How To Port Gp2X Games To Wiz?

[Blue Protoman]

Title. Yeah, there are a ton of GP2X games I wanna play on my Wiz, but the Wiz isn't backwards compatible. I know nothing about coding, but the hardware between the two systems is supposed to be similar. Is there a "porting from GP2X to Wiz for Morons"-type guide out there? Remember, I know nothing about coding.

 

[Mr.TwisT]

Well, knowing something about Linux, C++, C will help to port games. Other games may be programmed in different languages, so you have to understand those too. To port a game/program you have to have a Source Code of it. You MUST have knowledge of programming to port stuff. It's not for dummies.

 

[senquack]

If you know nothing about coding you have a bit of a steep hill to climb, because some of the difficulty in porting is not programming but instead fighting with compilers and toolchains, convoluted library dependencies, makefiles, and autotools nightmares.

That said, porting GP2X games to the Wiz is fairly easy. The biggest piece of advice I can give is just link dynamically, that's all you really have to do to get existing GP2X SDL apps working. You can even use the old Open2X GP2X toolchain and library packs, in fact that is what I do. All the old wiki information for the GP2X more or less applies to the Wiz, except you cannot link statically like everyone used to do.

 

[ledow]

If you know nothing about coding you have a bit of a steep hill to climb, because some of the difficulty in porting is not programming but instead fighting with compilers and toolchains, convoluted library dependencies, makefiles, and autotools nightmares.

Amen to that. I've just spent the past few hours trying to set up MSYS/MinGW to try to replace my Cygwin setup... I gave up after the fourth attempt from scratch - it seems to be almost impossible to compile libpng or SDL_Image properly on MinGW.

That said, porting GP2X games to the Wiz is fairly easy. The biggest piece of advice I can give is just link dynamically, that's all you really have to do to get existing GP2X SDL apps working. You can even use the old Open2X GP2X toolchain and library packs, in fact that is what I do. All the old wiki information for the GP2X more or less applies to the Wiz, except you cannot link statically like everyone used to do.

Ah, good to know for future reference, not that I have any way to test Wiz games myself at the moment.

 

[Blue Protoman]

Is there some kind of comprehensive guide out there? Also, I'm not even familiar with the jargon you just used.

 

[senquack]

Is there some kind of comprehensive guide out there? Also, I'm not even familiar with the jargon you just used.

There is no comprehensive guide, you just need to get in the trenches and start fighting it out. Google is your gun, good luck. You also will need the info found in the developer sections of the GP2X wiki. Also search these forums by adding site:gp32x.de to your google search terms. Google is much better at pulling pertinent info up.

You can see my post here for more advice: http://www.gp32x.de/board/index.php?/topic/52381-some-beginner-dev-questions/page__gopid__824850&#entry824850

 

[senquack]

If you know nothing about coding you have a bit of a steep hill to climb, because some of the difficulty in porting is not programming but instead fighting with compilers and toolchains, convoluted library dependencies, makefiles, and autotools nightmares.

Amen to that. I've just spent the past few hours trying to set up MSYS/MinGW to try to replace my Cygwin setup... I gave up after the fourth attempt from scratch - it seems to be almost impossible to compile libpng or SDL_Image properly on MinGW.

When developing for GP2X on windows, I prefer to install VirtualBox and use Linux within a virtual machine. You can enable virtual networking and telnet/SSH in using Putty and get yourself a real command window, it is very nice.

 

[notaz]

Title. Yeah, there are a ton of GP2X games I wanna play on my Wiz

You could list them here, maybe somebody gets interested and ports some of them for you.

 

[Blue Protoman]

Title. Yeah, there are a ton of GP2X games I wanna play on my Wiz

You could list them here, maybe somebody gets interested and ports some of them for you.

You know what, I'll just do that. Never mind.

 

[ledow]

When developing for GP2X on windows, I prefer to install VirtualBox and use Linux within a virtual machine. You can enable virtual networking and telnet/SSH in using Putty and get yourself a real command window, it is very nice.

I have Linux systems all over the place (I'm an IT manager in a 50% Linux private school), so it's not a problem to get a real Linux shell when I need it. I just find virtualisation a pain and like to have a "native" toolchain too. It's good for rooting out those silly errors I introduce because of assumptions about Linux-only things. I find Cygwin's the best at the moment - it's Unix-y enough to keep me working, Windows enough to run without having to be in a full emulation environment, and portable enough that I can just run it on any Windows machine without having to set it up or worry if the processor supports native virtualisation. I don't want to virtualise if it means managing a computer-within-a-computer (I do that all day long!), when I can just double-click a Cygwin icon and "be" in a Unix-like terminal that compiles stuff.

And the setup program, when you learn how to use it properly, is great for keeping the Cygwin system up to date and minimally-installed (so I don't end up sucking in a hundred different libraries I don't need). It's also pretty portable - copy the cygwin folder to a USB stick and run it on any Windows machine. I develop on Windows at least 50% of the time, especially with projects that aren't GP2X-related and might end up running on someone's Windows desktop, so I like a "native" Windows way to do things. I know you can do all those things on a virtualised Linux image with cross-compiling etc. but I started down the Cygwin route and it's served me really well so far, so I've had no need to virtualise. Though, the way things are going, I'm going to end up not leaving my office because even the servers in work will have been virtualised.