Re: [Bug-gnubg] gnubg on mac os x

[Jim Segrave]

On Fri 24 Jan 2003 (18:00 +0100), Olivier Baur wrote:
> Hello.
> 
> I'm wondering if porting gnubg to Mac OS X is currently planned or in 
> progress ?
> 
> If not, I'm willing to do this.

I hope my comments below don't sound too negative, consider it as a
devil's advocate sort of reply.
 
> I've already been able to build it (from yesterday's CVS snapshot) and 
> run it in an X windowing system (works either with "XDarwin" or Apple's 
> newly released "X11" X servers). Maybe I could consider release a "full 
> binary download" (pre-built) version for Mac OS X users?
> 
> I'm also willing to :
> - throw in multiprocessor support [as soon as I can put my hands on a 
> bi-proc G4 :-) ]

I've got a bad feeling that there won't be much of a gain there - it's
not a threaded application.

> - port it to a full Aqua version (ie, use Apple's GUI instead of 
> X+GTK/Guile's)

The trouble with that is that you'd have to keep updating the porting
as features are added/changed. Unless there's some simple automation
possible or you provide a GTK->Aqua API

> - add vector-computing for use with G4 processors' built-in superscalar 
> unit (known as "Velocity Engine" or "AltiVec") -- I have noticed that 
> during rollouts/evaluations, the CPU would spend 70% of its time 
> evaluating the neural net, which can be basically thought as a matrix 
> product between the different layers, which in turn is a perfect 
> candidate algorithm for vectorization and dramatic performance 
> improvement

Interesting idea - I wonder how much that might help for those who
have vector hardware.

> Please keep me informed if any of these projects are already being 
> worked on, so I don't start working on something that's on the verge of 
> being completed.

Certainly within a GTK environment, any feedback on porting problems
would be very useful, as the desire is to keep the code as platform
independant (or adaptable) as possible.

-- 
Jim Segrave           address@hidden