# Writing a Windows App on a Mac



## Inline_guy (Aug 11, 2003)

ey guys.

Question for you.  I am entering into a program here in Philly for computer science.  I am currently employed at a non for profit.  While I am in school I will be working on some apps for them.  I am of course a mac user, and they use only PCs with Windows 95, 98, and 2000.

The apps I am going to work on are as follows.  I want to write an app that lets the reception staff type in names of people and see what their extension are.  Also I would like it to say whether the person is in or out (and then the people would have control of their status).  I would like this app to include a quick search (search as you type), and some other things. 

The other app will be basically an appointment app.

So my question.
Since I will be writing these on a mac, for a windows computer could I just write it in Java on my mac, and compile it on a windows computer?  This might be dumb, and not making any sense.


I guess I am trying to see if I can write an app from my mac for windows?

Matthew


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## Lycander (Aug 11, 2003)

Java is probably your best bet. In Project Builder start your Java app template and it'll be compiled into a .jar file (Java archive). In both Windows and MacOS, double clicking a jar file is the same as

java -jar MyApp.jar

and your app will run. You can compile it on your Mac and just distribute the jar file unchanged to the Windows clients, but the runtime JVM must be the same version to be safe.


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## Arden (Aug 11, 2003)

I haven't looked into programming for Windows with the Dev. Tools, but you can always plunk down $500-600 for Codewarrior.  If you can't afford CW, Java sounds like your best bet, unless you know how to write platform-independent code really well.

If you can, you should wait for Panther so you can use Xcode and cut down on the amount of time you have to spend doing anything but programming and debugging.


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## wiz (Aug 12, 2003)

are u a c/c++ programmer? if so then why not try wxWindows


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## Captain Code (Aug 12, 2003)

You could use RealBasic.  It will compile your prog for Windows and Mac at the same time but produce 2 different executables.

It's not free though, but it's not as much as CodeWarrior.


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## dlloyd (Aug 12, 2003)

Or something called Revolution. I don't remember the site address, sorry. I think it itself was done in java, I didn't like the dev environment, but I did look at it for a while.


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## Arden (Aug 14, 2003)

If you want to write something other than Basic, though, REALBasic is out of the question.

Perhaps Python?


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## dsimpson (Sep 4, 2003)

Somebody else posted a note about Revolution - it is worth a look. The URL is: www.runrev.com   I have written several applications in Revolution and I usually compile my apps for multiple operating systems. Applications work and look almost identically on each OS. Here is an example of a recent app which I have compiled for MacOS X, Windows and Linux:  http://www.cgiscripter.net/downloads/demo_software/index.html#cgiscripter_demo       On Windows and Linux systems you end up getting an application which is a single file executable, on MacOS X you get a MacOS X cocoa application (which looks like a folder ending in the name .app if you look at it in the terminal app).


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## BitWit (Sep 4, 2003)

Holee cow, Revolution looks cool! Im glad I checked this thread out.

My advice was going to be Python.


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