New UNIX tools for Mac OS X

#1 Thu, 12 Feb 2015 - 18:28 68kMLA

How easy would it be to update some of the command-line tools on older versions of Mac OS X? Can they be taken from Linux or FreeBSD?

#2 Thu, 12 Feb 2015 - 23:04 68kMLA

Most people use package managers for Mac OS X such as Homebrew or Fink to accomplish this.

For older versions of Mac OS X you'll probably want to look at an archived version of Fink.

#3 Thu, 12 Feb 2015 - 23:19 68kMLA

or macports

#4 Fri, 13 Feb 2015 - 00:52 68kMLA

Thanks that's useful.

#5 Fri, 13 Feb 2015 - 17:35 68kMLA

I am looking for Mac OS X.5 PowerPC stuff, Flink seems to work but the repositories seem to be done, oh well at least I got some new binaries.

#6 Fri, 13 Feb 2015 - 18:44 68kMLA

Go MacPorts, then... everything will build from scratch, but they do support Leopard PPC. (I think Tiger PPC is unsupported, but still works too.)

#7 Fri, 13 Feb 2015 - 18:49 68kMLA

Thanks I will check that out.

#8 Sat, 14 Feb 2015 - 01:13 68kMLA

MacPorts for 10.3 isn't on the website any longer, but it's still there (if you need it)
http://svn.macports.org/repository/macports/downloads/MacPorts-1.6.0/MacPorts-1.6.0-10.3-Panther.dmg

#9 Sat, 14 Feb 2015 - 03:46 68kMLA

Macports works well for Leopard/ ppc. There are regular updates and many, many current versions of tools like git, python etc. are there. Having said that, there are also major gaps (e.g., the latest pandoc).

#10 Sun, 15 Feb 2015 - 01:35 68kMLA

NetBSD's pkgsrc is actively updated and supports PowerPC. I use it on all my PowerPC Leopard systems. It works well, encapsulates everything cleanly and has its own system for starting and stopping daemons.

#11 Sun, 15 Feb 2015 - 02:13 68kMLA

My friend maintains pkgsrc for OS X on Intel, if you want to use that.