Uh, "endianess issues"? What are those, and how bad will they be?

The "issues" part comes when you want to move data from one system to another, say, when you transfer a word processing file from a BeOS/PPC system to a BeOS/Intel system, or even to a Windows/Intel system. Because the processor's endianess changes, the data could be (though not necessarily will be) unreadable.

Fortunately, endianess issues are well understood, and well-written software takes it into account. For developers who have already thought about the problem (and there are plenty of textbooks with the answer), it shouldn't be a stumbling block.

Be has included a number of functions for doing byte-swapping, etc., which are commonly used in writing endian-neutral code, and we've written several Newsletter articles about the issue:

YABSA -- Yet Another Byte-swapping Article, By Bradley Taylor
http://www.be.com/aboutbe/benewsletter/Issue99.html#Insight

Will Your DATA Look Like ATAD?, By Bradley Taylor
http://www.be.com/aboutbe/benewsletter/Issue63.html#Insight

Be Inc.'s "Swapping Bytes, Part III", By Peter Potrebic
http://www.be.com/aboutbe/benewsletter/volume_II/Issue8.html#Insight