[Bf-committers] MSVC7 users rejoice!

[Jacques Beaurain]

On Wed, 09 Feb 2005 10:21:51 -0500, Joseph Gilbert <models at paposo.com> wrote:
> Jacques Beaurain wrote:
> 
> >Hi Ton,
> >
> >I have an idea that I'm working on that would enable me to generate
> >the VC7 files using the scons files and a python script. The vcproj
> >files are just XML with a fairly simple format. I will try to get it
> >done quickly and will happily accept the job of maintaining VC7 builds
> >once it works.
> >
> >Jacques
> >
> >Jacques
> >On Wed, 9 Feb 2005 12:27:20 +0100, Ton Roosendaal <ton at blender.org> wrote:
> >
> >
> >>Hi,
> >>
> >>We need a new official maintainer of the VC7 files.
> >>Joseph; you got cvs access already, isn't this a nice job for you? :)
> >>
> >>-Ton-
> >>
> >>On 9 Feb, 2005, at 12:00, Jacques Beaurain wrote:
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>>I too feel your pain.
> >>>
> >>>I recommend using scons for building using MSVC7 and just use the
> >>>project files for browsing the sources. You will still be able to
> >>>debug using the IDE etc. because the scons build does the same as the
> >>>vcproj compiles would (or should ;)
> >>>
> >>>Here are some pending tracker items you may want to read (and obtain
> >>>patches from) to get the scons build going for you.
> >>>
> >>>http://projects.blender.org/tracker/index.php?
> >>>func=detail&aid=2130&group_id=9&atid=125
> >>>http://projects.blender.org/tracker/index.php?
> >>>func=detail&aid=2131&group_id=9&atid=125
> >>>
> >>>I just posted another patch in #2131 against the current CVS build
> >>>that also includes the patch for #2130 in case there is any problems
> >>>applying the earlier patches.
> >>>
> >>>Also, you may want to look at my earlier post (today) about ftgl and
> >>>MAC encodings to get your build going.
> >>>
> >>>Cheers,
> >>>Jacques
> >>>_______________________________________________
> >>>Bf-committers mailing list
> >>>Bf-committers at projects.blender.org
> >>>http://projects.blender.org/mailman/listinfo/bf-committers
> >>>
> >>>
> >>>
> >>>
> >>------------------------------------------------------------------------
> >>--
> >>Ton Roosendaal  Blender Foundation ton at blender.org
> >>http://www.blender.org
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >_______________________________________________
> >Bf-committers mailing list
> >Bf-committers at projects.blender.org
> >http://projects.blender.org/mailman/listinfo/bf-committers
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> I love this idea. I was thinking about something similar myself. One of
> the biggest problems with the build process is that we have so many it's
> hard for everyone to remember to change them all (Or even know how to do
> it in the case of the windows specific build files). I think it would be
> great to see a script (possibly pythonish) generate the VC6/VC7/Scons
> files. (Dont know about the make files - most of that is updating
> dependencies). That way a single update to an XML file would be
> sufficient to update the project. Then as part of the pre-build you
> could generate the build files from XML. (Am I dreaming a pipe dream here?)
> 

Here is my big thank you!.

Finally the MSVC7 projects get a much needed update. And thank you for
applying the Python debug patch too.

Just to let you know what happened to my attempts to autogenerate the
files. I made a bit of progress using XML generation using Xalan to
parse XSLT files that takes generic XML files (describing project
names, files etc.) My plan was to generate the generic XML files by
plugging some Python fuctions into the scons scripts. These functions
would also scan the local directories for headers and add them to the
generated XML. The headers are useful in the project files for class,
structure and general definition browsing in the IDE.

After that a simple batch would be run on the XML that spits out sln
and vcproj (and possibly dsp and dsw) files at the version that you
specify. It would do this by switching XLS templates that "styles" the
XML files into the chosen project file formats.

Before I really started having any real successes I discovered
something this weekend that made me abandon that approach. What I
found is called MPC (free open source, written in Perl) and it can be
found here:

http://www.ociweb.com/product/mpc/ 

I am reading the following at the moment and will redirect my efforts
to this from now on, I really think this looks promising for realising
those pipe dreams;):

http://download.ociweb.com/TAO-1.3a/TAO1.3aMakeProjectCreator.pdf

The format of the files looks simple enough to update and maintain by
people on other platforms and system when they need to add new files.
I may even try to generate them using scons as I originally planned.
The other option (and possibly even better) would be to use the
automatical source finding features of MPC instead. The only
requirement for that is that any sources that should not be compiled
(I think old sources in physics stuff is an example). I'll keep you
posted..

Cheers,
Jacques