Darwine: Windows apps on the Mac without Windows
Darwine is a new project to bring Wine, an Open Source implementation of the Windows APIs, to Mac OS X.
The Darwine project intends to port and develop WINE as well as other supporting tools that will allow Darwin and Mac OS X users to run Windows Applications. There are two major phases to this project. The first phase is the port of WINE to Darwin/x86 with XDarwin (XFree86). While the basic compatibility is there, as Darwin is largely FreeBSD, we need to overcome the hurdle of its Mach kernel which uses the Mach-O format rather than ELF. The second phase is to then port WINE to Darwin/PPC and Mac OS X by integrating the Bochs IA-32 interpreter. Additional supporting tools for launching Windows applications from the desktop and an integrated installer are desireable items for the package.
This project is distinguished from simply using Bochs to run Windows because there is no Windows here. Just WINE and Bochs will be needed to run Windows applications directly under X. That will enable vastly better performance, better integration, and easier administration.
For Mac OS X, the ideal would be to eventually use the native GUI.
