Want to use IntuiFace on a Mac? Here's how

Best Practices + Tips & tricks
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Overview

Although Intuiface Composer and Player do not run natively on the Mac, there are two ways to use a Mac and Intuiface together:

Option 1: Use A Virtual Machine

Run Intuiface on a Mac using virtual machine software. This approach enables you to use your Mac-based software at the same time as Intuiface. Note that this side-by-side convenience does mean Windows will share system resources with MacOS.

Regardless of the virtual machine platform you choose, we suggest allotting at least 3.5GB of RAM and a good percentage of the CPU core to the virtual machine.

Here is a good summary of the virtual machine options for the Mac as of August 2023. The most popular options are:

NOTE:

The above virtual machine references are not formal endorsements. They are simply popular options listed for your convenience. In our experience, touch-enabled displays connected to the Mac can be accessed by the Windows OS via virtualization software.

Correcting Potential Path Error When Using Parallels

If, when adding a custom-built interface asset, you encounter the error “Error reading interface Asset… Unexpected Error”, follow these steps

  1. Check whether the path of your experience is listed in Composer’s title bar as “\psf…\myExperience.ifx”
    If no, contact Technical Support
    If yes, you will need to disable “Shared Profile”. Continue to the next step.
  2. Open the Virtual Machine menu or Alt-click / Option-click the Parallels icon in the Mac menu bar (in the Crystal view mode) and click Configure.
  3. In the Virtual Machine Configuration window, click Options and select Sharing in the sidebar.
  4. Uncheck the “Shared Profile” box.
  5. Restart the virtual machine
  6. Open your experience.
  7. If the path of your experience in the Windows title bar of Composer still contains “\psf…\myExperience.ifx” then, in Composer, choose the Save As option and create a new experience with a Windows compliant path (e.g. C:\User…myExperience.ifx). Use this new experience.

Option 2: Use Apple Boot Camp

This option only applies to older Mac models. Boot Camp was discontinued for the latest M-series CPUs from Apple.

Run Intuiface on a Mac by creating a Windows partition using Boot Camp. The benefit of this approach is you will achieve maximum performance as all system resources will be dedicated to running Windows and Intuiface.

  • Boot Camp is no-cost software from Apple that enables Windows to run natively on a Mac. It requires that only one OS be run at a time, meaning Windows can’t run side-by-side with the MacOS. However, performance will be excellent.

  • Intuiface’s minimum system requirements are sufficient to work with Boot Camp.

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Here’s a nice story about how Intuiface power user @tosolini uses Parallels to work with Intuiface - among other Windows-based software - on his Mac: Run tools on M3 Macs alongside key Windows applications with Parallels Desktop

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