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Mac-Carbon-0.50
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/ README

NAME

README - Carbon API for perl on Mac OS X

SYNOPSIS

Mac::Carbon is a collection of perl modules for accessing the Carbon API under Mac OS X. It is a port of the Toolbox modules written by Matthias Neeracher for MacPerl.

This is not release-quality software. It is still in development.

Part of the current strategy is to make Mac::Carbon the intersection of the old and new Mac OS APIs. We will not be adding new functionality from Carbon, except as needed, for now. This may change over time as Mac::Carbon stabilizes.

See the documentation in Mac::Carbon for more implementation details, bugs, etc.

DESCRIPTION

This version represents a major step forward for Mac::Carbon, with many of the TODO items checked off, including:

  • Mac::InternetConfig added

  • GUSI-emulation API able to handle FSSpecs for files that don't exist

  • Find apps with LaunchServices by creator, bundle ID, or name, instead of FSpDTGetAPPL

  • Open resource files in data fork, not just resource fork

  • Support for Mac::AppleEvents::Simple and Mac::Glue

There are also many bugfixes and other enhancements included. See Changes for details.

There are still some bugs, one unimplemented extension (SpeechRecognition), and a bunch of tests that need to be written before the distribution becomes "release-quality." Help wanted.

HELP ME

There are probably a lot of bugs, especially in Carbon.h. Bugs are listed in "Known Bugs" in Mac::Carbon; please feel free to report more. Patches are welcome, too, of course. For large patches, such as stuff for test suites and building, please do coordinate with me before spending much time on it.

http://projects.pudge.net/

REQUIREMENTS

Mac OS

These modules all build under Mac OS, but it is recommended you build them as a part of MacPerl itself, or at least under the MacPerl source (version 5.6.1 or greater). See http://dev.macperl.org/ for more information.

Under Mac OS, extra non-Carbon-compatible routines are available.

Mac OS X

To build these modules on Mac OS X, the Developer Tools are required.

The Test::More module is required for running tests.

The separate Mac::Errors module is not required, but is highly recommended.

Building these modules has been tested successfully on Mac OS X 10.1 and 10.2, with perl 5.6.0/5.6.1/5.8.0, with both gcc2 and gcc3. Some tests fail on UFS ([GS]etFileInfo in MacPerl.t). There are a lot of warnings on 10.1, though the tests should all pass.

Don't run the test suite on a remote computer (such as via ssh, instead of via the Terminal). It requires user feedback in some cases, and in general it is best to be there when you run the tests. Maybe in the future this can be addressed (patches welcome).

BUILDING

Matthias added some extensions to XS for his Toolbox modules; they were never fully embraced by p5p, and as a result, we have a separate xsubpp for these additional XS macros. The Makefile.PLs will choose and use the appropriate xsubpp version for your version of perl.

You might want to run the test suite with make test TEST_VERBOSE=1. It's cool.

SUPPORTED MODULES

Currently, only a subset of the modules are supported. The ported modules are:

Mac::AppleEvents
Mac::Components
Mac::Files
Mac::Gestalt
Mac::InternetConfig
Mac::Memory
Mac::MoreFiles
Mac::Notification
Mac::OSA
Mac::Processes
Mac::Resources
Mac::Sound
Mac::Speech
Mac::Types
MacPerl

Distributed separately on the CPAN and SourceForge.net (either now or soon):

Mac::AppleEvents::Simple
Mac::OSA::Simple
Mac::Glue

And, coming soon, possibly:

Mac::SpeechRecognition

There are currently no plans for the other (GUI) modules, including:

Mac::Controls
Mac::Dialogs
Mac::Events
Mac::Fonts
Mac::Lists
Mac::Menus
Mac::Movies
Mac::Navigation
Mac::QDOffScreen
Mac::QuickDraw
Mac::QuickTimeVR
Mac::TextEdit
Mac::Windows

We could do these eventually, if there is enough interest. They don't port as easily as some of the others, for many reasons, not the least of which is that we need a framework to handle events etc., which for MacPerl is mostly implemented in macish.c / macish.h.

AUTHOR

The Mac Toolbox modules were written by Matthias Neeracher <neeracher@mac.com>. They are currently maintained by Chris Nandor <pudge@pobox.com>.

VERSION

$Id: README,v 1.8 2003/04/07 01:29:17 pudge Exp $