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2.4.4 Windows using Cygwin

Originally written by Philip Wyett philipwyett@blueyonder.co.uk. Last updated 20 May 2007.

These instructions are for building Crystal Space with Cygwin a GNU compiler for Windows created by Red Hat Inc. and other third party contributors.

A Warning About Cygwin

A full or extensive Cygwin installation can take up alot of hard disk space. Please be careful if installing on low free space disks. A typical install can be around 400MB and large above 700MB. Note, however, that a full installation of Cygwin is not required for building Crystal Space. It is possible to get by with a fairly minimal installation consisting of the GCC compiler and linker suite and related tools, and several support libraries as discussed below.

Obtaining Cygwin

Cygwin uses a custom setup application for installation of Cygwin which can be obtained from their official website.

http://www.cygwin.com/

The installation program ‘setup.exe’ must be downloaded to your computer.

http://www.cygwin.com/setup.exe

Installing Cygwin

First, go to the location where you downloaded the Cygwin ‘setup.exe’. It is suggested that you download it into a directory of its own since it will place additional files in that directory later on when it downloads the actual Cygwin packages.

build/platform/win32/cygwin/cygshot1

Launch ‘setup.exe’ to begin the installation process.

You will first be prompted with a Cygwin welcome dialog. It provides basic information about the setup program, such as its version number.

build/platform/win32/cygwin/cygshot2

Click on the Next button to continue.

The next dialog you will see is the Choose a Download Source dialog. Here you need to choose if you wish to download and install directly from the internet or download to your system so you can install it later. Cygwin can install, uninstall, and update using this program. So, the decision is whether or not you want to download and keep the downloaded files around in order to avoid a large download at a later date if you re-install. If you have a fast Internet connection, then you can download and install directly without saving the packages to your disk drive. This is a matter of personal preference.

build/platform/win32/cygwin/cygshot3

After deciding, click on the Next button to continue.

Note: For the purposes of this discussion, it is assumed that you are installing directly from the Internet.

The next dialog you will see is the Select Root Install Directory dialog. The first thing to choose is the location of where Cygwin should be installed. It is suggested that you install in a directory named ‘cygwin’ at the location of your choice. Point the installer at that directory.

The next thing to decide, if you are a system administrator, is if you want any other users of that computer to have access to Cygwin. Also you are asked if you wish to use DOS text file line-ending format (CR/LF) or Unix format (LF). This is all a matter of preference for the user. If you are a pure Windows users it is suggested that you choose the DOS option. However, if you might move files to a Unix machine, for instance, it could be favorable to use the Unix option.

build/platform/win32/cygwin/cygshot4

After deciding upon a root install location and other options, click on the Next button to continue.

The next dialog you will see is the Select Local Package Directory dialog. This directory is corresponds to the location where you placed the Cygwin ‘setup.exe’ program.

build/platform/win32/cygwin/cygshot5

If they correspond, click on the Next button to continue.

The next dialog is the Select Your Internet Connection dialog. This lets you specify the type of connection you have. Most of the time it will be a Direct Connection. However, if you access the Internet via proxy server, then select that option and enter the necessary information.

build/platform/win32/cygwin/cygshot6

After choosing your internet connection type, click on the Next button to continue.

The next dialog you will see is the Choose A Download Site dialog. Choose a download location in or as close to your own geographical location as possible.

build/platform/win32/cygwin/cygshot7

After choosing the closest download site, click on the Next button to continue.

The next dialog is the Select Packages To Install dialog. This shows a tree with selectable packages in the branches. If you have sufficient disk space and a high-speed Internet connection, you may wish to install the majority of the tools. On the other hand, if you want to install only a minimum set of tools, choose the packages in the Devel branch and, at a minimum, jpeg, libpng, opengl, python, w32api, and zlib from the Libs branch.

build/platform/win32/cygwin/cygshot8

Note: You do not need to install the Apache server, XFree or Games packages. Also if you miss anything first time round you can simply repeat the install process and install the package(s) you missed.

Important: The above Select Packages To Install section is subject to change as Cygwin makes additional packages available.

After choosing the packages for installing, click on the Next button to continue.

At this point the installer will download and install the selected packages and perform post build steps, such as the generation of documentation, etc.

The next dialog is the Create Icons dialog. If you are performing a fresh install and want these icons, then check the boxes. If you are updating you need not check the boxes if you already have the icons.

build/platform/win32/cygwin/cygshot9

After making your selection, click on the Finish button to continue.

After all this, you will be prompted with a dialog to tell you that the installation is complete. Click on the Ok button to finish the installation process.

Using “cs-win32libs”

It is recommended to use the “cs-win32libs” package to obtain the required and optional third-party libraries needed to build Crystal Space. See cs-win32libs.

Crystal Space can also be built using some of the libraries from Cygwin (basic libraries like ‘zlib’, ‘libpng’, ...) and/or custom-built third party libraries. However you need to take into account that Crystal Space is by default built using the ‘-mno-cygwin’ flag; you must either built Crystal Space without that flag or build the third party libraries accordingly. See the ‘configure’ help for details on how to disable the flag.

You may want to select “Cygwin typical” in the “Select Components” screen when installing ‘cs-win32libs’. You can further adjust the selection of installed components depending upon your actual set up (e.g. install MinGW-related components if you plan to also use CrystalSpace with MinGW/MSYS).

After the installation, if you opted to set up support for the Cygwin development environment, the Cygwin shell startup file will be augmented so a helper script named ‘cslibs-config’ can be found when configuring Crystal Space. The Crystal Space configure script queries ‘cslibs-config’ to determine where the ‘cs-win32libs’ resources are located.

Building Crystal Space

Crystal Space can be built with either ‘make’ or Jam (see GettingJam). Both tools work equally well. The ‘cs-win32libs’ package contains a pre-built version of Jam which you can invoke simply by typing ‘jam’ at the Cygwin Bash prompt. These instructions assume you have installed the “cs-win32libs” and are using ‘jam’. However, if you don't, you can substitute ‘make -k’ wherever ‘jam’ is used in the examples below.

Open a Cygwin Bash prompt via the desktop shortcut or the via item in the Programs menu. Navigate to the ‘CS/’ directory and issue the following commands:

 
./configure
jam all

Alternately, if you wish to use Jam to build the project:

 
./configure
make -k all

The ‘-k’ option used in the ‘make -k all’ command instructs the project builder to ignore errors and continue compiling regardless. This can be useful in cases when localized errors appear in the project since often they affect only a single module.

If you prefer to build a debug version of Crystal Space, substitute the following commands for those shown above:

 
./configure --enable-debug
jam

If the Crystal Space source directory is read-only, if it is shared between several developers, or if you simply dislike building a project within its source tree, you can instead configure and build from a different directory. For instance:

 
mkdir $HOME/builddir
cd $HOME/builddir
/path/to/CS/configure --enable-debug
jam

Finally, if you want to utilize Crystal Space as a software development kit (SDK), you can install it and then clean up the detritus of the build process:

 
jam install
jam distclean

Additional Build Options

Sometimes it is a good idea to remove all of the built programs and executable files and start from scratch. You can do this with the following commands:

 
jam clean
jam

Once in a while it is even a good idea to completely clean and re-configure the project. This may be required if you are using the bleeding-edge version of Crystal Space from the SVN repository after some radical change.

 
jam distclean
./configure
jam

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