The sky is falling... [was Re: Is Rev too "Mac focused"?]

[Dan Shafer]

I guess we'll just have to agree to disagree on this one, Frank.
On Aug 7, 2004, at 9:18 PM, Frank Leahy wrote:

> On Aug 7, 2004, at 11:04 PM, use-revolution-request at lists.runrev.com 
> wrote:
>
>> From: Dan Shafer <revdan at danshafer.com>
>> Subject: Re: Is Rev too "Mac focused"?
>> To: How to use Revolution <use-revolution at lists.runrev.com>
>> Message-ID: <2E9DC2B0-E8C9-11D8-B198-000A95AE42E6 at danshafer.com>
>> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII; format=flowed
>>
>> And therein lies the rub.
>>
>> I believe it is literally impossible to create an xplat dev tool that
>> lets the developer call native system APIs. As an OS X guy, I would
>> much rather find xplat ways of accomplishing things that would
>> otherwise cause me to have to learn and deal with an underlying OS.
>>
>
> I'm on a 56K modem and haven't caught up with all of the previous 
> discussion, but I couldn't pass up responding to this one:
>
> 1. It is not only possible, but actually not all that hard, to create 
> hooks to native platform APIs on a cross-platform tool.  Java does it 
> with JNI.  Microsoft did it with their version of JNI  (RNI?) that Sun 
> had such a stink about and sued them over.  RealBasic does it.  What's 
> to stop RunRev doing it?  Once you decide how to pass parameters, the 
> rest is easy.
>
Java's xplat support  is, from all accounts and limited personal 
experience, a nightmare and a joke. Microsoft NEVER produced an xplat 
tool that supported the Mac as far as I know. Although RB lays some 
claim to doing xplat stuff right, from what I gather lurking on their 
message boards and reading developer web pages, it's not all it's 
cracked up to be.

I can't comment on the ease of doing it, just observe that it's been 
tried a lot and never, as far as I know, successfully. My deepest 
experience was with Smalltalk, which certainly didn't do it but came 
closer than anything else I've seen.

> 2. Neither adding hooks for native platform APIs,  nor adding an 
> alternate C-like syntax (as Director did) would cause the sky to fall. 
>  In fact both of these things would both make RunRev vastly more 
> accessible and to, and usable by, the overwhelming majority of 
> developers writing software today.
>
Which begs my point: I do not believe that RR has ANY shot at 
converting professional Windows developers. Period. Doesn't matter what 
they do.

> -- Frank Leahy
>
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