Re: [Visualpython-users] vPython for Windows x64?

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

It's good to hear that you've found VPython useful. Thanks for the comments.

Someone else asked about 64-bit support just a few days ago, and I'll
reproduce below my response to the question. Certainly there will be
support for 64-bit systems, but it hasn't been as high a priority as
other matters, since performance is quite good in 32-bit mode on
Windows. Note that VPython is open source, so anyone can try building
for a 64 bit environment should they wish to do so.

Bruce Sherwood

-----------------------------------------
It's true that support for 64-bit machines is relevant, not just on
Windows but also on Mac and Linux. VPython programs run nicely as
32-bit programs on Windows, so it's not an urgent problem. Perhaps
more of an issue is that people have had difficulties trying to build
VPython from source on 64-bit Linux.

But the really big scary menacing problem is the Mac. For important
reasons, VPython uses the Carbon framework on the Mac (for creating a
window and interacting with it). Carbon will not be available on
64-bit Macs, and Cocoa for major threading reasons poses a serious
implementation challenge. Whether Apple goes completely to 64 bits, or
Python becomes available for the Mac only as a 64-bit program, VPython
as a pure Mac program is dead unless someone can figure out how to run
it in the Cocoa environment. An out presumably is to retreat to what
used to be the case, that VPython would run only within the X11 world
on the Mac, not as a native-mode application. That's a problem,
because many Mac users were very uncomfortable with that approach when
we used it in the past.

On Thu, Feb 24, 2011 at 3:02 PM, Dave Lindbergh
<dav...@gm...> wrote:
> vPython is great!
>
> I'm new to Python (coming from MATLAB) and was delighted to see how
> easily I can visualize my simulations.
>
> Is there any chance of a vPython build that works with 64-bit Python
> (I'm on 2.7.1) on Windows?  The current vPython only seems to work in
> x86 (32 bit) mode.
>
> Cheers,
>
> --Dave