Windows Apps Running Native on Your Mac?

From Wired Blog Network:

Will Mac OS X one day run Windows apps without the need for dual booting or virtual machines? That’s the question/rumor currently making the rounds after Wine developer Steven Edwards discovered Leopard contains an undocumented loader for Portable Executables, a filetype used in Windows applications.

When Apple made the switch to Intel, it opened up a realm of possible Windows compatibility previously unavailable on the Mac platform. As the success of Boot Camp, Parallels, VMWare Fusion and Wine demonstrate, users would clearly love to have Windows and Mac apps running of the same machine.

And what’s better than virtualization and dual booting? Native support.

Comments 3

  • This sounds good and all, but I’m sure there will be all sorts of issues for system calls and DLL support. Almost all programs, besides a simple hello world app, will require hooks into the OS.

  • It sure is an interesting thought though!

  • Oh, I definitely agree. It would make buying a Mac the easy choice even for die-hard PC enthusiasts. Being able to use all my current applications without rebooting (or virtualization) would be ideal.

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