[Visualpython-users] Mac Carbon implementation

[Bruce S. <Bru...@nc...>]

Several people have privately expressed concern that the native-mode 
Visual 5 implementation on the Mac is based on Carbon rather than Cocoa. 
We developers are concerned, too. The problem is that Apple has begun 
the process of dropping support for Carbon, a decision that has caused a 
lot of anguish among many developers.

Unfortunately, it seems to be extremely difficult (impossible?) to base 
Visual on Cocoa, for highly technical reasons having to do with who is 
the primary thread. Some months ago I posted a question about this to 
the cocoa-dev mailing list. The first response flamed at me for being an 
idiot for wanting to continue to use Carbon. The second response said 
roughly, "No, the poor guy has a serious problem. Years ago we faced a 
similar, daunting problem trying to get Java working in the Mac 
environment."

At the moment we seem to have no option for responding to the strong 
need for a native-mode Mac version but to base it on Carbon. Maybe 
someone deeply knowledgeable in the Mac will step forward eventually 
with a Cocoa solution, which would be great.

There is a somewhat related problem with Visual 5 on the Mac in that it 
is no longer possible to call Tcl functions, even in the Carbon environment.

Bruce Sherwood