Compiling TADS Source

Authoring TADS
1

I’m sure I’ll figure out some things on my own, but prior to starting: are there any logistics or things I need on my machine before I get started compiling TADS?

I’m on a Windows 7 machine. I currently have the latest Visual C++ Express but I do have access to the Professional version if needed. Most of my development is in Ruby, Python, and Haskell so I probably don’t have whatever the equivalent of “build essentials” is on Windows.

My experience with C and C++ was many years in the past but I’m eager to reacquaint myself.

2

Load the project file and click “build”. Unless your version of VS is not compatible with whatever version Mike is using, it should work.

3

This will show how bad my C/C++ is:

So I have the tads3 source, the tads2 source, the htmltads source and each of those are in its own directory.

When I go into the tads3 source and do a search for main() I find it in a lot of files. What’s a good starting place for me in terms of seeing where program actually starts for the first time? I saw vmcore.cpp, which seems like a good bet. Right now I can’t just load it up because the latest Visual C++ versions don’t recognize the build or project files. (Here I’m not just looking at the Workbench, but the source as a whole.)

Any pointers on where to start would be appreciated. I may be in way, way, way over my head. I’m fine if that’s the case but I’d still like to walk the innards of TADS a little bit.

4

In the w32 API, the program starts in WinMain(), not main(). htmltads/w32main.cpp might be a good place to start.