Apple Explains How to Run X11 on Mac OS X

tuc writes "In this document posted on its Developer Connection, Apple explains how to install X11R6 on Mac OS X, details of the default quartz-wm window manager, how to compile X11 code on Mac OS X, how to install OpenOffice, and the like."

Comments

unix?

[Second_Infinity]

Isn't it based on UNIX nowadays anyway?

Re:unix?

[Anonymous Coward]

So? That doesn't mean one could just take the code for such a huge project, compile it and run it flawlessly.

Re:unix?

[over_exposed]

BSD actually...

Re:unix?

[Anonymous Coward]

The Mach kernel, actually. With BSD subsystems on top of that.

Re:unix?

[pclminion]

Yes, Mac OS X is based on BSD. This doesn't necessarily mean that UNIX software will compile and work unmodified. As an example, my company makes products that run on Windows as well as various UNIX variants, including HP-UX, Solaris, Irix, BSD, various SysV-like systems, etc.

Believe me, you do not want to see what the Makefiles for a piece of software like that look like. We're talking about the era before GNU-style "configure" scripts and Makefile modularity. It's hideous. But it works. And it makes the differences between the various UNIX platforms as clear as day.

Right now, I'm in the middle of porting our main project to run on OS X, so this article is very timely. To be honest, I anticipate that the majority of the difficulty will be in getting the make system to run correctly, and possibly fixing a number of linker issues. I expect that the code itself will work almost unmodified.

Re:unix?

[Anonymous Coward]

What idiot modded the VERY FIRST POST as redundant?

Fucktard.

Re:unix?

[stupidfoo]

Horrible makefiles haunt my dreams. I've had nightmares about them...

Re:unix?

[Anonymous Coward]

Agreed. How can the first post possibly be redundant?

Re:unix?

[Anonymous Coward]

Pinky let's make over the world!

Re:unix?

[Anonymous Coward]

It's hideous. But it works. And it makes the differences between the various UNIX platforms as clear as day.

I'm actually interested in this. Could you please point out some examples (no, I'm _not_ trying to counteract you.)

Re:unix?

[Anonymous Coward]

They just don't know what "redundant" actually means. They think it's a synonym for "stupid" or "I disagree."

Very common around here.

Re:unix?

[pclminion]

Certainly. First, let me say that most of the differences revolve around the compilers and libraries on the systems. As I said before, the code itself runs pretty much unmodified, but the build processes are significantly different.

Some compilers require an explicit "-ansi" switch to properly compile ANSI code. HP7v8 requires the magical compiler flags "+DA1.0 +DS1.0". On Solaris, we need to add a "-Xc" flag.

The situation is complicated by the fact that we do two Solaris builds. One build is done with the native compiler, the other uses GCC. As you might expect, these require slightly different flags.

Some platforms need a "ranlib" program to build the library indexes in the .a files. Some platforms have this functionality built into the ar utility.

On Solaris, we need to link against libsunmath.a instead of the traditional libm.a. Solaris also required linker flags "-lw -lresolv -lsocket -lnsl -ldl", other platforms do not.

Don't even get me started on the difficulty of doing static/dynamic builds (we do both types) on each of the various platforms. Some of the platforms have GNU binutils. Some do not. Some are remote. Some of the platforms we compile on don't even BELONG to us (we build on the customer's system).

Did I mention that this thing works on VMS and OS/390 also? And that it depends on Motif?

Re:unix?

[iwadasn]

Is ant a possibility here? I know that we use ant to compile some of our C projects. It's not really the intended use, but it might help your portability a little bit if you are able to count on the fact that at least it'll be the same program running your build scripts on all the architectures, rather than having to try to detect which make version is running, and what features it supports.

Re:unix?

[Peter Cooper]

I know this isn't the Slashdot definition, but I'd call it redundant because it's common knowledge.

It'd be like replying to a post about Windows saying, "Windows is an operating system." It's redundant information, even if it's relevant.

Re:unix?

[UniverseIsADoughnut]

The Mach Kernel, with BSD subsystem and lots of Voodoo, love, puppies and distortion field to bind it all together with some fruit on top actually.

I like it.

Re:unix?

[Space cowboy]

I've done this sort of thing before - had to have things that run under linux, Irix, SunOS, and windows. It's not really hard as long as you start out with the idea that things are going to be system-dependent. I had directories with Makefiles in that called directories (some ours, some 3rd-party) Makefiles etc. etc. You just need to put the thought in ahead of time.

My solution was to have the top-level Makefile set a variable based on running the 'uname' command, and then 'include' the definitions that worked for the platform, based on the variable name (we were running gcc and gmake on all the platforms, although the windows one was cross-compiled under Linux. Believe it or not, this was easier!)

So, CC, CXX, JAVA, LD, RM, AR, RANLIB
etc. etc were all defined within the platform-specific file, and the main Makefile looked pretty clean. All you have then are the #ifdef statements in the source code. It did get to the point where for one project we simply had different source code for the Windows variant, and the platform-specific Makefiles copied the correct file into place before trying to compile the module in question...

Looking back at the posts I'm making on /. these days leads me to believe I've become an old fart. Oh well. Happens to the best of us [grin]

Simon.

first post

[Anonymous Coward]

w00t

neat!

[urbieta]

Something more I do NOT need to do in Linux heh

atleast its good to see..

[KingPunk]

that Apple in general isn't propagating that their stuff is better than XGF-productname.
but Apple is embracing it.
i think that many more fortune-500 companies could take a few hints
from Apple & IBM's marketing ideas & schematics..

Re:atleast its good to see..

[Anonymous Coward]

Apple's stuff is better than 'XGF-productname'.

Re:atleast its good to see..

[grub]

I don't think Apple is embracing it. They're providing compatibility to a clunkier interface but that opens them up to the zillions of unix/linux apps available. Most of the software that runs in X11 wouldn't be considered competing packages.

Re:atleast its good to see..

[KingPunk]

i agree with you, but you must also see, atleast they're not saying linux or any x11-based application in this matter, is of satan and that you shouldn't use it.
unlike many other unnamed companies, just trying to monoplize the world

this way, atleast they're giving the people who are getting tired of the needlessly unnamed company's BS,
a path for migration, and they're still able to stick to their "UNIX" roots.
aside from the whole fact that OSX is mostly based off of NeXt, rather than UNIX. but thats a whole nother debate ;)

Re:atleast its good to see..

[Anonymous Coward]

Nice poem, asshole.

Let my browser work,
It can handle line-breaks fine,
Quit being a 'tard.

Re:atleast its good to see..

[Aeiri]

This is great to see, I agree.

Now it will probably be pointless to try to get Linux running on Mac, emulating Linux on Mac is worse than running the applications directly from Mac.

Re:atleast its good to see..

[Anonymous Coward]

Hi, this post is about X11, REAL X11. This post is awesome. X11 is cool; and by cool, I mean totally sweet.

Facts:
1. X11 is a network transparent graphics system
2. X11 displays things ALL the time
3. The purpose of X11 is to flip out and forward applications

Re:atleast its good to see..

[Dragonmaster Lou]

NeXT is a BSD-derived Unix, though. I fail to see what you'd be debating. :)

Re:atleast its good to see..

[Anonymous Coward]

X11 is so cool it makes me want to crap my pants!

Re:atleast its good to see..

[Anonymous Coward]

bah, fuck apple and their cake and lollies OS.. a rotten and silly abomination. give nothing, take alot; they're a leaky bucket.

Re:atleast its good to see..

[civilizedINTENSITY]

"Clunkier"? Let me know when anything else becomes network transparent. Aqua is a very sexy, fast sports car. X is a cargo helicopter. Different dimensions of functionality. But if you never leave the ground, Aqua *is* fast and sexy.

Re:atleast its good to see..

[pammon]

Running Linux on the Mac does not require "emulation."

Re:atleast its good to see..

[Anonymous Coward]

clunkier was referring to X11 not Aqua.

Re:atleast its good to see..

[Dorothy 86]

but, does it have REAL ULTIMATE WINDOW TRANSPARENCIES?

silly lameness filter... doesn't know the joke! :(

Re:atleast its good to see..

[mattyrobinson69]

What about the composite extention, which is very cool and becoming more and more stable (kde4/qt4 is going to use it later this year)

Re:atleast its good to see..

[notsoclever]

OpenStep had a network-transparent layer, and in theory Cocoa (which is basically OpenStep with a few extensions) could be similarly made network-transparent fairly easily, since ObjC already has a pretty nice distributed object model. Apparently OpenStep even came with a built-in way of doing network-transparent app management (which could even seamlessly migrate windows between systems, which even X11 can't do easily) though I don't know any details of it (this is just according to some formerly NeXT-using people I've known who have since moved to OSX).

The main reason I can see for Apple not doing such a thing is that it might make things seem a bit weird to people who are accustomed to thinking of each computer as a separate device, and not a big cloud of computation/storage/etc., and would rather do the "cloud" functionality via more traditional (to Windows/Mac users, anyway) file-sharing conduits such as AFP, WebDAV, etc.

Incidentally, Cocoa is the API, while Aqua is the equivalent of the window manager. Cocoa is to X11 as Aqua is to, say, fvwm, twm, pwm, etc.; it's not Aqua which would be made network-transparent.

Re:atleast its good to see..

[TelJanin]

Any operating system being run on another operating system will require emulation.

Re:atleast its good to see..

[sedna]

A Mac is not an operating system, it's a hardware platform. Os X is the operating system. You can run Linux on a Mac without even have another OS in the vicinity. Do you need to emulate Linux on a x86 PC just because it comes with Windows preinstalled?

Re:atleast its good to see..

[Anonymous Coward]

The application you refer to is and was called NXHost, it is still available for the NeXTStep platform and is being "ported" to OS X. From my talks with the developer in charge, it pretty much works exactly as it did in NeXTStep, however Mac Users are a lot more discerning then NeXT Users so they are adding features like those of several good virtual desktop managers to make it more palatable.

Re:atleast its good to see..

[bob beta]

So what you're really saying is there was Network Transparency, and Apple threw it away, probably for political and marketing reasons.

The NIH? NI! tradition lives on.

Re:atleast its good to see..

[The Infamous Grimace]

Any operating system being run on another operating system will require emulation.

You can run OS X under Linux without any emulation. It's all virtualization. Emulation, well, emulates hardware. Like Virtual PC. It emulates x86 hardware through software. Mac-On-Linux, for example, allows the virtualized OS to run by giving it access to the underlying system, which must be of an architecture on which it can run natively. Which is why it doesn't work on x86 hardware.

If I am misinformed, please correct me.

(tig)

Re:atleast its good to see..

[b17bmbr]

The main reason I can see for Apple not doing such a thing is that it might make things seem a bit weird to people who are accustomed to thinking of each computer as a separate device, and not a big cloud of computation/storage/etc., and would rather do the "cloud" functionality via more traditional (to Windows/Mac users, anyway) file-sharing conduits such as AFP, WebDAV, etc.

no, why would apple want you to run os x on non-apple machines. it would be a few days before someone figured out the protocol and they were running os x clients on a linux box. 'cause that'd sell lots of mac hardware.

Re:atleast its good to see..

[notsoclever]

Hey, thanks! A quick Google search led me right to it. Nice to hear it's being ported to OSX, even if it's only going to support Cocoa apps like one of the other responses said (though I don't think I even run any non-Cocoa apps regularly aside from iTunes and Photoshop, neither of which are really suited to remote display anyway).

Re:atleast its good to see..

[JQuick]

Remote display made sense for display postscript in ways that no longer apply.

1. Instead of shipping bits around it would ship fragments of postcript code that when executed would produce the bits.

2. When asked to ship raw bits it was pretty slow.

3. For general purpose graphics the model was highly limiting because it basically drew into a dumb frame buffer which was blitted to the graphics card. Because of this it was never designed to use hardware acceleration.

4. Security was poor.

5. Adobe killed display postscript. Apple had to redesign a new display model from scratch. They chose pdf swince it incorporates a subset of postscript, though not the elements critical to making the old model work sell remotely.

The core graphics model in OSX now makes heavy use of hardware acceleration. Their is a fundamental tradeoff involved. You can have it fast, or you can have it remote. It made more sense to optimize for speed.

You can use and number of VNC clients and servers to run it remotely or use Apple's remote administration tool. These are relatively slow. Had they made remote windowing a priority it would have dramatically reduced their efficiency and speed for basic rendering.

Re:atleast its good to see..

[civilizedINTENSITY]

"Adobe killed display postscript." I'd be interested in more discussion, here. Isn't GNUstep using display PS? Are there problems there?

Re:atleast its good to see..

[civilizedINTENSITY]

Of course on Linux one can develop/use GNUstep (Cocoa) on top of X11, underneath WindowMaker (or Gnome or KDE or etc...). Seem like the best of both worlds?

Re:atleast its good to see..

[JQuick]

Display postscript was an official language distribution from adobe. In the late 80s early 90s it was developed as a serious contender to the X10/X11 display model. Many people confuse Display Postscript (hereafter called DPS) with other postscript related implementations.

NeWS (the Network Extensible Windowing System) was an independent implementation of postscript. It used a complete different set of objects to model display objects and handle events. It was similar in general flavor and purpose to DPS, but its major shortcomings were that it did not accept postcript type 1 fonts, and it was incompatible in a number of minor ways that meant that much output destined for HP printers (which used real postscript) did not render properly under NeWS.

Some people on the GNUStep team had been developing a display Ghostscript engine. Note that Ghostscript and postscript are independently developed engines. Thus when adobe dropped support for DPS it had no effect on that project.

I have not looked at GNUStep in several years, so am not intimately familiar with the details, but searching google today seems to indicate that that a native Display Ghostscript (DGS) system is no longer under development. Also, I note that an attempt to implement DPS as an extension to XFree86 also died about 4 years ago. So, my guess (and it is just a guess) is that DPS as a windowing system is a dead language.

I believe that GNUStep developers, instead, split the GUI layer into back end and front end parts. The actual GNUStep libraries that accept postscript fragments in display calls would then call either vanilla ghostscript to create a bitmap which would then be rendered using X11, or perhaps rendered via some other X11 rendering library that understands a subset of the postscript language. In any case, the interpretation of postscript fragments would be passed to an X11 based back end, and the windows, mouse events etc. would also be managed by X11. In real DPS these events were accepted by a small C base core, and the passed to objects running in the DPS interpreter. This is a significantly different model than GNUSTep appears to be using.

So I don't consider GNUStep dead, but do consider DPS dead.

DPS was an interpreter which managed display contexts for a system. It was a set of OO extensions to postscript. Basically one of the underlying types in postscript was a dictionary, an associative array like storage structure. Each window, menu, click-region, etc, was a an object whose members (and methods) were stored by name in dictionaries.

An interesting offshoot of this was that the real semantic guts of both news and dps was a postcript file. Adventurous users (or crazy, your call) could tweak certain aspects of appearance or behavior system wide. I briefly experimented with sloppy focus by tweaking the dps source code back in NeXTStep 1.x days.

Anyway, in the early Rhapsody days, Adobe set such high license fees for continuing to allow DPS use by NeXT/Apple, that Apple chose to stop using it. Since PDF supports a subset of PostScript, they decided to go that route instead. Most people I spoke to, agreed that it looked like the license fees were good evidence that Adobe wanted to drop DPS entirely and that their choice of pricing forced Apple's hand.

In the end, I feel that Apple made the right choice. It automatically meant that remote display protocols for Macos X would take a hit. However, it meant that local display performance would dramatically increase. Since that affects far more people, they made the most sensible choice.

Sorry that I was not able go give a very coherent answer here. This is ancient history. I hope you found it useful anyway.

Re:atleast its good to see..

[notsoclever]

Or on MacOS one can develop/use GNUstep on top of X11 on top of Cocoa!

Weird

[pclminion]

How weird -- I'm right in the middle of doing exactly this (trying to port one of our UNIX products over to run on Mac OS X using an X server).

I think I'll wait to RTFA until after I've tried everything on my own first. Nothing like thrashing randomly to help you learn about a system :-)

Re:Weird

[pope1]

I'm a system administrator by profession, not a developer, but I was happy with myself today.

I got the 1993 source for xloadimage (From the X11R5.1 Contrib directory) to build with Xcode (gcc-3.3.3) under Mac OSX 10.3.7.

I only had to change a few #include's (varargs.h dosen't exist anymore, for one) and clean up a little outdated syntax, and after that it compiled relatively cleanly.

More importantly, it worked! But until I figure out how to get X11.app to run with an "actual" root winow, instead of the Quartz "integrated" mode, my main goal of running jwz's webcollage.pl
isn't as stunning as it could be =P

It does work, though. I used i-Installer to get the netpbm and libtiff/libpng/libjpeg stuff installed.

Re:Weird

[Kyro]

Did you check the X11 prefenences?

Under the output tab, there is a checkbox for Full Screen... that is what you are trying to do right? :D

Re:Weird

[sedna]

You can also try the aqua version...

http://www.nowhereville.org/archives/cat_software. html

Re:Weird

[zonker]

that would be fun as an active desktop background too. wonder if anyone has done one for windows yet?

Excellent

[Anonymous Coward]

Well what else is there to say?

Wow

[Anonymous Coward]

Fuck me, Apple embraces open source... news of the year, no minute, no second, no, oh wait

Re:Wow

[Anonymous Coward]

Christ, who's gone crazy with the "Redundant" mods today?

HEY ASSHOLE, look up the word. You keep using it, it doesn't mean what you apparently think it means.

The parent is Offtopic, not Redundant. Moron.

(And this is Flamebait, Offtopic or Troll, your choice. You might also try a piquant Overrated.)

The real question

[product byproduct]

Do they pronounce it 10-11?

Re:The real question

[SilentChris]

If you install at lunch time it'd be 10-11-12. Wait, no... that's a stretch.

Re:The real question

[Anonymous Coward]

No, they pronounce it "Hot across your moms buns - 11 (as in times)".

Re:The real question

[jxyama]

...but this one goes to eleven.

Re:The real question

[Captoo]

Is Apple going II use Roman numerals IV OS XI? By the way, If I were a Roman script kiddie, I'd be lIIIIIIt. :-)

Re:The real question

[LiquidRaptor]

I'm sorry, but thats the funniest thing I've read in a friggin long time.

Re:The real question

[Anonymous Coward]

I have a friend who works at Apple (I'm posting anonymously, so you can choose to believe me or not), and I asked him that once (though with fewer numerals).

My source says no. After they reach OS X 10.9, it will roll over to OS X 11.0. Such a strange company.

Re:The real question

[DeusExLibris]

No - it is pronounced "ex els". Microsoft's attorneys have already been in contact with them regarding trademark infringment.

Re:The real question

[Minstrel Boy]

Yes, and OS X does come with the vi editor, as well. But you have to pronounce it "six". ;)

KeS

Re:The real question

[SilentUrbanFox]

u hIVxored my LIIIgIo|\|!!!

Re:The real question

[igny]

Using Roman numeral seems more sensible than fractions, as in OS/2

Re:The real question

[Local ID10T]

and has 7-11 sued yet?

Re:The real question

[Captoo]

If you're putting things that way, then "OS/2" would only be half of an operating system. And "Windows 2000" would be extremely bloated. This really actually explains a lot.

Re:The real question

[fm6]

Blasphemy! Everybody knows it's ][, not II!

Re:The real question

[Tumbleweed]

Blasphemy! Everybody knows it's ][, not II!

Hardly. It's //, old-timer.

Ahh, the good ole days. Choplifter, Hard Hat Mack, Conan, Gemstone Warrior, & Karateka. Back when games were fun. Games today are either Mortal Kombat clones, or race games. No imagination.

Where the hell's my PSP, Sony?!

Re:The real question

[marcello_dl]

// was for the //c. I seem to recall older apples were ][. That ][ was my first taste of minimal ascii art, now that I think about it ;)

Re:The real question

[fm6]

More blasphemy! The Solidus was only used for the Apple ///, and that abomination was the beginning of the end.

Re:The real question

[tepples]

The Solidus was only used for the Apple ///

I seem to remember the IIe in the beige case (before Apple switched to gray cases for the enhanced IIe) being labeled //e.

Re:The real question

[Tumbleweed]

My Apple //e said //e, not ][e or IIe, FYI.

The beginning of the end was the Apple //gs, IMO. What a piece of crap compared to the Amiga 1000 which predated it!

Re:The real question

[UnknownSoldier]

> Ahh, the good ole days. Choplifter, Hard Hat Mack, Conan, Gemstone Warrior, & Karateka.

Definately gota agree with you about Conan, Gemstone Warrior, and Karateka.

What no Aquatron, Montezuma's Revenge, Lode Runner, Rescue Raiders, Wings of Fury, or Spare Change! ;-) Gumball, Dino Eggs, Diamond Mine were fun too.

Only game I miss is Pharoah's Curse on the C64.

I ripped the music for Karateka ... and manually typed it up as MIDI. I should post that someday...

Re:The real question

[MemoryAid]

The beginning of the end was the Apple //gs

You let me know when the end of the end gets here, okay?

Re:The real question

[Tumbleweed]

I meant for the ][, II, // family, not for Apple. The Mac mini is probably going to double their marketshare. At least, I hope so. At last, I can afford a Mac!

Re:The real question

[dhovis]

You do know that under the old "SimpleText" app from the System 7 days would speak text for you.

"vi" was actually pronounced as "six".

Re:The real question

[Brandybuck]

I'll have to remember that the next time my Mac developer friends get pretentious on me...

Bob [with nose in air]: "I wrote the whole site with BBEdit!"

Me [with finger in nose]: "Hah! That's nothing, I used Six!"

Bob: "What? You're not using the eMac's editor anymore?"

That's nice.

[Anonymous Coward]

See, this is why Apple computers are expensif. Because of that kind of support and technical details!

Re:That's nice.

[Anonymous Coward]

"expensif"

While they may be expensif, they certainly are not expensive. When pared against PCs with the exact same specs in hardware and software, Macs are typically less expensive.

PCs (unlike Macs) allow you to buy less and pay less, but that does not Mac Macs more expensive, though it does make them less configurable. All too often people get the two terms confused and use them interchangeably.

Re:That's nice.

[Anonymous Coward]

While they may not be expensive pared against PCs, they can be expensive when paired against them.

This could go on all day!

Step 1: Double click X11.app

[punkass]

Step 2: There is no step 2!

Re:Step 1: Double click X11.app

[geoffspear]

Well, the article does go into more detail than that and it's probably useful to someone starting out with X11. On the other hand, I'm not sure how this qualifies for /.'s front page.

I should try submitting "Apple posts technical Q&A on variable arguments in Objective-C methods" as a slashdot article, if every update to the ADC website needs its own story.

Re:Step 1: Double click X11.app

[Tsiangkun]

True, unless you want to compile your own applications that use the X11 windowing system. Then you need to install the development libraries and header files from XDarwin, or XFree86.

Fink makes it all easy.

Re:Step 1: Double click X11.app

[Alien Being]

Yeah, but which mouse button do I use? Oh, never mind.

Re:Step 1: Double click X11.app

[PeterPumpkin]

The article says nothing about starting an X app. Read through yourself, it only talking about building and installing. Maybe implied starting since screenshots are shown, but nothing specifically mentioned.

Re:Step 1: Double click X11.app

[geoffspear]

Umm, right above the screenshot of XGalaga, it shows you how to start xgalaga, which is an X app.

Re:Step 1: Double click X11.app

[Anonymous Coward]

Like how it doesn't say this?

Run xcalc:

[Gumdrop:/usr/X11R6/bin] asd% ./xcalc &
[1] 2452
[Gumdrop:/usr/X11R6/bin] asd%

Re:Step 1: Double click X11.app

[SilentChris]

"Step 2: There is no step 2!"

Depends. If you're running anything in KDE or Gnome, there's quite a few steps that Apple doesn't go into. I was quite perturbed to install KDE, have it start up successful, and get the Quartz WM trying to take it over (imagine KDE dialogs with Quartz close buttons). It took me a long time to figure out exactly what needed to be added to the .rc file to curb this behavior.

Re:Step 1: Double click X11.app

[PeterPumpkin]

This has been a test of the emergency RTFA system. We apologise for the inconvenience, and this was only a test.

Re:Step 1: Double click X11.app

[BrookHarty]

Step 2: There is no step 2!

Actually Step 2 is get Fink or Darwin ports for the applications. While Fink has been pretty good in the past, I've switched to darwinports as its more tested, and multi-platform. Darwinports also has less compile issues on popular ports.

Also nice you can run X apps in a -rootless display in mac by default. I even run VNC with Xquartz on the OSX box, i havnt used my linux box since ive bought the dual cpu mac.

Re:Step 1: Double click X11.app

[hunterx11]

All you have to do it type fink describe bundle-kde | less

To use KDE as your windowing system in XDarwin, create a file called
".xinitrc" in your home directory, containing the following line:
.
/sw/bin/startkde >/tmp/kde.log 2>&1
.
See http://fink.sourceforge.net/doc/x11/run-xfree86.ph p#xinitrc
for more information on the xinitrc files and how they work.
.
If you want to use Apple's X11 instead of the KDE window manager,
put the following line before the startkde line in .xinitrc:
.
export KDEWM=quartz-wm
.
Note that depending on your version of Apple's X11, this can cause
strange resizing issues with the kicker (KDE task bar).
.

Re:Step 1: Double click X11.app

[Anonymous Coward]

Ahahha! Oh, man, I LOVED the year 1993! Thanks for the trip down memory lane buddy!

Re:Step 1: Double click X11.app

[Anonymous Coward]

That joke is getting SO OLD.... Be more original, please.

X on windows

[datadriven]

It won't be long before windows does this too...ow wait.

Re:X on windows

[Anonymous Coward]

x server for windows

Re:X on windows

[DancesWithBlowTorch]

Aww man, I love your .sig, especially in combination with this moderation.

Trash your mac?

[Anonymous Coward]

You wont, theres nothing to do besides download the package and install it, and find the X11 icon in your Utillities folder. I dont get why this is front page news...

Re:Trash your mac?

[pclminion]

It's unfortunate, but people who have only been exposed to Linux really have no clue about cross-UNIX portability. Yeah, UNIX systems are all similar, but you can RARELY take a piece of code developed on one system and just compile it magically on another.

It's much less work than, say, porting a UNIX project to run on Windows, but it's definitely much more complicated than just copying the source code to the Mac and typing "make."

Re:Trash your mac?

[Anonymous Coward]

Eh?

I type ./configure
make

Re:Trash your mac?

[Gherald]

I type ./configure
make

Remember, 2 * x is still O(x). So that doesn't get you anywhere in terms of complexity.

Re:Trash your mac?

[cmacb]

I haven't tried Panther yet, but on jaguar I found that many X11 apps were much faster (or seemed so) than their aqua counterparts. It wasn't that unusual for me to be running KDE and Mozilla in X11 rather than bothering with the Aqua alternatives.

I was glad to hear that X11 was even better integrated into Panther...but at the same time, the download for X11 for Jaguar silently disappeared, and in fact when I located the few remaining links to it on the Apple site it was really downloaded an Panther-only version. Having had some hardware problems with my iBook I suddenly found I had to depend on a third-party X11 interface.

This is the compromise you have to make with commercial software. You upgrade, or you better have a CD full of the old version of things or you are out of luck. That software upgrade cycle, eventually and mysteriously, force you to buy a faster machine with more memory at some point. The "upgrade treadmill" as I've heard someone refer to it may be due to cost cutting, incompetence, or some sinister plan at Apple, but it doesn't matter, the outcome is the same, I, the user have little control over the use of my own equipment.

I'm very tempted by the new Apple mini, but if I get one I may just install Linux on it to begin with and avoid the treadmill altogether. The other advantage is that such a system integrates seamlessly with my existing menagerie of PCs (also running Linux.)

Re:Trash your mac?

[loraksus]

You could do this under 10.1 (and I think 10 beta), but it is nice that it is actually nice and easy to do now.

Re:Trash your mac?

[science_gone_bad]

One word....Fink

http://fink.sourceforge.net/

I grabbed the X11 server from fink, compiled it locally, and had WindowMaker running on it in a couple hours (well the X11 compile took ~12 hrs, but it was a Grape iMac (90MHz G3) my G4-400 can do it in ~3-4 hrs).

I haven't been back for a few months to see if the X11 is from Xfree86 or X.org, but either way, fink has it AND instructions on getting it functional.

Re:Trash your mac?

[Anonymous Coward]

uh, right

if you develop (or use) a well-behaving library, your code should be 100% portable.

witness the work that's done in the lab here where I work; i took stuff that was originally developed on sgi's and got it to work great on my mac. same with stuff that's developed on linux.

so, if the architecture and the frameworks are there, then everything should Just Work.

Re:Trash your mac?

[mrchaotica]

Everything I've written works just as well on OS X as it does Linux. Then again, that could be because I use ANSI C....

Re:Trash your mac?

[pclminion]

"Code" encompasses more than .c files. .c files, properly written, are amazingly portable. The surrounding structure of makefiles, build tools, and libraries hardly ever is, OTOH.

I have no doubt that once I get the build environment working, I'll have very few, if any, changes to make to the code base proper. But the build environment can't just be discounted as if it doesn't exist. For large projects, especially those which have been evolving organically for over a decade (as this one has), they are nearly as complex as the code itself, require their own testing (aside from tests of the "real" code base), and are far more platform-specific.

Re:Trash your mac?

[Tony Hoyle]

That's what autoconf is for.

I've done this with many projects.. and it really is just as easy as typing 'make' (rather ./configure;make).

Of course you have to write your code in a cross platform manner in the first place...

Re:Trash your mac?

[Brandybuck]

Of course you have to write your code in a cross platform manner in the first place...

And therein lies the rub! It's rather easy to tell who is the Unix and Linux developers apart, by who has the easiest code to port to a different flavor of Unix. When even their shell scripts have a hardcoded "#!/bin/bash", it's quite clear that portibility is a non-requirement.

Do they really need a step by step..

[Anonymous Coward]

I did this a few weeks ago and it was pretty damn simple. The cool thing abouts Mac's is that is what you get with the Unix backend and the Quartz windowing system, it can be as easy or as complicated as you want it.

Re:Do they really need a step by step..

[learn fast]

and their X11 is OpenGL native. So, rendering is fast as hell.

Re:Do they really need a step by step..

[garcia]

Do they really need a step by step..

Why shouldn't they? Macs appealed to all different types of users including the lowly n00b that didn't want to know anything about their machines.

A step by step guide (including how to do it all over SSH) is a great way to bring the information to ALL their users.

OS X has been running X11 for quite some time. It's just now that there might be a need for all their users to get access to it.

Re:Do they really need a step by step..

[Anonymous Coward]

Good point. I have a linux box at work and have had to do quite a bit of this stuff "by hand". I get spoiled by my Mac when I can go home and install a Radius server or X Windows with just a few clicks..

Re:Do they really need a step by step..

[mattyrobinson69]

i dont mean to be an arse, but you can do that in linux too. look up porthole for gentoo. i know debian has stuff for that too, but im not sure what it uses.

Slow news day?

[hwestiii]

I'm not sure that I get this. Its my recollection that X11 was included "in the box" with Panther. You had to download their beta version on 10.2 or could use XDarwin otherwise.

Why is this worthy of comment?

Hey, look! An MSDN bulletin on a strange but useful utility called, um, lets's see, uh, Notepad!

Re:Slow news day?

[Bastian]

I think it's that they point out how to compile stuff for X11. (i.e., when you install XCode, you have to remember to click the checkbox that says, "Install X11 libraries" or whatever)

Not that a bulletin on the existence of a clearly-visible checkbox is news, either.

Really, the most interesting and useful thing in this article for me was the screenshot of XGalaga. I didn't know this game existed. I like Galaga, so I'm going to hunt it down this afternoon so I can install it on my (already incredibly functional) X11 for OS X intall.

Re:Slow news day?

[JHromadka]

X11 isn't installed by default. You have to do a custom Panther install.

Re:Slow news day?

[Anonymous Coward]

Indeed. I've had my PowerBook since April. I installed X11 on around the 2nd day of ownership after having explored all the iLife apps. It went something like *Double-click installer* *next* *next* *agree* *next* *finish* *double-click X11 in the Utilities folder* "Hey, look, an xterm" *ls* "Yup, that's what I expected".

How hard is that?

Re:Slow news day?

[Anonymous Coward]

IT'S ABOUT COMPILING X-APPS YOU STUPID MORON!!

how about rtfa?

huh???

god, let it rain brain!!!

Re:Slow news day?

[Amiga Lover]

It's not included in a default install, and even if it were the configuration and working of X11 running on top of the Apple native Quartz windowing system is a bit different to the usual X11 experience. This gives a little depth to what goes on behind the scenes.

Double clicking an icon to start the X server is weird enough on its own.

Re:Slow news day?

[Anonymous Coward]

I've just installed the Darwin kernel on a Dell PC! "Welcome to Macintosh!," on a DELL!

Next Up

[Anonymous Coward]

Apple explains how to garnish a delicious steak with sauteed poo.

Why?

[goombah99]

Isn't X-11 already available either on the mac-install disk and as part fo fink. Or are these just X-11 servers instead of being real cleints (using the bass-ackward X-11 speak)?

Re:Why?

[pclminion]

Yeah, it's there. But you're thinking like a Linux user, not a developer :-) My job is more than just getting the thing to compile and run. I need to get it packaged up in a way suitable for endusers. We don't want to explain to our users how to get the X server running. They need to be able to just click and have the thing work.

Like I said, I'm in the middle of the project right now, so I don't know if it will be easy or hard. But I think you're jumping to the conclusion that it'll be a piece of cake just a LITTLE too soon...

Re:Why?

[which way is up]

Apple provides a version of XFree86, which is bundled with Panther, or a free download for Jaguar. X11 runs rootless, which means all of your X11 windows are mixed in with your normal OS X windows. KDE and Gnome have both been ported. KDE is a little farther along than Gnome, but both are available through Fink.

Re:Why?

[geoffspear]

The OS X distribution of OpenOffice comes with a handy .app that starts up X and openoffice at the same time, just like you're running a normal mac application. It's a nice idea, even if I don't like OO.o that much on the whole. This might be the sort of thing you're looking for.

On the other hand, it requires your end users to have X11 already installed and configured, which might be more of an issue for you, depending on your target audience.

Re:Why?

[roard]

Actually, the X11 version provided by Apple can run rootless OR fullscreen. Personally I use it mainly fullscreen with WindowMaker as WM -- it's quite puzzling for people that see me using WM on my ibook, thinking I'm under linux, when with a mouse stroke I reveal the OSX desktop ;-)

I also used it in Xnest, that can be useful too. Here is the small script I have to run it in Xnest:

#!/bin/sh
export DISPLAY=:0.0
open /Applications/Utilities/X11.app
xinit /Users/nico/.xinitrc.wmaker -- /usr/X11R6/bin/Xnest :3 -geometry 1020x680 &

Re:Why?

[Guy Harris]

Personally I use it mainly fullscreen with WindowMaker as WM -- it's quite puzzling for people that see me using WM on my ibook, thinking I'm under linux

Given that it's WindowMaker, I'm surprised they don't just think you're running a really old version of OS X. :-)

(For anyone who doesn't get the joke, just take the next step.... :-))

Re:Why?

[Onan]

Or are these just X-11 servers instead of being real cleints (using the bass-ackward X-11 speak)?

It's not backward, and it's not X11 specific. People just tend to have an inaccurate idea of what "client" and "server" actually mean.

The general tendency is to think of server as being "the big machine that does all the hard work for lots of little clients", or "the machine that provides some useful function, of which clients take advantage", and of course the client as the converse of these.

While these may often be true, the definitional difference is much simpler and clearer: the client is the system that initiates a connection. That's all. And the behaviour of X11 clients like xterm making connections to your X11 server is consistent with this.

And to answer your actual question, yes, an X11 server and set of standard clients is both an option from the standard osx install discs, and readily available via fink. I would imagine that this guide is not about the very basics of getting the server running ("You see that thing in your applications directory that looks like a big X? Doubleclick it."), but in how it quartz-wm differs from other common window managers, how X11 interacts with Quartz if they're both running, etc.

Re:Why?

[pjt33]

It's easy. I'm not at the Mac I work with now, so I can't check the exact syntax, but it's either

/usr/bin/open-x11 MyApp

or

/usr/bin/open -a X11 ; MyApp

Adding it to your installer should be straightforward too, because the package system is designed to handle that very cleanly.

Re:Why?

[sharkman67]

I've ported a number of Linux apps to OSX. I gone the route of creating a wrapper so it is a double click like a regular OS X app. The problem there is the environment has to be created within the .app directory and therefore gets way too big. I'm sure there is a better way. I'd probably take a look and see how the NeoOffice guys do it.

I've also created installers for X11 apps with Package Maker. I'll install everything in /sw so it is compatible with fink (usuall just add --prefix=/sw to the ./configure). I also create a symbolic link in the postflight script to the Applications folder and set the app to open within X11. This way it is almost transparent to the user (almost except the little arrow on the icon) that it is an OSX app. The preflight script check to make sure X11 is installed and exits with a message if it is not. I have been toying with doing a curl of the X11 app from Apple and installing it via command line via the preflight script if it is not installed. I have done it and it works I'm just not sure how Apple would feel about auto installing one of their applications without user intervention.

Good Luck!

Re:Why?

[roard]

Given that it's WindowMaker, I'm surprised they don't just think you're running a really old version of OS X. :-)

(For anyone who doesn't get the joke, just take the next step.... :-))

Indeed :-) -- furthermore as I'm running GNUstep programs, so the imitation is complete...

Re:Why?

[Guy Harris]

Or, to fix the URL, that's GNUstep.

Re:Why?

[roard]

thanks :-)

by the way, for thoses who will go to the Fosdem next february, there is a GNUstep developer's room, and there will be presentations, discussions, etc.

Re:Why?

[David Rolfe]

Maybe

/usr/bin/open -a X11 && MyApp

would be better. That way if the launch of X11 fails, MyApp won't even try to launch. You wouldn't want this if your app could detect X11 not running and give a pretty warning about it not warning. It would be good, though, as the X11 launch would have to complete before it would even try to launch MyApp.

Wow, really?

[Afrosheen]

People are still running X11 in this day and age? I thought since all the major distros adopted x.org that people quit using the outdated X11. One changes, the other one (sadly) remains the same.

Re:Wow, really?

[Anonymous Coward]

x.org is still X11!!

Re:Wow, really?

[Anonymous Coward]

X11 is a standard. XFree86 is an implementation of the X11 standard. X.Org is a fork of XFree86 anyways.

Re:Wow, really?

[Anonymous Coward]

X11 is just a protocol. You're thinking of XFree86.

Re:Wow, really?

[Anonymous Coward]

Sorry...But, Xorg and XFree86 are BOTH implementations of X11. X11 is closer to a standard on how to do windowing on UNIX and UNIX-like systems.

Re:Wow, really?

[ArbitraryConstant]

X11 is the protocol. XFree86 is the implementation that nobody likes anymore due to the change in license. X.org is the implementation that everyone is moving to. There are a number of other implementations.

Apple committed to XFree86 long before they changed the license. They may move to X.org as that implementation gets better features.

Re:Wow, really?

[nko321]

X.org is an implementation of the X11 protocol. X11R6 is the 6th revision of the X11 protocol. There was supposedly an X10 protocol before X11. What people have begun abandoning is XFree86, and not everyone is leaving it. I think NetBSD still uses it.

Re:Wow, really?

[rabbit78]

Isn't X:org also X11? You probably mean XFree86? X versions are really complicated to comprehend, I'm not sure what the 11 means. I think I remember something like X11R5 some years ago, but never R4, not to speak of X10.

Re:Wow, really?

[abes]

X11R6 is the protocol used, not the implementation. The XFree86 project was a popular project to implement the X11 protocol on 8086 machines. Because of politics, the X client/server was branched by x.org (as the source code was open), so a different development style could be done (and from what I understand many of the people from the XFree86 project switched to x.org as well). There do exist other implementations of X11 that cost money, but at least in the past advertised better performance.

Re:Wow, really?

[Anonymous Coward]

Maybe you should understand what X11 is before you post on the subject.

Re:Wow, really?

[Anonymous Coward]

X11 is a protocol like FTP. X.Org, XFree86, etc. are just implementations of that protocol just like ftp.exe, transmit, and curl are implementations of the FTP protocol. People are moving away from the XFree86 implementation towards the X.Org implementation but it's all X11R6 at the moment.

Re:Wow, really?

[Afrosheen]

Hey now, that didn't deserve an offtopic. I bet I'm not the only one that misunderstood the difference between a protocol and an implementation of that protocol. Anyway it's still relevant because Apple may use XFree86 or X.org, and that was kinda my original question.

But seriously, thanks for clearing that up. All 12 of you.

Re:Wow, really?

[Just Some Guy]

10 messages into the replies to your post, and every single one of them says the exact same thing.

Congratulations, guys; you all got it right without stopping to realize that 10,000 other people also knew the same answer but weren't frothing to correct him. I bet you're all a lot of fun on mailing lists, too.

Re:Wow, really?

[geoffspear]

X11R4 was in wide use when I first started using unix workstations back in 1992. X11R2 and X11R3 were before my time, but they did exist. Remember, those were the days before everyone thought a higher version number is automatically better, even if you're talking about a different app, which is why there was no Netscape 5. And why everyone switched to using a year or some random letters instead of version numbers (Photoshop CS or Fireworks MX both sound like they could be the best image editor out there, but no one's going to buy Fireworks v.2.0 instead of Photoshop 7.0. Photoshop is 5 better!)

Re:Wow, really?

[Homology]

What people have begun abandoning is XFree86, and not everyone is leaving it. I think NetBSD still uses it.

Yes, NetBSD imported the latest XFree86 as they had no problems with the license. OpenBSD has changed to X.org for upcoming release, while FreeBSD appears agnostic in this matter.

Re:Wow, really?

[Mr Guy]

That's true. I've said in the passed what Slashdot really needs is a -1 Wrong.

Re:Wow, really?

[IvyKing]

The XFree86 project was a popular project to implement the X11 protocol on 8086 machines.

8086???

I could believe x86 machines (possibly including the 80286), but don't think 8086 boxes would have had enough memory. Not to mention the old VGA cards that would support only 4 bits of color in 640 by 480 mode - don't even talk about EGA or (barf!) CGA.

Re:Wow, really?

[Anonymous Coward]

[..] FreeBSD appears agnostic in this matter.

They can't know if they're ok with the license?

Re:Wow, really?

[Guy Harris]

What the original poster probably meant was "the XFree86 project was a popular project to implement the X11 protocol on UNIX-compatible OSes running on x86 machines", with "x86 machines" probably mainly referring to 80386 at the time.

Re:Wow, really?

[Daniel Boisvert]

FreeBSD appears agnostic in this matter.

FreeBSD switched to X.org in -current in July of 2004. See Eric Anholt's post to freebsd-current here, or the Slashdot writeup here. You can still use XFree86 if you like, but X.org is the default.

Re:Wow, really?

[convolvatron]

supposedly?? stupid children.

Re:Wow, really?

[Homology]

FreeBSD switched to X.org in -current in July of 2004. See Eric Anholt's post to freebsd-current here, or the Slashdot writeup here. You can still use XFree86 if you like, but X.org is the default

Ah, was not aware of that FreeBSD had changed to use X.org as default. Thanks for the clarification.

Re:Wow, really?

[siskbc]

X.org is an implementation of the X11 protocol. X11R6 is the 6th revision of the X11 protocol. There was supposedly an X10 protocol before X11. What people have begun abandoning is XFree86, and not everyone is leaving it. I think NetBSD still uses it.

Will this be the first instance of a Netcraft-confirmed double suicide? XFree86 and NetBSD are definitely dying.

Re:Wow, really?

[Anonymous Coward]

I first wrote X applications in 1987 with X10. Initially with just Xlib and then with HP's Xray toolkit.

Reaction to OpenOffice

[digitalgimpus]

IMHO this is a reaction to the announcement that no aquafied OpenOffice is planned.

Apple doesn't want people to think they are locked into MS Office (hope it continues to support Mac OS X).

This way, Apple can say commercial grade alternatives do exist.

Apple's products aren't bad... but lets face it, they target home and educational use. Not a business person who wants to occasionally work from home. Microsoft does have powerful software, despite being buggy and insecure.

IMHO Open Office rocks. Wish Apple would invest in an aquafied port.

Re:Reaction to OpenOffice

[Scrameustache]

IMHO this is a reaction to the announcement that no aquafied OpenOffice is planned.
Apple doesn't want people to think they are locked into MS Office (hope it continues to support Mac OS X).
This way, Apple can say commercial grade alternatives do exist.

No, this is.

Re:Reaction to OpenOffice

[Anonymous Coward]

No you moron. This isn't a response to OpenOffice not having an Aqua version. There is an Aqua version, it's called NeoOffice/J.

Besides, Apple is working on their own office suite. Pages is already shaping up to replace Microsoft Word for most people.

Apple's products aren't bad... but lets face it, they target home and educational use. Not a business person who wants to occasionally work from home. Microsoft does have powerful software, despite being buggy and insecure.
Right, all the business people I know are just clamoring to run OpenOffice.

Re:Reaction to OpenOffice

[qwertphobia]

X11 for OSX has been available for several years - almost as long as OSX itself!

Re:Reaction to OpenOffice

[JJahn]

To those who want an aquafied OpenOffice, please check out NeoOffice. They are working to make OpenOffice more MacOS native. Currently, they have removed the need for X11, put in Aquafied menus, and native printer and font support. Sure, its not perfect yet, but its getting there.

Re:Reaction to OpenOffice

[richmaine]

You pigeonhole them too much.

As of OS-X, there is a *LOT* of interest in Apple systems as engineering workstations. That's what I'm using, as are many people I know. This mac replaced my linux box at work.

The big interest in Macs as engineering workstations isn't exactly a big secret.... anyway not to anyone in the engineering field.

Yes, there are also plenty of other platforms used. Still a lot of Sun/Linux/other boxes here as engineering workstations, and that isn't about to change in the near future. The Macs aren't suddenly taking over it all - but they are certainly now a significant player in that market.

Re:Reaction to OpenOffice

[angst_ridden_hipster]

I second this suggestion.

Works great for everything I've thrown at it.

Re:Reaction to OpenOffice

[BrookHarty]

iWork doesnt have a spreadsheet. Maybe so Microsoft wont dump MS Office support on OSX.

I'd still use Openoffice over iWork.

Re:Reaction to OpenOffice

[generic-man]

Where's the Excel replacement?

Oh, there isn't one? Guess I'll have to wait for version 2, since iWork with spreadsheets every day and I haven't found a decent Mac spreadsheet app besides Excel. OpenOffice's spreadsheet program is non-native, ass-slow, and supports half as many rows as Excel does (32,000 versus 65,536). Gnumeric is even worse than OpenOffice at reading or writing Excel files, and it too is not Mac native.

Re:Reaction to OpenOffice

[Anonymous Coward]

version 2.0 will support 65K rows in it's spreadsheet program Calc

Re:Reaction to OpenOffice

[digitalgimpus]

Hate to break it to you, but Apple's iWork, or AppleWorks doesn't even come close.

It's fine for kids doing homework, or a casual home user...

but in terms of interoperability... it stinks.

Business people can't afford to spend time dealing with "iWorks doesn't support _______".

End users are *not* geeks. They want simple equvilants. iWork is not an equivilant.

It's a good product. But it's not an office product.

Apple *needs* an office product. It's essential to it being viewed as a productive platform for anyone who interacts with businesses.

There are tons of alternatives to OpenOffice... but it's OpenOffice that keeps Linux at a point where it can be used in the workplace. If OpenOffice didn't exist, Linux would have 0 penetration in the workplace (as a workstation).

OpenOffice is a very good product. It's been a giant blessing for Linux. Apple can use that reliability too. Microsoft isn't guaranteed to keep doing Office for the mac.

Re:Reaction to OpenOffice

[Anonymous Coward]

Wow, have you tried iWork before? Maybe you should before you make blanket statements like that.

Re:Reaction to OpenOffice

[Phrack]

Apple's products aren't bad... but lets face it, they target home and educational use. Not a business person who wants to occasionally work from home. Microsoft does have powerful software, despite being buggy and insecure.

So, I'm a network engineer who does all his work on a Powerbook. Do I qualify as "home" or "educational"?

Re:Reaction to OpenOffice

[bynary]

No, but Appleworks does and MS still released Office for the Mac. After using Office for several years, I tried using Appleworks on my parent's iMac. Microsoft has nothing to worry about.

Re:Reaction to OpenOffice

[cioxx]

Hate to fix it for you, but:

"You can, for one, export your journal or newsletter as a PDF document, so that anyone with the free Acrobat Reader can enjoy it. You also have the option of exporting it as a Word, HTML, RTF or text-only file -- cross-platform formats one and all."

Perhaps do some research before correcting someone.

Also, I believe you're confusing iWork for something else. 'Kids doing homework' is another way of saying that an application is underpowered and lacks serious features. To state the obvious first - iWork is comprised of Pages and Keynote2, which target MS Publisher and MS Powerpoint respectively. Pages is not meant as a replacement for MS Word.

Secondly, Impress is horrible. It's clunky, slow, disorganized, and makes really unattractive slides. It cannot even compete with Powerpoint, let alone with Keynote.

AppleWorks is old, but I'd take that or AbiWord over OOo anyday.

Re:Reaction to OpenOffice

[javaxman]

Apple's products aren't bad... but lets face it, they target home and educational use. Not a business person who wants to occasionally work from home. Microsoft does have powerful software, despite being buggy and insecure.

I work for an engineering firm ( a small business ) where all of the computers are OS X machines. Aside from the occasional website with client-side scripts that restrict your use of their site unless they can run ActiveX or whatever, there isn't a thing we need a Windows PC for. We have one that sits in a corner, unused, just in case. But it's just that- unused.

Apple targets people looking to buy easy-to-use computers. People who think there's something they're going to miss out on by using a Mac don't realize they're thinking about viruses and stuff they don't actually *want* on their business machines.

Re:Reaction to OpenOffice

[sugar and acid]

>It's clunky, slow, disorganized, and makes really >unattractive slides. It cannot even compete with >Powerpoint, let alone with Keynote.
hmmm well I could maybe say yes, it is clunky and slow, but unattractive slides? I strip out all colourful backgrounds and text, so this doesn't effect me. Clear white background with a black easy to read text. Colour should be used in the text and in pictures to highlight important points, differences and correlations. Using anything else but the simplest base colour scheme robs you of much of the effect of using colour in this way. Simply put start off simple and it gives you more options to create impact where you want to impress upon people important points.

Now if you don't actually have much to talk about, sure hide that fact with colourful borders and backgrounds and all the other tricks that people employ to give a talk seem more than it is by using window dressing.

Re:Reaction to OpenOffice

[digason]

Although I'm not a fan of using non-native apps like OpenOffice, I prefer it to NeoOffice. NeoOffice is just really slow.

Re:Reaction to OpenOffice

[cioxx]

Attraction is not one of the inherent qualities of plain text on white background, so that's not what I meant. Obviously, I'm referring to bells and whistles like snazzy themes and whatnot that come with Keynote and ones which are available through 3rd parties like KeynotePro, et al.

Whenever I do a outline in Keynote, aesthetic appeal is top priority. I'm sure for you it might serve an entirely different purpose, like for example, putting up lots of information.

In sum, Impress cannot really deliver the type of results I look for in a presentation app. To each their own.

Re:Reaction to OpenOffice

[bob beta]

So, is there any Engineering Workstation software out for OS-X yet?

Can I generate schematics, autoroute circuit boards from them?, run simulations? Can I program FPGAs on a Mac? Is there much, if any, engineering software at all?

Re:Reaction to OpenOffice

[sugar and acid]

"Aesthetic appeal is top priority".
Aesthetic appeal for it's own sake shouldn't be your top priority, your top priority is to convey the information you want to convey in the clearest and most concise way, as this is the purpose of giving a presentation. The only time it isn't your top priority is if you are trying to be deceitful and hide and obscure important information for some purpose like conning someone, or you are in advertising (is their actually a difference). It is pretty clear cut distinction. Sure you can put on some nice borders and themes if you want but in the end that doesn't matter one bit to the impact of your presentation, and can only detract from it if done badly. I have seen to many people choose bad themes combined with poor text choices (unreadable fonts, dark text on dark backgrounds etc) that simply detract from what would have otherwise been a good presentation to think that themes in powerpoint/keynote etc. is actually a necessary or even a good feature. It just adds in another avenue for someone not experienced in giving presentations to make another bad mistakes that make it even harder for the already suffering audience to understand.

Personally I use powerpoint as people used to use slide projectors. Not for talk outlines but using it as a convenient way to present visual information like graphs and pictures. Having simple solid white or at least a solid colour as a background helps the visuals pop out more readily instead of sinking into a complicated background.

Re:Reaction to OpenOffice

[bob beta]

You qualify as I.T.

Now, fetch a new toner cartridge for the Ljet4 up on third floor, willya? Hop to it, IT guy.

Re:Reaction to OpenOffice

[drinkypoo]

So what you are saying is that since you cannot purchase canned content for it, it's an inferior product? How about the fact that Impress supports higher resolutions than powerpoint? It has more potential :)

Re:Reaction to OpenOffice

[betelgeuse68]

Your opinion is wrong. The X Window System on Mac OS X is nothing new, it's been there for quite some time. It's just a how-to article. Nothing more, nothing less.

Re:Reaction to OpenOffice

[richmaine]

Yes, there is lots of engineering software out for it. I didn't say I wished I could use it for an engineering workstation. I said that I *DO*, as do many other people.

Let's start with 4 completely independent competing Fortran 90/95 compilers (I'm not counting g95 and gfortran as independent), plus the usual collection of other languages. From that follows lots of engineering applications, including, for example, all of the ones I developed. The Mac is my primary development machine these days - anything else is a port.

Matlab/simulink, et al. I'm not a heavy user of those, but a lot of enginees here are. Speaking of simulink, yes there are plenty of simulations running on OS-X.

As I said, Macs *ARE* used as an engineering workstation. This isn't a matter subject to debate. Perhaps they aren't used heavily in all fields of engineering, perhaps including yours. I don't know about schematic software in particular - not my field. See my prior post where I said that "the Macs aren't suddenly taking over it all."

Re:Reaction to OpenOffice

[Fizzyboy]

No kidding, I've been waiting forever for them to port Autocad to OSX! They keep talking about it but never do anything.

Re:Reaction to OpenOffice

[jsebrech]

Aesthetic appeal for it's own sake shouldn't be your top priority, your top priority is to convey the information you want to convey in the clearest and most concise way, as this is the purpose of giving a presentation.

It depends on what kind of presentation you're giving. If you're presenting a paper or a set of research results to a technical audience, then yes, you would be exactly right. For sales presentations however, form over function can be a lot more preferable. The people who make purchase decisions tend to have to make a lot of them. They don't have time to know everything about everything, so they go by what their gut tells them. Information will sway them, but a smooth and sharply looking presentation, however light on details it may be, will sway them as well. The point is making them feel good about your product, and that can be done with pretty pictures.

Especially when your product is not the best product in a market, your sales presentations need to look extremely attractive. After all, in such a situation you can't sell based on information, since information will tell a potential customer he should go to your competitor.

Re:Reaction to OpenOffice

[bob beta]

When most people think 'engineering workstation' they refer to the classic EDA apps. To quote someone whose comment paralleled mine:

Unfortunately, you can't run Modelsim, Synopsys, or other EDA tools on it :(

Perhaps they aren't used heavily in all fields of engineering, perhaps including yours.

There are a shocking number of new 'disciplines' that get called 'engineering' these days. I hearken back to the classic definition. There are basically three kinds of engineers: Electrical Engineers, Mechanical Engineers, and Chemical Engineers. All the others are poseurs.

Re:Reaction to OpenOffice

[sugar and acid]

Which is why people should distrust any presentation that is light on detail and full of flash.

Remote Applications

[fm6]

It's worth remembering that an X application doesn't have to run on the same system as the terminal. So even if you can't get the source code, you might be able to run the software, provided you're willing to spring for a Unix box the software supports. That might be useful for people who need commercial applications (such as FrameMaker) which are no longer available for the Mac, but is still supported for Solaris.

Re:Remote Applications

[sootman]

Or like when I ssh home (um, at lunch, right) and play Freecell. :-) Or run nedit, then go help -> about and see "Built on Linux, x86." Fun fun fun.

In all seriousness, I guess the deal here is that it's a newer version than what ships as X11.app? 'About' says 'X11 1.0 - XFree86 4.3.0'. I know the '1.0' refer's to the fact that it's *Apple's* 1.0, but can someone who spends more time with X than I do explain the significance of X11R6?

[later]

OK, I just looked at TFA. The title of this summary is a bit misleading--this title is "Apple Explains How to Run X11 on MacOS" but the actual article's title is "Configuring and Running X11 Applications on Mac OS X" and in goes on to say "X11 for Mac OS X... includes the full X11R6.6 technology including an X11 window server, Quartz window manager, libraries, and basic utilities such as xterm." OK, got it. I think. Still not sure how R6 and 4.3.0 relate, but the main thing is, there is nothing new here. They're talking about the X11 that OS X ships with.

Re:Remote Applications

[sammy baby]

I regularly ssh from my PowerBook in my office to our backup server, then run the Arkeia GUI over the connection.

Or at least I did, until something broke Fink's install of X11. Dammit.

Re:Remote Applications

[djdavetrouble]

It was immensely helpful in administering the SGI box at my last job, we ran fullpress and all of the easy admin tools were part of the 'toolchest' or whatever they call it in IRIX, x-windows based of course. I was able to run the x-app on my local machine finally, previously had to use the PC.

Re:Remote Applications

[fm6]

That's a little unclear. What are you backing up? Is Arkeia able to access your laptop files?

Re:Remote Applications

[Gropo]

That might be useful for people who need commercial applications (such as FrameMaker) which are no longer available for the Mac, but is still supported for Solaris.

I did a bunch of research on the viability of running the Solaris build of FrameMaker on OS X/X11 when embroiled in a couple large jobs last year. With the frequency of the Classic environment tanking on me--FM being the only app running within it--I figured the Solaris version was a natural alternative. Sadly it's not that easy, being that Adobe has not and likely will not release the source to the Solaris/X11 version.

Re:Remote Applications

[fm6]

I should have thought to mention SSH -- a simple low-resource way to establish a secure connection to a server. Those of us in the Windows world who want to use access company networks have to reply on VPNs -- which are pretty resource-intensive.

I do use SSH to synchronize my Linux-hosted web site with its staging area on my Windows box. But that's done with command-line tools, since I don't have any X-Window support. Can't afford commercial X terminals, and the only free one I know of (X for Cygwin) doesn't work very well.

Re:Remote Applications

[drew]

X11 is an open group specification that is implemented by XFree86, X.org, and a number of commercial X servers. R6.6 is the current version of that specification.

4.3.0 is the version of the Xfree86 software that Apple ships with OS X, which implements X11R6.6.

Re:Remote Applications

[fm6]

I'm not talking about running Solaris FrameMaker on Mac -- I'm talking about running Solaris FrameMaker on Solaris, and making it available to Mac users on the same network. As I said before, X terminals can be used with software running on remote systems. In fact, X was originally designed for dedicated terminal systems, which wouldn't run any software at all, except for the terminal software. A concept which never caught on, probably because an X Terminal cost more than a PC.

The other people who replied to my post gave some good examples of remote execution in the real world.

Re:Remote Applications

[civilizedINTENSITY]

People don't seem to be able to believe what "network transparancy" means. They call X "clunky" or "old-fashioned", and then can't understand what it does that is so much more advanced than anything else written today.

Re:Remote Applications

[jsebrech]

I know the '1.0' refer's to the fact that it's *Apple's* 1.0, but can someone who spends more time with X than I do explain the significance of X11R6?

X11 is two things, a standard for windowing systems, and a series of implementations of that standard. X11, the standard, is developed by the X.org foundation, at www.x.org. The current base version of that is version 11, release 6, X11R6. Don't let the version 11 thing fool you though, X has been at version 11 since 1987, and likely will never get to version 12, which is why everyone just calls it X11.

As for the implementations ... originally it was simply X11, developed by the X consortium. However, since they were slow to adapt to new platforms or technologies (notably the x86 platform becoming powerful enough to run unix), a spin-off project called XFree86 evolved (it's a bit more complicated, but then who needs details). They became the de-facto reference implementation of X11, even if they didn't have the honor of owning any of the X consortium IP (like trademarks and so on). However, the leadership of the XFree86 project a while ago decided that they would change the license in ways the community did not like. As a result, the last truly free version of XFree86 is 4.3, which is the code that Apple's X11 1.0 is based on. X.org was founded around the same timeframe to step into the void left by the XFree86 project's implosion, and they now develop the official reference implementation (currently X.Org X11R6.8.1). Likely, in the future, apple's X11 will be based on the X.Org code.

Re:Remote Applications

[jsebrech]

Sadly it's not that easy, being that Adobe has not and likely will not release the source to the Solaris/X11 version.

I think the idea of the original submitter was that you would have a solaris box running framemaker, and export the solaris session's display to the X server running on your OS X box.

No rebuilding of the framemaker binary necessary in that case.

Re:Remote Applications

[Anonymous Coward]

X11R6 is the protocol version.
4.3.0 is the Xfree86 version of X

and, 1.0 is Apples port of Xfree86 4.3.0

I think.

Re:Remote Applications

[fm6]

I happen to think that X is clunky. The API is a nightmare, and customization or configuration means poking through a mind-boggling maze of resource files and startup scripts.

But you're right, today's platforms suck at network transparency. Windows is at the bottom of the list, which is why network transparency is such an alien concept to most users. Mac does somewhat better, but only by throwing in user-friendly wizards to make network chores a little less intimidating. Unix/Linux has the functionality, but almost nobody uses it.

OSs like CTOS and QNX were doing network-centric computing long before anybody ever heard of X. But CTOS is pretty much dead, and QNX seems to be a niche product. Nowadays people use "personal computers" which evolved out of hardware hacker toys, in which networking is an afterthought.

Re:Remote Applications

[Moofie]

Design==great.

Implementation==not so much.

Re:Remote Applications

[sirReal.83.]

It's 6.8.1, isn't it?

Re:Remote Applications

[sammy baby]

I'm backing up about half dozen servers in our ops room.

In theory, I could use Arkeia to back up the Powerbook: the client runs on a bunch of different platforms, inlcuding Mac OS X. But I have an external hard drive I use to back up my laptop's system state. I'm just using the laptop as a very swank X terminal for that purpose.

Re:Remote Applications

[Brandybuck]

Run your Solaris applications on a Sun! You can get a Sparc V "pizza box" for about $20 at many surplus computer stores. They're the equivalent of a cheap ten year old Micron, but with a hundred times the sturdiness and reliability. They will be slow, but you don't need speed for Framemaker.

Several people at my work (including myself) used Solaris Framemaker from our Macs and Linux/BSD PCs. Eventually the company beat us until we confessed our crimes against the state and switched to Windows, but we still use Framemaker from Cygwin/X11 or Hummingbird.

Re:Remote Applications

[civilizedINTENSITY]

The API is a nightmare if you code straight to it, but most people are a few abstraction layers away (think: GDK/GTK/Gnome). The Mac user-friendly wizard comment seems like really good advice. Linux is coming along, but this route involves controversy. GUIs don't have to exclude commandline tools and small apps piped together, they can rather be an interface on top of them. Many *nix geeks seem to worry that GUIs/wizzards would replace rather than augment the command line.

FINK

[chadpnet]

We have been doing this via fink for quite some time now. http://fink.sourceforge.net/

Re:FINK

[eeg3]

There's an entire part on using Fink to do it. RTFA, plzkthx.

Re:FINK

[CMRichar]

yeah, nice, and for those of us who DIDN'T RTFA, we now know about Fink. stop being a dick, plzkthx.

Re:FINK

[eeg3]

If you made it through using a mac for more than a week and never hearing of, or using, Fink... then you're a retard. Friggin' idiot. GOSH.

XFree86? Why not X.org?

[Anonymous Coward]

Apple's X11 implementation is based on the widely-used XFree86 project

Is apple going to switch to X.org, since most everyone else has already? or are they sticking with XFree86 for the long run? What kinds of compatibility issues will develop as a result of that?

Re:XFree86? Why not X.org?

[generic-man]

Why hasn't Apple blindly followed everyone else's decision to change X servers?

Because they Think Different (tm), of course. :)

Re:XFree86? Why not X.org?

[bonch]

None. I presume X.org and XFree86 both use the same X11 protocol.

Re:XFree86? Why not X.org?

[Anonymous Coward]

Ah my fellow Mac-slappy you are missinformed. X.org is a branch of XFree just before some ill advised boiler plate stuff was enterend into the licenses.

XFree is basically a floating ghost ship... bailing water.

XFree was last weeks news, X.org is next weeks news. So yes lets hope Apple DOES switch from XFree to X.org...

Re:XFree86? Why not X.org?

[Noksagt]

X.org was forked from XFree86. That wasn't TOO long ago & Apple X11 has been around for a while, so it really doesn't matter much.

XFree86 and X.org are certainly fairly compatible. (The benefits of having a well-designed, open protocol). I've found more things incompatible with either GNU Emacs or XEmacs. But, like this famous fork, I'm sure that the X-related forks will squash incompatibility bugs that pop up for popular apps.

Re:XFree86? Why not X.org?

[drinkypoo]

X.org already has at least one extension that XFree doesn't and things will likely only get worse over time. Unless Apple is going to bring that functionality to XFree, it will likely not be done at all, so it would be best if they accepted the change in the wind and moved on.

Re:XFree86? Why not X.org?

[node 3]

Is apple going to switch to X.org, since most everyone else has already? or are they sticking with XFree86 for the long run? What kinds of compatibility issues will develop as a result of that?

If XFree86 is as doomed as it looks, there's really no reason for Apple to stick with it, and plenty of reason for them to switch, which is the same boat all the Linux (and BSD and pretty much anything which uses XFree86) distros are in. This changeover isn't something that has to happen in unison.

So, I really wouldn't worry myself about it.

For the security guys

[Dark Paladin]

I rather like how the instructions talk about how to run X11 remotely, and the first thing they do is tell how to do it over ssh, with simple, easy to understand directions on how to do it. That is how "how to" manuals should be written.

2 points to Apple for doing that, and making my coworkers jobs a little harder (they're penetration testers).

Re:For the security guys

[Anonymous Coward]

I'd like to be a "penetration tester"...

...for your mom! :)

Re:For the security guys

[Anonymous Coward]

That's only a slashdot comment if his name is Luke Skywalker.

Re:For the security guys

[fm6]

Apple does pay a lot of attention to making their documentation clear and usable. Which of course goes with their ease-of-use religion. My only quibble is that their docs often leave out important technical details, for fear of confusing or intimidating users.

In any case, this is a reminder that educating your users is a big part of security.

Re:For the security guys

[jsebrech]

I rather like how the instructions talk about how to run X11 remotely, and the first thing they do is tell how to do it over ssh, with simple, easy to understand directions on how to do it. That is how "how to" manuals should be written.

Really, tunneling X through ssh IS the easiest way to run it remotely. That it happens to be secure is a nice coincidence, but even without the encryption it would still be the preferred way of doing things.

Any guide on remote X that starts out with xhost explanations is horribly outdated.

The amusing thing is that with ssh compression turned on I get better performance running an X session across the internet than if I do it without any tunneling at all, despite the overhead of the encryption.

Re:For the security guys

[circusboy]

I'm rather dissappointed, a sentence with the words "harder" and "penetration tester" in it and mine is the first comment about it?

I suppose it is a friday night...

Re:For the security guys

[Anonymous Coward]

so what, they penetrate their computers? right

Re:For the security guys

[bob beta]

If you want to, say, use an old Mac as an X terminal, you'll probably not want to tunnel it through ssh if you're on a local-only network. An old Mac can make a fine X terminal, running NetBSD or something similar. You'll bog it down badly by forcing it to encrypt all traffic to the machine running the X clients.

If you've ever enabled sshd on an SE/30 running NetBSD and had to wait while it generated the keys, you know what I mean.

Re:For the security guys

[jsebrech]

If you want to, say, use an old Mac as an X terminal, you'll probably not want to tunnel it through ssh if you're on a local-only network. An old Mac can make a fine X terminal, running NetBSD or something similar. You'll bog it down badly by forcing it to encrypt all traffic to the machine running the X clients.

First of all, you can turn off encryption in ssh. That just keeps the tunneling aspect, and forgets about the encryption aspect (on the command-line the argument is -cnone. Secondly, there are faster algorithms for encryption than the default. Just switching from idea or 3des to blowfish makes a big difference. I've served up evolution (a recent version) from a pII/233 across the internet in a blowfish encrypted ssh tunnel and managed a large mail archive with it, and it ended up bandwidth-bound, constantly saturating the cable internet feed on the remote end (which is capped at 24KB/s upload). It was also quite usable, as long as you didn't use drag and drop.

Secondly, I have my doubts about the usefulness of an SE/30 as an X terminal. Most SE/30's have stock graphics, meaning 1 bit 512*384. I own one as well, and the screen is very tiny. The OS7-era native apps fit on it well, but they were designed for a screen that small. Most apps nowadays are designed for screens almost twice the size running 16bit color at least. They might not even be usable on a screen that small.

X11 works really well...

[0xC0FFEE]

I've got fink to manage my open-source packages. I hear darwinports is also really good. I've got both KDE 3.3 and Xorg 6.8.1 installed and running under the XDarwin application. I got the KDE dock even. Everything works as it should, I can even copy-paste between Terminal.app and Emacs (under XDarwin*) without much hassle. I had freetype (anti-aliased fonts) working at some point but lost it when updating to KDE 3.3.

Xmms works, koffice works, karm (my personnal favorite) works, kdevelop works, etc.

* I'm not sure of the technical differences between X11 or XDarwin, if someone can point them out.

Re:X11 works really well...

[sharkman67]

I stick with fink becasue of how they install everything in /sw. This way my whole X11 environment is portable. Just tar it up and move it to another machine and it runs. No dependencies to break. My family likes kpat and a number of other X11 games. I am able to install them on my machine and with package maker (part of developer tools) I can create an installer that even my Mom can run on her new 20" iMac or my sister on her new 17" iMac. I keep multiple versions of my /sw tree depending on what I am doing. One for the family, one for my everyday X11 stuff and one for developmental stuff.

Great for UNIX admins!

[qwertphobia]

You can run your CDE off your Solaris or OpenVMS box, then display the X11 on your Mac desktop. The Gimp works pretty nice too. Version 2.2! Now if only there was better clipboard support...

I found Abiword to be much easier than OO

[sesshomaru]

If all you need is a word processor, there's a native version of AbiWord for OSX that seems to work great:

http://www.abisource.com/

I could never get OO to work on OS X, though I use it on my Windows Machine.

Re:I found Abiword to be much easier than OO

[leperkuhn]

I found it has a lot of problems with letters disappearing randomly.

Abbreviated Document here:

[gik]

Instructions on using X11 on MacOS X:

Chapter 1:

Don't.

Re:Abbreviated Document here:

[Anonymous Coward]

OS X allows network transparent applications does it?

Re:Abbreviated Document here:

[Anonymous Coward]

It used to back when it was called NeXTSTEP

Re:Abbreviated Document here:

[Gob Blesh It]

Hahahha, nice. :)

Minor OpenOffice.org corrections

[soullessbastard]

Disclaimer: I am a developer for Mac OS X OpenOffice.org and a founder of the NeoOffice project.

I happily noticed this myself earlier on in the week and was impressed to find the OpenOffice.org related section. Unfortunately there are some inaccuracies in the section, but I couldn't find any address to which corrections should be submitted.

Perhaps the most major omission is that the OpenOffice.org Mac OS X (X11) installer is not limited to 10.3 only. In fact, it supports both 10.2 and 10.3. For 10.2 users it also will automatically install XFree86 and a window manager if the system does not have XFree86 on it. Since Apple X11 is not redistributable under its license, 10.3 users are required ot manually install Apple X11. Ironically, that makes installation on 10.3 more inconvenient then 10.2!

On the trinity forums Smokey also noticed the file format "incompatibility" line in the article. It isn't actually true since OpenOffice.org is 100% compatible with StarOffice which, last I checked, is a commercial office suite even if it doesn't run on Mac OS X :)

Even with the little foibles, it's great to see support from Apple for X11 applications in general as well as a basic introduction that can help open up the entire world of X11 OSS applications for users, not just OpenOffice.org.

ed

Dumb explanation of X 'client' / 'server'

[figlet]

In the section "Which Machine Is the Client?", they completely mess up the explanation. What is wrong with just saying "The X server is a display server. X applications are clients (running on your machine or another machine) which request the server (which may be running on your machine) to do something ("draw a line", etc)."

Re:Dumb explanation of X 'client' / 'server'

[mph]

In the section "Which Machine Is the Client?", they completely mess up the explanation.

Heck, I'd say they completely mess up the question. It makes more sense if you ask, "Which process is the client?" Since most people run the server and clients on the same machine (at least on Unix workstations), their question can only lead to confusion.

Re:Dumb explanation of X 'client' / 'server'

[Brandybuck]

Try this then: "The client is the machine running the application. The server is the machine with the display. Often they are the same machine."

REDUNDANT?

[b374]

C'mon guys!!! How can a FP be redundant???

Re:REDUNDANT?

[carrierbagman]

C'mon guys!!! How can an FP be ANYTHING BUT redundant?!

Apple should...

[idlake]

integrate the X11 server fully into their system: it should be installed out of the box with every shipping Macintosh and it should either start up at boot time, or it should run on demand (X11 is quite lightweight compared to Quartz, so that really doesn't cost much). Apple also needs to do massive improvements on the performance of their X11 server before they are anywhere near competitive with workstations or Linux systems.

The way it is, X11 on OS X is just an emergency solution, not something you might want to actually deploy and use widely.

Re:Apple should...

[soullessbastard]

Disclaimer: I am a developer of Mac OS X OpenOffice.org and a founder of the NeoOffice project.

If the X11 server was preloaded onto all Apple systems, it would also solve quite a number of distribution problems for OpenOffice.org and other X11 applications. The license for Apple X11 doesn't allow third parties to bundle it and redistribute it. That makes it really frustrating from an installation perspective. Instead of being able to automatically install the X11 server (like we do using XFree86 for 10.2) we have to prompt the user to either go out and find where the X11User.pkg is on their Panther CDs or Software Restore CDs or even go and download it from Apple to install. Our installers can automatically install all of the other 6 applications OOo requires to run, but we just can't get Apple X11 so it kind of puts a dent in the installation experience. I'm sure that other commerical appliactions like MATLAB would like to be able to auto-install X11 as well.

Preloading X11 onto all shipping systems would allow us to not have to worry about users getting confused by the additional steps of the process. Traditionally, Mac installers are very simple and it's rare they require other software to be installed first.

Another solution which would be equally good IMHO is if Apple could come up with some type of distribution clause in their license to allow X11User.pkg to be bundled with installers for other applications. I don't think the problem is the underlying XFree86 based stuff, but rather quartz-wm and maybe other components. Last I knew quartz-wm wasn't open sourced, only the XFree86 derived stuff under the MIT license.

ed

Re:Apple should...

[dn15]

Apple also needs to do massive improvements on the performance of their X11 server before they are anywhere near competitive with workstations or Linux systems.

Really? I think performance is great. However, they need to work on a way to make X11 software look and feel more native (at least before it can compete with other OS X apps in the mainstream.)

Re:Apple should...

[idlake]

Really? I think performance is great.

Well, it's not a matter of "thinking", it's quantifiable, and it ain't good.

However, they need to work on a way to make X11 software look and feel more native (at least before it can compete with other OS X apps in the mainstream.)

What X11 applications look like is beyond Apple's control. If you don't like their looks, just don't use them. Most users don't give a damn in my experience.

Re:Apple should...

[dn15]

We'll agree to disagree on whether its speed is OK. It works well for me but not for you. Fine. :)

In terms of the looks of applications, I was thinking in terms of bundling versions of GTK, Qt, etc. that have themes which give the apps native-looking widgets, toolbar background colors, etc. That certainly would be within their control.

Re:Apple should...

[idlake]

The license for Apple X11 doesn't allow third parties to bundle it and redistribute it.

Wow, I didn't know that. It looks like Apple is deliberately making it hard for people to get X11 running on Mac OS X. Apple must be really scared of X11 taking over their desktop.

Can't you just ship a non-Apple version of X11? You wouldn't need much more than the server and a tiny number of utilities (assuming you are using Render for fonts, which puts it on the client-side anyway). The server itself should also be pretty small since it wouldn't need most drivers and only a few extensions. Furthermore, you could use a high connection number (:57 or whatever) so that it doesn't interfere with any Apple X11 that the user may be using.

Re:Apple should...

[idlake]

We'll agree to disagree on whether its speed is OK. It works well for me but not for you. Fine. :)

Well, it may be good enough for your needs, but it is much worse than native X11 on the same hardware.

In terms of the looks of applications, I was thinking in terms of bundling versions of GTK, Qt, etc. that have themes which give the apps native-looking widgets, toolbar background colors, etc. That certainly would be within their control.

Maybe. I don't see Apple going into the Gtk or Qt theme business. Furthermore, I don't think Apple has the wherewithal to manage Gtk and Qt library versions.

I think if Macintosh actually became a credible, commonly used platform for X11 applications, the theming and behavior would take care of itself: it would approximate Macintosh native as closely as users generally desire.

Re:Apple should...

[dn15]

I think if Macintosh actually became a credible, commonly used platform for X11 applications, the theming and behavior would take care of itself: it would approximate Macintosh native as closely as users generally desire.

True. Gimp.app has done a pretty good job of that. Sure, nobody who knows what they're looking at would mistake it for a native application. But it sure blends in a lot better than most X11 software.

Re:Apple should...

[hunterx11]

What they need to do is write a simple extension to their version of X11 that allows X11 applications on the Mac to have their own Dock icons. Even if it weren't backward-compatible, a lot of projects like OO.o would quickly move to implement this. If they made a standard to embed X11 programs in .app form, it would be great for many applications. Obviously you wouldn't want everything this way, but many applications would benefit. Combined with quartz-wm, such a system would allow such a completely transparent integration that less advanced users would find it unnecessary to distinguish between Cocoa/Carbon and X11 apps. This and a little bit of polish could make certain projects like OO.o take off on the Mac IMHO.

Re:Apple should...

[Eamon C]

Apple must be really scared of X11 taking over their desktop.

Mod parent funny.

Re:Apple should...

[soullessbastard]

Disclaimer: I am a developer of OpenOffice.org Mac OS X and a founder of the NeoOffice project.

Yes, we could ship a different X11 environment, and this is what we do already to automatically install XFree86 + OroborOSX on 10.2 machines. There are really two problems with 10.3 machines however...

First off, Apple X11 really is nice in that you get your full quartz-wm that allows X11 windows to be minimized into the Dock and used via Exposé. Not many of the other X servers support this type of integration. I don't know myself since I haven't really investigated using too many other X servers on 10.3 systems. But, like other Apple software too, non-technical Mac users tend to want to use an Apple alternative if it exists.

Secondly, both Apple X11 and XFree86 do wind up using the same locations to install themselves: /usr/X11R6, /etc/X11, .xinitrc, and so on. As a result, you can't really install the two different X11 environments side by side as there are differences in some of the libraries (such as Open GL). This makes it difficult to include a different X11 environment in the distribution since there's a strong possibility of potentially horking someone's pre-existing Apple X11 install on the machine or the opposite of the user installing Apple X11 after the other environment and horking it.

The general feedback we got from users is that they really do prefer using Apple X11, so that's why the OOo installer only supports Apple X11 when installing on 10.3. Heck, there are still users who are still using the Apple X11 Public Betas that ran on 10.2! (note, if you do that, search out Beta 2 and not Beta 3...Beta 3 has window positioning bugs that can't be worked around since quartz-wm doesn't really have source shipped for it IIRC. good luck finding it, tho).

ed

Re:Apple should...

[diamondsw]

Would it be possible to ask the user to insert the proper CD, and then just run the command-line version of installer.app to install it transparently? Or distribute your app in a metapackage, one of its dependencies being the X11 package on the CD? It still requires inserting the CD, but it would be more seamless.

Just a thought.

Re:Apple should...

[bynary]

You forget that many people don't even know what 'command-line' means. Asking an end-user whose experience level you may not be aware of to run something from a command line is rather dangerous.

Re:Apple should...

[soullessbastard]

Disclaimer: I am a developer for Mac OS X OpenOffice.org and a founder of the NeoOffice project.

That's actually what the 1.1.2 GM installer does do. When installing on 10.3, if it detects Apple X11 isn't installed it prompts the user for the appropriate CD from the Panther retail set and searches for the package.

Only problem is that the installer is only intelligent enough to work with retail 10.3 CD sets...it doesn't have the ability to go through the software restore CDs that ship with computers since we don't have the CD layouts. Unfortunately, in the time since we've released it that's much more common for users as there are less and less users upgrading machines via retail CDs. The installer still prompts users without CDs to go to the Apple X11 website and has the URL displayed in a dialog.

Next installer I put together I'm going to see if I can make it a bit more helpful or at least be able to redirect users straight to the website to download the .pkg. Apple does have registration forms to fill out prior to download, so the procedure unfortunately can't be automated using a simple curl command.

ed

Re:Apple should...

[diamondsw]

No, you misunderstand, have the installer for OpenOffice run the command itself. No need for the user to even know it's happening.

Re:Apple should...

[diamondsw]

Is it possible to have a pre-install script search for the proper package by name, even if the CD layout changes? (Forgive my ignorance of the capabilities of the installer framework.)

Re:Apple should...

[bynary]

Yes, that makes perfect sense.

Re:Apple should...

[99BottlesOfBeerInMyF]

OO.o would quickly move to implement this

They announced they are not adding any new features to the Mac version. I doubt they would rush to implement this one.

Re:Apple should...

[soullessbastard]

Disclaimer: I am a developer for Mac OS X OpenOffice.org and a founder of the NeoOffice project.

That very well may be an interesting solution for the software restore CDs as well as addressing changes in layout of the CDs or OS versions (e.g. locating X11 on Tiger CDs which will become needed at some point this year). I hadn't thought about that and will check out some sets from computers that shipped with 10.3. I don't have any since I've not yet purchased a mac that had 10.3 preloaded. Thanks for the suggestion!

ed

Re:Apple should...

[Anonymous Coward]

How does WindowMaker do it? Why couldn't OS X just use the same icons that WindowMaker does?

X11 works well now. I use it regularly, and I find it to be pretty fast. I get over 5200 fps in glxgears on my 2x2 G5, if that counts for anything. I put X11 in my Startup Items, so it loads when I log in, and just leave it running all the time. It would be nice if it was integrated into the system a little better. I think something like the Classic environment would be nice, where X11 would just start up automatically if an X app is run and the server isn't running already.

Re:Apple should...

[sugar and acid]

Apple really pissed me off taking down the 10.2 supporting beta x11 server. I had it installed on one 10.2 mac and trashed the installer, then I little while later I wanted to put it on another 10.2 mac and all of a sudden I couldn't download it. It was a very "soup nazi" type moment, "no x11 server for you!". It also seemed pretty damn arbitrary since it obviously works on 10.2 quite well in the beta version.

Re:Apple should...

[circusboy]

somewhere there is a tutorial that I followed and lost, that shows how to install x11 to run from startup and remove the x11 icon from the doc as well as be able to default call x apps from the apple terminal....

I wish I could remember where it was... but basically it was down to
-adding X11 to the start up bit of your account definition,
-setting the DISPLAY environment to 0.0 in .profile or similar
-adding an entry to the end of the x11 info.plist file
-------------
NSUIElement
1
-------------
just before the last

there was also a bit about using the 'defaults' mechanism to allow you to emulate the normal xwindows mouseover action but I preferred not to do that so I have forgotten that bit

Re:Apple should...

[circusboy]

<key>NSUIElement</key>
<string>1</string>

before thelast

</dict>

sorry, forgot to wrap the xml tags the first time

Re:Apple should...

[Anonymous Coward]

Why now thats just a stupid idea. Most mac users... home users have ZERO deisre to even touch the terminal much less run an x11 app. The users who do what x11 will install it... its not as if it hard or anyting... and hey you want it to start at boot time so be it. You can do it three easy steps. Oh and no you don't need vi or emacs.. just open System Preferences.

Re:Apple should...

[mrchaotica]

The way it is, X11 on OS X is just an emergency solution, not something you might want to actually deploy and use widely.

Yep, you're exactly right -- but have you considered the possibility that Apple wants it that way? I personally would like my X11 apps to feel more integrated on my iBook, but I can also appreciate the idea that Apple doesn't want to make it too easy, in order to encourage porting to Aqua. After all, no matter how good it is, on a Mac an X11 program is a poor substitute for a native one.

Re:Apple should...

[Anonymous Coward]

users can't tell the difference between running a business app locally, or over X11 on a remote linux server with the display being sent to the Mac. X11 has been used for longer than you've probably been alive. what are you talking about? Slashdot died again today.

goodbye
Simon Tyler

Re:Apple should...

[Leo McGarry]

It would solve a lot of distribution problems. It would create a lot more user-experience problems.

Apple is not in the business of making it easy for third-party developers to ship lousy software.

Re:Apple should...

[Anonymous Coward]

If it could be made significantly better on the Mac with a few hours of work, somebody would do it. Hell, I would if nobody else did.

Re:Apple should...

[Anonymous Coward]

Idiot! What has preloading X11 have to do with shipping "lousy software"?

Re:Apple should...

[99BottlesOfBeerInMyF]

If it could be made significantly better on the Mac with a few hours of work, somebody would do it. Hell, I would if nobody else did.

Pretty much anyone serious about OpenOffice on OS X has realized that the NeoOffice version that does not use X-windows (it implements the GUI with Java using the Cocoa APIs) is the way to go. It is fairly functional right now, and a year ahead of the X11 version, at least. It has it's own dock icon, and works with most of the rest of the OS X features. I usually think of X11 on OS X as a nice feature for running legacy UNIX software remotely and controlling remote servers, and an acceptable display set for quick ports. I don't think it is very good option for a large or serious project on OS X.

Re:Apple should...

[idlake]

Yep, you're exactly right -- but have you considered the possibility that Apple wants it that way?

Of course, Apple wants it that way: they want to tie developers and users to their own, proprietary platform. And they know full well that if running X11 applications were easy, native Macintosh applications would disappear because there is just so much great X11 software out there.

The question is: do you really want to go Apple's proprietary route or not? And are you happy with the limited amount of native Macintosh software that is out there?

Re:Apple should...

[Anonymous Coward]

Your posting is just another testament to the stupidity and ignorance of the Macintosh community. You know so little about other platforms that you seriously think that Linux users have to use "vi" to configure their systems.

Linux is already more popular than Macintosh, it's easier to use, has more software, and it's cheaper. And it's going to kick Apple's ass right into bankruptcy because Apple's hardware and software is overpriced and outdated.

Re:Apple should...

[mrchaotica]

The question is: do you really want to go Apple's proprietary route or not? And are you happy with the limited amount of native Macintosh software that is out there?

And my answer is: Mu.

Not all of the Cocoa API is proprietary, you know -- a big chunk of it is the OpenStep API, an open standard. There's even a Free Software implementation called GNUStep. So, I really want to go with the intersection of the feature set of the Cocoa and GNUStep implementations of the OpenStep API. : )

By the way, the "limited amount of native Macintosh software" isn't really all that limited -- Abiword, BitTorrent, Frozen Bubble, LyX, Mplayer, Nethack, Neverball, Nvu, StepMania, VLC, etc. are all Free Software apps with native OS X implementations; Blender, Firefox, and Thunderbird are native to the extent that they don't require X11 (although they don't use the built-in APIs to draw their widgets either); and there are even Mac-only Free Software projects, like Camino, Adium and Fire (IM clients), and many others.

Re:Apple should...

[idlake]

By the way, the "limited amount of native Macintosh software" isn't really all that limited -- Abiword, BitTorrent, Frozen Bubble, LyX, Mplayer, Nethack, Neverball, Nvu, StepMania, VLC, etc. are all Free Software apps with native OS X implementations;

You can't even tell native from non-native applications. I don't know about all of those, but Nvu uses the Mozilla toolkit (not native), Frozen Bubble uses SDL (a cross-platform gaming library).

Blender, Firefox, and Thunderbird are native to the extent that they don't require X11

As you are saying: they are not native applications.

Not all of the Cocoa API is proprietary, you know -- a big chunk of it is the OpenStep API, an open standard.

OpenStep has never been standardized and there is no open standards documentation of it (in fact, I know of no freely distributable, complete documentation). Furthermore, the Cocoa APIs are entirely under Apple's control.

So, it is simply incorrect to say that "the OpenStep API is an open standard"; it is nothing of the sort.

There's even a Free Software implementation called GNUStep.

Yes, and you can see how popular that is compared to the other choices.

In reality, Cocoa is only hanging on to dear life because it is propped up by Apple marketing and happens to ship with Macintosh. If it actually had to compete on its merits and performance with X11, it would just lose.

Re:Apple should...

[mrchaotica]

You can't even tell native from non-native applications. I don't know about all of those, but Nvu uses the Mozilla toolkit (not native), Frozen Bubble uses SDL (a cross-platform gaming library).

Yeah, I wasn't paying attention to what I wrote. I know Frozen Bubble is SDL, but I put it in the wrong group.

So, it is simply incorrect to say that "the OpenStep API is an open standard"; it is nothing of the sort.

Fine, you're technically right. However, if there's a legal Free Software implementation of it then it's close enough. And practically speaking, it's not difficult to write an application that can run natively on OS X and on Windows or Linux with GNUStep. Because of that, your original complaint about "[tying] developers and users to their own, proprietary platform" is inaccurate, since they're not tied to the platform, nor is it any more "proprietary" than, say, Mono.

If it actually had to compete on its merits and performance with X11, it would just lose.

Okay, I'm not quite sure how an API is comparable to a windowing system...

If you're talking about Aqua vs. X11, then maybe I agree with you. But if you're talking about Cocoa vs. the X toolkit, then WTF are you smoking? The inadequacies of the X toolkit are what caused this horrible mess of redundant libraries (CDE, GTK, QT, FLTK, etc.) that we have now. Cocoa is superior by the mere fact that it's reasonably complete, let alone it's "merits and performance!" Don't you realize that the single most important reason why some UNIX geeks get Macs is beacuse there's one single dominant API on the platform, and the desktop is consistent?

Re:Apple should...

[idlake]

And practically speaking, it's not difficult to write an application that can run natively on OS X and on Windows or Linux with GNUStep.

Not if it actually uses a lot of Cocoa functionality. Cocoa is and remains controlled by Apple, which means it's proprietary. Furthermore, GNUstep just isn't a realistic choice for writing applications because almost nobody actually uses it on their desktop.

The inadequacies of the X toolkit are what caused this horrible mess of redundant libraries (CDE, GTK, QT, FLTK, etc.) that we have now

That's incorrect. The reason the standard X11 toolkit (Motif) didn't catch on more widely was that it was proprietary and commercial. Other than that, it was actually ahead of both Windows and Macintosh.

Qt, FLTK, and wxWindows are cross-platform toolkits. They are as much Windows and Macintosh toolkits as they are X11 toolkits. You might take their existence as evidence for the "inadequacy" of the Macintosh toolkits as well.

Don't you realize that the single most important reason why some UNIX geeks get Macs is beacuse there's one single dominant API on the platform, and the desktop is consistent?

I realize that Macintosh advocates often claim that, but it is technically false, and I suspect the number of "UNIX geeks" that actually do that is rather small.

It is technically false because the Macintosh has one of the most inconsistent GUIs of any machine out of the box: three APIs (Carbon, Cocoa, Java), and several inconsistent looks. Neither Windows, Gnome, nor KDE have that level of inconsistency out of the box. And it only gets worse when you start installing applications on it, because many Macintosh applications use cross-platform toolkits (Mozilla, Qt, wxWindows, FLTK, MFC, etc.)--far more so than a Windows, Gnome, or KDE desktop.

As for the number of "UNIX geeks" using a Macintosh, I think that's hard to tell. Many UNIX geeks (myself included) use a Macintosh laptop because PC vendors are so braindead when it comes to supporting Linux on laptops. A Macintosh laptop gives me a UNIX shell out of the box and can be made to run Mozilla and TeX fairly easily, which is mostly what I want to run when I travel. Don't kid yourself into thinking that that translates into a lot of enthusiasm for the Macintosh platform. I wouldn't dream of putting a Macintosh on my desk as my primary computing platform--it is way too limited and too much of a hassle.

Re:Apple should...

[mrchaotica]

It is technically false because the Macintosh has one of the most inconsistent GUIs of any machine out of the box: three APIs (Carbon, Cocoa, Java), and several inconsistent looks. Neither Windows, Gnome, nor KDE have that level of inconsistency out of the box. And it only gets worse when you start installing applications on it, because many Macintosh applications use cross-platform toolkits (Mozilla, Qt, wxWindows, FLTK, MFC, etc.)--far more so than a Windows, Gnome, or KDE desktop.

Okay, here's the thing though: Nobody I know has a "GNOME desktop" or "KDE desktop!" The closest thing you could call their computers would be "Linux desktop" or "X11 desktop" or "BSD desktop." In my experience, most people have a mix of QT and GTK, plus some weird apps that use their own stuff (e.g. Firefox, XMMS, gKrellM) thrown in. There's absolutely NO way you could possibly say that's more consistent than a Mac OS X desktop!

Now, I admit that there are inconsistencies between Aqua and brushed metal, but at least they work the same way. You can't say that about the different toolkits on Linux, nor can you say it about X11 apps on a Mac.

You say Carbon, Cocoa, and Java are 3 APIs, but that's not entirely accurate either, since the Cocoa API has Java bindings as well as Obj-C bindings. Moreover, the Cocoa API actually calls Carbon functions for some things anyway.

As for the number of "UNIX geeks" using a Macintosh, I think that's hard to tell.

Well, that's why I got a Mac, anyway, and how I convinced one of my friends to get one as well (he's very happy with it, by the way; he was a big BSD fan before).

...it is way too limited and too much of a hassle.

How?? Aside from not being able to run WINE and having an underpowered graphics card, I have yet to find anything that my Linux PCs can do that my iBook cannot. And it's much less of a hassle than maintaining my other computers (that could be 'cause I use Gentoo, though).

Re:Apple should...

[idlake]

Okay, here's the thing though: Nobody I know has a "GNOME desktop" or "KDE desktop!" [...] There's absolutely NO way you could possibly say that's more consistent than a Mac OS X desktop!

Gnome and KDE each provide a complete, consistent set of applications. Most non-hacker types stick to either one or the other without ever mixing anything. In fact, many distributions only install one or the other desktop.

In my experience, most people have a mix of QT and GTK,

Well, maybe most Linux users you know are hacker types. Even if they do, the two desktops are getting quite well integrated, so that if you run a Gnome application under KDE, it will pick up the KDE L&F.

Now, I admit that there are inconsistencies between Aqua and brushed metal, but at least they work the same way. You can't say that about the different toolkits on Linux,

Actually, some of the most serious inconsistencies on the Mac are between Carbon and Cocoa, which handle files and key bindings differently, and between UNIX and HFS file systems. But, yes, appearance wise, the differences between Aqua and metal are jarring and confusing.

How?? Aside from not being able to run WINE and having an underpowered graphics card, I have yet to find anything that my Linux PCs can do that my iBook cannot. And it's much less of a hassle than maintaining my other computers

Installing packages like TeX, TeXMacs, Gnome, Mono, X11, etc. is a royal pain on the Mac. There isn't even a consistent way of installing software on the Mac: almost every software install is different, and most packages need to be downloaded and updated by hand. Then you have the problem that software like TeX or Gnome may have been packaged multiple times and conflict when you install it. Software installation and maintenance on the Macintosh is a bloody mess, worse even than Windows.

On a distribution like Debian or SuSE, software installation isn't even an issue: you tell it at startup what kind of machine you want to install, and everything else is automatic, including updates and maintenance.

Confised in Canada

[Anonymous Coward]

Sorry, I'm a tad mixed up. Why would you need to run X on a Widows machine? I thought X was a windowing system. Isn't this redundant? I'm not trolling, I just ain't an expert at this stuff.

Re:Confised in Canada

[generic-man]

If you want to run a program that uses X libraries to draw windows, then you need an X server. Most X servers for Windows can run in "rootless" mode so your X application windows can be moved around just like Windows windows.

Re:Confised in Canada

[Mr Guy]

Or to translate more: CygWin/X lets me ssh to my home linux machine and type something like gnucash and have the window pop up on my screen at work.

Re:Confised in Canada

[drinkypoo]

It also lets me open bash xterms on my windows box (using the rest of cygwin) so I can have a decent shell in a decent command window. Between XP and Cygwin I've come up with a single environment in which I can run everything I want to use (I'm a gamer.)

eWeek article on "cancelation" with clarification

[soullessbastard]

Disclaimer: I am a developer for Mac OS X OpenOffice.org and a founder of the NeoOffice project.

Well, as it turns out my update to the timeline was grossly misquoted in a couple of places. The update was really just to put things in perspective as to what was really going on in the various projects as well as to reinforce the importance of the X11 work. It was never intended to "cancel" anything since, well, there wasn't really anything to cancel. The update was just stating how things really are within the project.

Today's article on eWeek has some much better reporting on the progress towards 2.0 X11 and other issues that had been raised by my update. I highly recommend giving it a read as it's a bit more informative then the old /. comments in that thread.

ed

Interesting move.

[thegnu]

Considering the fact that Apple is working on its own MS Office replacement, it's interesting that they're providing a tutorial on how to use Openoffice in OS X.

To me it's clear that their motive is to give people a temporary, difficult alternative so they don't buy MS Office X so when Apple's office suite comes out, they will have a higher likelihood of converting those using Openoffice due to the lack of investment and non-standard Aqua look.

Very clever.

Re:Interesting move.

[Guy Harris]

Considering the fact that Apple is working on its own MS Office replacement

They are? Where was this mentioned? (Note: any place mentioning this that uses the word "Pages", with a capital "P", or the string "iWork" needs to indicate why they think Pages is intended as a full replacement for all uses of Microsoft Word, including the more "high-end" ones.)

Re:Interesting move.

[displaced80]

I think you're over-estimating the animosity between MS and Apple, if indeed there's much at all.

Of course, they compete with eachother, but what you describe doesn't sound like my interpretation of Apple and MS's behaviour.

The Macintosh Business Unit at Microsoft have a very close relationship with Apple. They're not just some MS developers who've been told to bash out some Mac knock-offs of Windows software. They're all long-time Mac developers who want to make the best Mac software they can. The spin-off of the MacBU to a separate division meant that they could work on making Mac software, not Windows ports. As this article explains, before the creation of the MacBU, the Win & Mac versions of Office shared 80% of the same technology. The result? Shoddy, un-Maclike software which no-one liked and few bought. The MacBU now works every bit as closely with Apple's technologies as it does with MS's.

Office:Mac (both v.X and 2004) are very nice programs. They're not perfect, but they bring a very usable, feature-rich, Mac-specific Office suite to the platform.

Apple would not benefit one single bit from making the MacBU's software unprofitable for Microsoft. iWork is not a replacement for Office. Keynote's a very nice alternative to PowerPoint, sure. But one app does not an Office-suite make. Pages is clearly not in the same space as Word. If you need Word, you won't buy/use Pages. If you don't need Word or can't afford Office, Pages is a sensible choice. If Pages is aimed at those who don't need or won't buy Office, it's hardly a competitor, is it?

Just as Pages is not a drop-in replacement for those who need Word, any rumoured spreadsheet app will not be a drop-in replacement for those who need Excel.

Apple aren't in the business of making 'temporary, difficult alternatives'. They're about fulfilling user's needs (with the caveat that, like all corps., they don't always get that right!).

Please don't use X11 OpenOffice on OS X

[VAXGeek]

If you want OpenOffice on OS X, help make one of the NATIVE ports more popular by using it. NeoOffice/J It's a totally native client that uses Java to render the UI. (Native Java? These are strange days.) Please help keep X11 apps off OS X.
I realize we're stuck with X11 on Unix, but if you're sitting on top of Quartz, might as well use it, no?

Re:Please don't use X11 OpenOffice on OS X

[idlake]

I realize we're stuck with X11 on Unix, but if you're sitting on top of Quartz, might as well use it, no?

Why do Macintosh users feel this compulsion to say bad things about Linux and X11?

But since you ask: no, I think between Quartz and X11, X11 is the cleaner and better designed system.

Re:Please don't use X11 OpenOffice on OS X

[Tumbleweed]

if you're sitting on top of Quartz, might as well use it, no?

If you use the quartz-wm, you _are_ using Quartz with X11 on OS X, at least, that's my understanding, and what the article link says.

Re:Please don't use X11 OpenOffice on OS X

[Anonymous Coward]

How is the parent in any way 'Insightful'? It's nothing but a troll.

What the hell has happened to the Slashdot community? It's so full of morons these days. :-(

Mac OS X IS a Unix OS Mr VAXGeek, and it's wonderful that an X11 server is now included with it. Now, if only it was installed by default... I'll be keeping my fingers crossed for that to happen with Tiger. :-)

Re:Please don't use X11 OpenOffice on OS X

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah... for window borders.

Re:Please don't use X11 OpenOffice on OS X

[realkiwi]

Some of us don't have the choice. I run Mac OS X 10.2.8, Apple X11 beta 3, OOo1.1.2-fr on a B&W G3 400 with 256 Mb RAM.

Neo/J requires a 800Mhz+ G4 and 512 Mb RAM. I really like Neo/J but I don't have the hardware to run it.

Apple machines last a lot longer than Wintel so you guys are stuck for a while with people who need OOo on X11.

Re:Please don't use X11 OpenOffice on OS X

[jsebrech]

Why do Macintosh users feel this compulsion to say bad things about Linux and X11?

People on the linux side want a system that is EXACTLY the way they want it. Since everyone is different, no such system exists, and linux desktops tend to be good starting points from where you spend considerably time tweaking the system to be exactly as you want.

People on the apple side want a system that "just works". Something that lets them do their job quickly and efficiently, with minimal initial effort. This does not mean a system that forbids tweaking, since there are many ways to tweak a mac desktop. But it does mean system that does not require tweaking if you're willing to learn its way of working once, and just once. Since linux desktops are just a loose collection of apps without much in the way of common workflows, they see the effort required in learning/tweaking them as prohibitive, and slam them as "badly designed".

Now, the reason mac users are so vocal is because they see how much quicker you can get to work with a mac and then they see all the time linux users have to invest in tweaking their desktop, and they just feel sorry for linux desktop users, and wish to help them reach "enlightenment". They don't understand that for linux desktop users the tweaking isn't a burden, but a pleasure. As a result, the linux people feel the mac people are elitist, and the mac people feel the linux people are misguided.

Re:Please don't use X11 OpenOffice on OS X

[jsebrech]

Mac OS X IS a Unix OS Mr VAXGeek, and it's wonderful that an X11 server is now included with it. Now, if only it was installed by default... I'll be keeping my fingers crossed for that to happen with Tiger. :-)

Why does a unix need to have X11?

The unix model is that of separate but interlocking parts. If you can build a better gui part than X, why not?

AFAIK, the X11 server is provided for compatibilty with existing unix apps, not to be any sort of alternative for quartz.

Re:Please don't use X11 OpenOffice on OS X

[idlake]

People on the apple side want a system that "just works". Something that lets them do their job quickly and efficiently, with minimal initial effort.

Trouble is: it's a marketing myth that OS X is that system. OS X gives you a nice out-of-box experience, but afterwards, it's a lot of work to maintain, configure, install applications on, and maintain. Macintosh systems don't "just work" unless you do very little with them.

And, of course, you can get an even nicer out-of-box experience than a Mac if you buy a PC with Linux pre-installed, because unlike the Mac, the Linux system comes with a complete complement of applications.

Now, the reason mac users are so vocal is because they see how much quicker you can get to work with a mac and then they see all the time linux users have to invest in tweaking their desktop

Mac users believe that they work so much quicker with Macintosh, but they are wrong. They are confusing a simplistic system with a simple system.

They don't understand that for linux desktop users the tweaking isn't a burden, but a pleasure

Bullshit. Linux users just want to get work done, and they find that Linux is a more effective and efficient way of doing that than either Macintosh or Windows.

Macintosh is an OK machine if you are a simple user with simple needs. But Macintosh users shouldn't project their ignorance on the rest of the world.

Re:Please don't use X11 OpenOffice on OS X

[David Rolfe]

Not for widgets?

Went back to Linux on my powerbook...

[grantma]

Apple NEED to integrate the X11.org desktop standards more with OS X. The X11 server they provide gives you the equivalent of an X11 desktop running FVWM in terms of integrating the X11 apps with the rest of the desktop.

The desktop.org standards cover file type to application relations, clipboard, menu itmes. If Apple would implement them, X11 Apps under OS X would be a lot more useful. As it is I have to fight the system to make them work better.

Also, could Apple turn on the Freetype font smoothing/rendering fully? Make Open Office.org look way better

To be fair...

[Anonymous Coward]

the first few are within 2-3 minutes of each other, so that is acceptable, but other than that, those other people should be ashamed.

You are right, those are the types that clog up mailing lists. The Slashdot equivalent of "me too"

Re:To be fair...

[Anonymous Coward]

I agree

Re:To be fair...

[Anonymous Coward]

me too.

No you don't

[I Like Pudding]

Mod parent ignorant.

Just download it from here:
http://www.apple.com/macosx/features/x11/

Re:No you don't

[Bluetick]

You need to install X11SDK if you want to compile stuff to run on X11 though. That's on the Xcode CD for Panther, though you can also download it seperately. However X11SDK isn't even installed automatically with the Xcode tools, so you have to install them off the CD specially, not that it's a big deal, it's just a small package.

Re:No you don't

[I Like Pudding]

Actually, I just bought a mini and all the Xcode packages were sitting on the HD.

Step 1

[Anonymous Coward]

Buy a mouse with more than 1 button.

Uh. Yes you can.

[Anonymous Coward]

Sorry dude, it's pretty easy to write portable code on Unix.

XDarwin forums still the best place to get advice

[ubiquitin]

The Apple article was helpful and all but there are guys who have been working on the XFree86 port for a long time, like since 2002 or something, so if you need a place to get answers to running X apps on OSX, keep an eye on www.xdarwin.org/forum

Is this the same joke as cygwin X11 server?

[Anonymous Coward]

Is this as bad as the XWIN with cygwin?

I.e. something so bad it's worthless and
you won't come back for more?

Re:Is this the same joke as cygwin X11 server?

[Eamon C]

No. OS X is Unix, and Apple's X11 implementation is fine. X apps don't 'behave' as well as native applications, but all the stuff you love about X, e.g. network transparency, works great.

Linux on Mac

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't see the point of this - why not running Linux on Mac to begin with? It might not look as pretty but you can simply download and compile everything and won't have to deal with porting stuff.

M$

[Gherald]

From TFA:

xgalaga 2.0.34-1 Clone of the classic game of galaga
xiangqi [virtual package]
ximian-connector 1.4.7-2 M$ Exchange plugin for evolution
xinvaders 2.1.2-2 Space Invaders clone for Xf

Apple spelt Microsoft as M$ !!!

Does that mean spelling Microsoft with an $ is automagically a 'cool' thing to do now?

Apple did it ... so it _MUST_ be cool!

Re:M$

[Guy Harris]

Apple spelt Microsoft as M$ !!!

No, whoever packaged ximian-connector for Fink spelled Microsoft as M$. Apple just cut-and-pasted the output from the fink command.

Re:M$

[peteforsyth]

still.

Re:M$

[SimHacker]

The great Guy Harris wrote:

No, whoever packaged ximian-connector for Fink spelled Microsoft as M$. Apple just cut-and-pasted the output from the fink command.

Whoever it was at Apple who cut-and-pasted the output from the fink command obviously wasn't running X-Windows themselves, because X-Windows interapplication cut-and-paste has never worked reliably and never will, thanks to ICCCM.

Who needs X-Windows when Emacs is still a much more reliable window system? Cut-and-paste in emacs has always worked perfectly, with full undo/redo and a kill ring! An Emacs shell with fully editable text beats X-Term any day.

X-Windows can sit on it and rotate its cut buffers.

-Don

Re:M$

[bob beta]

Yes, but I just opened up a shell window in Emacs (esc-X-shell) and when I tried to run vi, it came back:

sapphire: {1} vi
Error: tigetnum: lines: No such file or directory
ex/vi: error initializing terminal

And I was able to easily cut and paste that text from Xemacs to this comment window in Mozilla using the X cut and paste.

So neaner, neaner. Or something.

Re:XDarwin forums still the best place to get advi

[x40sw0n]

all i got to match is this stupid EULA...

-x40sw0n

GNU Emacs

[Anonymous Coward]

I know this is wildly off-topic but there's no need to bother with running Emacs on X11. You should really check into mindlube's port of GNU Emacs.

Re:GNU Emacs

[0xC0FFEE]

I've tried various "native" ports of Emacs and none fit my tastes. It's either the color scheme I can't set correctly or the font. I should mention that I prefer non anti-aliased fonts while programming.

There you have it...

[Senjutsu]

What X11 applications look like is beyond Apple's control. If you don't like their looks, just don't use them. Most users don't give a damn in my experience.

That's everything that's wrong with OpenOffice (and most other UNIX GUI) software in a nutshell, folks.

Developers generally don't care about Look & Feel, and when you're developing a package that primarily targets Linux, an OS whose desktop use is primarily confined to tinkerers, devs, or people making an ideological statement, most of the people you interact with aren't going to care, either. They've got bigger things on their mind.

But, and this is a big but, there is a reason that people who only use Windows or MacOS feel that OpenOffice is a clunky, user-unfriendly piece of software. It's because for the vast majority of GUI users (who overwhelmingly use Windows or the Mac), being able to use their software, and use it easily is much more important than whether or not it's interface cruftiness allows it to be ported to some developer's NetBSD toaster. Regularity of interface and ease of use matters to ordinary users.

Sure, the people you interact with on a daily basis don't share these concerns, but guess what: These people are not typical. As long as the OpenOffice developers basic attitude it "Hey, just install X11 and run OpenOffice with it. Users can either put up with it's idiosyncracies or fuck off", it's destined to be a distant also ran in most people's minds.

Description is from Fink, not Apple

[soullessbastard]

Disclaimer: I am a developer of Mac OS X OpenOffice.org and a founder of the NeoOffice project.

FWIW, the screenshot that appears with that text is actually showing the package descriptions from the Fink project through the FinkCommander GUI and the article text is representative output from a Fink command line. Apple didn't write Fink (and certainly not its package descriptions) nor a bunch of the other software mentioned in the article (e.g. OpenOffice.org, xgalaga).

ed

Re:Uh. Yes you can.

[pclminion]

I never suggested it was difficult. But portability has to be written in. You can't just stick to POSIX and assume everything will work properly. POSIX is a nice standard, but nobody follows it precisely.

Furthermore, the software I'm talking about makes heavy use of the FPU, so we need to account for all the little differences between architectures as far as floating point math. Yes, IEEE is supposed to standardize these things, but in practice there are little differences which become significant. The fact that you believe otherwise only proves that you have little real world experience.

Woo

[nomadic]

Great, I was just thinking the other day, "Ok, having UNIX underpinnings is great, but I miss the clunky, inefficient, bloated, ugly and outdated graphical interface that I used to have with linux and solaris."

Re:Woo

[Anonymous Coward]

don't forget potentially insecure. X can be sent across ethernet... (and the reason people don't is because it's totally insecure) basic VNC has more security in it's remote display capabilities... and then there is like one VNC variant that takes security hardcore by not only encrypting the password, but the screen data as well...

Re:Woo

[Anonymous Coward]

You think that X11 is bloated, so now you use Quartz? Ummm... ok...

Just one question though, do you actually know what 'bloated' means?

Re:Woo

[Anonymous Coward]

Ever heard of ssh?

Simplest way to install X11 on Macs

[harlows_monkeys]

At least if it is a new Mac...just reinstall from the system software disc, and select the option to include X11. It's on the disc and the installer knows about it...it simply isn't included in the default install that Apple does.

Re:Simplest way to install X11 on Macs

[bob beta]

And if it's an old Mac, just install Darwin. It has the X11 server built right in.

I've never run OS-X because I haven't wanted to spend the $$ for it, and have it shit all over my relatively nice Apple hardware (nice defined as a torqued out Beige G3 tower). Darwin runs great on it.

XLiveCD - Cygwin-based Windows X Server

[ManxStef]

For those of you stuck on Windows, XLiveCD might be a rather easy and useful way of getting an X server running. Here's the description from their website:

XLiveCD allows users of Microsoft Windows to connect to remote Unix computers, run graphical applications and have the graphics displayed on their desktops. The software runs from the CD without being installed. XLiveCD was prepared by University Technology Services to facilitate use of research Unix systems at Indiana University by Windows users on campus.

MacOS X-Windows

[SimHacker]

The best term to annoy X-Windows pedants is MacOS X-Windows.

-Don

Re:MacOS X-Windows

[bob beta]

The best term to annoy Macintosh ranters is Darwin with X11 running.

Which, incidentally, is a great combination on an old Beige G3.

iWork supports _______.

[RadRafe]

Business people can't afford to spend time dealing with "iWorks doesn't support _______".

But can you really fill in that blank? Pages exports to PDF, RTF, Word, plain text, or HTML. Keynote exports to PDF, PPT, Flash, QT movie, or a series of JPEG, PNG or TIFF images. Now what crucial format don't they support, again?

Re:iWork supports _______.

[snuf23]

Microsoft Works.

Hahahahaha!

Re:iWork supports _______.

[Anonymous Coward]

xls

Re:iWork supports _______.

[generic-man]

Don't give me a laundry list of features. How well does Pages export to Word? How well can PowerPoint 2003 for Windows read Keynote-created files?

Do you know anything about how well these programs work, or are you just going to parrot Apple's marketing?

MCCCXXXVII

[carabela]

1337 is MCCCXXXVII, but then it could also be the roman l33t-legion of |v|cCcXxX\/][

That's basically false

[Anonymous Coward]

I have had very good luck then. I've only had trouble moving code from one Unix to another in a few cases... and that was because it was badly written code (treating longs as arrays of shorts).

The more complex the program and the less attention has been paid to portability the more problems you will have. And of course programs with tons of dependencies like FireFox or OpenOffice will be a real headache just because you have to compile and intsall all of the components separately and make sure to use the right versions.

I've even had good luck compiling Unix softare on Windows with Cygwin. I've never had a problem with any of my software, nor with anyone else's except the occasional problem with a Makefile not understanding .exe file extensions.

Apple X11 b3 for X.2 with SDK

[not_hylas( )]

Apple X11 b3 for X.2 with SDK

http://tinyurl.com/2q7ys

X11 and 'Lifestyle Computing' (TM)

[delire]

http://kde-look.org/content/preview.php?preview=1& id=15431&file1=15431-1.jpg&file2=15431-2.jpg&file3 =15431-3.jpg&name=KDE+3.3+-+Xorg+6.8+Beta+-+Unbeat able

yes i jest.. but it does reveal another dimension to this discussion ;)

Porting and compiling: not for the clueless

[teamhasnoi]

Here is a great example of an app (nethack front end) I would *LOVE* to see on the mac. I have tried compiling, and following the (unclear) directions, but due to Apple doing a few things 'different', I have yet to make it happen. Nethack with the QT tiles is oogly, Noegnud is nice.

Anyone out there able to help?

No EDA tools

[ibentmywookie]

Unfortunately, you can't run Modelsim, Synopsys, or other EDA tools on it :(

I know some people who would be interested in it as a Unix workstation if those apps were ported.

Come on EDA vendors, get your SH*T together!

Re:No EDA tools

[drinkypoo]

Porting is not the issue. All of that software is on several different architectures already (usually several Unixes and Windows, too) and bringing it to Mac OS X from something BSD like SunOS4 would be a triviality. I doubt they would ever feel a need to make them native apps, since Apple provides X11, but at least they would be available. No, the issue is support, and until a bunch of different companies offer to buy x,000 seats on OS X (where x is at least more than 1) it won't be worth it to support another operating system. Most people want to run windows because of a bunch of crap apps not related to their core business, so that's the only support nightmare that most companies are willing to accept.

If only they would improve printing

[JPyObjC Dude]

Anybody sucessfully get printing to work with Open Office via X11 the first time. I have followed all the documentation on how to hack the printing engine , install all the proper dependancies and configure them and it's never worked :[

The end solution was to export to PDF then open the PDF in preview and then print. Kinda like a Microsoft workflow :p.

Is there any reason that Apple cannot create a bridge to enable X11 apps to print directly through the OSX printing frameworks?

Tighter Quartz WM integrations would be sweet too such as x11 apps showing up on doc and X11 acting more as a system level application instead of a regular dockable application.

Considering that OOO have dumped Native Aqua port, it would be nice to have Apples X11 less intimidating for non-*nix hackers.

JsD

Re:If only they would improve printing

[soullessbastard]

Disclaimer: I am a developer for Mac OS X OpenOffice.org and a founder of the NeoOffice project.

The printing problem really isn't related to Apple X11 at all but is rather a problem with Unix application porting in general since there's no good standardized way to do printing for Unix apps. Each large Unix app tends to print things a little differently, usually relying on either Xprint or on other low level tools like lpr to get access to the Unix print queue.

OpenOffice.org/X11 doesn't use Xprint...rather, it generates its own PostScript. This PostScript then has to get converted into PDF which is inserted into the Mac OS X print queue using CUPS. This is the only way to port the printing system as used on OOo for Linux & Solaris. It is fragile for obvious reasons.

If you're having trouble printing with OOo the recommended workarounds are to either use another application to print out that PDF (like you're doing above) or to use NeoOffice/J. Because NeoOffice/J is using native graphics, it provides access to the native print system of Mac OS X as well. NeoJ will give you access to normal Mac OS X print and page setup dialogs along with the additional access to specific printer extensions and the Mac OS X PDF save, Fax, and Preview functionality. That really is the correct solution.

Even if Apple does provide better X11 printing functionality through Xprint or other frameworks, unfortunately OOo/X11 is not able to use them since that's just not how it prints.

ed

Re:If only they would improve printing

[JPyObjC Dude]

Well, I now see why NeoOffice wins.

I guess I should completely dump the concept of installing OOO X11 on anybody's machines from now on and just go to your package.

I assume that X11 version of OOO will just be for those who either want the `latest OOO` or just love to use X11 (not sure who or why but...)

Thanks for the info. I've downloaded latest NeoOffice and it works great.

Keep up the great work!

JsD

great recruitment method

[SuperBanana]

If you want OpenOffice on OS X, help make one of the NATIVE ports more popular by using it

Bah, silly developer. This is good- any true MacOS X developer who actually tries out OpenOffice under X11 will, after his or her face has stopped twitching enough that they can see again, look for some alternative and find NeoOffice and start helping purely out of motivation to let OpenOffice under X11 die a fast death :-)

Re:great recruitment method

[Anonymous Coward]

I guessing then, that by 'any true Mac OS X developer', you must be meaning a Mac OS X developer that was a developer for that other Mac platform that existed before Mac OS X?

Perhaps Mac OS X would be better off without those developers.

Including an X11 server with Panther was the smartest decision that Apple have ever made.

nobody mentions: run Windows programs using Wine?

[Anonymous Coward]

run Wine on a Linux box, send the Windows app display to OS X. bingo! a use for all those expired Win95 licenses.

Simon Tyler
Systems Analyst

PC Competition for the Mac mini?

[Anonymous Coward]

When Apple announced their Mac mini, it caught my eye. Wanting to buy/build a small PC for my already cramped breakfast bar, I started pricing out similar PC hardware. The results startled me. Most of the configurations I found were more than the humble US$499 of the Mac, often much more. To match price I often had to configure with a much bigger shuttle-style case. What computers are currently on the market to compete with this? When my wife asks for the 'cute little Mac', what PC can I buy instead that will take up as little space and do as much for the same price (or less)?

Re:PC Competition for the Mac mini?

[Anonymous Coward]

Go to Lex.com.tw
The USA outlet is synertrontech

You'll find something the size of a Mac Mini at about $300, except no DVD.

It will boot from motherboard CF, has 3 network interfaces, a $60 wireless option, a dslmodem option, Disc on Chip, and about 15 motherboard variations, including one with 4 coax video in and one with firewire. You'll also find a rackmount option, up to 4 motherboards in a 1U form factor. You'll also find a rackmount option, 7 inches deep.

Re:Uh. Yes you can.

[drinkypoo]

On the other hand, there are libraries which abstract the mathematics still further in order to account for these differences for you...

Funny, I read this article earlier today

[Progman3K]

And followed the directions, which were clear.
I was able to get X11 installed.

There's already a terminal on OSX, but it doesn't know about the DISPLAY variable.

There's also an ssh client, and an ssh daemon, but I couldn't figure out how to enable the ssh daemon, does anyone know how?

For example, I tried adding it to the /etc/inetd
but I couldn't write to the file.

The 'su' command doesn't seem to work either; no matter which password I tried or even if I changed the password of the administrator user, 'su, would still give an error.

I know there must be a 'Mac' way to do all this, but what I'd really like is a list of DIFFERENCES between say an average Linux distro and OSX.

I know OSX is based on FreeBSD, which I've never run, but I expect it can't be that different from Linux.

Anyhow, if anyone has a link to an sshd how-to for OSX, I would both appreciate it and thank you in advance!

Re:Funny, I read this article earlier today

[thesman]

Go to System Preferences -> Sharing, click on "Remote Login". Description says "Click Start to allow users of other computers to access this computer using SSH". Hope this helps.

Re:Funny, I read this article earlier today

[Progman3K]

Hey!
That's it!

Funny thing is I had enabled the Windows Sharing in that same dialog earlier to get samba working, and i hadn't noticed that ssh was in there.

Actually I didn't expect something as arcane as ssh to be so simple, but that's Mac for you.

I just received this machine (A G5 Powermac, the 64 bit one with dual processors) and I can see I still have a bit of "unlearning" to do.

Thanks thesman, very kind of you.

Re:Funny, I read this article earlier today

[canon006]

Use sudo, or open up netinfo manager and enable the root account. Apple's X11 comes with its own termnial that should know about the DISPLAY variable. Someone else already posted about how to enable ssh, just start it in the system preferences.

Re:Funny, I read this article earlier today

[Yosho]

To expand upon what canon006 said, by default the "root" account is disabled in OS X. For security reasons, it's not recommended that you enable it unless you really, really need it. If you need to run a command as root, you can type "sudo [command name]", and when it asks for a password, type in your own password, assuming your account is considered an Admin account in the system preferences.

By the way, if you're new to OS X, I'd recommend checking out Fink. It's basically a package manager for UNIX software that is known to compile on OS X; it works somewhat like Debian's apt-get (it uses the .deb package format, even). If you're a long-time Linux user, there are probably a lot of little programs in there that you'll find useful.

Hmm Linux is not Unix.

[Anonymous Coward]

Cross Unix compad is a big problem.

Solaras(suns os typo I think) FreeBSD and Darwin(the kernel of Mac os). All share something in common. Very good linux compad.

98% of programs on linux use configure then make part of the autoconfig system. Ie you almost never just type Make.

almost 100% of Gnome and KDE can be cross built from the start line as long as a mac has X11. This takes ages.

Stuff that directly interfaces with the hardware either works or breaks ie accessing /dev directory or the /proc directory depending on how linux compad the os is. The trick is that FreeBSD Darwin and Linux share the same C lib ie glibc solaras I have not looked at for a while to see if it is using glibc. Most of these systems have replacted linux extentions to glibc regarding threading.

Basicly Linux is not Unix compad any more Freebsd and solaras has became linux compad to the point that they can run linux binarys no problem so building linux programs on these platforms is simple. Ie Darwin is a off branch of FreeBSD.

This is a completely different game.

About time Darwin got updated to run linux binarys and be done with it give linux developers 3 kernels it pick from and a harder target for a shutdown case to work.

Re:at least its good to see..

[moof1138]

While Cocoa (really Mach-O) apps would have been easy to move (I used to run apps remotely on Mac OS X Server 1.2), that doesn't account for all apps on Mac OS X. Carbon (really CFM) and Classic would not have that capacity without a lot of work. I expect that Apple decided to drop the support since it wasn't really that advantageous to most users, would be really confusing for many users, and wouldn't work for a lot of apps.

Add to that that Apple has Apple Remote Desktop, a commercial product for remotely running apps, and I could see a number of reasons why they would have been fine with dropping support.

These are guesses. There could also be real techincal reasons why it broke that were too serious of hurdles to manage for so minimal a payoff.

xfree86

[hanshotfirst]

One of the first things I did when I got an OSX machine was install xfree86 so I could run OpenOffice and ignore them M$ office trial versions that came pre-installed.

I found it easier to get this working than to figure out how the heck to get X-darwin going. Apple's site didn't seem much help at the time. It seems a little more klunky than I expected.. not as pretty as tying X natively into the desktop, butit go thte job done well enough so I moved on to setting up the main software I use on the system (recording).

Re:Uh. Yes you can.

[jbolden]

If you are interacting with the CPU that directly then either the code is much too low level for the task or in no meaningful sense is it Unix code (i.e. the core code is so level that the OS becomes almost irrelevent).

put a Pinto motor in a Testarossa

[Anonymous Coward]

No, Apples cost more because Apple doesn't care about marketshare. It's more of a cult.

What I dont get

[kronchev]

Is that so many tech people who buy macs do it because they claim they like that its "based in UNIX" (who gives a shit, is my thought), but then never, ever touch anything. I have NEVER seen a modified OS X system. Ever.

Re:What I dont get

[tim_bissell]

Is that so many tech people who buy macs do it because they claim they like that its "based in UNIX" (who gives a shit, is my thought), but then never, ever touch anything. I have NEVER seen a modified OS X

Wow... where to begin? "Based on Unix" I give a shit because it' fast, reliable, familiar ... and not Windoze.
"never seen a modified OS X" - what do you mean by modified? I have a couple of kernel hacks (not written by me) to remap the Capslock on my laptop keyboard, and to enhance the track pad. All my other modifications are user-level programs that do stuff I want.
If, by modifying you mean tuning the kernel, or linking a custom kernel - life's too short; I bought the Mac to do work, which it does perfectly, so there is no need to tinker. PCs are for tinkering.

Mods: The truth about bonch/rd_syringe/OverlyCrGuy

[Anonymous Coward]

Moderators: Please note that "bonch" is a known fanatical psycophant whose obnoxious offtopic rants are legend here on Slashdot. It doesn't matter what the topic is, he'll find a way to scrape in some pointless Microsoft shilling. While nobody expects us to love Microsoft in any way, his particularly tepid style of calling anyone he replies to "troll" or "liar" because he happens to disagree with whatever they're saying is well documented and should not be rewarded. If anything, bonch is the type of person that should not be part of the open source/free software community. He is an anathema to all that is good about free software.

I'm posting this so that you (the moderator) have some context to consider bonch and not mod him up whenever he posts his filler preformatted rants about installing Windows or whatever that unfortunately get him karma every single time and allow him to continue posting his trademark toxic crap (read on) day in and day out. You may consider this a troll - I consider it community service. And I ain't kidding.

If you're a /. subscriber, I invite you to look through some of his posting history. I guarantee that you'll be hard pressed to find someone that is more "out there" than bonch. You'll also probably notice he's got quite an AC following. Don't just read his posts, make sure you go through the replies.

For example, in this recent post bonch not only calls the OP a troll but attempts to "tell it like it is" while making some vague argument about "MS". Yes, if you're confused, you're not alone. The reply (modded +0) proceeds to simply destroy his bogus argument. You will notice he did not reply. This is what some people call "drive-by advocacy". A sort of I'll just leave you with my thoughts here and move on to the next flamebait kind of deal. In fact, he almost never replies because he knows that his fanatical arguments simply do not hold up to any sort of discussion. It's not that he's chosen the wrong cause - he's just going at it in a completely wrong way.

More? Just read though this post and the subsequent replies. I guess this stands on its own.

More? Bad spelling in astounding conspiracy theories, more offtopic FUD and uninformed "I'm right, look at me" rants, promptly proven wrong. Worse even, bonch wants to be Bill Gates, apparently (that first one is a winner). I mean, really. You think?

FUD, FUD, FUD, FUD, offtopic FUD, and more FUD. This guy is like the Monty Python SPAM skit, but with FUD and more FUD instead of canned meat. Amazed yet? Don't forget that KDE and Gnome make you dumb, and it's all a Slashdot conspiracy. How low do you want to go? Maybe as low as this?

The infamous Slashdot Front Page Troll? Nuclear fireballs? It goes on and on and on and on and on and on and on (troll?). Like the energizer bunny. Or take these two, which stretch the definition of weird.

It's up to you. We can get rid of this guy and make Slashdot a better place. I don't know about you, but I'd rather take the trolls and crapflooders over people like "bonch" any day. And I sure as hell don't want to be categorized along with him. This is not how you advocate free software, period.

OpenGL rendering

[Anonymous Coward]

Hell is fast?

sshd on OSX Howto

[k2r]

> I couldn't figure out how to enable the ssh daemon
> For example, I tried adding it to the /etc/inetd
> sshd how-to for OS

Well, I'm not really sure whether your question is real...

SSH on OSX Howto:
Take the MOUSE.
Navigate to
Apple-Menu->
System-Preferences->
Sharing.
There is a checkbox-item named "Enable remote login (ssh)" or similar.

Thats it.
You could enable apache there, too. Or Samba.

The root-account is not activated by default. Use sudo $COMMAND instead - it's much more save.
If you really really need it - activate it in directory services / do a sudo passwd. But sudo is safer and safety matters.

k2r

Re:sshd on OSX Howto

[Progman3K]

You're right. Safety is important.

I had never used sudo explicitly before. It's not a big thing to get used to to do 'sudo x', and like you said it's safer than enabling the root account.

But how would you add items in the services dialog?

For example, I'm also using osxvnc, which is a vnc server for osx. I start it by hand when I log on, but it keeps shutting itself down if I log off.

So I thought that there must be a way to install it as a service, sure enough, one of its dialog tabs lets you select that as an option, but it doesn't seem to work.

So i thought of adding it as a service. but other than the existing entries in the list, there doesn't seem (as far a I can see yet) to be an easy way of adding services.

Building a Successor to AppleWorks

[Anonymous Coward]

You may note that iWork's motto is not "A Successor to AppleWorks," but rather "Building a Successor to Appleworks," showing that they're not done. Last year, there was Keynote, this year, Keynote 2 and Pages. iWork '06 will probably include Keynote 3, Pages 2, and Cells (spreadsheet). Each year they will probably add a new, superior alternative application, and improve the existing ones. Plus, who needs Excel or Word? They need a spreadsheet app with feature X and option Y and format Z, and Apple could release one with X, Y, and Z, and it would be a fine alternative for the person who "needed" Excel. No one needs a certain program, they just need the program's functionality and compatibility.

Apple isn't in the habit of trying to be equal to the opposition. They won't release their product until it surpasses the opposition. The iMac G5 was thinner than any computer anyone had ever seen. The Mac mini is smaller than anyone thought possible, and it was under the $500 psychological barrier. The iPod shuffle offers more storage than the competitors for its price, and it's easy to use. Apple won't settle for equality. They want superiority. Then they make it better.

System-Startup Items on OSX

[k2r]

OSX uses an advanced startup system and is able to determine which sequence is the best from some configuration files.

Read more about it at
http://www.osxfaq.com/Tutorials/LearningCenter /How To/Startup/index.ws
and
http://developer.apple.c om/documentation/MacOSX/Co nceptual/BPSystemStartup/Tasks/CreatingStartupItem s.html

Actually, there's a LOT of useful information available at
http://developer.apple.com/documentation/MacOS X/in dex-date.html

But I doubt that there is an easy way to have a VNC server with the systems loginwindow. I remember that that's a problem on Windows, too. At least there must be _some_ things that are easier on Linux :-)

Switching components on and off is done best using "Diablotin". Look for it at macupdate.com. And be careful, you can switch off some essential stuff using it ...

k2r

Re:System-Startup Items on OSX

[Progman3K]

Everything you've written is really informative, I thank you.
However, I must disagree with your assesment of vnc being hard to install so that it is running during the login window:

I use UltraVNC all the time for that and have 5 machines (WXP W2K W98) and for the ones that are true Win32 implementations, with a service manager and all that, UltraVNC installs as a service perfectly. As a bonus it is also the VNC server that renders with the least amount of artifacts.

On the DOS-based versions of Windows (9x,ME), I've seen login bugs a few times with a few VNC servers.

Re:System-Startup Items on OSX

[k2r]

Thanks.

I remember that there were some difficulties running vnc on a Windows box in a way that enables the vnc user to login remotely on the windows login screen (the ctrl+alt+del login process, not the login within vnc).
But I'm happy for all the Windows admins to hear that I might be wrong and I must admit that I have had minimal contact to Windows guts within the last 6 years.

However, I cannot tell weather this is possible on osx or not, I haven't used VNC in this way on osx, yet. So it might - contrary to my guess - be a very common task with a very simple solution.

All the best,
k2r

uh

[Anonymous Coward]

why is this news ? People have been installing X11 on OS X since the beta of X11 came out (i.e ages)

I've been remotely controlling my Linux machine for a while with it. Which quite frankly is about all it's useful for. Oh and Gimp and Open Office

big deal. Thank God Apple didn't go with X Windows for their native GUI it's so slow and clunky and crap

Re:Mods: The truth about bonch/rd_syringe/OverlyCr

[Anonymous Coward]

Thank you, sir. Your tireless criticism will make Slashdot a better place.

How to run X11 on windows

[Anonymous Coward]

1. Go to www.cygwin.com
2. press "install cygwin" and select a mirror site
3. Wait a few minutes
4. Voila! You have X11

tastes like FreeBSD

[hawk]

Even with incredibly complicated programs (I think OpenOffice was one), it has been reported that telling make that you're running FreeBSD is sufficient to compile on a mac . . .

hawk