From: Bob Gustafson <bobgus@...>
Date: 2008-04-06T10:45:22+09:00
Subject: Re: Writing Excel on MAC OS X

Why not try NeoOffice/OpenOffice on both the Mac and your Windows
production server.

Since they are free it would be cheap to try.

You might also find a common API that would give you what you need.

If you have problems, there is an active community that could help with
hints and tweeks. You then leverage the open source aspect.

Bob G

On Sat, 2008-04-05 at 20:15 +0900, hengist podd wrote:
> Daniel Liebig wrote:
> 
> > So, does anybode know if ms office on mac does use COM objects?
> 
> Nope, COM is more or less non-existent on OS X. You can control Mac 
> Office applications via AppleScript or any other language that speaks 
> Apple events, but that's all as published APIs go. (Previous versions of 
> Mac Office also supported VBA, but that went away in Office 2008.) There 
> is a low-level Automation API, which I believe is what REALbasic uses to 
> interact with Office apps, but it isn't publically documented AFAIK. The 
> Mac and Win Office codebases are largely independent anyway, so even 
> with a cross-platform API you couldn't be certain that code written for 
> one will run on the other without trying it for yourself.
> 
> Given that you need to deploy your solution on a Windows server, you'll 
> really have to stick with Windows for developing it too. Though if it's 
> any help, don't forget that modern Intel Macs can also run Windows using 
> either Leopard's dual-boot support or third-party virtualisation 
> programs.
> 
> HTH
> 
> has
> --
> Control AppleScriptable applications from Python, Ruby and ObjC:
> http://appscript.sourceforge.net
>