The period from 1996 to 2000 had many many hundreds of Mac OS programmers rewriting and adapting existing technologies over, much of it C++ not ObjC -- classic apis (aka Carbon), Quicktime, Sound Manager, Quartz, font management, speech, probably lots more I can't think of.
So that's hundreds of programmers over two years or more. And to introduce C++ compatibility into shedloads of new code takes a single person half the time? Probably while simultaneously teaching himself about the intricacies of a new hardware platform and hundreds of big libraries he's probably never coded for before?
I had the impression that NeXT had very high coding standards[1] including endian-neutrality and processor portability; I guess that went by the wayside during OS X development.
[1] Perhaps too high, considering the failure of original NeXT.
What was Apple supposed to do, fire all of their existing PPC C++ programmers and hire a whole new team? No, they utilised their existing resources very effectively to finish the Mac OS X project in surprisingly short time. Apple made the smartest possible move considering commercial realities.
The period from 1996 to 2000 had many many hundreds of Mac OS programmers rewriting and adapting existing technologies over, much of it C++ not ObjC -- classic apis (aka Carbon), Quicktime, Sound Manager, Quartz, font management, speech, probably lots more I can't think of.
So that's hundreds of programmers over two years or more. And to introduce C++ compatibility into shedloads of new code takes a single person half the time? Probably while simultaneously teaching himself about the intricacies of a new hardware platform and hundreds of big libraries he's probably never coded for before?
I think it sounds impressive.