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I'm the first to admit that I have no idea how my macs work. However, having recently installed OpenDarwin 7.2.1, I was contemplating the similarity of Darwin and Mac OS X, particularly in terms of compatibility. This made me wonder two things. First, is it possible to run any OS X apps on Darwin? And second, is it possible to extract the Aqua interface and window manager and use them on Darwin? Basically, is it possible to reverse engineer Mac OS X from. Darwin?

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https://www.insanelymac.com/forum/topic/104948-mac-os-x-apps-for-darwin/
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  • 3 weeks later...

There are several reasons why this is not possible. Darwin is just the basis of Mac OS X. There are many things layered upon Darwin, like Core Image, Quartz Extreme, OpenGL, etc., and of course the all important Aqua interface that make Mac OS X what it is. Without these layers no Mac OS X application will run on Darwin. Basically, if its not a Terminal based app then it will NOT work on Darwin. However, obviously, the opposite way is possible, you can run Darwin apps on Mac OS X, and using Fink you can get access to repositories of many Mac OS X adapted Linux based apps. No it is not possible to reverse engineer OS X from Darwin by itself, which is why Apple releases Darwin for free.

OpenDarwin 7.x equates to about an OS X 10.3 level API and a majority of apps require 10.4 anyways.

 

Assuming it was even possible, why would you want the hassle of trying to extract Aqua from OS X so you could graft it on to a different branch of Darwin? Why not just install OS X and have "proper" Darwin and OS X?

  • 2 weeks later...

OpenDarwin 7.x equates to about an OS X 10.3 level API and a majority of apps require 10.4 anyways.

 

Assuming it was even possible, why would you want the hassle of trying to extract Aqua from OS X so you could graft it on to a different branch of Darwin? Why not just install OS X and have "proper" Darwin and OS X?

 

Well, I do have proper OS X. It was just idle curiosity. Before XP crashed (predictable, anyone?), I had about 20 VMs, basically Windows 3.1 - Vista, Mac OS X Tiger / Leopard, my favorite Linux distro, FreeBSD, OpenDarwin, anything. Unfortunately, system recovery toasted VMware, and of course I have lost my VMware serial. The main reason I asked the question is because the thing I like most about OS X is how it looks. Not necessarily how it works (although it's been so long without a windows machine that I try to use "sudo" in cmd.exe...). A free Darwin/x86 with Aqua would be awesome, because I wouldn't have to violate any license agreements to install it on a PC.

 

The other thing is that I can't build from source to save my life. So I would download the source to Darwin 9, but I wouldn't know what to do with it. I suppose xcode - build. But what would I do from there?

  • 1 year later...

I've also been wondering about this. I'm a long time Mac user and Linux user. I love the flexibility and freedom of open source environments and would love to use xfce/gnome for everyday use. Especially on my crispy 24" lcd.

But alas, I am an interactive designer by trade and require the use of Adobe software.

If there were a way to build carbon atop Darwin, I could have my cake and eat it too.

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