Re: [platform-swt-dev] Re: Mac port: Status Update

[Maurice Parker <maurice@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Hey,

On 12/7/01 4:56 PM, "Stu Charlton" <stuartc@xxxxxxx> wrote:

> Why not try a JNI -> Cocoa/ObjC bridge?  There shouldn't really be any
> technical problems that I can think of, if the library maintains that
> one-to-one.   Certainly it means doing what is effectively a new Java
> bridge, but we'd have to do that with Carbon anyway.   And it's different
> than the traditional OS.java procedural API approach, but that may not be a
> bad thing.

I think that the real trick is getting JNI to talk to Obj-C.

http://developer.apple.com/techpubs/macosx/Cocoa/ProgrammingTopics/JavaBridg
e/JavaBridge.html

Another project that has given it a try for GNUstep:
http://www.gnustep.it/jigs/index.html

My opinion is that if it comes down to this we would be better off using the
C API's like the other ports are doing.
 
> 
> I just think (and I think you'll agree) that Cocoa would be more exciting
> to work with when porting *all* those widgets. :-)

I've spent a couple of days looking at JNI alone or JDirect3 to get to the
Carbon API's and it doesn't look like any fun at all.  The more I look at
the Cocoa API's the more I realize that they really are all that they've
been bragged up to be.  Unfortunately, they don't do us any good if we can't
get to them.

I wrote some test applications today and ran 100,000 Notifications through
the Notification Center without any problems.  This was Java -> Java and not
Obj-C -> Java so it wasn't exactly the same, but even that test runs through
the Obj-C Notification Center.

Once Apple gets it's Bugtracker back on line (people are having trouble
signing in), then I'll report the Notification Center problem as a bug.
Hopefully that will get a response from Apple.

-Maurice