Nodecast Episode 5 - Engine Dev Getting Started
Minetest is an open source game engine, and many people want to contribute via mods, games, as players, etc. But many of us want to help the actual engine improve, and some of you are stuck on windows, or at least want a good windows setup for working with Minetest. This video will walk you through my current best setup for developing, building, debugging, and testing Minetest. You'll be asked to download a few different tools, and by the end of it, you can go from nothing to building the source code of minetest. Enjoy!
# Step 1: Download VSCodium
Go to the github releases page to get VSCodium:
https://github.com/VSCodium/vscodium/...
On this page is every possible release download for VScodium. We'll want the latest, so let's click "show all assets" here.
Next, bring up the find menu via "cntl-F" and search .msi
We'll be looking for the latest "x64" .msi as that is what most of you windows users will be on out there. Go ahead and download that, it'll take a bit.
# Step 2: Install VSCodium
Click the downloaded vscodium.msi in your Downloads folder. Smart screen will likely pop up, click more_info and run anyway.
Accept an open source agreement, click advanced, install for all users, accept the default location. I reccomend turning on all of these settings, except file associations.
You'll need admin rights.
# Step 3: Extensions
Lets install some must have extensions. First up is Cmake, and Msys2 Clang support, followed by native debug, clangd, overtype, and minetest tools by Greeen Xenith.
# Step 4: Cmake Tools extension
https://open-vsx.org/extension/ms-vsc...
This one you have to get from the actual open-vsx.org site that hosts these extensions. I don't know why Codium can't find it normally. Hit download - then find it and drag it into the Codium extensions tab to install it.
# Step 5: Download MSYS2
https://www.msys2.org/#installation
MSYS2 is how we will build minetest's source code. It is an open source windows build tools repository. Click the top download link there.
# Step 6: Install MSYS2
In downloads, run the msys2 setup. Accept the defaults, and .... go ahead and hit launch after.
This is an MSYS2 terminal.
# Step 7: Install Minetest Dependencies
(run the command in the msys2 terminal from step 6. If you closed it, you can bring it up by searching for msys2 in the search bar.)
pacman -S mingw-w64-x86_64-toolchain mingw-w64-x86_64-cmake mingw-w64-x86_64-zlib mingw-w64-x86_64-zstd mingw-w64-x86_64-curl-winssl mingw-w64-x86_64-openal mingw-w64-x86_64-libvorbis mingw-w64-x86_64-libogg mingw-w64-x86_64-libjpeg-turbo mingw-w64-x86_64-sqlite3 mingw-w64-x86_64-freetype mingw-w64-x86_64-luajit mingw-w64-x86_64-gmp mingw-w64-x86_64-jsoncpp mingw-w64-x86_64-mesa mingw-w64-x86_64-SDL2
Hit accept (Y), and this may take a while.
# Step 8: Get Git!
https://gitforwindows.org/
Git is how we manage source code. Git for windows is how we use git on windows.
Go and and download it, and hit run.... Wait for admin rights again....
Accept some defaults, when it asks for a default editor, use VSCodium.
Accept some more defaults, and we're done!
# Step 9: Get Minetest
Open any folder, and right click and bring up "Git Bash here".
Enter the following commands:
`mkdir /c/dev`
`cd /c/dev`
`git clone https://github.com/minetest/minetest`
`git clone https://github.com/minetest/irrlicht minetest/lib/irrlichtmt`
# Step 10: Compile Minetest
In explorer, right click the `C:\dev\minetest\lib\irrlichtmt` folder and open with VSCodium.
In this popup at the top, select the GCC option. Once CMAKE is done, press "cntl-shift-p" to execute a vscodium command. We're searching for "Cmake: build".
Now wait for the build to finish.....
Now let's open the top level /c/dev/minetest folder. Cmake will start right up, and we do the same build command again.
Let's try running our minetest we just made! (it's in /c/dev/minetest/bin)
Oof, there's some .dll errors. Let's fix 'em
# Step 11: Fix your paths
Go to the search bar for your Windows machine, and search for "envi" for environment variables. Click the option for "User" environment variables.
Here, select the "Path" variable, and click edit.
Now add two lines:
`C:\msys64\usr\bin`
`C:\msys64\mingw64\bin`
hit Ok. and Ok.
# Step 12: Actually Run Minetest
Now open a *new* file explorer and find c/dev/minetest/bin/minetest.exe and run it.
And now it runs!