Mac OS Support

SciTECO is currently cross-compiled for Mac OS X on the fmsbw.de server as part of the nightly builds. A nightly build can be downloaded here. They should work at least on Mac OS 10.13 on x86_64.

Installation

Mac OS packages are currently not signed, so it may not be easy to install them. It has been reported to work via the command line as follows:

sudo tar xzf sciteco-curses_nightly_macos_x86_64.tar.gz -C /

SciTECO will be installed into /usr/local and should behave like on any other UNIX system. It can also be installed into any other directory and added to PATH since SciTECO builds are relocatable.

The Mac OS port is still poorly tested. If SciTECO is working normally or if you have experience running these binaries on other versions of Mac OS, please let everybody know about on the dings@fmsbw.de mailing list.

Compiling on Mac OS

You should also be able to build SciTECO from source like on any other UNIX-like system.

• Download and install Homebrew. Other package managers like pkgsrc are also known to work.
• Download and install XCode. It may also be possible to satisfy all build dependencies using Homebrew.

Install a few more dependencies using Homebrew:

brew install autoconf automake libtool glib pkg-config

Clone and install SciTECO as usual from Git:

git clone --recursive https://github.com/rhaberkorn/sciteco.git
cd sciteco/
autoreconf -i
./configure
make
make check
sudo make install

Success was reported in building Gtk+ versions as well (use --with-interface=gtk) but I cannot test this currently.

Problems

• I do not own newer Mac hardware. It is expensive and not repairable.
• Renting a Mac server in the cloud is expensive.
• Apple forbids installing their system in virtual machines hosted on other computers. Furthermore, even acquiring installation media is hard.
• Apple does not provide any usable Open Source distribution. The existing projects are hopelessly outdated and do not allow hosting a development environment.
• I am therefore testing (very seldom!) using the Wine-like compatibility-layer “Darling”. It can barely host a development environment and naturally behaves different than real Mac OS installations.
• The nightly builds are currently cross-compiled and the test suite is not run every day under Mac OS.
• I am currently unable to test and package Gtk+ builds, mainly due to “Darling” limitations.
• I cannot create properly signed and notarized packages as that requires a paid Apple Developer ID.

If you are stuck on Mac OS, I recommend to switch to a developer-friendly free and open source operating system and buy hardware which is not designed to be thrown away after a few years.

If you want to support the SciTECO project and improve its Mac OS support, consider donating hardware or access to a Mac OS cloud. You could become a maintainer of the Mac OS port and be responsible for building and notarizing packages.

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