Installed versions of pango and cairo are (copied straight from macports):
  pango @1.16.5_0
  pango @1.20.2_0+no_x11
  pango @1.20.3_0+no_x11 (active)
  cairo @1.6.4_0+no_x11
  cairo @1.6.4_1+macosx+no_x11 (active)
As you can see, both of the active versions for cairo and pango have X11 disabled. I followed the instructions from http://www.inkscape.org/wiki/index.php/CompilingMacOsX
under the "Compiling Inkscape with native GTK using MacPorts [experimental]" heading to the best of my ability.
--
Matthew Peterson
Programmer
Christa McAuliffe Space Education Center

On Fri, Jun 27, 2008 at 1:22 AM, jiho <jo.irisson@...400...> wrote:
On Sun, Jun 22, 2008 at 12:02 AM, Bob Jamison <rwjj@...127...> wrote:
> I asked around, and nobody knew.  What I would suggest, is that you
> try visiting irc.gnome.org, in the "#gtk+" channel.  Since the native OSX
> gtk port is still in development, this might be something that they
> would need
> to see.  At any rate, that is where the experts in this area lurk.
> Matt Peterson wrote:
>> Putting that line into Inkscape didn't seem to help, although inkscape
>> is getting the change. I think it might be a problem with pango. The
>> errors I am getting are:
>>
>> (inkscape:19764): Pango-WARNING **: Error loading GDEF table 28333
>>
>> (inkscape:19764): Pango-WARNING **: Error loading GSUB table 28333
>>
>> (inkscape:19764): Pango-WARNING **: Error loading GPOS table 28333
>>
>> (inkscape:19764): Gtk-CRITICAL **: gtk_widget_show_all: assertion
>> `GTK_IS_WIDGET (widget)' failed
>>
>> (inkscape:19764): Gtk-CRITICAL **: gtk_box_pack_start: assertion
>> `GTK_IS_WIDGET (child)' failed
>>
>> (inkscape:19764): Gtk-CRITICAL **: gtk_widget_show_all: assertion
>> `GTK_IS_WIDGET (widget)' failed
>>
>> (inkscape:19764): GLib-GObject-CRITICAL **: g_object_ref: assertion
>> `object->ref_count > 0' failed
>>
>> (inkscape:19764): Pango-WARNING **: Error loading GDEF table 28333
>>
>> (inkscape:19764): Pango-WARNING **: Error loading GSUB table 28333
>>
>> (inkscape:19764): Pango-WARNING **: Error loading GPOS table 28333
>>
>> (inkscape:19764): GLib-GObject-CRITICAL **: g_object_ref: assertion
>> `object->ref_count > 0' failed
>>
>> (inkscape:19764): Pango-WARNING **: Error loading GDEF table 28333
>>
>> (inkscape:19764): Pango-WARNING **: Error loading GSUB table 28333
>>
>> (inkscape:19764): Pango-WARNING **: Error loading GPOS table 28333
>>
>> (inkscape:19764): Pango-WARNING **: Error loading GDEF table 28333
>>
>> (inkscape:19764): Pango-WARNING **: Error loading GSUB table 28333
>>
>> (inkscape:19764): Pango-WARNING **: Error loading GPOS table 28333
>>
>> ** (inkscape:19764): CRITICAL **: gdouble
>> sp_document_height(SPDocument*): assertion `document->root != NULL' failed
>>
>> (inkscape:19764): Pango-WARNING **: Error loading GDEF table 28333
>>
>> (inkscape:19764): Pango-WARNING **: Error loading GSUB table 28333
>>
>> (inkscape:19764): Pango-WARNING **: Error loading GPOS table 28333
>>
>> (inkscape:19764): Pango-WARNING **: shaping failure, expect ugly
>> output. shape-engine='BasicEngineFc', font='Lucida Grande 12', text=' '
>>
>> (inkscape:19764): Pango-WARNING **: shaping failure, expect ugly
>> output. shape-engine='BasicEngineFc', font='Lucida Grande 6.34765625',
>> text='5'
>>
>> (inkscape:19764): Pango-WARNING **: shaping failure, expect ugly
>> output. shape-engine='BasicEngineFc', font='Bitstream Vera Sans Mono
>> 12.5', text='?'
>>
>> (inkscape:19764): Pango-WARNING **: shaping failure, expect ugly
>> output. shape-engine='BasicEngineFc', font='Lucida Grande 15',
>> text='No objects selected. Click, Shift+click, or drag around objects
>> to select.'
>>
>> Seems to me that pango isn't reading the font files right.

These issues are indeed caused by Pango and the problem does not come
from note having bitstream vera sans (BTW, switching to Deja Vu sans
as the default would be a wise move since most new distros are using
this new version of the Bitstream fonts).

If I remember well, the problem, for me, was that Pango was build by
MacPorts with an X environement in mind while, obviously, the rest is
X-free (no pun intended). So look for a no_x11 variant of Pango, or
something similar. Basically it must remove dependencies on X and
freetype and use Cairo to render the fonts. When Cairo is compiled
natively, it ultimately removes any dependency on X11.
The other possible issue is that font stuff changed recently in Cairo
and Pango and that some environement variables names related to fonts
may be different between the two. Which versions does MacPorts gives
you on your G4 on 10.4?

I'll look a bit more into this when I am on my main machine.

JiHO
http://jo.irisson.free.fr/