macOS support
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Hi,
To continue making macOS releases, I need more sponsors, and money to buy hardware.
I used to run a macOS Big Sur in VirtualBox, it crashed while attempting to upgrade to Ventura. It has also proved to be unreliable and incredible slow. It is also not possible to run a ARM64 based macOS on my x86_64 based computer, which is what most users have today. So I've decided to give that up.
So to continue making macOS releases I need the cheapest mac mini (M2 8-Core / 8GB RAM / 256GB HDD) which costs around 760 USD.
If there are 20 users willing to donate, it will be $38 each.
This machine will be used only for Strawberry development, to build the releases, and also for me to use for testing releases and debugging macOS specific issues.I'm also requiring some regular sponsorship to cover time spent on making releases, solving issues and giving support. I'm going to set this to at least 30 users with 5 USD month each. Please note that this does not guarantee that all reported bugs and problems can be fixed, but I will of course try to fix anything I can.
I'm also closing future macOS releases so that they are only available to those that sponsor the project. But I will of course make exceptions for those who have donated money in the past. The source code will always be open source and free software, but not the binary releases.
I wish there was another way, but I know from 5 years experience developing Strawberry how much time and resources I need to put into this.
If someone else wants to volunteer to do this, then I'm open for that too. It requires some C++, Objective C and Qt development experience.
If you are a macOS user, please reply with your thoughts, or send me a message, or e-mail me in private.
I'm also considering doing the same for Windows releases, but I need to start with macOS because I have no way of supporting macOS anymore right now.
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Referenced by
jonas
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@jonas This is entirely reasonable. Maintaining something like this shouldn't be out of pocket for you in either money or time.
I can be one of the 20. Do you prefer GitHub sponsors or Patreon for the monthly thing?
I just now signed up because I was trying to find out what a CI for ARM would be exactly, and if I was even able to make one on my 2021 Mac (I'm not a programmer but have done pipelines and configuration management).
https://forum.strawberrymusicplayer.org/topic/318/strawberry-on-apple-silicon-m1
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Also if we believe GitHub, there will be MacOS ARM64 runners "sometime later this year" for a GA date (Q4 2023 at least), after it was pushed back once already. Not holding my breath.
https://github.com/actions/runner/issues/805#issuecomment-1438149537
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Also part two, MacOS ARM binaries will require code signing, $99 USD per year.
https://developer.apple.com/support/compare-memberships/
The instructions at https://wiki.strawberrymusicplayer.org/wiki/Compile_macOS_using_homebrew work for me (with a few modifications for /opt/homebrew), however I can't run any resulting binary as I get the exception "EXC_BAD_ACCESS (SIGKILL (Code Signature Invalid))".
Strawberry installed from Homebrew does work nicely through Rosetta however.
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@cwood
Thanks, either GitHub Sponsors or Patreon is fine with me.I'm aware that GitHub actions might support macOS ARM64 in the future, but I still need a machine for debugging and testing.
I know other users have compiled and used Strawberry on arm64. You might need to allow execution in the security settings. But if I get enough sponsors, I should get a developer account and sign the releases.
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@jonas I'm glad to support this and have donated in the past. I use Strawberry Music Player daily. It's great. I did wonder though if you are close to getting enough support to work on an ARM64 version? Either way I will throw something into the hat today.