README.MACOS

Using OOC under Mac OS
======================

This document describes options for using OOC on Apple Macintosh operating
systems.

OOC works under Darwin, Apple's open-source operating system based on 4.4BSD.
OOC also works under OS X, which is based on Darwin. Earlier versions of Mac OS
are not supported.

OOC requires the GNU C compiler (gcc) which is available as part of the
"Developer Tools" package available from Apple.

Issues:
======

1) Apple's distribution of gcc defaults to ANSI with precompiled headers. OOC
requires GNU extensions. Precompiled headers often go wrong. The
"-no-cpp-precomp" option must be specified to gcc.  This seems to fix both
problems.

2) OOC requires Hans Boehm's conservative garbage collector. Until version 6.2,
there were issues with dynamic loading and thread safety under Darwin. Also,
earlier versions of the GC would only work reliably on specific versions of OS
X. Users should install version 6.2 or later. If using threads, the argument
"-DGC_DARWIN_THREADS" must be specified, both to build the GC and to build any
clients of the GC library.

3) Apple supplies a version of libtool which is incompatible with the standard
GNU libtool. OOC may detect this version, but it will not work. For dynamic
library support, users should install GNU libtool. This is available as part of
the "Fink" project (fink.sf.net). Alternatively, dynamic linking can be
disabled by specifying "--disable-libs" during configuration.

Installation:
============

- Install the developer tools from developer.apple.com. Download is free for
  ADC (Apple Developer Connection) members. Free membership of ADC is
  available. Developer tools are also available on CD.

- Install version 6.2 (or later) of the GC. Specify "-DGC_DARWIN_THREADS" if
  using threads.

- If dynamic library support is required, install glibtool.

- Follow the regular instructions. Common configurations are outlined below.

  For static linking:
    env "CFLAGS=-O2" "CPPFLAGS=-no-cpp-precomp" ./configure --disable-libs

  For dynamic linking:
    env "CFLAGS=-O2" "CPPFLAGS=-no-cpp-precomp" ./configure

  For dynamic linking with threads:
    env "CFLAGS=-O2" "CPPFLAGS=-no-cpp-precomp -DGC_DARWIN_THREADS" \
      ./configure --enable-threads=pthreads

Problems?
========

1) While linking, the compiler complains about undefined GC_pthread_sigmask?
   Make sure that you specify "-DGC_DARWIN_THREADS" in CPPFLAGS when
   configuring OOC.

2) You installed programs or libraries with "Fink", but OOC cannot find them?
   Fink does not install its components in the regular places (eg. /usr/local)
   so the default searches will not work. As documented by Fink, you should
   set the symbols CFLAGS, CXXFLAGS, CPPFLAGS and LDFLAGS to point to your
   Fink installation. Normally, this is done in .cshrc using:
     setenv CFLAGS -I/sw/include
     setenv LDFLAGS -L/sw/lib
     setenv CXXFLAGS $CFLAGS
     setenv CPPFLAGS $CXXFLAGS
     source /sw/bin/init.csh

-- Stewart Greenhill <sgreenhill@users.sf.net>