Information Technology Reference
In-Depth Information
Understanding the History of Mac Development
Tools
Before OS X, Apple's IDE (Integrated Development Environment) was MPW (Macintosh Programmer's Work-
shop). As shown in Figure 1.2, MPW, which is still available today, was in competition with a commercial
product called CodeWarrior. Both CodeWarrior and MPW were expensive, and many would-be developers
were put off by the initial start-up costs.
Looking back at early IDEs
CodeWarrior was based on the Metrowerks C compiler and environment. It smoothed the transition from the
68k processors to the PowerPC and helped make the new PowerPC Macs a success. As an IDE, CodeWarrior
provided complete support for the PowerPC architecture; MPW took longer to catch up with Apple's own new
hardware. CodeWarrior also compiled code more quickly than MPW and created faster and more efficient bin-
aries.
FIGURE 1.2
The MPW IDE is available on Apple's FTP site, and users of antique Macs can download and use it.
