Good instructions here, but too much klunking around….

On Lion, will need to download:

• GCC 4.2 to compile with – lion uses llvm so you need to compile 4.6 with 4.2
• the new GCC itself here ftp://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/gcc/gcc-4.6.1/select gcc-4.6.1.tar.gz
• a few infrastructure libraries from here (ftp://gcc.gnu.org/pub/gcc/infrastructure/) – get mpc-0.8.1.tar.gz and mpfr-2.4.2.tar.bz2
• GMP itself needs a more recent version 5.0.2 (one of the features is 64bit under darwin)
• from the above article comments, be sure to update all your configures to include ABI=64 something like:

Well – I am still waiting! Why am I posting? Well – a few things happened – 1st – I cancelled, and re-ordered my MBA (yeah – that is the lingo MBA). Why did I do this? Well – a friend and collegue of mine said to me “hey Chris – did you know we get Apple corporate discount? You should have used that for your MBA!”. I said hmm… I logged on – checked out my discount – and it was a ~$150 savings. Nice – so – since my order was still “not shipped” from Apple – I cancelled it, and re-ordered it (same specs etc) thus – saving $150. That said – I would have had it by now if I had not done this .

More … That same friend and collegue came to me the other day and said “Hey – J&R just got a demo MBA, you should go check it out, I saw it – and I did not think it was ’all that’”. Also - I have been debating the idea of getting a MacBook Pro in stead (you know, more beef for the bucks, etc, etc). So – I went to J&R and saw, touched, compared, etc. Needless to say – it IS just what I want. I STILL LOVE my Lenovo ThinkPad X60 Tablet. I LOVE the smallness factor – it REALLY matters to me. I WAS impressed – I will continue patiently waiting. As of now – I will be waiting till the 22nd or so till I get my MBA

So – on goes the saga – I want my (discounted) MacBook Air!

-Chris

OK – so I ordered my 1st Mac in some… maybe 12 years?!?
MacBook Air. I figured a few things:

1. It is a 1st generation evolutionary (not revolutionary) bit of hardware. It is very sexy There may be issues with v1 hardware, but on par – it will be a Mac either way – and there is a good shot it will suit my needs well.
2. It is a Mac with just about the same specs as my ThinkPad X60 tablet. I really like my tablet. I really like small and light – a lot.
3. It is Unix   (I have had Linux machines @ home and work for at least the past 5 years).
4. I will re-learn the mac thing and see what all the current hype IN THE DEVELOPER COMMUNITY is about.
5. I will get to see more good UI design standards in practice.

Although I can program java – I am still largely “long Microsoft” personally. Any C\C++ I have done has been on Windows. Lets see what else we have as programming models for desktop applications. (I have done years of web stuff – I am still interested in desktop apps these days). The ‘architecture’ stuff, the people stuff, the agile stuff, etc – these are (thankfully) OS agnostic.

Check it out – it really looks lovely, small, lightweight, flat as can be, cool – really. I am NOT the uber-gadget-geek I once was. I am (trying hard) to generally be frugal. I have a lovely family that I would generally rather invest in – as opposed to my geek gadgets. This is really cool geekery – but it does have a purpose for me. So – kill me for getting a Mac as I have been talking about for a few months now – AND for it being cool, geeky, etc.

There are a TON of folks buying Macs these days. I am on an interesting mailing list with lots of experienced programmers/ agile folks. There are chains going on about whole dev teams ‘going mac’. It would be silly to ignore this. It would sort of be like ignoring the dynamic languages – there are reasons people are changing to Mac. On the server – Linux is there – big time – but it has been so many years and it is still not really on the desktop – except for dopes like me willing to spend hours on end getting drivers running, recompiling stuff you would never really care about as an ‘end user’ of a desktop OS.

Enough blabber. I will check in as my Mac experience begins in a few weeks.

-Chris