[vtkusers] Mac OSX stuck between 4.2 and 4.4

[Martin Costabel]

I would appreciate help or any ideas about the following dilemma:

There is a vtk package in Fink, based on the 4.2 release, that works 
with X11 and is doing more or less OK for the C++ and Tcl/Tk interfaces. 
I am using it to build and run HiVision, a scientific visualization 
platform http://www.hiflow.de/HiVision/ . I am the Fink maintainer of 
both the vtk and the hivision packages.

The Python wrapper does not work in this version of VTK, and I have 
learned that for a working Python wrapper on OSX 10.3, one needs at 
least VTK version 4.4. This would be needed for MayaVi, for example.

In fact, I have made Fink packages for vtk-4.4, based on a recent CVS 
snapshot, and for mayavi-1.3, using X11 and Fink's python-2.3. These 
seem to be working OK, but I cannot release them into Fink, because 
vtk-4.4 breaks hivision, due to the incompatible API changes in vtk-4.4.

HiVision does not work with the new API changes, mainly the 
float->double change, but there are probably other incompatibilities. 
HiVision is not going to use the new API as long as the latest released 
version of VTK is 4.2.

So the MacOSX users of VTK are stuck in an uncomfortable place between 
VTK versions 4.2 and 4.4. I would like to see any ideas about the 
following three questions:

1. Is there a possibility to backport the python wrapper fixes for OSX 
10.3 and python 2.3 from VTK-4.4 to VTK-4.2? Right now, since these 
fixes were applied in CVS after the float->double change and after the 
introduction of the "KIT" business, I don't see an easy way for such a 
backport.

2. If 1. is impossible, is there a kind of "compatibility kit" that lets 
applications written for VTK-4.2 compile with 4.4?

2. If 2. is impossible, too, is there a way to have two different 
versions of VTK coexist peacefully? Unfortunately, the cmake build 
system does not create version numbers for dynamic libraries like 
libtool does. Plus, there are a lot of python modules that seem to need 
to live in unversioned vtk_python or similar directories, so that I 
don't see how one could have two versions of vtk simultaneously.

Any help appreciated
-- 
Martin