[plug] development platform

[Leon Brooks]

Rob Dunne wrote:
> I need some advice. We are starting a project
> that involves a numerical computation engine and a front
> end (probably attached to some existing software).

> The current deliverable has to be on NT but several of us
> would like to develop under Linux (at least the numerical part
> if not all of it) and then port to NT. This is all up for grabs at
> the moment -- the project leader is concerned about developing
> under Linux but could be convinced.

> Are there any examples of commercial projects that develop
> under Unix but release a final product under NT?

> Are there any good sources of arguments for doing this?

Plenty. Java, TCL, Python (.NET deployable today, and otherwise highly buzzword
compliant), even PERL (with PERL-GTK or PERL-Tk) and the like make brilliant
portable front ends/wrappers.

Doing the numerically intensive bits as a C or C++ module would make things
faster for the latter three languages at the expense of extreme portability. It
would not be hard with any of these to do the basic implementation in the pure
language and offer C/C++ ``speedup'' replacement modules on platforms (CPUs) for
which they are known to work. You could impress your boss by developing the
thing on LinuxPPC and running it under (say) NT-on-Alpha and Linux-on-PalmPilot
as well as the target NT-on-x86 environment.

-- 
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die for it; anything but live for it. -- Charles Caleb Colton