Reports that Mac OS X 10.5.3 triggered a problem that led to Photoshop files being corrupted by the process of saving to a network volume triggered a furore.

Some people were blaming Apple, some Adobe. Some said the issue had been around since Mac OS X 10.4.6. Others pointed out that a similar problem could strike when using Word and other applications.

When it was pointed out that Adobe didn't recommend reading and writing directly to networked volumes, incredulity was expressed.

So there was lots of heat and not much light being cast on the matter.

Subsequently, Adobe's John Nack has revealed that Adobe and Apple have identified the cause of the problem, and Apple is working on a fix that's expected to become part of the next system update.

That does suggest to me that either the problem really was in Apple's code, or that it makes more sense to apply a fix to the OS because other software developers have fallen into the same trap.

Other remarks in Nack's blog entry suggest that 'not recommended' in the context of saving files to servers doesn't mean 'won't work', just 'might not work'.

It's tempting to suggest this is like an ISP saying it doesn't support Mac OS X or Linux. That doesn't mean you can't use those operating systems - they're just saying "don't come crying to us if you can't get it to work."

But the trouble with the Photoshop scenario is that once you save a modified file and it becomes corrupted in the process, the previous version is gone.

If you can't bring yourself to Save As each time (thus preserving the previous version), I'd be inclined to invest in additional local disk space coupled with an automated mechanism for copying the local files to the server where they are accessible to other users.