MacOSX vs Win32

S

stolmax

Registered
Hello. I am new to Mac OSX or to any Mac for that reason, so please be patient. I am trying to determine similarities and differences between installing applications on Windows and MacOSx. I know that when I develop application for Windows, I can use registry to access information from my application or to look up information about some other application already installed on the user computer. I can also setup Start Menu or Desktop shortcut (links) to allow user to start my application without navigating to application's root folder. Is this possible on MacOSX or 9? I know that MacOSX is unix based, therefore, if I need to determine if a specific application was installed, do I need to look in any specific file? Also, is there something similar to Win shortcuts or links in MacOS, if there is, then where can I look up information on how to first locate needed shortcuts and then modify them? Thanks in advance.

Max
 
With regards to information (in the style of the registry) you can store info specific to your app in hidden files buy putting a . infront of the filename like: .myapp.cfg

The data inside the file can be in any format you want to work with. In the user's home directory there's a Library folder that's typically used for extraneous appliaction data. It's useful because you can reference it by "~/Library" and that'll resolve to /Users/USERNAME/Library for having seperate sets of data specfic for each user. If you want to get at info about other applications installed, you sort of have to rely on documentation of those apps and how they store data and files.

As far as shortcuts are concerned, the style of MacOS is to put apps in the /Applications folder. So when a user installs new software, they always know to go to that one location to find their apps. An application bundle is basically a file folder that's self contained (for most basic apps) so if the user were to move that icon around to different places it will always work as expected. Afterwards it's up to the user to decide if they want to keep the app on the dock, or make an alias on the desktop. An "alias" is the same thing as a shortcut in Windows.
 
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