getting started on OSX

[cinereaste]

Does anyone have experience with compiling Angband on OSX?

I would love to download the code, have a look at it, and compile it on my own machine. I have some C experience, but not with a project of this magnitude. For instance, I've never retrieved code from an SVN repository. I see that andrewdoull wrote an excellent guide to getting started on a Windows machine. If I install Eclipse on OSX, will the same steps work? Would other Mac programmers recommend XCode instead?

[d_m]

Does anyone have experience with compiling Angband on OSX?

I would love to download the code, have a look at it, and compile it on my own machine. I have some C experience, but not with a project of this magnitude. For instance, I've never retrieved code from an SVN repository. I see that andrewdoull wrote an excellent guide to getting started on a Windows machine. If I install Eclipse on OSX, will the same steps work? Would other Mac programmers recommend XCode instead?

I have a Mac that I use, although I actually just use a text editor and the makefiles. I think I have built Angband.app before but I usually don't do that... I just build an angband executable and then play in a terminal (angband -mgcu) or in X11 (angband -mx11).

If I get a chance sometime soon I will try to do that again and write a guide. Pete Mack may already have something like this ready--I think he's done a lot of the Mac development in the past.

If you want basic unix instructions for getting the code, it would be something like this:

# check out "trunk" (aka HEAD aka current development version) to DIRNAME
svn co svn://rephial.org/angband/trunk DIRNAME
cd DIRNAME

# create configure script
./autogen.sh

# configure angband to install to SANDBOX location
mkdir SANDBOX
./configure --prefix SANDBOX

# build
make

# install to SANDBOX
make install

# run angband
SANDBOX/games/angband

That is from memory but I'm pretty sure it's correct, I do it all the time. I really recommend having a special sandbox to install to... so you can have a stable/packaged version installed and also have your own custom set up.

[Derakon]

Modern Angband compiles to an OSX-standard application just fine. You'll need the Angband source code, the OSX Developer Kit (available from Apple), and Terminal. Just cd into the src directory and run "make -f Makefile.osx", and it'll make Angband.app for you.

Now, compiling old variants is another matter entirely...

[cinereaste]

Thank you, d_m. I successfully retrieved things from svn. autogen.sh failed, however, with this error:

./autogen.sh
*info* running aclocal
./autogen.sh: line 38: aclocal: command not found
*error* aclocal failed. (exit code = 127)

My first guess is that I need to adjust the PATH variable. I'll take a closer look at this tomorrow if I have time.

[Derakon]

You shouldn't need to mess with configuration at all. Just use the OSX Makefile.

[cinereaste]

So you're saying skip the ./autogen.sh and ./configure --prefix SANDBOX steps and proceed directly to make? I can give that a try.

[d_m]

I think Derakon is right... the OSX Makefile works differently than the default unix one.

[takkaria]

So you're saying skip the ./autogen.sh and ./configure --prefix SANDBOX steps and proceed directly to make? I can give that a try.

Yup, just cd src; make -f Makefile.osx. Works like magic.

[cinereaste]

Thank you d_m, Derakon, and takkaria! With your guidance that was way easier than I imagined it would be. Now to start tinkering . . .