I've been following this thread with interest. May I throw out a
few observations?
1) "No 64-bit Carbon in Leopard" is not the same as "no 64-bit
Carbon ever".
I was wondering if someone else was going to mention that. ;-)
(Of course, Eric hinted we may learn more about this after the
HIToolbox session on Thursday.) As we all know, sometimes you have
to cut features to ship,
Carbon 64-bit support in Tabby (10.6) just isn't going to cut it for
a lot of people. Obviously it would signal the continued support of
Carbon, which many of us would see as a positive, but people who have
been planning 64-bit Carbon products, just waiting for said support
to appear, are unlikely to be willing to sit around twiddling their
thumbs hoping it actually appears in 10.6. In addition to the obvious
timeframe aspect, there's the "fool me once, shame on you; fool me
twice, shame on me" effect in which people may not trust Apple if
they renege this time on their last promise for 64-bit support.
and perhaps somebody decided that Leopard's success depended more
on translucent menu bars than on 64-bit Carbon.
I sure hope not, given that I find the busy look of translucent
interface objects to be distracting. Maybe it was so they could get
the iPhone finished. That's why they said they were postponing the
release of Leopard anyway.
2) "No 64-bit Carbon in Leopard" is not the same as "no Carbon in
Leopard".
True, but it will look like writing on the wall that signals the
eventual end of Carbon as a way to write competitive products. I
think that's the biggest concern for a lot of people.
3) Re Objective-C as a "dead" or "niche" language: OK, how about
Python (or Ruby)? "Too slow"? I bet a 2.4 GHz Core 2 Duo can
execute Python byte code fast enough to run a UI that will keep up
with most human beings -- and Python will call into your C/C++
libraries just as easily as it will call into Objective-C frameworks.
I don't see how this addresses anything.
[...] Still, as Eric points out in the companion thread, let's not
have any illusions about Apple's support for Objective-C.
I don't think that was the point of the post to which he was
responding. I think the OP in that exchange merely meant that Obj-C
is only of use for Mac OS X development. I find it interesting that
in many ways Apple decided to be less proprietary in Mac OS X --
Unix, open source, extensions, less reliance on types and creators,
and so on -- but on the other hand are becoming increasingly
proprietary with respect to the language and framework used to write
software for Mac OS X.
If this is so troubling to you that it makes you think about
leaving the platform -- well, that's your choice, I guess. To me,
it's the platform that's the attraction, not the language (or the
specific toolkit).
The platform may be the attraction, but it's the whole package that
determines whether or not you enjoy developing for the platform.
Developers, being people, are not all the same. The fewer options we
have for Mac OS X development, the fewer people there will be who are
happy with that limited set of options. Just my $0.02, though. I have
no idea what Apple has planned for the future of Carbon or how all of
this will play out.
Larry
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