Sorry it took so long, but I was hoping for better news on this question. It doesn't look like ESRI will support Arc products on the Macintosh UNIX platform, but there is some hope for a JAVA application to run on the Mac. Thanks, Bruce > -----Original Message----- > From: Bruce P. Eggleston [mailto:Beggleston@cityofboise.org > Sent: Tuesday, 22 May 2001 11:18 AM > To: ARCVIEW-L@ESRI.COM > Subject: [ARCVIEW-L] AV Unix on Mac OS X > Dear AV List Members: > Has anyone used or heard about anyone using AV on the new > Macintosh OS X Unix based o.s? I would like to set up a home system with > that configuration, but I need to know how it performs before making the considerable > investment. I have been unable to find any information on this recently available combination. > Thanks, > Bruce > Boise City Planning and Development Services Department > 150 N. Capitol Blvd. > Boise, Idaho > Hi Bruce, I'm no expert but I'd guess that while the underlying executables could be recompiled for Mac OS X, all the GUI stuff would need to be rewritten for Aqua. I've already asked Jack about support for Mac OS X and he said that if there is a big enough market, they'd consider it, here's hoping. I personally think there is more chance of ArcGIS arriving on Mac OS X via a Java port (rumoured to be worked on at ESRI). All the best, Karl I wasn't aware of any plans to support MacOS X, but I'd be glad to be told I'm wrong! Inspired by your question I have done a quick Google search on "Arcview MacOS X" which has turned up the following link, which seems reasonably definitive, in the negative. http://maccentral.macworld.com/news/0010/17.esri.shtml hth Andrew. No Mac OS X support planned by ESRI by Dennis Sellers, dsellers@maccentral.com October 17, 2000, 7:00 am ET ESRI, which makes ArcView 3.0 for the Mac, is phasing out Mac support and has no plans to support Mac OS X. ArcView GIS is a desktop geographic information system. With ArcView GIS you can create dynamic maps using data from virtually any source and across most popular computing platforms. ArcView GIS provides the tools to let you work with maps, database tables, charts and graphics all at once. You can also use multimedia links to add pictures, sound, and video to your maps. When George Schoeneberg, a graduate student at St. Mary's University in Winona, MN, asked ESRI about plans to port ArcView and the company's other UNIX applications (such as (Arc/Info and ArcPlot) into the upcoming Mac OS X, he was told no. A letter from ESRI says: "ESRI's position on operating systems is entirely market driven. We will support any/all operating systems and technology for which there is a large market. This is because it is very expensive for us to port to another platform and support it over many years. "We see computing today as falling into two distinct architectures; the desktop/server environment and the server-centric environment. The industry standard platform for desktop clients is Windows, and the industry standards for server technology is both UNIX and Windows NT/2000. Java and Internet server technology play key roles in the server environment. Generally speaking, ESRI has been migrating its client and server technology according to these two trends. "ESRI selected Windows for its desktop environment because it offers many advantages, including advanced user interfaces and development environments that are simply not available in the UNIX environment. This platform is also fully interoperable with the other desktop technology pervasive within most organizations. We have been communicating this decision to our users for a number of years. "ESRI has fundamentally redeveloped and rewritten ArcInfo and ArcView for a native Windows environment using Microsoft's desktop standards (COM, VB, etc.). This means the Windows platform has become our standard platform for initially developing and releasing desktop products. ArcInfo 8, released in early 2000, was the first ESRI software product built using this architecture. ArcView 8.1 is near final release and is developed on the same Windows/COM platform using the same component technology. As a result, the BSD lineage of Mac OS X does not help in the task of porting our current desktop GIS software products to Macintosh. "In conclusion, ESRI is not planning to support the Macintosh platform with future releases of ArcView or ArcInfo at this time." Of course, Schoeneberger and other Mac OS users might disagree. "MacOS X is BSD based, so it should be much easier and cost effective in the future to support this new OS," he says. "It should not be very hard to recompile into the new Carbon or Coca language to make your applications run. In the past, the Macintosh applications have been behind the Windows and Unix versions, but this is an opportunity to support all three equally." Schoeneberger urges everyone who agrees with him to send an e-mail to buspartners@esri.com. And remember: be polite and reasonable. Flaming and rude hate mail will only hurt the Mac platform, not help it.