Supporting Windows

[Magnate]

We've decided that we'd like to be a bit more systematic about supporting people trying to build on Windows, and clearer about what is and isn't supported. Most of the current devteam use linux (or Mac, which is unix-y) by default for hacking, building and playing - although we can cross-compile for Windows, and even test under WINE, it's not quite the same. The vague consensus among us is, perhaps not surprisingly, to standardise building for Windows using MinGW, MSYS and msysgit. This is a command-line-driven unix-like environment, hence the easiest for us to master and support. It's also how fizzix, who is essentially the one Windows-based member of the devteam, builds.

There are other options though. Blubaron uses Visual Studio, and so do some others. There's also DevC++ and Eclipse, which are both free.

Supporting GUIs is a much more difficult task than supporting a CLI approach, because it requires very careful descriptions (or screenshots) of exactly what to click, and different versions have subtle UI differences which will ruin careful guidance at a stroke. We would probably only be able to support one of these IDEs, and probably only with significant help from a new team member.

I guess what I'm asking is, how many people give a stuff about this? Those who have found a way of building their own versions in Windows would probably prefer to stick to what works for them. Is there anyone who would like help to build on Windows but can't, and would be prepared to use a CLI to do it? Or is there anyone who would like to evangelise about their preferred free Windows IDE to the extent of helping the devteam to help others?

[konijn_]

Greetings,

Sounds like a plan!

Please make sure then to remove the obsolete makefiles or replace their contents with a reference to the last version that is known to work with that makefile. Also please make sure to comment in the 1 windows make file what the required setup is and that it will not work cygwin.

T.

[Magnate]

Originally Posted by konijn_

Greetings,

Sounds like a plan!

Please make sure then to remove the obsolete makefiles or replace their contents with a reference to the last version that is known to work with that makefile. Also please make sure to comment in the 1 windows make file what the required setup is and that it will not work cygwin.

T.

Yes, tidying up the Makefiles is definitely part of the plan. I'd have thought it would be possible to come up with a MinGW build system that worked on both msys and cygwin, but perhaps that's too ambitious. From my last foray with cygwin it doesn't look like the subset of Angband players who build from source has much of an intersection with cygwin users anyway.

[PowerWyrm]

If you didn't know yet, I'm a Windows user and my variant has only been compatible with windows so far (because I'm completely ignorant of Unix/linux types of systems), though of course you can play it using WinE.

I'm using Borland C++ compiler to build my variant (got the v6, but you could also use the free v5.5 compiler that comes with the "free command line tools" package) with a makefile (for building) and bpr files (for debugging purposes). I find it very easy of use... a simple build.bat and binaries get built in the blink of an eye.