C++ users

(William Andrew Johnson <willij6_at_u.washington.edu>)

I found this really helpful, for doing the project in C++.
http://people.sc.fsu.edu/~burkardt/cpp_src/ppmb_io/ppmb_io.html

Java users on OS X.

(Contributed by Jim George <jimg_at_cs.washington.edu>)

import javax.media.jai.JAI;
import javax.media.jai.PlanarImage;
import com.sun.media.jai.codec.FileSeekableStream;
InputStream image = new FileSeekableStream(imagePath);
ParameterBlock pb = new ParameterBlock();
pb.add(image);
PlanarImage imageOp = (PlanarImage)JAI.create("PNM", pb);
BufferedImage inputImage = imageOp.getAsBufferedImage();

These libraries come native on OS X. Looks like other builds need to download
them...this page may have them

https://jai.dev.java.net/binary-builds.html