windows and portability?

[Mitchell Lerner]

Dear Bob:

I seem to be drawn to the speculation that some sort of standard for the 
interface between applications code and the O.S specific window support 
would make these programs alot more portable.  It would be wonderful!!!


I've recently started learning about programming the Mac (I have been
programming Suns).  I was kinda shocked to learn about the Mac's software
interface.  It is incredebly machine dependent and very cumbersome.

It would be quite a large job to build a layer on top of the Window Manager
and Quick Draw that would be as high level as Sun's Sunwindows.  I'm not
very sure that if  one was built, that once it was linked, that all of the code
would fit into the aprox. 500k (<-- generous) of primary store. Of course
there is alot of stuff one has to do in the Mac environment that one doesnt
need to worry about in the Sun environment but I think that alot of that
could be hidden in the apriori support software.  In comparison, the Mac's
window support looks like a "quick and dirty" compared to the Sun's. And
they are paying for this "quicky" because it is so "dirty" to use that
It take a while to get somthing done under it; let alone to "get up to speed"
on it.

If a standard were to be developed then I think: like standards for 
the C library routines, the standard for window support will be very 
heavily influenced by the first widley accepted and used model.  The
C library interface of Berkley's is widley accepted and I think that
Sun's Sunwindows will become the defacto standard.  It is very clear
and well designed. Is this what you mean by "people should make programming
easyer" Bob?

I dont mean to lambaste the Mac.  It is a very neat machine and I know that
It is really not fair to compair it to a Sun, but I think that It could be
a lot more than it is, and in order for that to happen,
support (like that on the Sun) needs to be developed for it. 

Portability of applications would only increase the Market of their machine.