Getting Started with ES Development.

[Charononus]

@mitu

Hey, quite a long time between my posts but I did get it working with Clang now. Still haven't packed the app into a bundle yet.

[BenMcLean]

I am trying it now using the Windows Subsystem for Linux but keep running into problems with missing dependencies, even to get past the cmake part. At the moment, I'm trying to figure out how to install freetype. Isn't there some big giant "sudo apt-get install thing1 thing2 thing3 thing4" command someone could write to grab all the dependencies at once instead of needing people to hunt around to find each one?

(later edit) Never mind, I found it.
sudo apt-get install libsdl2-dev libfreeimage-dev libfreetype6-dev libcurl4-openssl-dev rapidjson-dev libasound2-dev libgl1-mesa-dev build-essential cmake fonts-droid-fallback libvlc-dev libvlccore-dev vlc-bin

[BenMcLean]

Alright, now it builds but will it run?
I get this result:

Creating config directory "/home/ben/.emulationstation"
error: XDG_RUNTIME_DIR not set in the environment.
Apr 25 14:21:21 lvl0:   Error initializing SDL!
        No available video device
Apr 25 14:21:21 lvl0:   Renderer failed to initialize!
Apr 25 14:21:21 lvl0:   Window failed to initialize!

I'm not sure running graphical programs is even possible on Windows Subsystem for Linux. I assumed they would be but I guess that wasn't a safe assumption. I'll have to research this more to find out if that's even possible.

(later edit) Apparently, the thing I need is called an "X server" for Windows. I'm trying vcxsrv

[BenMcLean]

Yes! I got it to run!

I got help from this page here. It explains how to set up VcXsrv and let you run your graphical Linux programs through it.

[Hex]

@BenMcLean Thats great, you might want to create a post detailing this

[BenMcLean]

@Hex said in Getting Started with ES Development.:

@BenMcLean Thats great, you might want to create a post detailing this

This page explains the only stuff you need to do different to build on WSL Ubuntu instead of regular Ubuntu.

However, I have been thinking that the features I want to add would make more sense being in the RetroPie setup menu rather than being in EmulationStation so I've been reading through the source code for that. I have found out that this menu uses Joy2Key to translate the joystick movements into key presses but haven't yet managed to figure out what code is creating all the boxes and blue crap around the menu items or providing the interactivity.

[mitu]

@BenMcLean said in Getting Started with ES Development.:

but haven't yet managed to figure out what code is creating all the boxes and blue crap around the menu items or providing the interactivity.

It's called dialog - https://linuxgazette.net/101/sunil.html.

[BenMcLean]

@mitu said in Getting Started with ES Development.:

It's called dialog - https://linuxgazette.net/101/sunil.html.

Wow. In that case, the feature I want to add isn't even a RetroPie-specific feature at all.

I want to add an on-screen-keyboard option to dialog and then have the RetroPie setup script use it when text entry is required. That would enable entering the wifi password with a game controller.

So I believe I'd need to start here, (or maybe here?) code up my own new version and then get RetroPie onto using that, with a new -osk command line option.

(later edit) I have started a fork of dialog and even got it to make using this guide

[BenMcLean]

I hate to disappoint anyone who cared about that feature I was thinking of coding, but a major development has happened since I wrote that: the Raspberry PI 400 came out.

Now anyone who actually cares about typing in the wifi password can just buy a Raspberry PI 400 and never have to worry about this problem ever again. Consequently, I no longer see it as worth my time to work on developing this feature. Sorry, but you have to pick your battles and I have to let go of this if I want to get other development goals done. I'm still full steam ahead on my Wolfenstein 3-D VR remake though

[Lolonois]

Create a static class model from ES sources: See here