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by lukasco 25 days ago
Cross platform building and packaging in C/C++ is such a hot mess. There's so many dimensions to unpack I don't even really know where to start. (I say this as the person who has been packaging GIMP for Mac for the last good number of years.)

OK, here's a few (with a MacOS slant): - compilers (gcc, clang, and their many versions) - libc (and friends) compatibility (I can't say I even ever delved into this one, but it's bit me) - package manager (macports, homebrew) - building for backward compatibility; what's the earliest MacOS version to support (the package managers either like to build for the OS they are running on, or force you -- yes I'm looking at you homebrew) - dependency and dependency version management (love you pkgconfig) - build system for each package (cmake, autotools, meson, ...) - bundling everything into an application - turning that application into a Mac application - code signing and notarization - creating the DMG - debug symbols - crash detection and notification Like right now, libheif on 26 can't be built for 11 and it's not clear why (or maybe they just fixed it...but it's been weeks)