5 ms·

And while they're busy breaking their current set of APIs, they're dragging their feet on adding anything designed in the last 15 years. Someone just wrote to m

And while they're busy breaking their current set of APIs, they're dragging their feet on adding anything designed in the last 15 years. Someone just wrote to me with a complaint because my software doesn't build on macOS due to missing getline and fmemopen implementations. Naturally I told them to use an open source operating system and declined to update my code to accomodate Apple.

my123 6y ago
getline and fmemopen are both supported on macOS. [/Library/Developer/CommandLineTools/SDKs/MacOSX11.1.sdk/usr/include] -> % grep -r -n getline stdio.h stdio.h:355:ssize_t getline(char \* __restrict __linep, size_t \* __restrict __linecapp, FILE \* __restrict [/Library/Developer/CommandLineTools/SDKs/MacOSX11.1.sdk/usr/include] -> % grep -r -n fmemopen \* stdio.h:356:FILE *fmemopen(void * __restrict __buf, size_t __size, const char \* __restrict __mode) __API_AVAILABLE(macos(10.13), ios(11.0), tvos(11.0), watchos(4.0)); getline became available on OS X 10.7 (in 2011) and fmemopen on macOS 10.13 (2017).
- ddevault 6y ago
  They were on OSX Lepoard, maybe that's not the most recent one? I don't use Mac. When were they introduced? In any case, it's a trend with Apple, even if this particular example is wrong. See also: Vulkan.
  - bombcar 6y ago
    Leopard is the final version of macOS to support the PowerPC architecture - and released in 2007. Honestly, I wouldn't expect even Linux or BSD from 2007 to work well with modern software.
    - IggleSniggle 6y ago
      This is where I really need to pay respects to Windows. It’s a heaping pile but their commitment to backwards compatibility is remarkable. I recently installed a complex application that last updated in 2007, and while performance was absolutely terrible, it worked.
      - bombcar 6y ago
        Microsoft’s dedication to backwards compatibility is insane - going so far as to ship with thousands of shims to imitate buggy code and hardware. Virtualization is killing the need to do that, sadly.
  - my123 6y ago
    OS X Leopard is very old in Apple terms, released in 2007 and being the last release to support PowerPC processors. (that even pre-dated the functions that you say above being standardised, they were just GNU extensions before) For Vulkan, MoltenVK works very well and is officially supported by Khronos directly. (Metal is a much more approachable API than Vulkan, but oh well...)
    - ddevault 6y ago
      Okay, 2007 is pretty old, I can't fault them for not supporting these functions. However, this is a noticable trend with macOS. Their pace with modern Unix is severely behind, and I often get bug reports from macOS users lacking some API that's been available on open source Unicies for 5+ years. Plus, even if Linux in 2007 didn't support what you need, it's open source so backporting the required functionality is feasible, and impossible on macOS. MoltenVK is a good workaround, but open standards > workarounds.
      - jimsmart 6y ago
        Technically: Linux is not in fact Unix (it is Unix-like), whereas macOS is certified Unix. The certification is current: I think that's pretty modern. https://www.opengroup.org/openbrand/register/ https://www.opengroup.org/openbrand/register/

my123 6y ago

getline and fmemopen are both supported on macOS. [/Library/Developer/CommandLineTools/SDKs/MacOSX11.1.sdk/usr/include] -> % grep -r -n getline stdio.h stdio.h:355:ssize_t getline(char \* __restrict __linep, size_t \* __restrict __linecapp, FILE \* __restrict [/Library/Developer/CommandLineTools/SDKs/MacOSX11.1.sdk/usr/include] -> % grep -r -n fmemopen \* stdio.h:356:FILE *fmemopen(void * __restrict __buf, size_t __size, const char \* __restrict __mode) __API_AVAILABLE(macos(10.13), ios(11.0), tvos(11.0), watchos(4.0)); getline became available on OS X 10.7 (in 2011) and fmemopen on macOS 10.13 (2017).

ddevault 6y ago
They were on OSX Lepoard, maybe that's not the most recent one? I don't use Mac. When were they introduced? In any case, it's a trend with Apple, even if this particular example is wrong. See also: Vulkan.
- bombcar 6y ago
  Leopard is the final version of macOS to support the PowerPC architecture - and released in 2007. Honestly, I wouldn't expect even Linux or BSD from 2007 to work well with modern software.
  - IggleSniggle 6y ago
    This is where I really need to pay respects to Windows. It’s a heaping pile but their commitment to backwards compatibility is remarkable. I recently installed a complex application that last updated in 2007, and while performance was absolutely terrible, it worked.
    - bombcar 6y ago
      Microsoft’s dedication to backwards compatibility is insane - going so far as to ship with thousands of shims to imitate buggy code and hardware. Virtualization is killing the need to do that, sadly.
- my123 6y ago
  OS X Leopard is very old in Apple terms, released in 2007 and being the last release to support PowerPC processors. (that even pre-dated the functions that you say above being standardised, they were just GNU extensions before) For Vulkan, MoltenVK works very well and is officially supported by Khronos directly. (Metal is a much more approachable API than Vulkan, but oh well...)
  - ddevault 6y ago
    Okay, 2007 is pretty old, I can't fault them for not supporting these functions. However, this is a noticable trend with macOS. Their pace with modern Unix is severely behind, and I often get bug reports from macOS users lacking some API that's been available on open source Unicies for 5+ years. Plus, even if Linux in 2007 didn't support what you need, it's open source so backporting the required functionality is feasible, and impossible on macOS. MoltenVK is a good workaround, but open standards > workarounds.
    - jimsmart 6y ago
      Technically: Linux is not in fact Unix (it is Unix-like), whereas macOS is certified Unix. The certification is current: I think that's pretty modern. https://www.opengroup.org/openbrand/register/ https://www.opengroup.org/openbrand/register/