Re: General question about GNUStep

[Simeon Mitev]

Good point David,

Actually, the server application will mainly deal with networking, in 
memory data structures manipulations, threads and database interactions. 
If I use GNUStep to develop it, I will be later on able to reuse all 
data models and networking modules directly for the iPhone client 
application and will avoid doubled work, data mappings and so on.

What about database connectivity of GNUStep? Is it "mature" enough?

I do not plan to use MySQL. Good target is Firebird. Unfortunately, 
there is no port of BerkeleyDB for Objective C :|


// Simeon


> I'm not sure why this follows.  Just because you can't use DO doesn't 
> mean you can't use GNUstep on the server.
>
> By the way, in theory it ought to be possible to port GNUstep's 
> NSPortCoder to Cocoa and use this for serialising messages to be sent 
> across sockets.  This would let Cocoa apps talk to GNUstep ones via DO.
>
> David
>
> On 25 Aug 2009, at 15:31, Simeon Mitev wrote:
>
> > Hi David Chisnall,
> >
> > Thank you very much for the hints.
> > It looks like that I do not have too much possibilities. The server 
> > will be develop in C++ or Java. It would be not bad if the client is 
> > not only iPhone but also Android compatible. Therefore I will use 
> > communication protocol as Hessian in example. It is provided for all 
> > (C++, Java, Objective C) programming languages. XML is not a good 
> > solution for game development, that's true.
> >
> > Once again, that you very much for the information.
> >
> > Best regards,
> >
> > Simeon
> >
> >
> > > Hi Simeon,
> > > You're going to have two problems, I believe:
> > > Firstly, the GNUstep and OS X wire protocols for distributed objects 
> > > are different.  This means that you can recompile Cocoa code that 
> > > uses DO with GNUstep, but the two versions of the problem will not 
> > > work together.
> > > The other problem you will have is that there is no support for 
> > > Distributed Objects on the iPhone (unless it was added with a recent 
> > > SDK and I wasn't paying attention).
> > > This doesn't prevent you from using GNUstep for your server, but it 
> > > does mean you can't use DO easily.  You can, for example, generate 
> > > property lists from objects on the iPhone using standard Foundation 
> > > methods and classes like NSPropertyListSerialization and then send 
> > > them via a socket.  If you use the NeXT plist format 
> > > (NSPropertyListOpenStepFormat) you get quite a dense representation; 
> > > Nicolas Roard wrote a distributed visualisation application using 
> > > this technique for control messages for his PhD.
> > > David
> > > On 24 Aug 2009, at 13:47, Simeon wrote:
> > > > Hi All,
> > > >
> > > > I am pretty new to GNUStep but I think I will use it for my upcoming 
> > > > project. It is a multilayer online game for iPhone. Initially I 
> > > > though to program the server in C++. The client is clear - a native 
> > > > Objective C application. Currently I am looking for a good solution 
> > > > for the communication layer. There are very good C++ only and Java 
> > > > solution. What about Objective C and distributed objects? This is 
> > > > how I heard about GNUStep. Reading the articles in internet I 
> > > > started to think into direction to write also the server in 
> > > > Objective C (I really like this language). The first question I need 
> > > > answer for is "How good is the colaboration between Apple (iPhone) 
> > > > Objectve C libraries and GNUStep runtime"? How difficult good is the 
> > > > coupling between two runtimes when it is about object remote 
> > > > invocations and remoting in general?
> > > >
> > > > I am sorry for my English but it is not my native language :)
> > > >
> > > > Thank you very much in advance.
> > > >
> > > > Simeon
> > > >
> > > >
> > > >
> > > > _______________________________________________
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