MacResearch

I have just tried installing the current version of IBM Workplace Forms Viewer - Mac Special Edition (2.5.1) on a Mac Pro 2.66GHz Intel Quad which was upgraded to Leopard from Tiger a couple of days ago. The original Tiger installation did not have this program installed so I downloaded the latest version for Intel Macs. When the installation comes to the point where you choose which drive to install the application on, I get the following message:

IBM Workplace Forms Viewer cannot be installed on this computer.
The IBM Workplace Forms Viewer 2.5.1 - Macintosh OS Special Edition does not support your system setup. Please Contact your system administrator for further instructions.

When you click on the "Close" button on the message the installation program closes. It is unclear whether the problem is with Leopard itself or a preference setting. This application when installed on Tiger breaks several application rules which included installing and only running from within the user's directory rather than from the Application directory. Maybe Apple has banished apps from the user directory (God knows they have been informing everyone not to put them there for the past 5-6 years). If so, then that might be the reason.

Has anyone else had similar experiences or heard anything about it elsewhere? I know that Grants.gov was supposed to migrate to a PDF-based submission solution but have not seen anything on their progress. I know that there are upcoming grant deadlines for NIH and NSF and do not want to upgrade to Leopard people that are still on PPC Macs (I do know that I can run the Windows version using Boot Camp or a virtual machine set-up on Intel Macs).

Thanks in advance for any comments you can provide.

Update (11/15/2007):
Grants.gov is aware of the problem. They have begun moving their submission process from the PureEdge forms to a PDF forms based process so an updated IBM Workforms Viewer is unlikely. The forms will be real PDF form packages that will be editable in Adobe Acrobat 8.1.1 or Acrobat Pro 8.1.1. But it will take a little time to transition the forms to this new process. It is hard to find the PDF forms out there right now. Also be aware that Acrobat is not fully functional in Leopard and that Adobe is looking at providing a fix sometime in January. The only two options for now are: 1. Stay at OS X 10.4.x . 2. Run PureEdge forms using Windows XP on an Intel Mac using either BootCamp or a virtual machine (i.e. Parallels Workstation or VMWare Fusion).