After the successful porting of all my Zoo Design Platform programs from Solaris Unix to Ubuntu Linux I am ready for a new challenge; porting some of my programs from Linux to Mac OS X. Mac OS X is my favorite OS and having my programs running in Mac OS X would be a great thing. Before we can run a Linux or Unix program in Mac OS X we have to make sure we have the X11 software installed.
X11 for Mac OS X
X11 for Mac OS X offers a complete X Window System implementation for running X11-based applications on Mac OS X. The X11 program is part of the normal Mac OS X 10.5 installation and can be found in the /Application/Utilities directory. After starting the X11 program we can start the terminal program xterm from the Program menu.
From the xterm window it is now possible to run almost any X11 compliant program compiled for Max OS X.
Xcode development environment
To compile and link programs we have to install the Xcode development environment. The Xcode package includes the GNU Compiler Collection (GCC) and other useful tools. You can download the Xcode package from Apple's developer web site. You must be an Apple Developer Connection member to download Xcode. Online membership is free. If you have another account at Apple, enter your existing username (Apple ID) and password in the ADC Member Log In area and complete your membership registration. Or sign up today for your ADC online membership. The latest version of Xcode is 3.1.3 and it requires Mac OS X 10.5 The package is almost 1GB so you better look for a high-speed connection. The package will be installed in the Developer folder in Macintosh HD.
Get the source code
I will start by copying the Cobra source code to my MacBook.
System header files declare the interfaces to parts of the operating system. You include them in your program to supply the definitions and declarations you need to invoke system calls and libraries.
Your own header files contain declarations for interfaces between the source files of your program. Each time you have a group of related declarations and macro definitions all or most of which are needed in several different source files, it is a good idea to create a header file for them.
The header files for the xview, olgx and slingshot library functions must be included in the compilation. The xview header files can be downloaded from Physionet. The slingshot header files can be downloaded from this site. This screen plot shows the /usr/openwin directory which is the default installation directory for the header files used in the SUN OS. This is where I put the header fils.
Makefile I use a makefile (Make_macosx) to compile and build the program. The following command is used to run the makefile: make -f Make_macosx
Shared libraries Cobra makes use of some shared libraries that are not part of the normal X11 installation. These libraries have to be compiled for Mac OS X. These libraries will be linked to the Cobra program when it is starting. The libraries can be downloaded from here.They are included in the file cobra_9.9macosx.tar.gz.
I add the following command in the startup script to tell the program where to find the shared libraries:export DYLD_LIBRARY_PATH=$INSTALL_DIR/libraries
Running Cobra
I compiled and linked the Cobra program and here it runs on my MacBook. I am happy as a child.
Download Cobra
You can download and try the Cobra program yourself. Here is the download site.
Running X11 applications in Mac OS X You can read more about configuring and running X11 applications in Mac OS X here.xterm provides a significant advantage: when you start an xterm session, it sets up the X11 environment for you. You can then easily run X11 applications from the command-line. By contrast, in Terminal you need to run the /usr/bin/open-x11 script to set up the X11 environment and launch X11 applications, as shown here: /usr/bin/open-x11 ./cobra &
Launching Aqua apps from the Terminal window
One way to launch Aqua applications from the Terminal or xterm windows is the open command. To start Firefox use the following command: open /Applications/firefox.app or open -a /Application/firefox.app http://www.google.com
The Fink project
The Fink project wants to bring the full world of Unix Open Source software to Darwin and Mac OS X. We modify Unix software so that it compiles and runs on Mac OS X ("port" it) and make it available for download as a coherent distribution. Fink uses Debian tools like dpkg and apt-get to provide powerful binary package management. You can choose whether you want to download precompiled binary packages or build everything from source. Here is a good description of how to run X11 on Darwin and Mac OS X.
Sejo December 5, 2007 02:49 AM PST Hello, Sven!
I have read your page on compiling x11 compliant software on mac os x with great interest.
The problem I am having is following:
I would love to run línux version of Xilinx Web pack (vhdl deslgn) for one of our courses at Chalmers on my Ibook G4.
Is it possible at all to run linux version of this software on mac (ppc based) under x11?
You can mail me on this to: sejsel@gmail.com
