Re: [SIP-devel] next step: Windows porting

[Ricardo F. <rf...@gm...>]

Hi Zhang

>=20
>     I'm doing some hacking to simpletoolbox. Becauce I got disappointed
> with Mingw and MSYS, I decide to use native build tool on Windows.

Nice.. I would at least leave a comment on MinGW forums/lists, at
least for _their_ benefit. They are usually very responsive.

> I
> read some articles on web talking about the GNU build system(aka
> autoconf,automake,libtool) and its alternative such as
> CMake(www.cmake.org) and SCons(www.scons.org). The capability of
> cross-platform build of the later two is very impressive. Used in VXL
> project, CMake shoud be familiar to Ricardo.

That's cool. CMake is specially good for C++ code. The only issue with
it is to learn how to build a loadable module using it. Also, CMake
has poor documentation online AFAIK, the only complete and didatic doc
is the book, which you have to pay for. Anyways, my knowledge of CMake
is far less than autotools (yep, this is no excuse)..

What I like about Autotools is the flexibility a "configure.ac" script
offers for unix systems, since you can write any portable shell script
to test virtually anything. Animal is so portable: it works with _any_
ImageMagick version! Cmake can possibly do the same, but I really have
no knowledge how.. that would be a major effort.

>=20
>     I modify the SimpleToolbox today and use nmake( command line tools
> from Microsoft, also used by Scilab ) to build it. I succeed in
> generating libsimple.dll and loader.sce and installing them under the
> directory SCILAB/contrib automatically :-)

That's awesome.. did you actually load the toolbox and typed=20
soma(2,3) and got 5 ? :-)

>=20
> Now I want to liston to other developers' ideas and suggestions for
> further hacking.

Just a little piece of advice: under windows, it is more important to
make an installable binary than to make an easy-to-compile source.
Another advice: take note of your hacks :)

>     How can I put a *toolbox* button on the panel of Scilab? What files
> shall I have to add under the directory SCILAB/contrib/simple? Now there
> are only two files(libsimple.dll and loader.sce) in that folder.

Put a dummy empty builder.sce in there too.

good luck,
--=20
Ricardo Fabbri

PhD Student in Computer Engineering / Computer Vision
LEMS - Laboratory for Engineering Man-Machine Systems
Brown University, USA