[Openmcl-devel] OpenMCL Versions

[Raffael Cavallaro]

On Aug 14, 2006, at 2:03 PM, Hamilton Link wrote:

> Phil makes a good point and I'd normally be inclined to agree, but  
> I am
> guessing that the openmcl user base will be moving to Core 2 faster  
> than
> an intel 32-bit port will happen, particularly since everyone already
> knows that 64-bit will be supported and at least for the moment 32-bit
> isn't.


Right, but this assumes openmcl programmers never distribute apps. If  
you do, then you have to consider that every intel mac shipped until  
last week, and millions which will continue to ship until the iMac,  
MacBook and MacBook Pro lines are updated, is 32, not 64 bit. That's  
a fair number of machines to say "well you just can't run this unless  
you buy a new machine."  It would be one thing if these were ancient  
G3s, but these 32 bit intel machines are more recent than the 32bit  
ppc machines which openmcl does run on.

Also consider that Apple have stated that 32 bit intel apps will run  
unchanged under 10.5. It seems like supporting 32 bit intel is  
unavoidable unless you never distribute your software to other mac  
users.

Raffael Cavallaro, Ph.D.
raffaelcavallaro at mac.com