[Mono-dev] Failing to compile mono on Windows cygwin

[Jean-Michel.Perraud at csiro.au]

A blank line is certainly not the expected behaviour of a Mono 'make'. I tried to checkout the master branch to double check what you describe but encountered instead "fatal: Not a git repository" for an external module. Seen that git annoyance in the past, can fix but I don't have enough time. I very much doubt the cygwin build is as broken as you describe.

I'll forward you in a separate email a PDF of a personal wiki page I have to remind myself how to go about compiling Mono on Windows, in case this helps.

You certainly to not need all cygwin packages. From my notes what I typically need to add to a rather Spartan cygwin setup:
 “autogen.sh requires a few additional packages to be installed in cygwin: bison, libtools, automake of course, and the gettext packages (incl devel packages), or you get a configure: error: msgfmt not found. You need to install the 'gettext' package, or pass --enable-nls=no to autogen.sh or configure”

Not sure exactly what you are after with "Alternatively, where can I download a zip of the binaries and VS project so that I can start adding tests and fixing bugs?". Which binaries: the mono runtime and/or including the framework (C# assemblies)?

Assuming you'd be OK to recompile the mono runtime and the C# assemblies (sounds like you have VS), the core mono runtime (mono-2.0.dll) is relatively easy to build in VS, though sometimes broken and VisualCPP and/or C code needs update/adjustments to get things going. Look under the 'msvc' folder (past outdated instructions). One can definitely set up a mono runtime in debug mode in VS.

You can, with a fair bit of work, get the VS project files/solutions: look at "msvc/scripts/README". You can even build most of them, though there are quirks. However to my knowledge you cannot debug these through VS, unless something like Mono Tools for Visual Studio is alive and maintained unknown to me.

FYI I have a fork intended to better document and improve the VS build use cases, but it is a draft and I struggle to find time for it https://github.com/jmp75/mono/tree/msvc_build_20130604

By the way if someone had advice on a feasible procedure and setup with MonoDevelop for contributors to Mono itself, I for one would be interested.

Hope this helps.
J-M



From: mono-devel-list-bounces at lists.ximian.com [mailto:mono-devel-list-bounces at lists.ximian.com] On Behalf Of Bryan Crotaz
Sent: Sunday, 25 August 2013 9:43 PM
To: mono-devel-list at lists.ximian.com
Subject: [Mono-dev] Failing to compile mono on Windows cygwin

I've found a bug in mono, logged it, and created a unit test for it.  Now I want to add the test to the Mono test suite, and fix it.

So I've now spent 2 days attempting to work out how to get cygwin to work, ending up installing ALL the packages to get autogen to run successfully.

I'm now stuck.

I run make and get nothing.  No error, just a blank line and back to the prompt.  I'm assuming this isn't correct.  What do I do to fix this?


Alternatively, where can I download a zip of the binaries and VS project so that I can start adding tests and fixing bugs?

Bryan