Info about App Bundles on Mac

[Jeremy Lavergne]

Attached are some emails from various discussions about application bundles. 
These may be relevant, especially the ones from ryandesign and jeremyhu, as 
they discuss what is needed to properly handle calls to the application for 
opening files.

Much like the -psn flag I pointed out previously, several things are passed to 
the application so it can hook in and listen for these sorts of requests 
(quitting, opening files, is it done launching, etc).

> --- Begin Message ---
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> Subject: 
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> Re: Packages ignoring applications_dir
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> Date: 
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> Thu, 08 Sep 2011 23:35:38 -0500
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> On Sep 8, 2011, at 21:56, Scott Webster wrote:
>
> > On Thu, Sep 8, 2011 at 7:06 PM, Bryan Blackburn wrote:
> >> On Thu, Sep 08, 2011 at 06:52:22PM -0700, Scott Webster said:
> >>> It forces a build from source if you use a non-standard prefix?  Wouldn't it
> >>> be straightforward to just replicate the same files into an alternate
> >>> location?  The situation here seems slightly more complex since we're
> >>> outside the $prefix/ tree...
> >> 
> >> Yup, if your prefix is not /opt/local, port always builds from source.
> >> Libraries and executables both have hardcoded paths in them (you can use
> >> 'otool -L /some/lib/or/executable' to see) so building to one location then
> >> moving will definitely break things.
> >> 
> >> There are also some ports with things like ${prefix}/etc and other paths
> >> compiled into binaries, config files with paths, and so on.  All of that
> >> means relocating would be a mess at best...
> >> 
> > 
> > Thanks for the explanation!  I guess now to complete my education I
> > should go look up how Mac OS X deals with moving application bundles
> > around...
>
> Application bundles are painstakingly crafted by their developers so that 
> relocation is possible. They are a completely different animal from the kind of 
> command-line software most MacPorts ports provide.
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> macports-users mailing list
> address@hidden
> http://lists.macosforge.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/macports-users
>
> --- End Message ---
> --- Begin Message ---
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>
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> Subject: 
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> Re: advice on application bundles running unix binaries
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> Date: 
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> Fri, 19 Aug 2011 22:11:57 -0700
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>
>
>
> You need to register with the dock.  The easiest way to do this is by using a 
> runloop.  You can have a stub NSApplication call the runloop on the main thread 
> and have your application "running" on other threads.  I don't have much time 
> right now, but take a look at how we modified the X server to run on a second 
> thread (look at dix/main.c and hw/xquartz/mach_startup).
>
> --Jeremy
>
> On Aug 19, 2011, at 1:48 PM, Jeremy Lavergne wrote:
>
> > I've made a PSPP application bundle, first using a wrapper script to
> > launch the binary and then using the new app PortGroup.
> > 
> > To utilize launching via symlink it can produce, I had the PSPP devs dump
> > the -psn_* argv flag that gets passed in by the GUI. This of course,
> > leaves the Dock bouncing until the timeout and likely won't accept any
> > drag/drop of files and so on.
> > 
> > Do you have any advice or suggested reading material on a proper way to
> > handle -psn for non-native apps?
> > 
> > 
>
> ---
> Jeremy Huddleston
>
> Rebuild Sudan
>  - Board of Directors
>  - http://www.rebuildsudan.org
>
> Berkeley Foundation for Opportunities in Information Technology
>  - Advisory Board
>  - http://www.bfoit.org
>
>
> --- End Message ---
> --- Begin Message ---
>
>
>
> Subject: 
>
> Re: advice on application bundles running unix binaries
>
>
>
>
> Date: 
>
> Fri, 19 Aug 2011 22:11:57 -0700
>
>
>
>
> You need to register with the dock.  The easiest way to do this is by using a 
> runloop.  You can have a stub NSApplication call the runloop on the main thread 
> and have your application "running" on other threads.  I don't have much time 
> right now, but take a look at how we modified the X server to run on a second 
> thread (look at dix/main.c and hw/xquartz/mach_startup).
>
> --Jeremy
>
> On Aug 19, 2011, at 1:48 PM, Jeremy Lavergne wrote:
>
> > I've made a PSPP application bundle, first using a wrapper script to
> > launch the binary and then using the new app PortGroup.
> > 
> > To utilize launching via symlink it can produce, I had the PSPP devs dump
> > the -psn_* argv flag that gets passed in by the GUI. This of course,
> > leaves the Dock bouncing until the timeout and likely won't accept any
> > drag/drop of files and so on.
> > 
> > Do you have any advice or suggested reading material on a proper way to
> > handle -psn for non-native apps?
> > 
> > 
>
> ---
> Jeremy Huddleston
>
> Rebuild Sudan
>  - Board of Directors
>  - http://www.rebuildsudan.org
>
> Berkeley Foundation for Opportunities in Information Technology
>  - Advisory Board
>  - http://www.bfoit.org
>
>
> --- End Message ---
> --- Begin Message ---
>
>
>
> Subject: 
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> Re: handling -psn_X_Y
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>
>
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> Date: 
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> Thu, 18 Aug 2011 05:07:58 -0500
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>
>
>
> On Aug 17, 2011, at 14:56, Jeremy Lavergne wrote:
>
> > You had said you were doing some dark magic on a port to handle the -psn
> > flags. Do you recall what needs to be accomplished to handle the flag,
> > other than ignoring it?
> > 
> > I've not done GUI development before so it's new to me :-) and the PSPP
> > dev is receptive to doing things like ignoring the flag for now so we can
> > just plop the binary into the app bundle until we know how to do it
> > properly.
>
> Well I said two things which weren't related:
>
> 1) Programs not designed to be launched from an application bundle won't know 
> what to do with the -psn_* flag Mac OS X passes it. You can write a wrapper 
> script to bypass this problem: Mac OS X will pass the -psn_* flag to the 
> wrapper script, which will ignore it completely, and instead call the desired 
> executable with no arguments (or just the arguments you want).
>
> 2) Application bundles are designed to launch programs that show an icon in the 
> Dock that stays there until the program terminates. Programs that aren't proper 
> Mac OS X GUI applications don't do this on their own. Putting them in an app 
> bundle makes them do this, but the icon doesn't behave properly: it never stops 
> bouncing, clicking on it while the program's running does nothing, the OS 
> things the app is frozen and gives you the Force Quit option if you click and 
> hold on it, etc. This is what I tried at great length to combat in the 
> mystonline-wine port, by having my wrapper script stay open and try to 
> intercept these OS events while launching the game separately, and waiting 
> around until the game exits. This didn't work particularly well. Your PSPP app 
> demonstrates what you get if your wrapper launches the real program 
> asynchronously with "&": the icon bounces briefly in the Dock, then disappears, 
> while the app launches. If you click it again, another copy of the app 
> launches! Also not behavior a user would expect. Dragging document icons onto 
> the application icon also wouldn't work; this wasn't an issue for me with 
> mystonline-wine because it is a game and there aren't any document files. 
> Bottom line is apps that aren't designed to be Mac apps don't behave well if 
> coerced into an application bundle. It might be possible to do better by 
> writing an app wrapper of some kind using AppleScript or Cocoa but that's a bit 
> involved. Possibly some day if I or someone writes such a wrapper that works 
> well, we can make a port for it, then the app portgroup can expose an option to 
> allow a port to use it.
>
>
>
>
>
>
> --- End Message ---

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