.zip.
- Open Sophie2Author to run Sophie Author; Sophie2Reader to run Sophie Reader; or Sophie2Server to run Sophie Server. These application files can be moved to wherever you'd like them to be.
If you download the entire platform for the Mac, you'll get a folder with the internal workings of Sophie; you can run Sophie this way, but this isn't recommended for most users. If you have downloaded the platform, double-click on sophie2_author.app.zip and sophie2_reader.app.zip to unzip them; you can then double-click sophie2_author and sophie2_reader to start Author and Reader respectively. To start Server, you need to type sh sophie2_server.sh from the command line. As noted, it's significantly easier to use Sophie on a Mac if you don't download the platform.
Mac-specific issues
- Currently, downloading a Sophie book in Safari may change the extension from .spbf to .spbf.zip. Remove the .zip suffix; the books will open normally in Sophie.
- The menu bars in the Mac application don't appear in the standard location for Mac applications.
- On some Mac OS 10.5 systems, the first time media or a browser frame is inserted, an error may occur. Dismiss this error; all subsequent use of media & browser frames should be fine. This will happen the first time you use the application, but shouldn't happen again.
