[Aldor-l] Distributing Aldor

[Bill Page]

Pippijn

2008/9/11  <pip88nl at gmail.com>:
> On Thu, Sep 11, 2008 at 12:32:08AM -0400, Bill Page wrote:
>> Installation went fine with no errors, but I was not able at first to
>> run the Aldor -gloop bat file. In order to get it to work I had to
>> edit the .bat files and add a full "C:\program files\path
>> to\exectuable\aldor.exe" (including the " ). Also it would be more
>> convenient of the install script would also add the location of these
>> batch files to the Windows PATH.
>
> That is a bit strange, because the (latest, created 02:30Z last night)
> installer adds an environment variable ALDORROOT which is used by the
> aldor executable. The full path is being used as a fallback (but I
> thought %0\..\aldor.exe would do that, doesn't it?). Adding them to the
> PATH variable would be no problem, except that I am worrying about that,
> too, not working, due to some issues your installation has with setting
> ALDORROOT.
>

I just downloaded the msi file again 12 Sept, 2:00 Z (although the link from

http://xinutec.org/~pippijn/en/projects_aldor_install.xhtml

was missing). I tried the install again on another machine running
Windows XP/SP3. This time the user interface was noticably different.
The end result was a Aldor/Aldor REPL link in start/All Programs that
runs "C:\Program Files\Aldor\aldor-loop.bat". But when I click this
link a command windows flashes open and immediately closes.

When I look at C:\Program Files\Aldor is see aldor.exe with a Date
Modified of 11/09/2008 1:06 AM. In aldor-loop.bat I find:

---
@echo off

%0\..\aldor.exe -gloop %1 %2 %3 %4 %5 %6 %7 %8 %9
---

But this file has non-windows line endings. (Correcting the line
endings does not fix the problem.)

Changing the file to:

@echo off

"C:\Program Files\Aldor\aldor.exe" "-gloop" %1 %2 %3 %4 %5 %6 %7 %8 %9

also does not fix the problem.

If I open a Command Prompt window I do see that the ALDORROOT variable
has been set.

C:\Documents and Settings\Administrator.ASUS>echo %ALDORROOT%
C:\Program Files\Aldor

Trying to run Aldor gives an error message

C:\Documents and Settings\Administrator.ASUS>cd C:\Program Files\Aldor

C:\Program Files\Aldor>"C:\Program Files\Aldor\aldor.exe" -gloop
The system cannot execute the specified program.

>> One more thing. After getting -gloop and -ginterp to work, I notice
>> that I could not create executables.
>

I cannot seem to reproduce even getting -gloop to work on this system
with this most recent version.

> Indeed, and currently, I don't have a reliable way to build the native
> versions of the lib{aldor,axllib,algebra}. I will take care of this in
> the near future. (Currently, I am moving.)
>
>> The reason is that creating a
>> binary requires that a C compiler be installed. Since most Windows
>> users might have the Microsoft C compiler installed,
>
> Not really. I doubt any normal windows user will have such a thing.
>

Sorry, I meant to write:

  Since most Windows users might **not** have the Microsoft C compiler
installed ...

But then I re-considered the issue. What Windows user is likely to
install Aldor (a compiler) if they have not previously installed some
C compiler?

>> perhaps you
>> should at a paragraph to your web site about how to download and
>> install a free version. E.g.
>> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_Visual_Studio_Express.
>>
>> http://www.microsoft.com/express/
>>
>> I haven't tried Visual C++ 2008 yet. What version of the C compiler do
>> you use on Windows?
>
> I *can* do that, but the way aldor currently works, it can only use the
> compiler it was built with. As I currently use the Microsoft Visual C++
> compiler version 9 (2008), that paragraph should mention Visual Studio
> Express,

Ok.

> but if I ever wanted to use the mingw crosscompiler (I have
> already successfully built aldor with that and ran it on wine for
> testing),

I have not had particularly reliable results testing with wine. I
would recommend running actual Windows in a VM.

> then they need to install the mingw native compiler.

Except for licensing issues, it would be possible to include mingw in
the windows installer for Aldor and thereby make only a single
installation necessary. This is what we did in some versions in the
Windows installer for the some versions of Axiom.

> Should I change these semantics and allow the user to define the
> compiler being used?
>

If it is possible to define the compiler at run time or even at
installation time I think that would be great. Also provide a link to
where users can download Visual Studio or mingw.

Native windows in preferrable but for compatibility with some versions
of Axiom, you might also want to consider a build of Aldor for cygwin.

Regards,
Bill Page.