i386 Executable on 10.1 cd

kilowatt

kilowatt

mach-o mach-o man
Boy was I surprised when I found this!!
Mount your OSX update cd (I assume the full install cd would work too from what I hear they are a bit *too* similar...), and cd to this directory:
cd '/volumes/Mac OS X Install CD/System/Installation/Packages/Essentials.pkg/Contents/Resources'
Ok, now type:
file *
this will print a description of every file and directory in the current directory.

Here are the interesting points:
CheckForOSX: Mach-O fat file with 2 architectures
CheckForOSX (for architecture ppc): Mach-O executable ppc
CheckForOSX (for architecture i386): Mach-O executable i386

GestaltTool: Mach-O fat file with 2 architectures
GestaltTool (for architecture ppc): Mach-O executable ppc
GestaltTool (for architecture i386): Mach-O executable i386

NameRegTool: Mach-O fat file with 2 architectures
NameRegTool (for architecture ppc): Mach-O executable ppc
NameRegTool (for architecture i386): Mach-O executable i386

As far as I can tell, these are the only i386 executables on the cd, although I'm not posative because I can't figure out how to recursivly use the 'file' command.

What is interesting to note here, is that, although the cd does not contain an i386 version of Mac OS X, it DOES contain a 'CheckForOSX' executable which will run on an intel computer.

Now, why would they ever need to check for osx on a pc.......

And I don't think its for x86 darwin, because if you had x86 darwin, a mac os x update cd would be worthless, x86 or ppc.

any thoughts?
 
Like I (and others) frequently mentioned whenever somebody started to talk about an OS on Intel thread:

The bloody OS was ported to PPC from Intel!!! OpenStep was running fine on Intel hardware. Even the 'Prelude to Rhapsody' CD developers were given at WWDC at the time contained OpenStep for Intel.

Apple had a complete Rhapsody for PC Compatibles (Developer Release 2 of Mac OS X Server 1.0) running. I still have the CD and the accompanying 2 driver floppy disks.

It's no big secret that Mac OS X could easily be ported to the Intel platform. Only Carbon (and of course Classic) wouldn't be as easy. (Maybe Carbon's done already, though...)

But Apple has no interest to port OS X to that platform right now, because they're basically a hardware business.
 
since the PPC is better than the x86 I seruously doubt that apple will move over to the x86 chipset....unless motorola goies out of business or something :p

I have Open, NeXTSTEP and rhapsody :p (x86)


Admiral
 
Yeah, I seriously doubt that apple would ever release macosx for intel, and I agree, ppc is way better than anything on the intel side.

Still, though, I think this is the first direct evidence that Apple has a port of osx for intel just for s&g's.

I mean, why else would the CheckForOSX binary be ppc and x86?

Also interesting, if you read the preflight and postflight (I think thats where this stuff was) scripts, you'll see that the other two ppc/x86 binaries are used to determine if the dvd player should be removed based on the hardware it detects.

I too hope that apple doesn't release mac os x for intel unless its a last resort (and lets hope that they open-source it too, if they are really headed down). But I sure would like to see a PC run Mac OS X just for fun.

PS: anyone read that article in MaximumPC (or some PC magazine... not sure of the name) about putting an atx board into the G4 tower case? Talk about a sheep in wolf's clothing!!! ;-)
 
Want to see something really interesting in Mac OS X? Open Sherlock and type "i386" and then press "Return" or click on the green magnifying glass. Sherlock found 41 occurrances of "i386", ten of which are folders named "i386" that I did NOT put on my system. The rest are files (HTML, Document, GIFs, and C Header Source Files). I am not a programmer or developer and I did not put these files on my system. Looks like Apple's installer did that. I do remember reading many years ago that after Apple purchased NextStep Inc. (I think that's the company name), it developed Rhapsody on intel first because Next had such a large presence in the intel community (I could be wrong on this one). I just remember reading about Rhapsody and seeing screenshots every so often. Apple may have a Mac OS X for intel deep inside a vault somewhere "just in case Apple would go belly up" as a last resort to save something of the Mac. I think a lot of what we're seeing (i386) is what was left over in a rush to get Mac OS X out the door. There may be some old i386 code left floating around, I don't know, but I look to see it disappear from our HDs as we update Mac OS X in the future. We will probably never know how many or how little people actually worked on OS X. It could have been just a few geniuses working very hard into the early morning hours writing and porting, with Steve Jobs standing behind with a gun to their heads (LOL). People make mistakes and files sometimes don't get removed, even though they are no longer used by the system.

chemistry_geek
 
The rumors I have heard is that Apple is continually keeping a version of X running on Intel, sans Classic. Given Motorola's record, I don't blame them. Since Carbon is a wrapper around the core services, I don't see an issue with it.

Optimizations for OS/Driver level code is written very differently for the two platforms. I believe that is the only technical hiccup. Oh, besides the Wintel architecture being a chaotic mess. We know Apple only likes orderly messes :)
 
OS X on Intel is also a marketing problem. The driver set that was included with Rhapsody DR 2 for PC Compatibles was very ... hmm ... small. :) It's a bit of a chicken & egg situation that leaves Apple without a choice: They can't market & support such a beast right now, because there are so many different configurations of PCs.

Apple would get reviews like 'Nice eye candy, interesting port, hardware compatibility = zero'.
 
One doesnt have to drift far to see that other OSes like Solaris and BeOS have a small driver base for PCs :p

Lets face it the PC market is like a sea, so many things out there, some brand spanking new, some recent, and some are mathusalas begging for someone to shoot them and put them out of their misery...what is an OS developer to do ? make drivers for all of em ? ;)


Admiral
 
I don't think Apple would be sitting on an Intel OSX port to release as a last gasp should they go belly up. I think it's far more likely that they are doing this to:
a) prepare should PPC (esp the Motorola faction) go downhill and not leave Apple able to compete with Intel/AMD
b) keep the pressure on Motorola. If they know Apple could jump ship and get AMD or Intel to make their chips and that Apple already has a plan in place to hit the ground running perhaps it lights a bit of a fire under Motorola's butt.

I think that if Apple goes to AMD they would get them to tweak a current chip so that it is somehow not compatible with current hardware so that Apple could have one machine that they support, and not try to support the millions of various configurations of PCs.

Of course within a week or two someone will have found a way to run OS X on whatever crapola Dell they have, but at least then Apple can just say, "if there's not an Apple on the case we don't support it. Have a nice day."
 
While I doubt Apple would switch to Intel (at least anytime soon since people still rely on Classic), the argument that they can't because of too many pc configurations isn't all that important. from a marketing standpoint, it would be a bear b/c consumers like to be able to upgrade their computer, even if they never do. That would just require a consistent and strong effort to create and keep relationships with peripheral and chip vendors and to code in-house anything they can't get a vendor to do. But, Apple would likely sell OSX/i386 on an Apple built and branded PC, so at least the initial sale would be a fully compatable machine.

I'd be more interested in seeming the yellowbox actually implemented. It'd be much more powerful to run win32 apps on OSX I think than to run OSX on Intel.


Besides, no other Intel-based operating system has ever been able to get a foothold against Windows on the desktop, beyond a fringe or specialist market. I'm discluding Linux b/c it's not a commerical interest and therefore not concerned with profitability and market penetration, but look at OS/2, BeOS, Solaris/Intel, etc
 
Its a big deal for Apple, if there are about 90% of mission critical applications are carbonised, to open the box and...

HEY there is a MacOS X 11.5 for PPC and Intel Platform!!!

Why?
a) the second time for a good OS on NON-APPLE-HARDWARE (like HP Vectra so on)

b) the dedline for expensive Motorola-RISC-PPC, (and the new begin for Sledge Hammer AMD and Athlon Xp for X)

... like NuBus --> PCI
... like PDS --> AGP
... like SCSI --> IDE
... like ADB --> USB

RISC is the better architecture, but is is much expensive, there are no other developer for this processor. And a Athlon is cheep, strong and has much speed for the future... for photoshop too!!! :D
 
your point is good except for one thing: Carbon is a transition technology from Classic to Cocoa. If OSX were on Intel, and Apple software vendors followed Apple's development plan and developed in cocoa, they'd need to offer intel versions of cocoa apps for the intel version of OSX. Remember, classic is to go away eventually, and Carbon is the intermdiary technology to help that happen, not the end-all of Mac programming.

Having to recompile closed-source, commercial apps for the different architectures would amount to OSX being as useless on Intel as WindowsNT was on Alpha. It runs great, sure, and there would even be some apps for it, but would that be enough?

I don't know. But I don't think so.
 
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