Porting a multi-threading Delphi application to Mac: what are my choices?

Question

I need to port an application (written in XE2) to Mac.

My application is split into a simple UI executable (single-threaded) and an invisible engine (which heavily relies on OmniThreadLibrary 3.02 and Cromis DirectoryWatch)

Both EXEs communicate via Cromis.IPC

This is to say that I mainly have issues with these 3 components (OmniThreadLibrary, Cromis IPC & DirectoryWatch)

My focus right now is the Engine, which has most of the code.

My question is: Is there something similar to OmniThreadLibrary, Cromis DirectoryWatch & Cromis.IPC for Mac? (Whether with lazarus or XE2 with Mac as a target compiler)

The answer will help me a lot in deciding whether I should use Delphi XE2 or Lazarus (an IDE which I'm not familiar at all with) and see what's the best long term approach to offer/support both Windows & Mac with the minimum headaches

Answer 1

I am answering the part of your question dealing with compiler /IDE. I've used Lazarus and I must say that it won't take you too long to get up to speed (except for your exact requirements). Lazarus is getting more and more professional; a number of the developers are professional Delphi / XE2 coders by day. I think since you want to make your application available on Mac, you are going to have some work cut out anyway. But, it you decide to use Lazarus, you can for the most part build applications for Linux, Mac, and Windows without much effort ... most things just build right for each of the platforms from the same mostly unmodified source. Of course, as you say, your code heavily leans on OTL With OTL being a windows only library, I think you are going to have your work cut out for you. (read ... you might have to write an equivalent library yourself, or have someone do it for you) As for Chromis Directory watch, I haven't found anything yet.

I hope this helps a bit. CHEERS

This Lazarus tutorial shows that threading functionality built in. I am unaware of an equivalent library for what you are searching for. CHEERS