### ----------------------------------------------------
### -- MacOS::NativeLib
### -- Licenses: Artistic-2.0
### -- Authors: Elizabeth Mattijsen
### -- File: README.md
### ----------------------------------------------------
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NAME
====

MacOS::NativeLib - Make native libs reachable on MacOS

SYNOPSIS
========

```raku
use MacOS::NativeLib 'gd';  # make all versions of GD libraries accessible
use GD::Raw;                # load raw GD support
```

DESCRIPTION
===========

MacOS has built-in security features that disallow loading native libraries unless they are in a trusted location, or if they are symlinked from a trusted location.

The most common way to install native libraries on MacOS is by using `HomeBrew` with the `brew install` command. The location at which these libraries are installed, are however **NOT** trusted by MacOS.

This module allows one to specify one or more library names that should be made reachable in the `use` statement. A symlink will then be installed if there is none already.

Library names can be specified with or without the "lib" prefix, so `"gd"` and `"libgd"` would produce the same result. By default, **all** versions of a native library will be made available. You can limit to a specific version by specifying a more specific name, e.g. `"gd.3"` to only make version **3** of the GD library available.

You can have all libraries installed by HomeBrew linked automatically by specifying `"*"` or `*` (aka `Whatever`), although this may not be a wise decision from a security point of view.

If this module is loaded on any OS other than MacOS, it is simply a no-op.

Any errors will be shown on STDERR, but will **NOT** interrupt the further execution, so that any module actually depending on the reachability of a native library can use its own checks and error reporting.

AS AN OPTIONAL DEPENDENCY
=========================

If a module author does not want to create a hard dependency on this module, it is quite easy to make it an optional dependency in the code, by wrapping the `use` statement in a `try` / `EVAL` combo:

```raku
try 'use MacOS::NativeLib <gd>'.EVAL;
```

SCRIPTS
=======

ensure-symlink-for
------------------

    $ ensure-symlink-for gd

This module also installs a command-line interface called `ensure-symlink-for`. It takes the same arguments as in the `use` statement, and will install the necessary symlinks if they did not exist yet.

AUTHOR
======

Elizabeth Mattijsen <liz@raku.rocks>

Source can be located at: https://github.com/lizmat/MacOS-NativeLib . Comments and Pull Requests are welcome.

If you like this module, or what I’m doing more generally, committing to a [small sponsorship](https://github.com/sponsors/lizmat/) would mean a great deal to me!

COPYRIGHT AND LICENSE
=====================

Copyright 2024, 2025 Elizabeth Mattijsen

This library is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the Artistic License 2.0.



