Interesting and Important Libraries (Mac OS X for Unix Geeks)

5.7. Interesting and Important Libraries

Table 5-2 lists some significant libraries included with Mac OS X and Table 5-3 lists some significant libraries that do not come with Mac OS X (but are available through Fink).

Table 5-2. Important Mac OS X libraries

Library	Description	Headers
libalias	A packet aliasing library for masquerading and network address translation	Not included in Mac OS X. See the network_cmds module in the Darwin CVS archive.
libl.a	The lex runtime library	Not applicable. Lexical analyzers that you generate with lex have all the necessary definitions.
libMallocDebug	A library for the MallocDebug utility (/Developer/Applications)	Not applicable.You don't need to do anything special with your code to use this utility.
libncurses(libcurses is available for backward compatibility.)	The new curses screen library, a set of functions for controlling a terminal's display screen	/usr/include/ncurses.h (curses.h is available for backward compatibility.)
libobjc	The library for the GNU Objective-C compiler	/usr/include/objc/*
libpcap	Packet capture library	/usr/include/pcap*
libssl and libcrypto	An OpenSSL: Open Source toolkit implementing the Secure Sockets Layer (SSL v2/v3) and Transport Layer Security (TLS v1) protocols, as well as a full-strength, general-purpose cryptography library	/usr/include/openssl/*
libtcl	The Tcl runtime library	/usr/include/tcl.h
liby.a	The yacc runtime library	Not applicable. Parsers that you generate with yacc have all the necessary definitions.
libz	A general-purpose data-compression library (Zlib)	zlib.h

Table 5-3. Libraries that are missing from Mac OS X

Fink package	Description	Home page
aalib	ASCII art library	http://aa-project.sourceforge.net/aalib
db3	Berkeley DB embedded database	http://www.sleepycat.com/
db4	Berkeley DB embedded database	http://www.sleepycat.com/
dlcompat	Dynamic loading compatibility library	http://fink.sourceforge.net
dtdparser	Java DTD Parser	http://www.wutka.com/dtdparser.html
expat	C library for parsing XML	http://expat.sf.net
fnlib	Font rendering library for X11	http://www.enlightenment.org/
freetype	TrueType font rendering library, version 1	http://www.freetype.org/
freetype2	TrueType font rendering library, version 2	http://www.freetype.org/
gc	General-purpose garbage collection library	http://www.hpl.hp.com/personal/Hans_Boehm/gc/
gd	Graphics generation library	http://www.boutell.com/gd/
gdal	Translator for raster geospatial data formats	http://www.remotesensing.org/gdal/
gdbm	GNU dbm	http://www.gnu.org
giflib	GIF image format handling library, LZW-enabled version	http://prtr-13.ucsc.edu/~badger/software/libungif/
glib	Low-level library that supports GTK+ and GNOME	http://www.gtk.org/
gmp	GNU multiple precision arithmetic library	http://www.swox.com/gmp/
gnomelibs	GNOME libraries	http://www.gnome.org
gnujaxp	Basic XML processing in Java	http://www.gnu.org/software/classpathx/jaxp
gtk	GTK+, the GIMP widget toolkit used by GNOME	http://www.gtk.org/
hermes	Optimized pixel format conversion library	http://www.clanlib.org/hermes/
imlib	General image handling library	http://www.enlightenment.org/pages/imlib2.html
libdivxdecore	OpenDivX codec	http://www.projectmayo.com/projects/detail.php?projectId=4
libdnet	Networking library	http://libdnet.sourceforge.net/
libdockapp	Library that eases the creation of WindowMaker Dock applets	ftp://shadowmere.student.utwente.nl/pub/WindowMaker/
libdv	Software decoder for DV format video	http://www.sourceforge.net/projects/libdv/
libfame	Fast Assembly Mpeg Encoding library	http://fame.sourceforge.net/
libghttp	HTTP client library	http://www.gnome.org/
libiconv	Character set conversion library	http://www.gnu.org/software/libiconv/
libiodbc	ODBC libraries	http://www.mysql.com/
libjconv	Japanese code conversion library	http://ghost.math.sci.hokudai.ac.jp/misc/libjconv/
libjpeg	JPEG image format handling library	http://www.ijg.org/
libmpeg	GIMP MPEG library	http://www.gimp.org
libmusicbrainz	Client library for the MusicBrainz CD Index	http://www.musicbrainz.org
libnasl	Nessus Attack Scripting Language	http://www.nessus.org/
libnessus	Libraries package for Nessus without SSL support	http://www.nessus.org/
libole2	Library for the OLE2 compound file format	http://www.gnome.org/
libpoll	System V poll(2) Emulation Library	http://fink.sourceforge.net
libproplist	Routines for string list handling	http://www.windowmaker.org/
libshout	Library for streaming to icecast	http://developer.icecast.org/libshout/
libsigc++	Callback system for widget libraries	http://developer.icecast.org/libshout/
libstroke	Translates mouse strokes to program commands	http://www.etla.net/libstroke/
libtiff	TIFF image format library	http://www.libtiff.org/
libungif	GIF image format handling library, LZW-free version	http://prtr-13.ucsc.edu/~badger/software/libungif/index.shtml
libunicode	Low-level Unicode processing library	http://www.sourceforge.net/projects/libunicode/
libwww	General-purpose Web API written in C for Unix and Windows	http://www.w3c.org/Library/Distribution.html
libxml	XML parsing library	http://www.gnome.org/
libxml++	C++ interface to the libxml2 XML parsing library	http://sourceforge.net/projects/libxmlplusplus/
libxml2	XML parsing library, version 2	http://www.xmlsoft.org/
libxpg4	Locale-enabling preload library	http://www.darwinfo.org/devlist.php3?number=9143
libxslt	XSLT library	http://www.xmlsoft.org/XSLT/
log4j	Library that helps the programmer output log statements to a variety of output targets	http://jakarta.apache.org/log4j
lzo	Real-time data compression library	http://www.oberhumer.com/opensource/lzo
neon	HTTP/WebDAV client library with a C API	http://www.webdav.org/neon/
netpbm	Graphics manipulation programs and libraries	http://netpbm.sourceforge.net
pcre	Perl Compatible Regular Expressions library	http://www.pcre.org
pdflib	A library for generating PDFs	http://www.pdflib.com/pdflib
pil	The Python Imaging Library; adds image-processing capabilities to Python	http://www.pythonware.com/products/pil
pilot-link	Palm libraries	http://www.pilot-link.org/
popt	Library for parsing command-line options	http://www.gnu.org/directory/popt.html
pth	Portable library that provides scheduling	http://www.gnu.org/software/pth/pth.html
readline	Terminal input library	http://cnswww.cns.cwru.edu/~chet/readline/rltop.html
slang	Embeddable extension language and console I/O library	http://space.mit.edu/~davis/slang/
stlport	ANSI C++ Standard Library implementation	http://www.stlport.org/

The list of available libraries is ever-growing, thanks to an influx of open source ports from FreeBSD and Linux. One of the best ways to keep on top of the latest ports is to install Fink (see Section 6.1 in Chapter 6), which lets you install precompiled versions of libraries and applications or install them from source.