Version 9 of Building TclBlend with msys_mingw

Updated 2003-09-23 00:31:30

Sept 22, 2003 CB

Inspired by Building JACL with msys I try to do my part to advance the cause of TclJava.

In this page I will try to relate some (hopefully) usefull information for any other newish tclers who might want to try TclBlend on Windows. (Based on my experience trying to get it working)

These steps are only for TclBlend 1.3.1. Hopefully they will be slightly smoother for 1.3.2

Steps:

First (Downloads):

  1. Go to http://sourceforge.net/project/showfiles.php?group_id=10894
  2. Download the most recent version of msys_mingw (down near the bottom)
  3. Download tcl844-src.zip
  4. Download tk844-src.zip
  5. Download thread252.zip (down near the bottom)
  6. Go to http://sourceforge.net/project/showfiles.php?group_id=13005
  7. Download tclBlend131.zip
  8. Download jacl131.zip while your at it if you want to.
  9. Download this file from here [L1 ] and save it someplace you won't forget. There is a problem with linking to the jvm. This file solves it (it comes from Mo Dejong) if you don't have it, ./configure will DIE when building tclBlend.

Second (Unzip):

  1. Unzip msys_mingw.zip to whereever you want to keep it (I put mine on the root of the C drive.) It will create a top level directory called msys and a directory tree underneath containing all necessary files for msys/mingw operation.
  2. Create a src directory somewhere convenient (I used /src --C:\msys\src if looking at if from outside msys.
  3. Unzip tcl844-src.zip into the src directory
  4. Unzip tk844-src.zip into the src directory
  5. Unzip thread252.zip into the src directory
  6. Unzip tclBlend131.zip into the src directory
  7. copy the libjvm.dll.a file that you downloaded earlier to src/tclBlend1.3.1/win (you MUST do this)
  8. Unzip jacl131.zip into into the src directory (if desired)

Third (Install JDK):

  1. Go to java.sun.com
  2. download/install desired jdk/j2sdk to somewhere either in the msys directory tree or wherever else desired.

Forth (Build Tcl):

  1. cd to src/tcl8.4.4/win
  2. ./configure --enable-threads
  3. make
  4. make install

Fifth (Build Tk):

  1. cd to src/tk8.4.4/win
  2. ./configure --enable-threads --with-tcl=<path to src>/tcl8.4.4/win
  3. make
  4. make install

NOTE: This --with-tcl directive always refers to the tcl build directory. Just in case the relative paths don't work, the following will always work.

Sixth (Build threads)

  1. cd to src/thread25
  2. ./configure --enable-threads --with-tcl=<path to src>/src/tcl8.4.4/win
  3. make
  4. make install

Seventh:

  1. cd to src/tclBlend1.3.1/win
  2. ./configure --with-tcl=<path to src>/src/tcl8.4.4/win --with-jdk=<jdk install directory>

--with-threads=<path to src>/src/thread25

  1. make
  2. make install

NOTE: It is simplest if you refer to the jdk directory with its full path name. To refer to the C: drive you start the path in msys with /c/ so if the jdk were in C:\jdk131 the configure directive would be --with-jdk=/c/jdk131

Eighth (Build JACL - if desired) See also Building JACL with msys:

  1. cd to src/jacl1.3.1/win
  2. ./configure --prefix=<desired dest. directory> --with-jdk=<jdk install dir>
  3. make
  4. make install

NOTE: At this point Everything is installed and should be working. You will find it in /c/msys/local/bin. (You will find JACL wherever you told it to install) Run it by starting the jtclsh or jwish scripts. They will set up all the environment variables you need and then start the interpreter. These must be run in msys, not under a regular cmd prompt.

Comments: You will almost certainly want to get tkcon for interactive testing since msys does weird things to the tcl shell (it doesn't display toplevel responses from the shell).

 Run it as: jwish tkcon.tcl
 Once in tkcon do: package require java