page jumps: preamble -|- folders -|- build -|- runtime -|- downloads -|- quick start -|- missing items -|- end
2007-03-18 - It has already been about four(4) months since I last built FlightGear from scratch - my how time flies ;=)) Last page update 2007-04.20.
FlightGear depends on a considerable number of other 'libraries', which must be downloaded, and built first, then FG source and base data. Where possible, I tend to use the CVS (or SVN) development sources. And I tend to use the COMMAND LINE versions of these tools, since this facilitates the construction of a single batch file to update all the sources at one time.
CVS - Concurrent Versions System - I have zipped (MD5: 58a6ae5eb66eb1641e441f9e86d5a791) my client version 1.11.17, Copyright (c) 1989-2004 Brian Berliner, david d `zoo' zuhn, Jeff Polk, and other authors. CVS may be copied and used only under the terms of the GNU General Public License. At - http://ftp.gnu.org/non-gnu/cvs/binary/stable/x86-woe/ - later versions can be found, up to cvs-1-11-22.zip 10-Jun-2006 ... There are also several GUI version available, but I have never tried these.
SVN - Subversion - This is available from - http://subversion.tigris.org/ - I downloaded svn-1.4.0-setup.exe which does a nice windows setup, including automatically adding a path to the svn.exe, so it was all easy. I note there is a later svn-1.4.3-setup.exe, or you can download one of the zip files, and do your own setup. You may have to right mouse click, and use 'Save Target As...' to download these files in windows.
The link were valid at the time of this pages creation. In no particular order these are :- openal, freeglut, PLIB, OpenSceneGraph, OpenThreads, zlib, simgear, pthreads (optional), and flightgear source and base data -
With all the above sources, (and data) downloaded, you are ready to begin a build, first of the dependant libraries, and then FlightGear itself ...
I place all these source in a single folder I call FGCVS ... This is a view of the subdirectories in that folder. Note it contains a lot more than just the above mentioned source, but none of these additional items are specifically needed for FG ... It should also be noted I have unpacked zlib into to same folder, even though it is not a CVS/SVN source ...
You need to emulate this folder structure if you want to use the setup and compile tools given at the end of this page.
For various reasons, including the fact that today big hard disk prices are very reasonable, I never build in the above, what I call 'updateable' folders. I first XCOPY the required sources to a new work folder. To make all this EASY I have a batch file, SETUPFG.BAT, to create a new set of folder, in a chosen 'work' folder, and copy the required sources into place. This batch file is included in the vc8sln04.zip given below. After this setupfg.bat has run, I have a simpler set of WORK folders, containing the desired sources :-
The first folder, 'bin', is where all the final binary runtime items will reside. The 'data' is a full copy of the base FG data folder. In here I can also download, and add additional scenery, and additional aircraft models, etc. The 'fgfs' is the make, or build folder.
In this case I am using MSVC8 - each component, and finally FG could be loaded individually, and built separately, but I have created a single solution file, and set of MSVC8 project files, that includes all the required components, set to compile first, then finally FlightGear. Due to the changing sources, this is always a work-in-progress. Quite frequently files have to be added or delete from certain projects, and invariably, since this is nearly all ongoing development source, sometimes code fixes have to be made.
To try to ease some of the 'pain' of this latter item, the modified sources are also included in vc8sln04.zip. But you should first try the build WITHOUT these modified files. To aid in this, the source changes are in separate zip files, within the main zip. Sometimes, hopefully by the time you are using this, the relevant fixes have made it into the particular CSV/SVN development source. All that should be required is to unpack vc8sln04.zip into your chosen 'work' folder, allowing an overwrite of the existing project files.
As well as the modified source zip file, this will also add a srccfg04.zip to the 'work' folder. This must also be unpacked, using the folder names ... Load fgfs\fgfs.sln file in MSVC8, select either 'Debug' or 'Release' configuration and build ... Sometimes many other 'configurations' are listed, BUT ONLY 'Debug' and 'Release' have been fully tested. Using any other configuration, and you are on your own ;=)) Although I think I have now removed all the other configurations ...
For example, in building from vc8sln03 to develop vc8sln04, I found I had to delete about 4-5 files, add 4-5, and a changed source folder (ac3d to ac) in the OSG ... and had to delete a few, and add about 5 new files to simgear and flightgear ... these type of ongoing changes are inevitable ... it would be nice if I could automate a way, but that would be quite involved, perhaps impossible ;=() It would involve writing a unix/linux type makefile interpreter, but, for example, OSG used GNUmakefile, while simgear and flightgear use makefile.am ...
This build, with Microsoft Visual C++ 2005 Express Edition (MSVC8), is using the runtime library 'Multithreaded DLL' (/MD), and 'Multithreaded Debug DLL' (/MDd)! When you create a new project in MSVC8 this is the default, but many prerequisite projects use /MT-/MTd, perhaps some with /ML-/MLd. It is VERY IMPORTANT that the runtime of the prerequisites and the final FlightGear build all use the SAME runtime, or else there will be 'conflicts' in the LINK.
Also, as previous, I had to make some minor code changes in Router\alc.cpp ...
1. I had to un-define HAVE_VISTA_HEADERS, since I don't have these installed ...
#ifndef __MINGW32__ #define _CRT_SECURE_NO_DEPRECATE // get rid of sprintf security warnings on VS2005 #undef HAVE_VISTA_HEADERS #endif
2. And a little later, change -
#ifndef __MINGW32__
to#if !(defined (__MINGW32__) || defined (_MSC_VER))
so this is the only 'changed' file in vc8chg.zip. I must try to remember to post this to the OpenAL development board in the hope they will change it in CVS ...
When the final link is successful, run UPD.BAT - this can be run with a 'D' parameter - like> upd d to also copy the debug versions to the 'bin' folder. In the 'bin' folder there is also an OpenAL folder. In this folder is another UPD.BAT, to copy the sound DLL shared libraries to your system folder, hard coded as C:\WINDOWS\System32. If your windows is installed in other than this folder, then this upd.bat will need to be adjusted. If you already have the sound files installed, then it will refuse to do anything until these are deleted ...
Now you are ready to run flightgear. There are a number of batch files in the 'bin/bats' folder, to provide some initial scenarios. rfg.bat is the simplest with a content of :-
cd .. FlightGear --fg-root=..\data --fog-disable --timeofday=noon --prop:/sim/rendering/fps-display=true cd bats
You will note a number have 'noai' in their name. This is because I get a CRASH after about 5-10 minutes if I do not disable AI planes, but you might have more luck ;=)) You will note each uses ..\data as the path to the base data and scenery. If you did not copy the base data during setupfg then this will have to be adjusted to where you have installed at least the base data, and/or additional scenery ...
1. fgvc8rt04.zip - Set of WIN32 runtime binaries - MD5 = 84fc5c20f7dcad127e539ed6c2d309b8 - contents
Length Size Ratio Date Time Name ------ ----- ----- ---- ---- ---- 0 0 0% 20/03/2007 14:40 bats\ 138 112 19% 19/03/2007 16:10 bats\cleanup.bat 116 101 13% 19/03/2007 16:10 bats\rfg.bat 62 62 0% 19/03/2007 16:11 bats\rfgair.bat 170 130 24% 20/03/2007 14:34 bats\rfgdbg.bat 52 52 0% 19/03/2007 16:11 bats\rfghelp.bat 391 273 31% 19/03/2007 16:11 bats\rfgmig.bat 444 307 31% 19/03/2007 16:12 bats\rfgmigd.bat 136 112 18% 19/03/2007 16:12 bats\rfgnoai.bat 633 358 44% 19/03/2007 16:31 bats\rfgufo.bat 680 370 46% 19/03/2007 16:14 bats\rfgufo1.bat 620 354 43% 19/03/2007 16:15 bats\rfgufo1noai.bat 177 136 24% 19/03/2007 16:15 bats\rfgufonoai.bat 3850240 1527309 61% 20/03/2007 14:07 FlightGear.exe 0 0 0% 19/03/2007 13:43 OpenAL\ 24576 16426 34% 20/03/2007 13:58 OpenAL\alut.dll 49152 15916 68% 20/03/2007 13:58 OpenAL\OpenAL32.dll 2892 799 73% 22/12/2006 13:57 OpenAL\upd.bat 86016 36571 58% 20/03/2007 13:58 OpenAL\wrap_oal.dll 18944 8784 54% 20/03/2007 13:52 OpenThreadsWin32.dll 1282048 444636 66% 20/03/2007 13:56 osg.dll 266240 93003 66% 20/03/2007 13:57 osgDB.dll 147456 51154 66% 20/03/2007 13:59 osgdb_ac.dll 22016 9779 56% 20/03/2007 13:58 osgdb_rgb.dll 741376 278642 63% 20/03/2007 13:58 osgUtil.dll 30208 15004 51% 20/03/2007 13:58 pthreadVC2.dll ------- ------- --- ------- 6524783 2500390 62% 26
2. vc8sln04.zip - Set of MSVC8 build files - MD5 = a8b8a0da04b0b8ca86fdac978fa3c8ac - contents
Length Size Ratio Date Time Name ------ ----- ----- ---- ---- ---- 15541 2034 87% 19/03/2007 17:04 fgfs\fgfs.sln 3926 1054 74% 25/11/2006 10:21 fgfs\fgfs.vcproj 246073 8640 97% 19/03/2007 15:21 FlightGear\FlightGear.vcproj 62545 2743 96% 19/03/2007 12:04 SimGear\SimGear.vcproj 16001 1404 92% 20/11/2006 14:10 freeglut\freeglut_static.vcproj 8412 1196 86% 20/11/2006 14:30 OpenAL\OpenAL-Windows\Alc\ALc.vcproj 8412 1196 86% 20/11/2006 14:30 OpenAL\OpenAL-Windows\Alu\ALu.vcproj 23381 1840 93% 26/11/2006 10:59 OpenAL\OpenAL-Windows\OpenAL32\OpenAL32.vcproj 15996 1595 91% 26/11/2006 11:03 OpenAL\OpenAL-Windows\Router\Router.vcproj 5532 1255 78% 21/11/2006 12:40 OpenAL\alut\admin\VisualStudioDotNET\alut\alut.vcproj 12213 1495 88% 19/03/2007 13:19 zlib-1.2.3\projects\visualc6\zlib.vcproj 5624 1127 80% 21/11/2006 13:18 PLIB\src\fnt\fnt.vcproj 7365 1158 85% 21/11/2006 13:18 PLIB\src\js\js.vcproj 7822 1262 84% 22/12/2006 12:18 PLIB\src\net\net.vcproj 15596 1395 92% 21/11/2006 13:18 PLIB\src\pui\pui.vcproj 10871 1273 89% 21/11/2006 13:18 PLIB\src\puAux\puAux.vcproj 6459 1133 83% 21/11/2006 13:18 PLIB\src\sg\sg.vcproj 6561 1132 83% 21/11/2006 13:18 PLIB\src\util\ul.vcproj 42495 1821 96% 22/12/2006 12:19 PLIB\src\ssg\ssg.vcproj 8816 1525 83% 20/03/2007 13:52 OpenThreads\win32_src\OpenThreads.vcproj 79627 3628 96% 19/03/2007 13:23 OpenSceneGraph\VisualStudio\osg\osg.vcproj 18220 1860 90% 19/03/2007 13:23 OpenSceneGraph\VisualStudio\osgDB\osgDB.vcproj 23464 2054 92% 19/03/2007 13:23 OpenSceneGraph\VisualStudio\osgUtil\osgUtil.vcproj 7176 1519 79% 19/03/2007 13:23 OpenSceneGraph\VisualStudio\osgPlugins\ac3d\ac3d.vcproj 7196 1502 80% 19/03/2007 13:23 OpenSceneGraph\VisualStudio\osgPlugins\rgb\rgb.vcproj 6540 1392 79% 21/11/2006 14:49 pthreads\pthread.vcproj 1651 848 49% 20/03/2007 14:50 README.fgfs 1568 583 63% 19/03/2007 15:13 upd.bat 3619 1145 69% 20/03/2007 14:46 update.mak 424 199 54% 20/03/2007 14:53 zipall.bat 513 280 46% 19/03/2007 13:41 ziprt04.bat 1461 541 63% 19/03/2007 13:41 zipvc04.bat 2892 799 73% 22/12/2006 13:57 bin\openal\upd.bat 38 36 6% 22/12/2006 13:58 changed.txt 164 110 33% 19/03/2007 13:30 others.txt 908 293 68% 19/03/2007 13:29 project.txt 93 64 32% 15/12/2006 12:35 config.txt 2946 890 70% 18/03/2007 14:01 SETUPFG.BAT 13321 13321 0% 18/03/2007 19:22 srcchg04.zip 3158 3158 0% 21/11/2006 12:27 srccfg04.zip ------- ------- --- ------- 704620 70500 90% 40
Or you can go directly to the zip download page on the server that houses these zips ... or to my specific download page ... (MD5 (rfgbats02.zip) = d56c665199a141a5cb80e024288f7414) is a set of updated (2007-04-20) batch files, for the bin/bats folder.
This is a somewhat abbreviated version ;=))
If this is your first run, you may have to 'Unblock' the net communications, depending on your security settings, although, unless you have specifically enables some 'net' actions, flightgear does not really use this channel. I think this dialog occurs when 'socket' library is initialized in PLIB, and not only when a socket is specifically opened.
As some examples of the command line options, you could also download the fgvc8rt04.zip and extract all the BATCH files into the bin/bats folder, or directly download some updated (20070420) batch files, (MD5 (rfgbats02.zip) = d56c665199a141a5cb80e024288f7414), and extract them , using the folder names ...
Since this is NOT an automated build system, and many of the projects are very active, the VCPROJ files can become out-of-date very quickly. This is usually evidenced by the fact that there are 'missing files' during the build, or 'unresolved externals' during the final link. This usually means that the source file list, for that particular project, has changed since the build system was last updated.
Aside from the quite drastic cvs 'backtracking' - that is do a cvs update using a Mar 30,2007 date - not tried nor recommended - the only thing that can be done about the 'missing files' is to delete them from the particular project, and continue with the build. The 'unresolved externals' usually means that some NEW file, or files, has/have been added, and now that file, or files, must be added to particular project of the build system.
Example 1: missing file
encoder.cxx c1xx : fatal error C1083: Cannot open source file: '.\src\Instrumentation\encoder.cxx': No such file or directory
I just deleted this files from the FlightGear project, and continued the build.
Example 2: unresolved external
Linking... altimeter.obj : error LNK2019: unresolved external symbol "public: __thiscall FGAtmoCache::~FGAtmoCache(void)" (??1FGAtmoCache@@QAE@XZ) referenced in function "public: __thiscall FGAltimeter::~FGAltimeter(void)" (??1FGAltimeter@@QAE@XZ)
How to FIND the missing file? Using grep, or a grep-like tool you can search for the source (in *.c, *.cxx, *.cpp files) that contains 'FGAtmoCache'. In this case it showed up in FlightGear/src/Environment/atmosphere.cxx, which must then be added to the FlightGear project.
Example 3: unresolved external
Linking... NasalSys.obj : error LNK2019: unresolved external symbol _naInit_utf8 referenced in function "public: virtual void __thiscall FGNasalSys::init(void)" (?init@FGNasalSys@@UAEXXZ)
Again, searching the SimGear source for 'naInit_utf8', it is found in SimGear/simgear/nasal/utf8lib.c, thus this file is added to the SimGear project.
Example 4: unresolved external
Linking... NasalSys.obj : error LNK2019: unresolved external symbol _naInit_thread referenced in function "public: virtual void __thiscall FGNasalSys::init(void)" (?init@FGNasalSys@@UAEXXZ)
Searching the SimGear source this time, for ' naInit_thread', it is found in SimGear/simgear/nasal/threadlib.c, thus this file is added to the SimGear project.
And that does the trick.
Linking... Embedding manifest... Build Time 6:20 Build log was saved at "file://c:\FG\14\FlightGear\Release\BuildLog.htm" FlightGear - 0 error(s), 251 warning(s) ========== Build: 24 succeeded, 0 failed, 0 up-to-date, 0 skipped ==========
Notice, I tend to work on the missing items 1 by 1, since sometimes the inclusion of a new file may require other new files to be added. Also I try to add it specifically to the appropriate 'project' ... you can verify, at least for simgear and flightgear the full set of source files, by carefully reading all the makefile.am files ...
Of course, in the above link, I am IGNORING the 251 warnings!!! Hopefully NOT at my peril ;=)).
Happy SIM flying ...
Geoff R. McLane
date: 20070420 original: 20070320