Mac OS/X Port data Model

[Mike Swingler]

On Jan 11, 2011, at 12:25 PM, Henri Gomez wrote:

>>> I built it on an iMac with 64bits kernel (x86_64), should I expect
>>> problems if I try to build with a box on 32bits kernel ?
>> 
>> No it should build fine on any machine
> 
> Good.

Actually, there are some components of the JDK build that run during the build and require native architecture (X11 struct offset generation, I believe). That is why we state that building requires an x86_64-capable machine. Building on an i386-only machine can only be expected to produce an i386 binary, but we have not checked that that configuration actually produces a viable build.

>>> Universal apply to x86 architecture, did PPC will be supported also ?
>> 
>> PPC is supported when building universally.  At Apple, we build many things "3-way Fat" meaning i386, x86_64, ppc.  (By the way ppc refers to 32-Bit PPC, ppc64 refers to 64-Bit PPC)
>> So it is possible to build something 3-way fat, however "as of this instant in time" the MacOSX-port is only 2-way fat (i386, x86_64).  Apple no longer supports PPC, so you probably won't see any Apple engineers supporting PPC, however if you want to support PPC, you can do so.  I believe our stance is we won't stop anyone else from supporting PPC, and we will do our best to make it possible for PPC to be supported, but we (Apple engineers) won't do any direct support for PPC.
>> 
>> So today, PPC is not supported by the code, but we won't stand in your way if you want to support it (and it is fully possible to support it).
> 
> I don't have access to PPC machine, so I can't help, but some people
> on openbsd-port list could be interested since they build OpenBSD port
> on OS/X PPC.
> They will probably have some patches/code to provide, they should pass
> by CLA, it there contributions could be kept on this branch.

We don't have any problem with developers who want to support pre-10.6 systems and/or PPC, however we will be using many 10.6-and-higher APIs and features like NSOpenGLLayer and Blocks (C-based closures). If PPC enthusiasts would like to provide alternate implementations (like using PLBlocks <http://code.google.com/p/plblocks/>), we'd be happy to accept their contributions.

Regards,
Mike Swingler
Java Engineering
Apple Inc.