PlayOnMac is a free

compatibility layer In software engineering, a compatibility layer is an interface that allows binaries for a legacy or foreign system to run on a host system. This translates system calls for the foreign system into native system calls for the host system. With s ...

and

emulator In computing, an emulator is Computer hardware, hardware or software that enables one computer system (called the ''host'') to behave like another computer system (called the ''guest''). An emulator typically enables the host system to run sof ...

for

macOS macOS, previously OS X and originally Mac OS X, is a Unix, Unix-based operating system developed and marketed by Apple Inc., Apple since 2001. It is the current operating system for Apple's Mac (computer), Mac computers. With ...

that allows installation and usage of video games and other software initially designed to run exclusively on

Microsoft Windows Windows is a Product lining, product line of Proprietary software, proprietary graphical user interface, graphical operating systems developed and marketed by Microsoft. It is grouped into families and subfamilies that cater to particular sec ...

. PlayOnMac is based on the open-source

Wine Wine is an alcoholic drink made from Fermentation in winemaking, fermented fruit. Yeast in winemaking, Yeast consumes the sugar in the fruit and converts it to ethanol and carbon dioxide, releasing heat in the process. Wine is most often made f ...

project and therefore creates and uses virtual drives much like Wineskin wrappers (the virtual drives are essentially Wineskin wrappers operating on a particular version of Wine). Furthermore, it uses an online database of installers (called scripts) that are applied to different applications that need special configuration. The scripts act as installers for the desired software. If the video game or software that must be installed is not in the online database of PlayOnMac, a manual installation can be performed but the positive result cannot be guaranteed. Aside from video games, any other program can be installed and each one is put in a different container to prevent interference of one program with another. Therefore, PlayOnMac allows users to install some of the most popular Windows programs and many video games as well. As with Wine, the use of PlayOnMac does not require nor use a Windows license. Lastly, PlayOnMac has been developed using a combination of two

programming language A programming language is a system of notation for writing computer programs. Programming languages are described in terms of their Syntax (programming languages), syntax (form) and semantics (computer science), semantics (meaning), usually def ...

s, more specifically Bash and

Python Python may refer to: Snakes * Pythonidae, a family of nonvenomous snakes found in Africa, Asia, and Australia ** ''Python'' (genus), a genus of Pythonidae found in Africa and Asia * Python (mythology), a mythical serpent Computing * Python (prog ...

. In addition, it also uses the wrapper/toolkit

wxPython wxPython is a wrapper for the cross-platform GUI API (often referred to as a "toolkit") wxWidgets (which is written in C++) for the Python programming language. It is one of the alternatives to Tkinter. It is implemented as a Python extension ...

References

External links

* {{Official website, www.playonmac.com/en/
Supported software
MacOS-only free software macOS emulation software Software derived from or incorporating Wine Software that uses wxPython Software using the GNU General Public License

See also

References

External links