Quote:
Originally Posted by Diligent
The reason there is no SwordSearcher for Mac is the same as why 99.99% of developers never target Mac. Here some blog entries about my Mac development "adventures": Here and Here . (Some of the numbers mentioned are well out of date, but the points about development are the important ones.)
There is a history behind technical decisions at Apple. Essentially, when Jobs came back to save Apple, he brought with him all his baggage from his failed Next company. Even though Next was a failed enterprise, Jobs wanted to keep their work, so their development framework was used for Mac OS X. Jobs knows nothing about software development and this ensured that anyone who wanted to develop for the Mac in the next two decades would pay the price with mind numbing tedium. Bottom line: Mac development tools are in the dark ages compared to what is available for Windows. People who stick with it can create great applications for the Mac, but there was no way for me to justify my continued development on Mac when 95% of the people interested in my software use Windows and I am just one developer. Besides, the Mac Bible software market has gotten a lot more crowded lately so the ROI is even lower that it could have been a few years ago.
But don't take my word for it. If you google variations of "Mac development sucks, XCode sucks, Interface Builder sucks, etc" you can read to your heart's content. 
Anyway, SwordSearcher on a Mac is an option for people and I have plenty of customers who do it: http://www.swordsearcher-mac.com Sure, it's not native Mac API, but SS Mac users don't seem to mind. |
Well it's growing a bit faster then that, thanks to Vista.
http://www.infoworld.com/article/09/...ears_10_1.html
10% and growing, linux is probably taken some of that with the server and mobile phone market too.
Having beta tested for various linux, I am as anti microsoft, as most folks that use it are unaware that there are alternatives.
This still creates a lot of headaches for developers on both sides. Linux has the 'open' development license which allows anyone in the world who can, develop software. A slower growth rate I would think then M$ who pays a lot of folks to develop. I would think that the MAC development team only needs to tweak what the linux world develops to look and feel osx'ish.
The private developer, like Brandon, has no choice but to work on where he can get the most mileage with his limited resources.
I have NO regrets switching to OSX, a lot of similarities to linux (with beos) as its code base, and I don't have to keep trying the linux flavor of the month with the constant 6 month development release of each brand.
http://distrowatch.com where you have the top 100 linux flavors.
AND, SwordSearcher runs like a champ on my mac.