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Will MacIntel Hardware Open The Door for Mac OS X CAD?
xcleetusx wonders: "I've been a fan of Apple for years, and with their current strangle-hold on mainstream media my desire to make the switch has been growing ever more, but the same nagging issue that has prevented my switch for years still remains: I'm an engineer, and I simply can't invest in a computer that won't run modeling/simulation software like CATIA and Solidworks. Since this software is available on Unix (which Mac OS X is built on) and also on Windows (Intel hardware), is the Apple switch to Intel-based hardware going to better my chances for a Mac OS X CAD workstation, or will it remain a pipedream?"
Hopefully the switch means increased popularity which will lead to more support from venders. I'm an engineering student (ece) so i don't usually deal with cad and solid works but i deal with other stuff like spice and vhdl. Luckily eagle comes for os x.
Biggest complaint though is that most software that is "ported" uses X11. It's quite nasty.
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Go canucks, habs, and sens!
Since Mac OS X will use a Darwin (Unixish) on x86, it will not be very hard to port your standard CAD programs to run natively in OSX. Mostly it depends on the demand in the market. If a lot of users start asking the CAD software developers for a port to OSX, it will probably happen. Short of that, your best bet may be Darwine or X11 for OSX. Using one of these may allow you to run standard CAD software without it actually being ported (don't hold your breath for Darwine, though).
What might happen that could help you is that virtual PC programs will be able to run MS Windows at near full speed since it'll be running on the same processor that Windows is written for. So you should be able to run a virtual PC program with Windows and your CAD apps on your Mac.
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My best answers at this point are. . .
We can only hope.
-and-
We'll have to wait and see.
I'm a big user of GIS, and while I find GRASS to be a wonderful alternative to ESRI products, it's sometimes too much hassle to fire up GRASS, define a region, import files, etc., if all I want to do is edit a shapefile or query a feature. I do know about QGIS and other alternatives, but sometimes it would be nice if ArcGIS was ported to the Mac. Given the change in landscape over the past couple of years and changes yet to come (Intel, I'm looking at you), I think there's more probability of these sorts of things happening. They are, however, still possibilities. Until a company commits to producing their specialized software (CADD, GIS, etc.) for the Mac, or until there is an increased demand for Macs in such industries, we're still just speculating.
Now, if Apple manages to wedge their way into the server market with a killer Intel-based Xserve coupled with a low-cost Xserve RAID, we may see those pressures come from another side. Time will tell.
Per Square Mile, a blog about density
The only thing that is likely to happen with Intel-Mac is that Windows Emulators - and hence Windows software - will run at nearly native speed.
gopher://cramer.plaintext.cc http://cramer.plaintext.cc:70
MacOS is not going to magically turn into Windows or Linux just because there's Intel Inside. Mac development will be unchanged, with some marginal exceptions.
What I'm listening to now on Pandora...
...it'll run on OS X under X11 with fairly minimal porting effort today.
If the companies haven't made that port available then the (trivial, from an application developer point of view) change from PowerPC to x86 isn't going to change that.
It's all about size of market and differential pricing. Not the CPU that happens to be in the box.
Programs run on operating systems, not CPUs. Your best chance is if the new Apple/Intel hardware dual-boots, or if Apple gains enough market share that CAD companies decide to start coding for them.
Dear Slashdot: next time you want to mess with the site, add a rich-text editor for comments.
'm an engineer, and I simply can't invest in a computer that won't run modeling/simulation software like CATIA and Solidworks.
You do realize that Solidworks is available for OS X, right?
rooooar
MacOS is not going to magically turn into Windows or Linux just because there's Intel Inside. Mac development will be unchanged, with some marginal exceptions.
I dunno, maybe this falls into the "marginal" category, but "scientific" [or "mathematical"] programming is really REALLY REALLY difficult.
For instance, take a gander at the list of FFTs catalogued at BenchFFT:
Then look at their relative performances for speed and accuracy: In many instances, the software and hardware engineers at the companies that build the chips [Intel and AMD] can't write FFTs that are as efficient as third-party vendors [or hobbyists], which should be a pretty good indication that something as ostensibly straightforward as writing an FFT routine is just fantastically complicated in practice.So if you're a company with a lot of low-level proprietary software that's tuned for the x86/x86-64 instructions sets, or for classical PCI bus communications [apparently PCIe is very backwards compatible], or for the nVidia/ATI/Oxygen instruction sets, then your porting job just got a heckuva lot easier if you don't have to deal with PPC RISC, Altivec, etc etc etc.
VectorWorks and TurboCAD are already here - and have been for many years. After several conversations with the AutoDesk AutoCAD procuct manager, it seems they think the Mac is dead, or dying. Anyhow, VectorWorks does handle AutoCAD files nicely, as long as you can get the M$ AutoCAD users (wiennies) to use standards-based file formats. CAD was born on the Mac... and I believe its still better with the available stuff today; AutoCAD is very much a M$ product - too much of everything, and nothing worth using day-to-day
This doesn't stand up to the simplest of analysis. Consider that Wintel ISN'T the platform of choice for most if not all CAD software. The platform of choice 5 years ago was Solaris NOT NT/XP/etc.
The reason is practical and historical in nature. These applications needed more memory, stability, and horsepower than the average PC had. Many applications wanted to be in a 64 bit address space. None of the MS products supported this until very recently.
I don't need to bash MS with the above. MS products were more aimed at the home than the back server room from the beginning.
Only recently the perferred platform for these types of applications has become Linux on 64 bit Operterons. They all still support Solaris as well - though not Solaris x86 yet that I'm aware.
To address the original poster's question of whether these apps will become available on OS-X. I doubt it for two reasons. The first is that the hardware will still be sourced from Apple, therefore there will be an "Apple Hardware Tax" applied. The next issue is that as of today, OS-X is still a minor player in both the server space and the desk-top space. Only if this changes will vendors decide to begin supporting yet another OS (which has a cost to it -it's more than just compiling it to the new environment for a product to come into being!)
Have you compiled your kernel today??
I'm a big user of GIS, and while I find GRASS to be a wonderful alternative to ESRI products, it's sometimes too much hassle to fire up GRASS, define a region, import files, etc., if all I want to do is edit a shapefile or query a feature.
Well personally, I find grass to be a wonderful alternative to sobriety. It's never too much hassle for me to fire up grass.
This is a viewer application, it's on Linux too. One can see data created via Solidworks on a win32 PC, that's about it. Well, measure, etc...
Solidworks is about as closely married to the win32 API as one can get. They stated this goal early in their development process and have not deviated one iota.
The whole integrated deal will keep a lot of MCAD off of Mac and Linux for a very long time to come yet. Microsoft is very aggressive in this area, working with vendors closely to interlink CAD with Office. The combination is good, however it will remain win32 as well. (Sigh...)
The older cad packages, that still have UNIX versions, are more likely ports. We have PTC on Linux today, it's not too much of a stretch to see OSX --provided there is demand. That's what all the vendors what to see. Tell them and tell your friends to tell them.
Better: Inquire about their software, get them to do a demo, then tell 'em you need it on the Mac. As they walk out the door, know they will be carrying that information with them to their technical marketing people. --Those are the folks that need to be sold.
Don't say Mac up front either... just keep the discussion about CAD and needs. The assumption will be win32. (It always is) Then drop the Mac bomb on them.
Blogging because I can...
The switch to x86 doesn't change the API of MacOS X and hence won't magically give you Intel PC software. And if that software had been cross-API-compatible (via Qt, wxwidgets etc.), it could have been released for PPC-MacOS already.
True.
The only thing that is likely to happen with Intel-Mac is that Windows Emulators - and hence Windows software - will run at nearly native speed.
Not strictly true. Everybody is concentrating so hard on the whole Windows emulator possibility that they're completely missing another benefit to x86 Macs that I'm personally looking forward to: Linux binary compatibility.
FreeBSD has had rock-solid Linux binary compatibility for years. Almost any executable compiled on and for Linux will run perfectly well on FreeBSD. Porting the Linux compatibility layer to Darwin is probably something that a skilled dev can do on a rainy weekend. And that's if it hasn't been done already. For x86 Mac users, this immediately opens the door to almost all programs built for Linux, both open and closed.
I say to the fellow who wants his CAD software on Mac: You'll probably waste your time pestering the vendor to release a native OSX version of the application. And WINE is unreliable at best, which x86 OSX won't change. What you want is to be able to run the Unix version of the app natively on your Mac and that's what Linux binary compatibility will do.
better not tell the people at Architosh.com that there is not a MacOS CAD workstation
You mean, like this?
Except that it is, and they don't.
"Since this software is available on UNIX (which Mac OS X is built on) and also on Windows (Intel hardware), is the Apple switch to Intel-based hardware going to better my chances for a MacOS CAD workstation, or will it remain a pipedream?"
If the software is available on UNIX, and is not available on the Mac right now, then whatever is holding it back is unrelated to the processor the Mac is using. Either the vendor does not consider the Mac market large enough (which is odd, since by this time the majority of workstations capable of running UNIX software are Macs), or they consider even a port to another UNIX platform unreasonably difficult, or they don't realise that Mac OS X runs ordinary UNIX applications very well.
These are not problems that will be solved by switching to a new processor, case design, color scheme, mouse, keyboard, monitor, or pizza topping.
Programs run on operating systems, not CPUs.
Nope, they run on CPUs also. Operating systems do to. Operating systems and programs are both software. They both run on CPUs. The operating system schedules what programs get to run when, and when the OS itself runs, but everything happens on the CPU.
Now what you may have been trying to say is that programs are built to be run with certain operating systems, which would be correct.
This doesn't stand up to the simplest of analysis. Consider that Wintel ISN'T the platform of choice for most if not all CAD software. The platform of choice 5 years ago was Solaris NOT NT/XP/etc.
You are full of shit. Which CAD environment are you talking about? Is it possibly within your own personal sphere of knowledge or are you referring to "real" CAD use as defined by reliance upon big iron?
The vast majority of CAD users are trundling along with 2D AutoCAD on WinTel systems and making do because the full transformation to 3D seems to require a bunch of IT jerks that would impede their productivity. You sound like one of those jerks.
Hopefully the switch means increased popularity which will lead to more support from venders.
The switch will mean OS X will be easily pirated. Apple's whole plan is predicated on something Microsoft has known for years: piracy = marketshare. No matter how you slice it, people who otherwise wouldn't have bought an apple machine will download and install this on some machine or another, even just "because they can". Apple knows this.
When they release OS X for x86, you can expect a huge jump in marketshare from the current ~2%, simply because people will be torrenting this thing like crazy. (as if they aren't already)
The theory of relativity doesn't work right in Arkansas.
What makes you think the switch will prompt Dassault Systemes to port CATIA to OSX?
:\), and it's one of those pieces of software that keeps me from switching to OSX (Valve's Source is the other big one).
They already support AIX on POWER and PowerPC. Given that they haven't ported a program that runs on AIX/PPC to OSX/PPC, what makes you think they will port a Win/x86 program to OSX/x86?
It's not about obscurity. CATIA runs on platforms with tiny marketshares like HP-UX (on PA-RISC?), Solaris on Sparc, and IRIX on Rx000. The software is obviously very portable, DS just has no interest in an OSX port.
I'm a huge fan of CATIA (just reupped my license a week ago