WINE stands for Windows Is Not Emulated. It works on unix/linux like Classic work on Mac OS X because it doesn't have to emulate the processor. It just emulates the environment and passes the commands to the CPU like a native app. To run x86 apps, you have to translate the commands to the CPU through an emulator like VirtualPC.
Would it be possible to run WINE on a Mac, and use a PPC-compiled Windows executable with it? (assuming anyone decided to compile a Windows program for PPC)
IIRC, Windows NT 4 actually was compiled for PPC. Why do you bring this up, though? Do you seem to think Microsoft will build a version of Windows for the PPC970? What incentive would it have to do that? Microsoft would be facing the same problems Apple would face if it tried porting Mac OS X to x86; any third party application would have to be recompiled to work on the new processor. Also, any assembly code or processor-specific optimizations (like AltiVec or SSE) would have to be scrapped. Windows developers would essentially have to put out two versions of all software unless Microsoft could engineer some kind of "fat" binary. In the former scenario, that would greatly confuse the masses.
Perhaps such a discussion of said idea would be better off in its own thread.
Comments
WINE stands for Windows Is Not Emulated. It works on unix/linux like Classic work on Mac OS X because it doesn't have to emulate the processor. It just emulates the environment and passes the commands to the CPU like a native app. To run x86 apps, you have to translate the commands to the CPU through an emulator like VirtualPC.
[ 12-10-2002: Message edited by: Brad ]</p>
That's what they say <a href="http://www.winehq.com/about/index.php?myths#slow"; target="_blank">here</a>.
I haven't used the thing in over a year.
Amorya
IIRC, Windows NT 4 actually was compiled for PPC. Why do you bring this up, though? Do you seem to think Microsoft will build a version of Windows for the PPC970? What incentive would it have to do that? Microsoft would be facing the same problems Apple would face if it tried porting Mac OS X to x86; any third party application would have to be recompiled to work on the new processor. Also, any assembly code or processor-specific optimizations (like AltiVec or SSE) would have to be scrapped. Windows developers would essentially have to put out two versions of all software unless Microsoft could engineer some kind of "fat" binary. In the former scenario, that would greatly confuse the masses.
Perhaps such a discussion of said idea would be better off in its own thread.
[ 12-11-2002: Message edited by: Brad ]</p>