I've been writing code since 1971. But I've used IDE's for decades and don't know Unix or scripting. And I'm maybe a bit old to start an extensive new learning curve.

I want to add new devices to INDI, principally for my own purposes, but this will extend to other users because some of my devices are in widespread use but not available as INDI devices.

So I really want to establish a development environment on my local machine. And I need help.

I'm using macOS. I have used Rob Lancaster's package kstars-on-osx-craft, but cannot get it to build. My "native" machines are both using Apple Silicon (i.e. ARM) but I have given up trying with them. I also have a few Intel Macs available, and have installed the latest macOS, Sonoma, on one of them for the purpose of installing a development environment.

But I'm still having problems. If I stick to the vanilla script I run into the problem that some packages (specifically KTextTemplate, StatusNotifierItem and KColorScheme) are, apparently, not available under Qt5 (why Qt5 is allowed under the craft setup but is not then compatible beats me).

If I choose Qt6 in setting up craft I get precisely the same error, because somehow, despite choosing Qt6, the nested scripts (or other instructions) manage to switch back to Qt5.

I've changed every instance I can find of Qt5 to Qt6, but still it ends up the same way.

Rob Lancaster (and others) did an excellent job in bringing this system to Macs, but now it needs a revisit. For Intel-only would be OK, but frankly, as the future of Mac is ARM (or Apple Silicon as they call it), that would be even better.

Please, could somebody, please, create a foolproof macOS recipe which would allow an old coder/codger to contribute to this community?

Thanks,
Richard

Richard,

This may/may-not be the answer you're looking for, but here's what I do.
I run a Ubuntu-Linux VM on my MacbookPro and develop with Ubuntu.
The VM is VMWare Fusion, but Parallels works fine too.
I use the QtCreator IDE on Linux. The building etc work just fine and is quite fast.

Hy

Thanks Hy,

It's probably not what I was looking for, but, if it can generate code I can then run on macOS I might be able to live with it.

If it can't generate macOS executables then I don't think I could live with that solution. I have too many other things going on with the Mac connected to the hardware (eg telescope control system; a multi-PT1000 temperature monitoring system, etc)

Thanks !

Sorry, but I don't generate any code that runs under MacOS from my VM.
In fact, I usually don't connect to any real devices in my work with the VM either.
I have occasionally connected to real devices from the VM, it is possible,
but my workflow is to use a Linux miniPC for that.

Hy

Hi Richard,

I've tried reaching out to Rob Lancaster on this topic. He's the expert on the Mac environment although I don't know if he has any experience of Apple Silicon. Rob's not been very active just recently, so may be busy with other things, I don't know. Fingers crossed.

Sorry I can't offer help myself. When I started developing on Mac I followed Rob's instructions and got things going on Intel. Obviously things have moved forward since then.

Sadly I'm not sure Macs are being supported anymore.
The last successful build on Binary factory was December 16, 2023.
I really am not looking forward to having to switch platforms, as my whole observatory is Mac based.

I sure hope that's not true!

This whole setup looks so sweet, but if it means changing my whole basis, not to mention replacing 4 computers in the observatory, I'm not going to do it. I'll have to (reluctantly) revert to my old TSX setup.

Please, somebody, make it not true ....

Although Apple Silicon native would be ideal, I can live with a macOS-Intel x86-16 basis too. I have the machines for it. It can't be that hard to modify the various scripts surely, for somebody who knows what they're doing. (Clearly that last qualifier excludes me, unfortunately).

Thanks,
Richard