I have confirmed that neither wx widgets, nor anything else that is put on the
host computer by the Mach4 installer uses the .NET framework.
As best I can tell, plug-in dependencies are:
Ethernet SmoothStepper - the actual plug-in does not seem to need .NET but the SCU
(system configuration utility) does use .NET but use of the SCU is optional
Darwin legacy parallel port driver - needs .NET
Vital Systems HiCON - the plug-in may run without .NET but the configuration utilities
and libraries to support extra APIs and expanded functions such as their internal
MACRO language and their Closed Loop system do need .NET
CS Labs MIO series - needs .NET
PoKEYs - as best I can tell, all PoKEYs devices need .NET for configuration and operation
PMDX SmartBOB series - does not need .NET
We chose not to use .NET because we wanted to be able to support alternate
operating systems in the future. There are no current plans to offer Mach4 on
Linux or OSX, so don't jump to conclusions here.
All Windows systems from Win 7 and later natively included the .NET framework, so
only XP users are actually affected by the need for .NET and it can be installed as
needed on XP.
Regards,
Steve Stallings
PMDX