Office 98 is running without a crash, hiccup or disappearing act. Taking two suggestions from over a year ago left on this board that suggested installing the Japanese Language pack (re: user "umax") as well as removing "Shared Library Manager" from the extensions folder (re: Ronald P. Regensburg) performed the miracle (keeping Shared Library Manager PPC in the extensions folder).

Prior to removing "Shared Library Manager", Excel 98 ran and opened files but crashed when saving any file in Excel 98.xls format. Interestingly enough, it did not crash if the file was saved in an older format as a "Worksheet" rather than in a newer "Workbook" format. Once the Shared Library Manager extension was removed it saved flawlessly in the "Workbook" Excel 98.xls format.

Word 98, on the other hand, was the next to worse offender of the three programs in Office 98. Before Shared Library Manager was removed it crashed SheepShaver entirely when saving in Word 98.doc format; like Excel 98, it opened files but saved only in TXT, Word 5.1, Word 4, Word 6/95 formats without crashing;. Once removed, Word 98 now saves in Word 98.doc native format. PowerPoint 98 did nothing more than bring down the whole house (PC and all!). Now, it runs, opens, saves, and does not wipe or dissolve SheepShaver.

Also, keep in mind that Office 98 will crash from corrupt fonts.


I am running SheepShaver_05_05_2010 on Win7 with a full install of OS 9.0.4. Using TransMac is indispensable because it not only allows me to read and transfer Mac files from a HFS+ Mac external HD or CD to a PC HD, but it can be used to open dmg files (ones created on a Mac as well as open ones that are used by SheepShaver and stored on the PC HD) - this is moot for Mac OS X users, of course.

Moving from Mac to Win7 has not been the nightmare I feared using SheepShaver 5-5-2010 on Win7. I create dmg files (as large as 4GB) loaded with Mac files (back to 1987) using an iMac (OS X 10.3). My primary purposes are to use Freeway 3.5 Pro for web work (in OS 9/SheepShaver) and to help me convert decades of Mac publication work to Win7 cross-applications (PageMaker, Quark Xpress, Illustrator, Photoshop). I now can open and view side-by-side the original Mac PageMaker 7 document in SheepShaver/OS9, for example, while viewing another copy of it in Windows PageMaker 7 in order to check accuracy, text flow, leading, etc. Often, complex publication files made on one platform do not translate perfectly to another platform. CrossFont is used to convert Mac Postscript fonts to PC Postscript and cross-platform OTF fonts. Over the years, I learned to use only applications that are cross-platform, and this rule has saved me.

So, I have my 2002 iBook again - on a PC laptop, no less. Ideal! OS9 Forever!!!!!

Wish list:
USB recognition
CD/DVD recognition in Win7 (capable of reading HFS+)

What I can run is more important than what I can't (Digital Performer, for example, requires authorization from original CD; InDesign 2 requires OS9.1). Here is a list of apps I am running in SheepShaver (programs marked with asterisk are Mac only with no Windows version available):

Acrobat Distiller 5.0
Acrobat Reader 4.0
Acrobat Reader 5.0
Adobe Illustrator® 3.2
Adobe Photoshop® 5.0
Adobe® PageMaker® 7.0
*Aldus PageMaker 4.0
Aldus PageMaker 5.0
*AppleWorks 6.2.4
ATM® Deluxe 4.6
Color It! 3.0
*Freeway 3.5.5 (web design)
*Freeway Pro 3.5.15
*Freeway Pro 3.5.app
*GraphicConverter 4.44 .app
Internet Explorer 5.1.7
*iTunes 1.1
iView MediaPro 1.4
iView Multimedia 3.6
*Mariner Write. 3.51.app
MicroLOGIC 2.0 (music)
Microsoft Excel 98
Microsoft Word 98
Microsoft Word 5.1
Microsoft PowerPoint 98
Microsoft Works 3.0
Outlook Express 5.01
*PhotoStudio 4
QuarkXPress 3.32
*StickyBrain 2.02
*TypeStyler 3.72
*Tao Te Ching 1.0f

Interesting. Incredible.

I THANK YOU ONE AND ALL for a fantastic solution
for an old Mac man gone to the dog of Windows.
(OS9...Forever!...on a PC Forever?
Yes, Steve Jobs, "I switched".)

Hi, Welcome!


Thanks for a most informative read. Good to see SheepShaver can come to the rescue
Can you tell us why you switched to Windows 7 (I'm just curious...)

Best,
Cat_7

I thought that you could make Office98 more portable if you put some extensions Office 98 installs normally in System Folder/Extensions to Office 98's own folders.
And why not just run Office 98 using System 7.6 or 8.1?

maybe he needs os 9.04 for running other applications?

@ Michael_T_Bucci: thanks for the feedback!

i noticed that also other applications seem to benefit from removing "Shared Library Manager". an example is open transport: it acts strange when this file is in the system - although this does not seem logical: shouldn't it be required by 68k applications?. unfortunately, if you "install" applications, this damned file will sometimes be put into the system again.
this may not be a problem on a "real" mac - but sheepshaver is different.

therefore, whenever i have to "install" something, i use a minimized test system, do the install there and check differences before/after the install (i use filebuddy for checking differences). then i copy all required files/extensions/control panels to a folder (and only what is really needed), compress the folder and save it for later use on my main system. this quarantaine ensures that i only copy the essential files - and prevents any "installer" from messing up my system.

quicktime is another good example: the "installer" will not enable all possibilities, you need to transfer some files manually and not transfer others.

office 98 is definately one of the worst installers, thankfully i had not to use it for years - even on my "real" macs it was a nightmare and messing up systems.

what i still haven't managed to do is making a list of "good" and "bad" system files for use with sheepshaver, sigh. maybe next year:)

Thank you Cat_7 Alexandre for welcoming me. It feels like home here.

To answer your question about why I moved to Win7 would involve several chapters, but the short-list of factors are: Freedom, Diversity and Economics. I began with Apple in 1983 (Apple IIe) and graduated to a MacSE in 1987. For business purposes (PR, in-house typesetting and design), Macintosh was the only game to play with DTP (Aldus PageMaker 2, Quark Xpress 1.6, Adobe PS fonts, Apple LaserWriter, etc.) - no flashing DOS cursor and all WYSIWYG. From Win3.1 onward, Aldus and Adobe entered the PC platform and my attempts to switch then were defeated by non-compatible existing peripherals, inexact conversions of PS fonts, and - also being a composer - a paucity of midi applications that equaled MOTU Performer (Cakewalk soon grew up and Logic became the cross-platform choice). All the while, my new 486DX-2 Acer served other uses.

Fast-forwarding to 2001, now retired, I invested $3000 in an iBook dual-USB, HP Postscript Ink-Jet, HP scanner and software upgrades for OS9.1. In two years time, all of it became practically obsolete due to OS X. I stayed with OS9, especially since some of the updated software mentioned was not carbon and I resisted starting over again having already done that two years prior. I often made the remark: Why should I switch to OS X where nothing works, when everything I own works in OS9? As history shows, Apple prefers the future at the expense the past - even the recent past. Lately, this has become repeated: Goodbye Universal Binary, goodbye AppleWorks, goodbye 32-bit, goodbye the entire history from 1984-2009! Soon, I presume, it will be "Goodbye Rosetta" (I understand it was last minute decision by Apple to include it in SL, and only under protest - ridiculous!). I bought a Mac mini with 10.5 last year. A few OS X 10.3 era apps worked. I used SheepShaver on the mini for OS9 but more so VirtualBox for Win XP and 2000. Then came 10.6, and no OS X app I owned - which worked on 10.5 - worked on SL! I felt I was repeating the year 2003 again. Ridiculous. Self-defeating. Purposeless!

Mr Jobs has a strange business model that seeks growth through obsolescence. Mr Jobs also is very mercurial. Taken together it explains Mac history from 2001 forward.

Win7 is not XP, but XP came closest to OS9 in look and feel and that is why I began again with a PC in 2006. In choosing a future for hardware and software, I see the future as Win7 for all the reasons mentioned. Microsoft is no angel, but the company doesn't control either the independent software or hardware industries. Apple is a "closed shop" and a monopoly.

Have I answered your question, Cat_7 Alexandre? Sorry about the length...I promised a short-list.

Best
MTB

PS: If Mac people are annoyed with me, don't be. This is just my opinion. And I'm just a nobody.

maybe he needs os 9.04 for running other applications?

@ Michael_T_Bucci: thanks for the feedback!

----

Thank you Mr umax for providing the correct answer. I do run Sys 7.5.3 on minivmac, but why not run everything on OS 9.0.4 when SheepShaver works so marvelously?

Your suggestions are also totally correct about the need to periodically back-up the virtual disks. I learned the hard way, as they say, when running Virtual PC 4 on OS9 in 2001. With SheepShaver, I keep the System Folder and a dozen apps on one drive (2GB), while the documents and files are spread across seperate 2GB drives (making a working total of about 8GB). In fact, I copy and paste the first drive (with System Folder and apps) in Win7 (making a clone copy) just about every time I close work on OS9. It takes less than 30 seconds. Believe me, I've saved days!

Your proviso on watching the Extension Folder for a a return of "Shared Library Manager" is a great tip. I've kept a watch on its reincarnation since your advice.

Your list of "good" and "bad" system files for SheepShaver sounds ideal. I did a full install of os 9.0.4 and can contribute to you when I find anomalies.

Insofar as progress here (on Win7), almost everything that I run in os 9.2.2 on my G3 iMac is working in SheepShaver OS 9.0.4...so far (!).

For DTP people, be aware that PM7 upgrade to 7.01 crashes.
Virtual PC 4 won't launch and reports insufficient memory (though my SheepShaver is set at 512MB memory).

Newbies to OS9 and those who forgot the "old school" methods, need remember that memory allotments to applications should always be reviewed and reset if necessary (especially when an app is errant) within the "Get Info" dialogue box. I run a 64-bit Win7 system with 3GB of memory, setting SheepShaver at 512MB and therefore use memory allocations well beyond the suggested ones for intensive programs.

Stuffit Deluxe 6.5 presents problems when using "Magic Menu" contextual menu (turn it off) but no problems when using its stand-alone apps (i.e. console and separate DropStuff and Stuffit Expander apps).

Thank you Mr umax for your hard work and diligence. For me, it is extrememly invaluable.

MTB

Hi Michael,
nice to read your profund review!
I did not care much about that issue, because I used MacOS 7.6 as a workaround, like others.
Still it is a great help to have everything working with 9.04. My configuration is:
Linux 2.6.25.5-1.1-default x86_64, SheepShaver from Cat7 22.03.2010. I did not install the
Japanese Language pack, still everything is fine for me.

My wife and me migrated from the Mac when WIN2000 came up and more and more cross-platform
software like Photoshop and Pagemaker was ready. A friend told me about Linux those days:
"everything legal, no viruses, no spyware".I was quite impressed by the amount of free
applications and I am using dual boot systems since that day.

Of course we still keep our iMac (OS 9.22) and our PPC7100 (OS 9.04),
although we don't use them often.

Greetings!

Great to see that Office 98 is working well under SheepShaver, at least under Windows 7. Congratulations!

Has anybody made progress on installing Office 98 in SheepShaver for OSX? Any further insight why this seems to work only in SheepShaver for Windows 7? Any suggested tweaks?

Thanks!

Hi. It is interesting as to why it hasn't worked on OS X. I did try mightily last summer to get Office 98 to work with SheepShaver-Mac, but repeatedly failed. So, I am as surprised as you that it has worked using Win7. Also, for DTP people, PM7 never worked either on SheepShaver-Mac, but did on Win7. I don't know the answers, alas.

Beforehand, I failed to mention a trick to try if all else fails. If you have Office 98 installed on a OS9 machine already, copy the entire "Microsoft Office 98" folder over to SheepShaver together with these files from the System Folder/Preferences:

Microsoft Office Settings (8)
MS Office ACL (8)
Office Registration Cache

Place these three files in System Preferences and place the Office 98 folder anywhere. Should a launch fail, copy more Office 98 files over (e.g., Graph Chart Gallery (8), Microsoft Grammer Settings, Power Point Settings (8), Word Settings (8) ). If launch is successful, the application will rebuild itself on the new system and not ask for registration information.

Yours is a good question. Maybe someone who knows much more than I has the answer.

Hi,

No amount of tweaking has yet resulted Office 98 to work in OSX.

I have removed extension "Shared Library Manager".

I have added to System Preferences all the ones that were suggested:


Microsoft Office Settings (8)
MS Office ACL (8)
Office Registration Cache
Graph Chart Gallery (8)
Microsoft Grammar Settings
Power Point Settings (8)
Word Settings (8)
Excel Settings (8)
Excel Toolbars (8)
Microsoft Graph Settings (8)
PowerPoint Settings (8)
PowerPoint Toolbars (8)
Word Font Menu Cache (8)
Word Settings (8)

Alas, the symptoms have not changed:

WORD 98 brings up a warning panel
"The application was unable to start due to an error. Please contact customer support"

EXCEL 98 immediately closes down after double click

POWERPOINT 98 brings up its normal splash screen, goes through the complete launch, and at the end then crashes SheepShaver

This can all be repeated ad nauseam.

Perhaps somebody more knowledgeable can draw conclusions from the different behavior of the apps. Even better, perhaps someone can recognize what difference the guest OS 9.0.4 experiences within OSX 10.6 and Windows 7 causes this different behavior.

Thanks in advance!

AD NAUSEAM are the appropraite words. I felt as you now do now and spent the better part of last summer tweaking and crashing AD NAUSEAM... I used Mr Ronald P. Regensburg's "Classic On Intel" on 10.5 (Mac mini) and later on 10.6 (MacBook Pro), and perhaps he is best equipped to explain the SL vs Win7 differences.

Whoever gets the answer deserves a free trip to Disneyland!

Keep in mind that I performed a FULL install of 9.0.4.

In passing - since I am not the only person with Win7 using Office 98 on SheepShaver - it would be more than interesting to take the startup disk (image) of 9.0.4 containing a working Office 98 that is made on Win7 and use it on OS X and see whether it works. If so, then all is accomplished. If not, why not?

First: I am no programmer, I did no development on SheepShaver, I only built a couple of SheepShaver for MacOSX versions from source in cvs for users of this forum, the 25-10-2009 build being the last one I could build successfully. This is "SheepShaver" and not "Classic On Intel", which is a package by someone else who uses SheepShaver builds for his pre-configured compilation of files that are distributed in violation with Apple's EULAs.

Many have tried to run Office 98 in SheepShaver and no one succeeded, so I think we can safely assume it is not possible, at least in MacOS 9.0.4. I do not know how many tried in MacOS 7.6.1 or 8.6.

SheepShaver does not emulate all hardware that is available in a real PPC Mac and some applications (among which several games) simply do not run because the needed hardware is not available.

It is not strange that there are differences between SheepShaver versions for the three different host platforms. Although these versions share code, they are different programs, use different solutions adapted to the different host platforms, and have different features.

Why Office 98 applications do run in SheepShaver for Windows and not in SheepShaver for MacOSX, I have absolutely no idea. I do not know if the applications run in SheepShaver for Linux.

To investigate what happens and what should be changed in SheepShaver MacOSX to enable running Office 98 applications, detailed and time-consuming debugging research is probably needed.

Since Gwenole Beauchesne stopped working on SheepShaver (and BasiliskII) a couple of years ago, there is no leading developer for this project anymore. We can only hope that one day someone with the needed personal interest, the time, and the skills steps forward to carry this project further and possibly solves this Office 98 problem. Until then, we have to be satisfied with the occasional fixes and minor improvements that are contributed to the source in cvs by users with programmer skills.


It could be tried, but I doubt very much that it will work. If the problem is something in SheepShaver for MacOSX, it will not work.

Thank you for clarifying. And I thank you again for providing the tip of removing "Shared Library Manager" from the extensions folder and keeping Shared Library Manager PPC in the extensions folder. As I said, this helped the perform the miracle on Win7.

Office 98 works quite well in OS 9.0.4 on SheepShaver on Windows (XP, I haven't tried 7) on Fusion on 10.5.8.

And I didn't have to remove any files. Installation was a bit tricky, though.

Terrific! Are you using Fusion 2 or Fusion 3?

Do you have SS installed on both the Leopard and Fusion/XP platforms? If so, can you try taking the virtual image used by SheepShaver on XP (containing start-up OS9.0.4 with a working Office 98) and use it with the SheepShaver version running on 10.5.8 to determine if it works there as it did on XP?

The idea is to have a Classic running on Intel, but if running Office 98 means needing OS9 run on XP/Win7 run on Intel...well, that is one solution (not ideal, but a solution.)

"Installation was a bit tricky" you say. Please tell more.

Congratulations.

I'll play around a bit.

For the installation I had to use the image on a G4 Software Restore CD. I started SS from the restore disk and copied the image to the SS desktop, mounted and restarted. Very simple, but you have to find out first.

You should be able to use the disk image file with OS9 installation that was created with SS in MacOSX with SS in Windows.

I haven't yet managed to get the disk image created in SS/XP into SS/Mac. During the transfer it looses identity and cannot be opened anymore (this is true in both directions)

':('

Tried it and I'm getting the same error message as before. Pity

OK. Do I understand you to mean you DID get SS/OSX to open the image created on SS/XP, that you ran Office 98 and that you got the same Office 98 error message? Or is the error message generated by SS from failing to open the image made on the other platform?

I made an image of the complete MacOS9 disk in SS/XP. I hid the image in a Stuffit archive. This archive was opened in SS/Mac and the image mounted. I put the whole contents of the classic disc into the bin and replaced it with the whole contents of the virtual disk from XP, including Office 98. A restart convinced the new System to take over but office still gave me the message that it cannot start because of an error (unspecified)


I think this means that the problem is on the SS level, not the OS level.
By the way, hiding the image in a .sit archive is necessary, otherwise the image cannot be opened.

Experts: ENTER!

I am without an Intel Mac and only can refer to my months recently with COI (Classic On Intel). Using COI4.0.1+ as a front-end of SheepShaver, I did not get under the hood of SS. If anyone does use COI and has an image from XP or Win7 with a working Office 98, they can try taking that entire image (which is a dmg image) over to COI and use its routine to create a "newOS" from it (making the former startup image an "oldOS"). It's just another idea, for COI people to try.

We can't be sure if the problem is on the SS or the OS level, or both, until a solution emerges. I am sure a solution will emerge - lot's of people need it.

Thanks for your hard work.

I am now quite certain that it is on the SS for MacOSX level, see the experiment by dkretschmer.


A solution will not "emerge" by itself, regardless how many people need it. Only when a programmer familiar with SheepShaver takes an interest in this issue and is willing to spend time and effort to investigate the problem, you may hope for a solution.

I stand corrected.

I began this discussion thread to share my success with other Windows users. As made clear by yourself and others, some solutions for Windows users do not apply to Mac users. Understood.

It is amusing that SheepShaver for Ubuntu, running on a OLPC XO Laptop, can run Office 98, even Office 2001:

http://www.olpcnews.com/forum/index.php?action=printpage;topic=4215.0

So, it would seem that not Windows is the notable exception, but something is amiss in the SheepShaver for OSX version, while it has been properly implemented everywhere else. Maybe the similarity of Ubuntu UNIX and OSX gives the experts some clue where to look for the problem.

I still have the hope that SOMEONE knowledgeable will see this forum...