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Run Windows Applications Natively in OS X?
mcho writes "Unlike other speculators, who get no spam, Robert X. Cringely offers an intriguing reason behind Apple's recent strategy of Boot Camp. From the article: 'I believe that Apple will offer Windows Vista as an option for those big customers who demand it, but I also believe that Apple will offer in OS X 10.5 the ability to run native Windows XP applications with no copy of XP installed on the machine at all. This will be accomplished not by using compatibility middleware like Wine, but rather by Apple implementing the Windows API directly in OS X 10.5.'
If it can just run Windows apps anyway?
I'll form my OWN solar system! With blackjack! And hookers!
He points out one of the difficulties WINE has had keeping applications healthy:
I wonder that his assumption Microsoft can't break its own API in Windows is correct, and suspect (or fear) it isn't. Or, at best, writing to Microsoft's API is only a half truth and is at the core of one of the EU's complaints against Microsoft -- complete API documentation!
Cringely does confirm third party reports of this suite of software working at Apple, but I wonder for how long? And for what versions? A complete, robust, and current maintenance of what is available for a Windows API is a minefield, and in my opinion, likely to somehow "break" rather quickly.
I can imagine if Apple somehow has pulled this off and is ready to roll it out publicly they must be bracing for the Microsoft blitzkrieg, because they're going to get it.
As to whether or not this really is a realistic scenario (Microsoft and Windows Apps running transparently in OS X), please, please, please let it be true! (We can all hope, right?)
Wow, Cringely obviously has a clue.
"This will be accomplished not by using compatibility middleware like Wine, but rather by Apple implementing the Windows API directly in OS X 10.5."
Wine *is* an implementation of the Windows API.
Cringeworthy is more like it
because people want native OS X programs. thus there is a market. thus profit.
anyway, i'm doubtful this will happen - as then apple would probably have to support it.
Cringely is out of his mind.
1) There is no way in hell Microsoft would document their API to the level necessary to allow Apple to duplicate it.
2) It's blatantly obvious he doesn't understand precisely what Wine is. Remember: Wine Is Not an Emulator. It's a built-from-scratch implementation of the Windows API.
Idiot.
Damn, I whish I could mod this story +5, Funny
The Wine guys worked a decade on cloning the Windows API, and there are still more than enough problems. There is no way Apple can do this. Maybe for specific applications, but implementing Win32 with all the required libraries on top? Never.
...but it isn't going to happen. BootCamp is about advertising. Macs are generally known as Really Nice Hardware(TM). As a result, some people will buy Macs just to install Windows. They may even think, "Hey, I can even try out this Mac OS X thing so that I can *really* make fun of my Mac-lover friends!" Then the users purchase a Mac, try OS X, realize they don't actually NEED Windows, and never use BootCamp at all.
It's a stroke of genius, actually.
Javascript + Nintendo DSi = DSiCade
... would certaily push a lot of users like me over the edge to the Macintosh camp. If only I had bought that Apple stock 10 years ago...
-Arthur
Cave ne ante ullas catapultas ambules
Cringely and Dvorak must be making humongous ad-revenue trolling Mac Fans lately. They're eating it up!
It's understandable because Apple has made some radical moves lately (Intel, Windows), so the Mac Zealot's universe must seem like it's in total flux. No longer can they confidently predict Apple's next move using their supposed expertise in everything-apple. If Apple will put Windows on Macs, pretty much anything goes!
Obviously these columnists sense the uncertainly and are having fun stirring things up a bit. Anyway, before you fire off your 1000 word point-by-point response denouncing Cringely, keep in mind he probably wrote this column in 15 minutes while high on cough medicine.
Whenever I hear the word 'Innovation', I reach for my pistol.
I bet it will be a classic like environment, but for windows. Once the data is on the HDD, it is trivial to start up a virtual machine and fool the win partition into thinking that it is booting natively. That is much more likely. That would be the final "Integrated" solution for running windows apps. They proved it could be done workably with OS 9. Now, they just have a separate partition to boot. But this again, is from another whack job on the innerwebinator thingie.
One Token Ring to Rule them All, One Search Engine to Find Them, One WAN to bring them in, and TCP/IP Bind them...
Could cringely be saying something that actually makes a bit of sense? I have no doubt that WINE will eventually be at least as good on os x as it is on linux today, which is not too shabby. Apple have shown with boot camp that, if the hackers get it working and people are excited about it, Apple is willing to release a more elegant solution to accomplish the same goals. With the mach microkernel setup they've got going now, it's not too hard to imagine a windows compatibility layer that could run tandem to the BSD layer they already use. IMO, this one is at least a possibility. I wouldn't say Apple is neccesarily planning to do this right now, but if people start getting really exited when darwine starts getting good, I wouldn't be suprised to see the ole man in the turtleneck upstaging them by releasing an Apple sanctioned implementation.
Really the most shocking part of this whole article is the fact the Cringely said something that actually kinda makes sense. I guess a stopped clock really can be right once in a while.
Cool! All of the spyware and viruses can run in OS X too. That would be great.
First, there is more than one API used in Windows. Second, WINE is an implementation of the Windows APIs. It is entirely possible Apple will reuse a lot of the WINE project and DarWINE in order to allow Windows Apps to run in OS X (hopefully sandboxed), but it is also entirely possible they won't. I rather suspect the latter for a number of reasons. First, Apple doesn't have to do this, there are a half dozen third parties clamoring to offer the same functionality. Second, by making it too easy to run Windows programs within OS X, they can reduce the incentive for developers to write programs to the current APIs. Third, since Windows is slowly strangling OpenGL on their platform and MS owns DirectX, Apple may have difficulty keeping graphics intensive applications behaving well if they go this route. Fourth, Windows APIs do not have all the functionality of OS X APIs and some of the most useful and advantageous features of OS X would be killed.
Only time will tell for sure.
By your reasoning, then why bother writing OSX programs in the first place? The point is that people write programs for OSX because they want to, not because they're somehow stuck with a Mac and can't write something for the PC. This is giving people who use program Y that was never "ported" to the Mac platform (and thus can't switch over) a reason to switch over. Of course, this is also giving a lot of convenience to long-time Mac users who just can't seem to get any games.
Now, only if I can plug in any PCIE gfx card and be able to get the OSX drivers for them, I'll be all set....
Because Mac users will treat any Windows apps running on OS X like second class citizens. They'll stomach it, but not for long.
People credit Apple for how apps are consistently Mac-like and interoperate with each other, but the users are the ultimate enforcers. Any developer who steps out of line is crucified.
Frankly, it's probably better not to go down Cringley's road, since Microsoft's flavor of application design and integration is so very, very different from the OS X model; running Windows Word "native" in OS X would be a constant headache for users used to the drag-and-drop-just-works world of Apple's flagship apps...
Obliteracy: Words with explosions
1) There is no way in hell Microsoft would document their API to the level necessary to allow Apple to duplicate it.
And because of that, they're losing 2 million euros a-day...
I can not wait to run Bonzai Buddy, not to mention all the _GREAT_ screen savers that are available for download (for free!) off the web!
yea!
1. Why and how would Apple implementing the Windows API be a good thing?
2. What Cringly has been smoking?
3. Most importantly, where can I get some of what Cringly been smoking?
If "disco" means "I learn" in Latin, does "discothèque" mean "I learn technology"?
Why bootcamp when you can run in a VM (aside from games)? Anandtech has a nice review of the macbook, and running windows in a window, as well as dual booting. Seems performance is quite good, even with the beta!
The answer? Because X11 apps (and likely Windows apps, if they did implement Windows compatibility) look and behave like crap next to Cocoa and Carbon apps. They don't use the menu bar, all the shortcuts use control instead of the command key, etc. There's nothing wrong with those on an X11 system, but switching back and forth between Cocoa and X11 apps can be jarring.
I doubt Windows compatibility would cause existing Mac developers to drop support. And who knows, Windows-only developers might start considering a Mac port more seriously if a significant portion of their user base started running their apps on a Mac.
Ideally this would be in a sandbox, similar to a virtual machine. That way all you have to do is kill the VM, and all that crud is gone. Since it's a VM, you can easily make backup copies of the file system -- similar to a restore partition on OEM machines. Set it up the way you want, and when ActiveX rips a hole in Windows or malware slows it to a crawl, it's easy. Kill the VM process, copy the backup partition over.
Of course some of us can run Windows without malware, viruses, and all that stereotypical garbage. Some of us do have a clue how to administer a Windows computer. I've worked with many operating systems -- DOS, DOS/Windows, Windows NT, Linux, FreeBSD, Solaris, HPUX, and even little Vax. In my experience, none are easier or more difficult to secure with the exception of DOS or DOS-based Windows (96/98/ME), which suck. All it takes is a little training on the security issues and the ability to be proactive with security.
24 beers in a case, 24 hours in a day. Coincidence? I think not!
there have been a lot of work on that!!! It's called http://darwine.opendarwin.org/ and it's not yet stable...
...because Apple might just have their own implementation of a Windows API ready to go before Vista actually ever ships.
IBM had that problem with OS/2. It ran Windows apps just fine, there were very few that didn't work jsut as intended... Which lead to nobody making native OS/2 apps. I mean if you can write it once and it'll run on both OSes, why bother with a port? Sure it would work BETTER if it was a native app, but it worked well enough.
I think Apple would face a similar problem. Not all apps would stop porting, of course, apps that have a healthy market like Photoshop would keep porting, but I think many would. You'd never see another game port, and any app that wasn't really core-market kind of app for Apple would likely stop porting. You have to figure you aren't really going to lose any sales since it does run, and there are few people using it in the first place, so why bother?
Now maybe Apple decides they don't care. Maybe they want to implement the Windows APIs and just use those. Maybe they figure the other features of the OS are enough to keep epopel buying. However I gaurentee they are smart enough to know that if they implement the Windows API natively in OS-X, that most apps will just use that and not bother to port.
There have been at least three projects that I know of (Wine, OS/2 Warp 4, and ReactOS) that have tried to do implementations of the Win32 API. OS/2s implementation never truly got off the ground (and was neither able to run native Win32 code, nor was it even reasonably complete). Wine and ReactOS have both been fighting a Sisyphean battle with Microsoft throughout the life of their projects.
Then, you need to add in the fact that Apple has historically been very jealous of their user experience. I don't expect that Apple would ever release something like this unless and until it was impossible to distinguish a Win32 application from a native app.
Don't get me wrong: I'd love to see it (it would provide justification that I could use on the spouse for upgrading our G4 MiniMac). I just think that Cringely needs to put down crack pipe and slowly back away.
Karma: Chameleon - mostly influenced by bad '80s New Wave music
WHat we need is a multi-billion dollar organization with knowledge of the Windows API and developers on staff...oh. wait.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
Hell, make XCode a cross-compiler that builds Win32 apps from Win32 and Cocoa projects and give it away for free
Hades, the Windows version of QuickTime already implements 2/3 of Carbon itself.
Sounds like Cringely has been sleeping with Dvorak too long. You know how when couples are with each other for a long time they begin to sound and act like each other...
WINE becomes an OS component as soon as one Linux distro vendor bundles WINE
So apache an OS component, because all of the distribution vendors bundle it with linux?
Does that mean AOL is a component of windows, because dell bundles a 6 month trial on most of their machines?
If I have been able to see further than others, it is because I bought a pair of binoculars.
A lot of comment so far correctly point out that WINE is is an implementation of the Windows API, but they miss Cringely's point that Apple licensed the Windows API. The whole shebang. So unlike the WINE development team, OSX-XP project team doesn't have to reverse engineer undocumented and cryptic API's. Anyone who remembers IBM's OS2 knows that IBM licensed the Windows API, and included it into OS2, and could run all Windows programs. OS2 failed because of lack of consumer appeal (eye-candy), not because of lack of compatibility.
I imagine Apple could pull a better OS2 than IBM. Security, stability plus consumer appeal plus Windows compatibility.
Even if all this is speculation, it probably gives Messrs Dell and Gates nightmares.
In Soviet Russia, articles before post read *you*!
What's wrong with not having programs written for OS X if it will be able to run the Windows apps anyway? Either way, people will buy macs and the mac marketshare will continue to increase. Eventually there are bound to be enough users to make having OS X versions of one's software (that can take full advantage of OS X's capabilities) advantageous enough to compel developers to make them in order to be competitive. Even if they don't, if MS does something with the next version to cause Windows compatibility to break, application developers will have to make Mac versions of their software in order to keep the customers happy. What's the big deal?
One of the advantages/curses of the Mach microkernel that Mac OS X uses is the abstraction between the hardware drivers and the "kernel" that does stuff like manage IPC and disk activity etc., etc. The advantage is the isolation of hardware, the disadvantage is performance. While slower than a monolithic kernel, Mach can be a lot more stable. And with computing power at the level it's at these days I'm not sure how noticeable the difference is for everyday desktop use.
Cringley's idea would make a heck of a lot of sense in this kind of environment, because you'd just instantiate a Windows "kernel" (server in Mach parlance) that provides the runtime profile. This gives you a heck of a robust virtualization implementation, with the Windows and Mac OS X kernels running as peers with equal yet controlled access to the hardware. When us Mac users were running MkLinux it was not unheard of to run a development version of the linux kernel as a Mach server alongside the current linux kernel.
I've always felt Apple's Boot Camp was merely a reason for them to provide the driver glue needed for Windows, and that dual-booting most certainly is not Apple's final goal.
Microsoft has an ongoing issue with the EU where Microsoft is unable (unwilling) to produce documentation on their APIs to a standard that anyone can sensibly write code that interfaces with it. If the state of affairs are as shoddy as Microsoft gives the impression of, even Steve Jobs's RDS cannot reliably help Apple engineers re-implement the full Windows API.
The EU is treathening to fine Microsoft $2,7 mill a day for the inability to produce said documentation.
The future is in beta
Not to mention all the great spyware and malware that supporting ActiveX and the rest of the Windows API will bring! Oh, yes, Nirvana.
Currently hooked on AMP
- Switch browsers from IE to Firefox
- Switch Operating Systems from Windows to Mac
- Switch Preferences from Women to Men
That leaves you in one of the smallest possible target audiences for... well... just about anythingI doubt Jobs is looking to support running every Win32 binary under the sun - for that you can dual boot. If something like what Cringely describes were to take place, OS X would implement only a subset of the win32 API, but with graphical widgets having an OS X look and feel and perhaps some win32'ish extensions that provide access to OS X specific functionality (spotlight, etc...) This 'subset' API would be different enough that there would be very little likelihood that an unmodified binary would run out of the box on top of this compatibility layer.
But with a recompile and some refactoring, I bet most windows programs could run quite will under this compatibity layer. What those would do is open up the Mac platform as a viable target for Windows software developers. Recompile under OS X, fix the few quirks, or work around the APIs that aren't present, and bingo, you've got a mac app. With a few IFDEFs you might even be able to support both Mac and Windows versions with the same code base. Software makers like Quicken might find this a very attractive option.
Quite simply, a monolithic kernel like the one used in Linux or most of the other Open Source Unix clones is inherently two to three times faster for integer calculations than the Mach microkernel presently used in OS X 10.4. ... Apple has evidently reached the point where they need to trade claimed performance, -- typically based on floating-point operations that aren't a part of much web or database service -- for real performance.
In this amusing quote, Cringely is asserting that the mostly-microkernel architecture of Xnu is responsible for poor integer performance, which wrecks web/db performance, but does fine with floating-point operations. Makes sense to me!
Speeding-up performance is great, but normally a system vendor won't want to do that for older hardware, which might encourage some users to keep their old box and just add a new OS. But in this case, Apple HAS NO installed base of Intel Macs to worry about having to compete with, so speeding up the OS becomes a no-brainer, especially if it simultaneously encourages PowerPC owners to upgrade so they can share in the fun.
Apple already does make their OS releases faster from one to another - I don't know about other Apple policies, but the WebKit team, for example has a strict 'no performance regressions' policy which is enforced pretty well. It wouldn't surprise me to find the same is true of the rest of the OS and components. Asserting that Apple is so intent on selling new hardware that they would intentionally ignore potential performance improvements is ludicrous to say the least.
Wow, he got all that from Apple release of Boot Camp. His article me of another contemporary article of a man who traded up to apartment from a red paper-clip. I just thought the release was becasue Apple wanted to sell more Macs and sales are down due to the transition. Whether via virtualization or Apple directly using Windows API, Windows program will run on top of Mac OSX in the future. The question with virtualization is speed and direct access to hardware. Alternatively, using Windows API raises the question of appearance and consistency of interface. Apple's interface is not exactly like Windows. Menus are different and located in different places. Borders are also very different. In addition, keyboard combinations will be different. For example, the difference between using alt-f4 versus Command-Q. So, Windows programs are just going to bring in inconsistency to Mac OSX that Apple goes through great pains to avoid. It will screw up people who have become accustomed to certain way thing work in Mac OS X and mess up their work flows. One other problem is it will discourage developer from Mac OSX native programs. I am sure Apple doesn't wants that.
You don't have to be smart to use a Mac, you just have to be smart enough to buy one
CometCursor will accentuate my OSX desktop nicely! I can't wait!
Isn't that what Ruby on Rails is for?
http://wiki.rubyonrails.org/rails/pages/CRUD
trichard
It would be much easier for Apple to move in that direction by implementing their own version of the Microsoft .NET CLR. This is a 'public' set of interfaces that is now being implemented in Rotor 2.0. None of the ISVs I work with today are developing anything but .NET code for the Microsoft platform. Sure - there is a great deal of interop remaining for COM+ and Win32 - but most companies have realized the ROI of moving to a managed environment like Java or .NET, and don't want to go back to the bad ole days of C coding.
Having .NET on the Apple could actually go a long way to bringing MACs into corporate environments, as companies would demand 'portable' .NET code.
More importantly, if they could carry over their non-UI logic with just a recompile via some sort of Carbon-style XCode project mechanism (that would import, say, VC and VC++ projects) and then redo the UI via the Interface Builder (but be able to access NIB data via Win32 widget calls) then the barrier to porting to OS X would pretty much go away.
You can do most of that right now, if your model classes (assuming MVC design) are in C++. Just use controllers written in Objective-C++ to talk to your C++ models and Objective-C views. The only thing missing from what you're describing is importing VC projects, but that's just an inconvenience, not a show-stopper - it's not exactly rocket surgery to create a new project and add your model files to it.
Lost: Sig, white with black letters. No collar. Reward if found!
I had an apple rep show me a beta of Codeweavers Crossover Office working with OS X in a demo 3 weeks ago (Alpha version).
It does not need to run 100% of apps to REALLY be a hit. If the majority of vanilla apps run with little or no issues then I know of MANY People who would dump windows.
What if Apple bought codeweavers? With the Windows API in hand they could probably take their modified codebase and get it running even better than it is now.
Well, preloads (actuall, lack thereof) also had something to do with it. The OS/2 division within IBM couldn't get the PC division to offer OS/2 version 2 through 4 on stock hardware. When industry execs from other PC companies like Compaq were interviewed their response was, ``why would I load my competitor's operating system onto my PCs?''
But on top of this, between v.3 and v.4 of OS/2, IBM gambled almost their entire budget on OS/2 PPC and, well, lost that gamble when neither CHRP nor PREP took off, Microsoft ditched NT for the PPC and the only commodity computer running the PPC chip was the Macintosh. Guessing wrong not only cost IBM billions, but also lost quite a few turf battles for OS/2 proponents inside IBM.
It also didn't help that IBM kept insisting that certain key flaws (can you say synchronous input queue?) were actually features and would not be fixed.
But by comparisson, rather than having to fight internal battles to get OS X preloaded on Macs, every Mac ships with OS X. Tens, if not hundreds, of Hackers are trying to get OS X to run on stock PC hardware despite Apple saying that they'll not support stuff. CEOs of competing hardware makers, like Michael Dell, are saying that they'd love to be able to preload OS X onto their gear. The situation is clearly different.
But the biggest difference between now and 1995 when IBM's best chance at making OS/2 make it big is that thanks to Linux, most people understand that a choice in operating systems exists. In the nineties, you got either got a Windows machine or a Mac; most people had no clue that you get load other system software.
You may recognize that porting Win32 is far from enough to have modern and future Windows apps running on OSX. They'll have to port DirectX, .NET, Avalon, Indigo, in the near future WinFS and more like those.
Porting Win32 is hard enough, but I can tell you Apple has neither time nor resources to port the entire WinFX framework.
And this, besides making it easy for devs to make Vista apps, is the whole reason WinFX exists in first place, to lock apps further into Windows with a sophisticated, very flexible and capable, yet simple to use framework.
- Windows 3.0 - compatible with MSDOS (earlier versions had some compatability too but it wasn't as solid
- Windows 95 - compatible with Windows 3.x and DOS
- Windows XP - compatible with Windows 95, 3.x, and DOS
- Mac OS X - compatible with Mac OS 9. Also able to run many X11/Unix apps with just a recompile
Other people can probably come up with other examples of operating systems that, in their time, were successful, and had substantial back-compatibility with platforms that you generally wanted to obsolete, not support.Anyone thinking "Hey, Windows is Windows right?" should note that Windows 3.x and Windows 95 couldn't have had more different looks and feels, and their APIs were only superficially similar. Win32, 95's base API, was 32-bit, worked with flat, 32 bit, addressing, and provided access to something resembling a sane file system. "Win16", the pseudonym of the Windows 1/2/3.x APIs, by comparison required programs be written to use segmented memory. Filenames were UPPERCASE and had eight characters, a period, and three more after that. The GUIs were marginally similar in terms of widget layout, indeed a Win16 application was grating when you saw it up against native 32 bit applications.
The real question is: Is Apple prepared to get this operating system out to the mass market, should they consider including Red Box in Leopard? If they don't, then with a 3-5% marketshare, there's a serious risk that programmers will rely upon Red Box to get their critical, we're-the-only-people-who-do-this, applications to OS X users, and not care too much about complaints from Mac OS X users about the ugliness of the GUIs. Native Mac programs will still exist, especially if Apple re-releases an updated version of their OpenStep/WebObjects for Windows development tools, incorporating the software into Xcode. But they'll remain the minority, and the divide between Mac apps and Windows apps will, if anything intensify.
You are not alone. This is not normal. None of this is normal.
I am not an Apple fan, I have never used an Apple computer but I have come to admire Apple for it's business savy. How many times has it been down for the count only to come back better, stronger, and smarter? I've lost count.
I don't know what Apple will do. I do not know any insiders and unlike Cringly, I do not have some sort of mystic ability to look into a crystal ball and predict the future.
What I do know is that Apple is currently operating from a position of financial strength, they are making quality products that have captured the public's imagination and, they have a great deal of real marketing talent on their side. At various times in their history, you could have said that Apple lacked focus but I don't think we can say that today -- I think they have a plan and are following it. I do not know what it is but I suspect that it is the right one for Apple.
Is Boot Camp a sign of something to come? I don't know and neither does anyone outside of the inside circle at Apple. Maybe it is a flag they are waving at Microsoft, telling them "Yea, we can run your O/S too" or maybe they just thought that they had to float it out there before hobbiests did something that Apple would find harder to control? Maybe by showing the public that they can run Windows, they can manipulate Microsoft into giving them a very attractive license agreement?
In the end, Apple will do what they know is the right thing for their product(s) and their plans for the future. That is what has always worked for them before. They know what they are doing. They are bright and savy technobusinessmen (hey, did I just invent a word?).
That would suck. Apple has pretty good interface guidlines. "Preferences" is 3rd option in App menu. It's not Tools->Prefs, View->Options, File->Properties, View->Customize, Edit->Configuration, etc.
DarWINE is fine, but I don't want Windows app and their (un)usability officialy made "native" for OS X.
The big thing about Crossover office is....Office. Apple already has office for OS X. Look at the supported apps page http://www.codeweavers.com/products/cxoffice/suppo rted_apps/ 50 whole apps are supported. Many of them only work partially. You know what? Most of those already have versions for OS X that work 100%. Photoshop. itunes, Quicken, Notes, etc the list goes on. Maybe there is some special win32 only app that would really help if it was ported to OS X, but going by that list I just don't see it.
.005% of Windows apps. In fact they are falling behind. How does that possibly help Apple? It doesn't.
Here is the deal, codeweavers have been working their asses off to get win32 apps to run on linux. Thus far they have barely scratched the surface and can only run like
The only thing Codeweavers brings to the table for Apple is possibly the ability to help devs port apps to OS X X86. My guess is that if most vendors are not making their apps available on OS X it sure as hell isn't due to difficulty in porting but rather has more to do with the limited ROI of making apps for OS X in the firstplace.
If you wanna get rich, you know that payback is a bitch
If Apple were to make it possible to port a WIN32 app to OS/X using winelib or something else, but providing hooks to allow the resulting app to have a native look and feel (if the developer were willing to exploit those hooks), then it could be a win-win.
Apple would get the Windows apps, and Windows devs who would really like to build native OS/X apps would have a way to feasibly do that. Some 'porting' work required, but far short of a total rewrite.
That would be really great.
And if they were to release the resulting technology back to the WINE folks so the same thing could be done to get a 'native' Linux port, well that would be fabulous.
And once the market shares of OS/X and Linux are there, then we can worry about migration paths to truly portable apps (via QT, etc). Or not, if they do a good enough job of making WIN32 'native'.
Posted from my Android phone. Oh, I can change this? There, that's better...
"Speed. Quite simply, a monolithic kernel like the one used in Linux or most of the other Open Source Unix clones is inherently two to three times faster for integer calculations than the Mach microkernel"
Quite simply, Cringley is a tool, who doesn't know the difference between integer calculations and Interprocess Communications. After reading that how can anyone believe the rest of the article?
I don't doubt that he has sources inside Apple who've tried to describe things that Apple are working on for Leopard, but I think that his comprehension of the technology is so low that he can't understand them.
To him it's all just magical. Apple has stolen away some of the oompa-loompas that live inside of Windows and make Office run, covered them with chocolate and sprinkled them over OSX to make a miracle or two.
That's called Darwine (WINE and ReactOS share a codebase).
"[Regarding the 'cloud,'] ownership was what made America different than Russia." -- Woz
If I can run Outlook, Visio, & MS Project, I can switch out of Dell running Windows and into Mac OS X on Apple hardware. These are simply "must have" applications. Everything else is already native or has an accepted alternative.
I'm not a typical Mac user either (got an iBook as a Unixy laptop) but since I started looking at the Mac groups I was surprised at the amount of bitching there was against applications like (for example) Firefox which seemingly don't look right.
A lot of them prefer to use Safari apparently just because it looks better. I still haven't figured what was the big deal with Firefox (other than it taking longer to load).
As a longtime Unix user, having used desktops with a mix of Athena, Motif, Tk, and whatever else was used at the time and now a mix of KDe and Gnome apps, something really has to really look weird for me to notice it. But those Mac users have a piercing eyeseight.
"There's at least 4 pixels missing in the shadow of the third icon of the toolbar, no way this crap is running on my screen !"
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