windows ad portability? (longish)

[Tim Smith]

In article <600 at brl-tgr.ARPA> lerner at isi-vaxa.arpa (Mitchell Lerner) writes:

> When I first learned that I was to be programming a Mac I sought
> out documentattion, first to find and incredibly 68k based book
> called Inside the Mac.

The book is called _Inside Macintosh_.  The only parts that are "incredibly
68k based" are the parts for the assembly language programmer.  I would
expect those to be 68k based, since that is what is in the Mac!

> I was warned that many examples are wrong and that the book is very
> confusing If you are not a 68k wizard (and even if you are!).

The descriptions of Quickdraw, the window manager, the menu manager,
and the event manager were quite clear, as was Text Edit.  The section
on controls was fairly clear also.  This covers nearly everything you
need to write an application if you are using a reasonable development
system.  What did you find unclear?

> The book is not a book about programming the Mac (examples and
> top down approach to complexity) as much as it is about Mac
> system internals.  I do not have time to learn the internals just
> to write an application!

Right.  It's a description of the Macintosh operating system, written
for experienced programmers.  It shouldn't try to teach programming any
more than, say, the VAX architecture handbook should try to teach
programming, or the ANSI C standard should try to teach C.

You don't have to read all of _Inside Macintosh_ to write an application.
Most programmers will only have to deal with a few chapters ( Quickdraw,
the window, menu, event, resource, and control managers, and maybe the file
manager.  If you are writting in C, you can use stdio for your file stuff,
so forget the file manager. )

Did you read all of the UNIX documentation before you started writting
UNIX programs?

>A little repreave came when someone pointed me toward two books: Macintosh
>Revealed vols. 1 & 2.
>
>This book is well written and geared toward writing software on the Mac.
>It includes many helpfull examples and all of the system calls In both
>68k and some sort of Pascal.  However, and this is and has been my
>main point about programming on the Mac; one MUST COMPLETELY digest
>vol1 and strenuously identify with vol2 BEFORE one can start succesfully
>programming the Mac for ANY application.
>

All one has to do is skim IM ( _Inside Macintosh_ ) to get an idea of
where things are.  You then simply read in detail the parts needed for
your application.  For example, when I got my C compiler ( Megamax ), I
read the chapters on Quickdraw and the window manager.  That is sufficient
for putting up windows and doing output.  A short time with the event
manager, and windows could then be dragged around, resized, and brought
to the front.  Then I read and implemented menus.  Next was text edit.
Then desk accessories.  Then controls.  Sure, if you sit down and say,
"This is my first Mac program.  I am going to do _everything_", you will
probably have to read everything in IM, but if you instead say, "This
is my first Mac program, so I will add on feature at a time till I
support the full user interface", you will find that you can get started
quickly, and you will not have to read a lot.

--
Tim Smith       sdcrdcf!ism780c!tim || ima!ism780!tim || ihnp4!cithep!tim