A t its Developer Forum this week, Intel reiterated that it plans to release beta versions of both its compiler and performance libraries for Mac OS X later this year.
The tools will be released as plug-ins for Appleis Xcode software and will especially appeal to those who already use Intel tools for Linux and Windows, the company said. Kevin Smith, director of the Intel compiler lab, added that he expects Intelis compilers to offer the best performance on its processors.
"We do more tuning of our compilers on our processors than anyone else," Mr. Smith told CNET.
Intel didnit demonstrate the tools running under Mac OS X as they remain in the early stages of development. Mr. Smith said Intel was hesitant to deliver a more specific time frame as the company is unsure of what possible challenges lie ahead in developing the tools for Appleis operating system. Intel also has yet to decide how its tools will interact with compilers for PowerPC chips and whether they will support the 128-bit Altivec unit in G4 and G5 processors.
Additional reporting is available at eWeek.