Version 41 (modified by aldacron, 16 years ago) |
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Welcome to Derelict
Derelict is a collection of D bindings to C shared (dynamic) libraries which are useful for multimedia applications, with a heavy bias toward game development-related libraries.
Features
Derelict supports some useful features for project development, including:
- Cross-Platform Consistency - No matter which platform you release on, Derelict loads shared libraries manually at runtime and throws an exception when the library, or any symbol in the library, fails to load. This gives you complete control over how to handle the case of a missing shared library. You can fall back to a different code path, give your users a helpful error message, or take any action you want. Regardless, you have consistent behavior across multiple platforms.
- Selective Symbol Loading - This feature allows you to override exceptions thrown by Derelict when a shared library symbol fails to load. It is a goal of the project that each Derelict package be updated from time-to-time to load the latest version of each library. Often, new library versions include new functions. If a user has an older version of the library installed, one that is missing the new function symbols, Derelict will notice and throw an exception. By making use of Selective Symbol Loading, you can override this behavior and allow the older library version to load successfully.
Getting Started
To start using Derelict, you will need the latest Derelict source and either Derek Parnell's Bud, Gregor Richards' Rebuild or DSSS. If you are using Derelict with Tango, Bud will likely have problems, so you should prefer Rebuild for such applications.
Derelict applications compiled on Linux have a dependency on libdl, so you will need to tell your build tool to link with that library when compiling.
Obtaining and Learning Derelict
Download Derelict: here
Alternate Download: Get Derelict via DSSS
Derelict Forums: here
Documentation: here
Tutorials: DMedia has a few tutorials on using DerelictSDL and DerelictGL.
Building Derelict
For the large majority of applications, you do not need to build the Derelict libraries. The build script included with Derelict is a convenience and not a requirement. Both Bud and Rebuild can compile your applications without the need to link with any Derelict libraries. As long as the Derelict modules are on your import path, both Bud and Rebuild will automatically compile those modules that you require and will link the resulting object files into your final executable. This is the recommended way to use Derelict. If you are a Tango user, you should prefer Rebuild over Bud. Users of Code::Blocks, or other IDES that compile and link D applications in a two-step process, will need to use the build script to create the Derelict libraries.
For those who need to use the build script, it currently can only be executed as a script in a Phobos environment. If you are building the libraries in a Tango environment, use Rebuild to first compile the script into an executable. You can then execute the resulting binary and it will do the right thing. Currently, however, you will still need to have Bud installed on your path, as the script used Bud internally. Support for Rebuild is forthcoming.
To build Derelict in debug mode in a Phobos Environment:
cd Derelict dmd -run buildme.d debug
To build in Release mode:
cd Derelict dmd -run buildme.d
In a Tango environment, first compile the build script into an executable using Rebuild (Bud will fail on Windows):
cd Derelict rebuild -clean buildme.d
You can then run the executable to build the libraries, using the same command line options. On Windows:
buildme debug
On Linux:
./buildme debug
Detailed build instructions are available in the documentation. Follow the link "Building Derelict" in the left side bar, or view build.html directly.
Libraries Supported By Derelict
Here is a list of the libraries for which Derelict currently provides bindings:
- Open Dynamics Engine (ODE)
- OpenAL
- OpenGL
- OpenGL Utility Library (GLU)
- DevIL, ILU, and ILUT
- SDL
- SDL_image
- SDL_mixer
- SDL_net
- SDL_ttf
- FreeType
- libogg
- libvorbis
Although not official Derelict packages, members of the community have produced the following bindings (these packages may or may not be compilable with the latest DMD or GDC):
Need More Help?
See the Derelict documentation for specific details on a particular package. If you are having problems installing or using Derelict, please visit the forums.