[wplug] Linux on Mac questions
Steven Leach
stevenaleach at mac.com
Tue Feb 24 19:03:49 EST 2004
On Feb 24, 2004, at 6:16 PM, Robert E. Coutch wrote:
> Your response is very intriguing.
> Obviously I can't expect a program written for X to work on the Mac
> (without
Sure you could, just download the source and compile. (Although your
chances are getting better and better of being able to just download a
precompiled binary).
I haven't played with it any, but Fink is an dpkg / apt-get like system
to resolve dependencies and install software from a master archive.
> the X stuff you mentioned) but can I grab a tarball for something like
> nmap
> and build it on OS-X ?
Most likely yes.
While I haven't reinstalled X since I upgraded to Panther, I had
installed XDarwin and had no problem downloading freeciv and compiling
it. I had to play with options a little, but I can't actually remember
what had to be done anymore. Most non X applications should be as
simple as unpacking and compiling.
>
> Also, is there a website of opensource stuff for OS-X or at least some
> free
> software sites?
>
Oh yea, a ton.
http://mrcla.com/XonX/ is a good guide for getting X Windows up and
running. Probably a better option than Apple's pre-built package.
http://fink.sourceforge.net/ Fink Project.
http://osx.hyperjeff.net/Links.html Huge collection of OS X links.
http://www.osxgnu.org/ GNU Mac OS X Public Archive.
http://www.webweavertech.com/ovidiu/emacs.html Emacs for OS X.
Everything important (to me) is already installed: default shell is
bash, vim is already there, gcc is already there (Might not be
installed unless you install the included developer tools cd.... I've
never not installed this cd so I don't know) ssh(d) is already there as
well as ftp(d) and telnet. OS X is a lot like Linux on steroids with
access to mainstream commercial applications (including MS Word and
Internet Explorer.... though I'm not sure if that's a good thing or
not) thrown in as a bonus.
If you don't want all the extra luggage of aqua and the pretty Apple
Apps, then Darwin would be a bette choice than Linux. It is the open
source BSD/NextStep core of OS X. It's free and open source, and you
should have no worries about hardware issues since the G3+ Mac is
Darwin's native platform. Hardware support should be much better than
Linux on x86 hardware since there simply isn't the great variety of
hardware to deal with.
>
> Thanks for the info,
>
> Bob
>
>
>
> On Tuesday 24 February 2004 01:58 pm, Steven Leach wrote:
>> In regards to questions 2 and 3:
>>
>> Depending on your purpose, you might find (as I did) that OS X makes
>> installing Linux unnecessary or even counter productive. I bought an
>> eMac when they were first released to the general public with the
>> intention of installing Yellow Dog. After playing with OS X for a
>> while, I never bothered installing Linux. OS X is a complete Unix
>> system, not just a Mac OS on top of some hidden BSD core. Every tool
>> that you would expect to find under Linux or *BSD is provided. You
>> can
>> even run X on top of the aqua desktop (or presumably instead of the
>> aqua desktop).
>>
>> I now have two x86 systems running Debian and two Macs (an eMac and an
>> iBook) running OS X.
>>
>> On Feb 24, 2004, at 11:12 AM, Robert E. Coutch wrote:
>>> Just a couple of quick questions about running Linux on the Mac.
>>>
>>> 1 - Is anyone doing this?
>>>
>>> 2 - If so, how does it compare to the PC in terms of hardware
>>> support,
>>> updates
>>> and such?
>>>
>>> 3 - Some distro's offer install iso's. Do these allow for leaving
>>> OS-X in
>>> place and adding Linux or do they attempt to overwrite Mac OS.
>>>
>>> 4 - Are hard disks partitioned on the Mac similar to the PC?
>>>
>>> 5 - Have you tried Mac on Linux and if so, how well does it work?
>>>
>>> Just toying with the thought of getting a Mac but not sure.
>>>
>>>
>>> Thanks for any info,
>>>
>>> Bob
>>> _______________________________________________
>>> wplug mailing list
>>> wplug at wplug.org
>>> http://www.wplug.org/mailman/listinfo/wplug
>>
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