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Hello brave GDK coders,

I am now up and running with the Express Edition of VC2005. It is working (FINALLY!) but there are several steps in the creation of a project that seem like you shouldn't have to do everytime. I'm sure someone has figured it out, and if so hopefully you could share your wisdom with me(all of us).

First of all, couldn't we/someone/GameCreators make a Project Wizard for 2005 Express? VC6 had one I think and it worked fine. But this isn't major, that part's not hard, creating an empty project and a new .cpp file in it. But a Project Wizard would probably fix the next two more important issues I have everytime.

(If you are having linker problems and haven't gotten past them, read this part)
-I have to go to the project properties of every new DGDK project and in the C++ section/Code Generation/Runtime Library section change it to be "Multithreaded (/MT). (this cures the "__invoke_watson already defined" linker error)

-Next I have to go to the project properties and in the Linker/Input/Ignore Specific Library section add in "atls.lib". (this cures the "cannot open file 'atls.lib'" linker error)

So those two required changes to every project seem like they should be fixable once and for all. In the "GettingStartedWithExpress.txt" file that came with the fine GDK it mentions, "2. Configure the INCLUDEMFC headers (specifically afxres.h), and ignore ATLS.LIB from all builds". This, and posts on this forum helped me figure out the ignore atls.lib fix but is that sentence in that doc trying to tell me there's an easier way than typing that into the ignore section for every project (and I make lots of projects =)

In other words (one more time hehheh) I'd love to be able to just select New Project, type in the name, select win32 empty project then type some code and run it. Is it possible or are we stuck with these extra steps?

Thanks for the help, it's much appreciated, and I apologize if I've duplicated any information, but I thought it would be nice to spell it all out clearly for people having the same linker errors.

Best regards,
VRMan

<Edits By the way I just want to say, WOW! I'm very pleased with the size of the release executable being a mere 208kb! Well done guys! I've been programming in DarkBasicProfessional for many years now and the huge executable was one of my least favorite parts.

Also wanted to point out that the above project properties changes ALSO have to be done when you switch to a Release solution. So you have to do it twice for every project basically. But, the thing does work flawlessly, performance is excellent, and like I said I love the 208k .exe! Kudos GameCreators, this is a winner product!

Thanks for remdining me, i've been meaning to post about this but completly forgot.

The full version of visual c++ 2005 (standard or pro) comes with the ability to create a project template from a currently open project. The express version does not

I'm not sure if a created template will retain the options too, but they should so should be able to ignore atls.lib and all that and then never have to do it again when using this template. So if anyone with the non-express versions of visual studio fancies opening a new project, filling it with a bare skeleton (#include "DarkDGK.h", DarkGDK(), while loop sdk, sync) peice of code and setting the proper options in the project for compiling (ignore atls.lib, /FORCE in debug mode, code generation to Multithreaded Debug for debug and multithreaded for release) and then uploading the template for all to download - then I would like that very much xD Thanks!

How do you do that ?

http://msdn.microsoft.com/coding4fun/images/weekend/apptemplate/apptemplate_10.gif

Never noticed that before

OMG!! And there's me trying to work out how to turn this machine off... <sigh>



(j.k)

Paul.

And how many games have you written, eh eh ?

BTW, aparently and according to MS the template export wizard does NOT support C++ projects (it's greyed out).

[edit] But feel free to use the attached skeleton .

Be warned: my project (from which I extracted this blueprint), issues one gazzillion warnings when compiled in Debug, due to conflicting versions of libraries and the fact that the dgdk libraries are in release mode: but it _does_ work. These warning only show up as you add more things to your project, so don't be surprised that you see none if you compile just this skeleton. FYI, compiling in Release does not issue any warnings on my project and shouldn't issue on yours either.

You can disable warnings. This disables the warnings about casting that I get when I am using pointers, and calling them DWORDs.

@Miguel

Cheers for that framework, seems to have fixed up one of my errors that wouldn't go away