Building on Linux

[ibisum]

Understood!  I will also look at it in my spare time ..   :)



I guess I just wonder if anyone else out there in moai-land is using linux, or if its mostly just osx/windows users in this crowd, so far .. seems really viable to me, the way Lua is used in this framework, could be a good way to build a new Linux distro, also, I think ..

[sixman9]

Hi all,
I'd like to offer links to some promising-looking cmake-build-file-generating tools which should, hopefully, speed up the delivery of a Linux build of Moai, considerably. I found 2 tools which are:

1. ProjectGenerator, formerly CmakeGenerator (Windows/Linux) – by Dinand Vanvelzen (http://www.VanvelzenSoftware.com): The ProjectGenerator code itself is contained within the 'trunk/tools/ProjectGenerator' directory of the GUCEF project at SourceForge, however [I believe] you need the all of the GUCEF project to build it (svn co https://gucef.svn.sourceforge.net/svnroot/gucef gucef (view svn))

2. gencmake (ruby) – KDE Project (svn://anonsvn.kde.org/home/kde/trunk/KD ... s/gencmake (view svn))

Although I'm writing this from a MacBook myself, I very much like the idea of having a Linux build of Moai. One thing I'm not overly blessed with, right now, is time, so I'm putting this info out there in the hope someone might make use of it.

Cheers

Rich

[todd]

Thanks Rich - good pointers.

[Liberator]

1. ProjectGenerator, formerly CmakeGenerator (Windows/Linux) – by Dinand Vanvelzen (http://www.VanvelzenSoftware.com): The ProjectGenerator code itself is contained within the 'trunk/tools/ProjectGenerator' directory of the GUCEF project at SourceForge, however [I believe] you need the all of the GUCEF project to build it (svn co https://gucef.svn.sourceforge.net/svnroot/gucef gucef (view svn))

Rich

Hi,

I'm the developer of the ProjectGenerator tool. I gave Rich some feedback on Friday by e-mail. It is part of the GUCEF archive and uses some of its modules but only basic ones. It should be easy to build and use. In the projects folder of my archive you can find scripts to generate project files (solution in VC terms) for different development environments. I like Linux myself but I also like the convenience of just clicking a executable to get things done. As such you should be able to run these scripts without having to run any magical console commands. Just make sure you set the executable bit on the scripts (*.sh on Linux) so you can just run them by double-clicking them. I myself use Ubuntu exclusively for Linux related activities.

Note that There are some pre-built binaries as well in the archive but they might lag behind a bit at times. Building from source obviously gives you the latest version of my tool plus the other modules.

The ProjectGenerator can output an XML dump of all info gathered and Android makefiles and CMake module files. Note that for CMake I mention module files not project files. It will do all the tedious work for you in adding headers and what not to your files for a gazillion source files. It however cannot do the central script file which runs the build. This is the CMakeList.txt you can find in the root of my archive. That one is hand-made (I borrowed its guts from a version people at Ogre3D made). There simply is no way to automate that part since it completely depends on how you wish to run your build and involves all sorts of scripting logic. You can just copy those files from my archive and then tweak them though they are usually hardly ever changed, its the module files that change.

- Cheers
Dinand Vanvelzen (aka Liberator)

[sixman9]

If CMake seems like a little overkill (due to the setting-up), maybe we could come at it from another angle. I found this:

sln2mak

It will take a Visual Studio solution (.sln) file and turn it into *nix makefiles. Looks likes sln2mak is Windows only (requires a few Microsoft assemblies, I tried to compile it on my Mac using Mono). When I get to a Windows box, I'll try to convert Moai's Visual Studio solution(s) into Makefiles, unless someone else here does it first .

BTW, there maybe other build file conversion paths hanging about out there, one of them could be pbtomake. 'pbtomake' says it can convert XCode xcodeproj/pbproj files to Makefiles (however, it maybe outdated).

Cheers

Rich

[Liberator]

You would still be stuck having to maintain project files for multiple platforms. The only painpoint of a unified solution is the initial setup after that it is easy going.

[o0k4m1]

Any news on native linux version?

I need to use moai for my university project soon and I would like to develop in linux environment. But I failed to find any info on how to do this. I tried to build linux host too, but cmake files were missing. Bjorn version didnt compile well too, and it's old.

Hope to hear from you soon, thanks for the answer.

[sean]

We're still hoping to officially support linux by the time we release 1.0 of the SDK (timeframe TBD, but weeks, not months).

[framp]

I'm interested in this too.

Are there particular problems which need to be solved or is it "just" a matter of writing a makefile?

[ibisum]

I think its just a matter of writing the CMakeFile for Linux .. Linux was supported once, and it seems obvious that if OSX can be supported, so too can Linux, but it appears that nobody who can do the work, has the time to do it yet ..

[stick]

Yes, Linux support would be much appreciated!

I tried to build it manually by writing own CMakeFiles.txt, but failed in overall. I might be able to help with smaller tasks, though.

[sixman9]

Nothing to see here....was contemplating using GYP, not working.......

[pip010]

in fact there is more to see: https://github.com/bjorn/moai-beta/
there "was" a CMakeFile, which for some reason is not in moai-dev nor moai-beta !
after following on : https://github.com/moai/moai-beta/pull/1
granted the code code patch is thereit should be just matter of cmake maintenance.
maybe an XML- XSLT transformation from VS .sln to cmake will do a perfect job since VS msbuild files will be maintained.

[stick]

in fact there is more to see: https://github.com/bjorn/moai-beta/
there "was" a CMakeFile, which for some reason is not in moai-dev nor moai-beta !
after following on : https://github.com/moai/moai-beta/pull/1
granted the code code patch is thereit should be just matter of cmake maintenance.
maybe an XML- XSLT transformation from VS .sln to cmake will do a perfect job since VS msbuild files will be maintained.

The CMake files you mention are really old (9 months+). Lots of code has changed since then (files added/removed), so it's almost unusable now (I checked it few weeks ago). A proper way would be to have CMake definitions and generate .sln files from there, not the other way around.

[ibisum]

Honestly, I think its sort of a downer that this is not being given a higher priority. MOAI has a chance to really establish itself in the Linux app-store scene, which is another gold-mine opening up now with new releases from Ubuntu and Mint and so on.

Linux-support should be a priority - this is nothing but a growth market, and Linux gamers have proven their willingness to pay even more than their Windows/OSX counterparts when it comes to supporting independent developers who make the effort to target Linux as a platform. This lack of coherent support in parallel with the other platforms is, honestly, a bit of a bummer, because it appears there is little good reason for the stale nature of the Linux makefiles other than that someone, somewhere, wrongly decided its not worth the effort to keep things in parity.

[thebullno1]

Honestly, I think its sort of a downer that this is not being given a higher priority. MOAI has a chance to really establish itself in the Linux app-store scene, which is another gold-mine opening up now with new releases from Ubuntu and Mint and so on.

Linux-support should be a priority - this is nothing but a growth market, and Linux gamers have proven their willingness to pay even more than their Windows/OSX counterparts when it comes to supporting independent developers who make the effort to target Linux as a platform. This lack of coherent support in parallel with the other platforms is, honestly, a bit of a bummer, because it appears there is little good reason for the stale nature of the Linux makefiles other than that someone, somewhere, wrongly decided its not worth the effort to keep things in parity.

I believe Moai is primarily intended to be a mobile engine and Linux support is removed due to the sheer number of build system that this project must support.

Can you give me the source of your claim: "Linux gamers have proven their willingness to pay even more than their Windows/OSX counterparts when it comes to supporting independent developers who make the effort to target Linux as a platform"? Because I can't believe it is the case. Last time I checked the Humble Indie bundle sale statistics, most of the purchases come from Windows users.

Moreover, this is an open source project. Folks at Zipline Game have their priority (which I think is mobile). If you want Linux support, get your hands dirty

[evgeni.i.petrov]

MSBuild project transform to CMake files is the best option.

[ibisum]

thebullno1: Per http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Humble_Indie_Bundle Linux users proved most generous. Thats what I'm talking about. Most purchases came from Windows, but Linux users paid more - by choice.

[evgeni.i.petrov]

I think the issue is more of developers using Linux as development platform We all know Windows is king for PC gaming but mac and linux support, if easy (MOAI), will add profit rather than loss to your project.

[sixman9]

MSBuild project transform to CMake files is the best option.

Have a look at http://www.sourceforge.net/projects/vcproj2cmake.

Being a lazy programmer (ssshhhh), I'm averse to doing something by hand if I don't have to, especially when I've got a computer, Google and the Open Source community at my finger tips (others call this 'promoting re-use' ).

On my travels I've come across various project translations tools, take a look at my post over at StackOverflow for a list of them.

Cheers

Rich