On 12/05/2012 08:30 PM, Ludovic Rousseau wrote: >> > >> > If you still consider OSX to be a Unix, there it is hell because Apple >> > still ships that ancient version.. We're considering packaging our >> > own binary.. We don't like the idea and all of the >> > risks/support/followup work it implies.. But what other choice do we >> > have if we want to continue supporting OSX at all?
> Another option is to work with the SmartCard Services project [1]. > Apple externalized the maintenance of PC/SC lite and the project is > now hosted on their Open Source forge. > > I am one of the maintainer of the project. In July 2009 I did fix some > bugs. The fixed PC/SC lite version has been used in Lion released in > 2011. See "Mac OS X Lion and smart cards status " [2] for the changes. > > So Apple can improve the pcsc-lite included in Mac OS X. But you have > to do the job yourself. > Maybe we can work together and do something for the next Mac OS X? Ludovic, Your blog posts are well known to us (my clients and myself) :-) But if Apple ships 17-month-old versions (almost 2.5 years by now), I still call that "ancient" versions. The point is that "someone" :-) is putting in all the effort, and we're certainly willing to contribute, but Apple takes ages to ship that, it's not going to help our users much: They can't wait for 2.5 years (and counting) for a fix.. We're currently in a situation where an Apple update of the JRE causes a SEGV somewhere in the JNI borderlands between Java and pcsclite.. Everything seems to indicate that the issue would not have occurred if they'd only updated pcscd.. This has been the one single most-heard comment in second line support for the past 2 years.. "yeah.. Ludovic has fixed this years ago.. but Apple isn't shipping the fixed version.." Apple users mostly refuse to believe us when we tell them that it's "Apple's fault". So far it's been relatively minor issues but now, it's become systemic and blocking.. So.. We're grudgingly arguing for shipping our own up-to-date "SmartCard Services" pcsc-lite binary.. But I fear the support impact.. and that is a powerful counter-argument, of course. It looks like we'll have little choice though. So far, Apple has ignored our pleas and requests consistently and for years, about anything. We seriously wonder if they're going to continue supporting PCSC at all.. In which case it will be prudent to at least have our own binary ready to ship.. We might get away with it by bundling it so, by default, that only our own programs are affected.. a wasteful way of doing things,.. But safer in terms of impact.. We could still have an up-to-date binary to replace Apple's ancient one system-wide, by explicit user choice. What do you think? -f _______________________________________________ Muscle mailing list [email protected] http://lists.musclecard.com/mailman/listinfo/muscle_lists.musclecard.com
