forum.freeciv.org

Ok, I went through this a few times so, basically, the final question: how do you install Freeciv on Linux mint system? Is there a idiot's way like for the Windows version? it seems paradoxical that FreeCiv is better supported for Windows than for Linux.

The packagers for various distros mostly go with the info about what's stable and what not, so the answer is "it's easy as pie"... for the stable version.

Building the game for the first time is an uphill battle, but once you get all the dependencies, it's very easy. Admittedly, a bit of developer-fu is needed, when deciding what is the next missing bit. The build tools do tell you that something is missing, the trick is finding what's the package name for that.

If it's any help, I can build freeciv on Ubuntu and play directly without installing, so that totally works.

Windows has 2.5.9. as stable version. The only thing "easy as pee" I can find for Linux is 2.5.1. Please grab my shoulders and turn me in the right direction... kick in the arse is optional...

Corbeau wrote:The only thing "easy as pee" I can find for Linux is 2.5.1.

What linux distribution we are talking about here?

Mint 17.

Don't tell me a different version needs to be done for each distribution...

Yes, it does. Linux doesn't on the whole do "one binary runs everywhere" like Windows.

If no-one (the distribution maintainers or anyone else) is maintaining up-to-date backport packages for your chosen distribution, you're going to have to build yourself, one way or another.

Since Mint is Debian/Ubuntu-based, I expect the instructions on http://www.freeciv.org/wiki/Install-Debian apply. In particular, the trick of using to get all or most of the packages needed to build from source without having to figure out what they are.

Ok, thanks.

JTN wrote:Yes, it does. Linux doesn't on the whole do "one binary runs everywhere" like Windows.

Well, there could be, if we did such a binary releases (statically linked etc, like skype on Linux, at least in the past). However, we release only the source code, and the distributions do their binaries themselves. For Windows we also have to do binary releases as nobody else is going to do it, and Winodws users typically wouldn't get very far if given only the source code (given that buiding Freeciv on Windows is much harder than on Linux)

cazfi wrote:

JTN wrote:Yes, it does. Linux doesn't on the whole do "one binary runs everywhere" like Windows.

Well, there could be, if we did such a binary releases [...]

True; I was glossing over that.

For the old-school approach of static linking, I suspect we would still run into ABI compatibility issues at the bottom of whatever stack of stuff we linked in; I think this is why the (moribund) Linux Standard Base effort existed.

The alternative these days would be supplying packages for one of the containery application deployment systems like FlatPak, Snappy, etc. That would mean picking one of those technologies that is likely to be less hassle for users than building from source, i.e., widely deployed and Just Works on a range of distributions. I personally don't have much appetite for this style of packaging.

I think either approach would make us responsible for deploying security updates to anything we depend on, as well as our own software.

Our current distribution model is in line with most other (old-school) Linux software.

Corbeau wrote:Ok, I went through this a few times so, basically, the final question: how do you install Freeciv on Linux mint system? Is there a idiot's way like for the Windows version? it seems paradoxical that FreeCiv is better supported for Windows than for Linux.

I'd like to ask why you want install self built freeciv, as I suspect there's some confusion behind your request.

Anyway, I start by assuming you don't want to install to system directories, messing with bookkeeping of your real package manager (especially since you can't easily 'uninstall' what you install) and anyway installing to system directories would limit you to one version of freeciv while installing to, say, under you home directory, allows you to have unlimited number of freeciv versions parallel.

1) At configure time, give '--prefix' parameter pointing to location where you want produced binaries to get installed, e.g., '--prefix=/home/cazfi/freeciv/installation/freeciv-3.0'
2) After regular 'make', do also 'make install'
3) You now have freeciv installed under /home/cazfi/freeciv/installation/freeciv-3.0, and you can run it e.g. by /home/cazfi/freeciv/installation/freeciv-3.0/bin/freeciv-gtk3.22