Current state of WinCE / Pocket PC

SDL Development
1

Hello,

After using it for years on PC, I would really like to use SDL on Pocket
PC. There seem to be a couple of unofficial ports of SDL to Windows CE,
like Arisme’s and Dmitry Yakimov’s.

Arisme's:
http://arisme.free.fr/ports/SDL.php

Dmitry's:
http://www.activekitten.com/pbc_download/sdl_wince_0.7.zip

I’ve managed to get Arisme’s port to work for a simple example - setting
up the screen and clearing it to a solid colour, exiting on SDL_QUIT or
SDL_KEYDOWN. If there are any problems with the port I may not have
encountered them yet. I believe this port is used in PocketScumm (which
works great on my iPaq) so that leaves me with some confidence.

http://arisme.free.fr/PocketScumm/index.php

I’m not used Dmitry’s port, basically because I found Arisme’s first.

On the PC though, I heavily use SDL_image and SDL_ttf, which I might
need to find ports for or compile them myself.

I was wondering, if anyone out there is actively using an SDL port, or
even the official unsupported SDL version? From reading previous posts
to the list I know people are interested in using SDL on Windows CE, but
I don’t know if they’ve been successful. Any hints, experiences, or
advice would be gratefully received.

Kind regards,

Peter

2

I am currently developing a small turn-based space conquest game using SDL
on the PocketPC platform (and the Compact Framework). I have SDL with a
patch to load 32bpp bitmaps (so I can support transparency without
SDL_Image) and I have also managed to compile in the SDL_gfx library in to
the dll. I have not, as yet, tried to port SDL_ttf. I have tried this on
various models of PocketPC devices extending back to the very first model (a
friend of mine had it lying around). Basically, if it can be called a
PocketPC device, SDL seems to work on it.

I have also created a compact framework compatible wrapper around the whole
thing.

The performance has been excellent, thus far. You don’t get any hardware
surfaces, but it’s only working with 240x320, so it’s more than powerful
enough.

If you would like a copy of the compiled dlls, please let me know and I can
provide them. (Contingent on my checking the licenses for SDL and SDL_gfx
to make sure I can do that).

Todd Lang> -----Original Message-----

From: sdl-bounces+todd.lang=kiyote.ca at libsdl.org
[mailto:sdl-bounces+todd.lang=kiyote.ca at libsdl.org] On Behalf
Of Peter Mackay
Sent: May 23, 2005 7:14 AM
To: sdl at libsdl.org
Subject: [SDL] Current state of WinCE / Pocket PC

Hello,

After using it for years on PC, I would really like to use
SDL on Pocket
PC. There seem to be a couple of unofficial ports of SDL to
Windows CE,
like Arisme’s and Dmitry Yakimov’s.

On the PC though, I heavily use SDL_image and SDL_ttf, which I might
need to find ports for or compile them myself.

I was wondering, if anyone out there is actively using an SDL port, or
even the official unsupported SDL version? From reading previous posts
to the list I know people are interested in using SDL on Windows CE, but
I don’t know if they’ve been successful. Any hints, experiences, or
advice would be gratefully received.

Kind regards,

Peter

SDL mailing list
SDL at libsdl.org
http://www.libsdl.org/mailman/listinfo/sdl

3

Hello,

I am working for a project that needs a relativly fast display on a PDA. As I don’t like to use the emulator, I wanted my project to run on PC and PDA to be able to develop on PC and juste test my code on the PDA from time to time.
So I tried to use the SDL 1.2.8 version on my PDA ( the so called unsupported version), and I had a few problems compiling it, I had to patch the some files to be able to catch SDL_KEY events.
As I didn’t need all the functionalities of the SDL and that I needed to catch some windows events, I switched to tinyPTC/GAPI for the moment.

I also compiled the freetype library which is needed by the SDL_ttf but I didn’t use the SDL_ttf (I will probably do if I finally use the SDL for my project).
I might come back to SDL because I found an interesting port, used in a fps game, that is openGLES enabled.
It looks like intel did some relevant changes to make it work with its 2700g chip.
I have no time nor skills to maintain the pocketPC version, but it would be interesting to have an official working version of SDL on WinCE.

here is the url where you can download cube3D and the port of SDL for arm pocketPC (you have to download the whole game to get all the libs)
http://sourceforge.net/project/showfiles.php?group_id=91993

-----Message d’origine-----De : sdl-bounces+jean-gregoire.foulon=fr.thalesgroup.com at libsdl.org
[mailto:sdl-bounces+jean-gregoire.foulon=fr.thalesgroup.com at libsdl.org]D
e la part de Peter Mackay
Envoy? : lundi 23 mai 2005 13:14
? : sdl at libsdl.org
Objet : [SDL] Current state of WinCE / Pocket PC

Hello,

After using it for years on PC, I would really like to use SDL on Pocket
PC. There seem to be a couple of unofficial ports of SDL to Windows CE,
like Arisme’s and Dmitry Yakimov’s.

Arisme's:
http://arisme.free.fr/ports/SDL.php

Dmitry's:
http://www.activekitten.com/pbc_download/sdl_wince_0.7.zip

I’ve managed to get Arisme’s port to work for a simple example - setting
up the screen and clearing it to a solid colour, exiting on SDL_QUIT or
SDL_KEYDOWN. If there are any problems with the port I may not have
encountered them yet. I believe this port is used in PocketScumm (which
works great on my iPaq) so that leaves me with some confidence.

http://arisme.free.fr/PocketScumm/index.php

I’m not used Dmitry’s port, basically because I found Arisme’s first.

On the PC though, I heavily use SDL_image and SDL_ttf, which I might
need to find ports for or compile them myself.

I was wondering, if anyone out there is actively using an SDL port, or
even the official unsupported SDL version? From reading previous posts
to the list I know people are interested in using SDL on Windows CE, but
I don’t know if they’ve been successful. Any hints, experiences, or
advice would be gratefully received.

Kind regards,

Peter

SDL mailing list
SDL at libsdl.org
http://www.libsdl.org/mailman/listinfo/sdl

4

Hi Todd,

Thanks for your reply. It’s good to hear that others are using SDL on
Pocket PC without too much trouble.

Also, thank you for the offer of the precompiled DLLs. I would be most
grateful if you could e-mail them to me, or upload them on the web
somewhere I could get them from.

As I mentioned before, I use Arisme’s port, but unfortunately it is in
.lib format, not .dll, which means I can’t use it in commercial apps (if
I understand the LGPL correctly). I could of course recompile it as a
.dll, but if I can get a working dll version elsewhere I would really
appreciate it.

Judging by Jean-Gregoire’s post there is significant interest in an
official WinCE version of SDL. I would really like to hear Sam’s take on
the idea, whether he’d be happy to have the best parts of the various
ports patched into SDL.

I would be happy to be involved in the official version, although I only
have access to a single XScale Pocket PC (iPaq h2210) to test with.

Peter

Todd Lang wrote:> I am currently developing a small turn-based space conquest game using SDL

on the PocketPC platform (and the Compact Framework). I have SDL with a
patch to load 32bpp bitmaps (so I can support transparency without
SDL_Image) and I have also managed to compile in the SDL_gfx library in to
the dll. I have not, as yet, tried to port SDL_ttf. I have tried this on
various models of PocketPC devices extending back to the very first model (a
friend of mine had it lying around). Basically, if it can be called a
PocketPC device, SDL seems to work on it.

I have also created a compact framework compatible wrapper around the whole
thing.

The performance has been excellent, thus far. You don’t get any hardware
surfaces, but it’s only working with 240x320, so it’s more than powerful
enough.

If you would like a copy of the compiled dlls, please let me know and I can
provide them. (Contingent on my checking the licenses for SDL and SDL_gfx
to make sure I can do that).

Todd Lang

-----Original Message-----
From: sdl-bounces+todd.lang=kiyote.ca at libsdl.org
[mailto:sdl-bounces+todd.lang=kiyote.ca at libsdl.org] On Behalf
Of Peter Mackay
Sent: May 23, 2005 7:14 AM
To: sdl at libsdl.org
Subject: [SDL] Current state of WinCE / Pocket PC

Hello,

After using it for years on PC, I would really like to use
SDL on Pocket
PC. There seem to be a couple of unofficial ports of SDL to
Windows CE,
like Arisme’s and Dmitry Yakimov’s.

On the PC though, I heavily use SDL_image and SDL_ttf, which I might
need to find ports for or compile them myself.

I was wondering, if anyone out there is actively using an SDL port, or
even the official unsupported SDL version? From reading previous posts
to the list I know people are interested in using SDL on Windows CE, but
I don’t know if they’ve been successful. Any hints, experiences, or
advice would be gratefully received.

Kind regards,

Peter

SDL mailing list
SDL at libsdl.org
http://www.libsdl.org/mailman/listinfo/sdl

5

Hi Jean-Gregoire,

Thanks especially for the information regarding your approach to PPC
development. You may be interested in PocketHAL, which may run faster
than GAPI on devices that support better (GETRAWFRAMEBUFFER or whatnot).

In the past I’ve used PocketHAL, but I’d really like to keep to a single
development environment for my PC and Pocket PC (and eventually Mac)
work, which SDL could do, with a nudge.

The cube3d version of SDL is also tempting to consider, thank you for
telling me about it. Particularly because they’ve got OpenGL ES too. Do
you know if it works indentically to SDL when creating an OpenGL window
using SDL_SetVideoMode?

Peter

Jean-Gregoire.FOULON at fr.thalesgroup.com wrote:> Hello,

I am working for a project that needs a relativly fast display on a PDA. As I don’t like to use the emulator, I wanted my project to run on PC and PDA to be able to develop on PC and juste test my code on the PDA from time to time.
So I tried to use the SDL 1.2.8 version on my PDA ( the so called unsupported version), and I had a few problems compiling it, I had to patch the some files to be able to catch SDL_KEY events.
As I didn’t need all the functionalities of the SDL and that I needed to catch some windows events, I switched to tinyPTC/GAPI for the moment.

I also compiled the freetype library which is needed by the SDL_ttf but I didn’t use the SDL_ttf (I will probably do if I finally use the SDL for my project).
I might come back to SDL because I found an interesting port, used in a fps game, that is openGLES enabled.
It looks like intel did some relevant changes to make it work with its 2700g chip.
I have no time nor skills to maintain the pocketPC version, but it would be interesting to have an official working version of SDL on WinCE.

here is the url where you can download cube3D and the port of SDL for arm pocketPC (you have to download the whole game to get all the libs)
http://sourceforge.net/project/showfiles.php?group_id=91993

-----Message d’origine-----
De : sdl-bounces+jean-gregoire.foulon=fr.thalesgroup.com at libsdl.org
[mailto:sdl-bounces+jean-gregoire.foulon=fr.thalesgroup.com at libsdl.org]D
e la part de Peter Mackay
Envoy? : lundi 23 mai 2005 13:14
? : sdl at libsdl.org
Objet : [SDL] Current state of WinCE / Pocket PC

Hello,

After using it for years on PC, I would really like to use SDL on Pocket
PC. There seem to be a couple of unofficial ports of SDL to Windows CE,
like Arisme’s and Dmitry Yakimov’s.

Arisme’s:
http://arisme.free.fr/ports/SDL.php

Dmitry’s:
http://www.activekitten.com/pbc_download/sdl_wince_0.7.zip

I’ve managed to get Arisme’s port to work for a simple example - setting
up the screen and clearing it to a solid colour, exiting on SDL_QUIT or
SDL_KEYDOWN. If there are any problems with the port I may not have
encountered them yet. I believe this port is used in PocketScumm (which
works great on my iPaq) so that leaves me with some confidence.

http://arisme.free.fr/PocketScumm/index.php

I’m not used Dmitry’s port, basically because I found Arisme’s first.

On the PC though, I heavily use SDL_image and SDL_ttf, which I might
need to find ports for or compile them myself.

I was wondering, if anyone out there is actively using an SDL port, or
even the official unsupported SDL version? From reading previous posts
to the list I know people are interested in using SDL on Windows CE, but
I don’t know if they’ve been successful. Any hints, experiences, or
advice would be gratefully received.

Kind regards,

Peter

SDL mailing list
SDL at libsdl.org
http://www.libsdl.org/mailman/listinfo/sdl

6

Judging by Jean-Gregoire’s post there is significant interest in an
official WinCE version of SDL. I would really like to hear Sam’s take on
the idea, whether he’d be happy to have the best parts of the various
ports patched into SDL.

Yes, I’m happy to incorporate WinCE patches into SDL, as long as they work
correctly and don’t break other ports. My only reluctance would be that I
don’t have any way of testing them myself, so I would suggest coordinating
with the various WinCE ports available to get one meta-patch that can be
added to CVS.

See ya,
-Sam Lantinga, Software Engineer, Blizzard Entertainment

7

Hi Peter,

I 'll check pocketHAL but I agre with you on the point of keeping a single development environment for PC and Pocket PC. It may interest me if it allows me to use VGA mode on the Dell X50v as easily as GAPI does with 240x320.

I don’t know about the behaviour of SDL_SetVideoMode. I just try a little to make some openGL stuff with the SDL port from cube and I didn’t succeed. But I tested cube 3D on my PDA and it is quite impressive, ii is a proff that this port of the SDL works well.
When I needed openGL, I used to code with GLUT rather than SDL, and I didn’t manage to run some SDL+GL examples I found. I am too busy/lazy to look for the problem at the moment. The other problem is that most GLES examples I found on the net were using a sofware GLES lib and not the intel one.

Jean-Gr?goire

-----Message d’origine-----De : jean-gregoire.foulon
[mailto:xxxxx]
e la part de Peter Mackay
Envoy? : lundi 23 mai 2005 18:07
? : sdl at libsdl.org
Objet : [SDL] Re: Current state of WinCE / Pocket PC

Hi Jean-Gregoire,

Thanks especially for the information regarding your approach to PPC
development. You may be interested in PocketHAL, which may run faster
than GAPI on devices that support better (GETRAWFRAMEBUFFER or whatnot).

In the past I’ve used PocketHAL, but I’d really like to keep to a single
development environment for my PC and Pocket PC (and eventually Mac)
work, which SDL could do, with a nudge.

The cube3d version of SDL is also tempting to consider, thank you for
telling me about it. Particularly because they’ve got OpenGL ES too. Do
you know if it works indentically to SDL when creating an OpenGL window
using SDL_SetVideoMode?

Peter

Jean-Gregoire wrote:

Hello,

I am working for a project that needs a relativly fast display on a PDA. As I don’t like to use the emulator, I wanted my project to run on PC and PDA to be able to develop on PC and juste test my code on the PDA from time to time.
So I tried to use the SDL 1.2.8 version on my PDA ( the so called unsupported version), and I had a few problems compiling it, I had to patch the some files to be able to catch SDL_KEY events.
As I didn’t need all the functionalities of the SDL and that I needed to catch some windows events, I switched to tinyPTC/GAPI for the moment.

I also compiled the freetype library which is needed by the SDL_ttf but I didn’t use the SDL_ttf (I will probably do if I finally use the SDL for my project).
I might come back to SDL because I found an interesting port, used in a fps game, that is openGLES enabled.
It looks like intel did some relevant changes to make it work with its 2700g chip.
I have no time nor skills to maintain the pocketPC version, but it would be interesting to have an official working version of SDL on WinCE.

here is the url where you can download cube3D and the port of SDL for arm pocketPC (you have to download the whole game to get all the libs)
http://sourceforge.net/project/showfiles.php?group_id=91993

-----Message d’origine-----
De : sdl-bounces+jean-gregoire.foulon=fr.thalesgroup.com at libsdl.org
[mailto:xxxx]D
e la part de Peter Mackay
Envoy? : lundi 23 mai 2005 13:14
? : sdl at libsdl.org
Objet : [SDL] Current state of WinCE / Pocket PC

Hello,

After using it for years on PC, I would really like to use SDL on Pocket
PC. There seem to be a couple of unofficial ports of SDL to Windows CE,
like Arisme’s and Dmitry Yakimov’s.

Arisme’s:
http://arisme.free.fr/ports/SDL.php

Dmitry’s:
http://www.activekitten.com/pbc_download/sdl_wince_0.7.zip

I’ve managed to get Arisme’s port to work for a simple example - setting
up the screen and clearing it to a solid colour, exiting on SDL_QUIT or
SDL_KEYDOWN. If there are any problems with the port I may not have
encountered them yet. I believe this port is used in PocketScumm (which
works great on my iPaq) so that leaves me with some confidence.

http://arisme.free.fr/PocketScumm/index.php

I’m not used Dmitry’s port, basically because I found Arisme’s first.

On the PC though, I heavily use SDL_image and SDL_ttf, which I might
need to find ports for or compile them myself.

I was wondering, if anyone out there is actively using an SDL port, or
even the official unsupported SDL version? From reading previous posts
to the list I know people are interested in using SDL on Windows CE, but
I don’t know if they’ve been successful. Any hints, experiences, or
advice would be gratefully received.

Kind regards,

Peter

SDL mailing list
SDL at libsdl.org
http://www.libsdl.org/mailman/listinfo/sdl

SDL mailing list
SDL at libsdl.org
http://www.libsdl.org/mailman/listinfo/sdl

8

Hello,

I 'll check pocketHAL but I agre with you on the point of keeping a
single development environment for PC and Pocket PC. It may interest
me if it allows me to use VGA mode on the Dell X50v as easily as GAPI
does with 240x320.

It should, and I think it’s well tested. As far as I know it’s been used
in many commercial games. The other main PDA lib is called GAPIDraw,
which strangely enough now uses PocketHAL as one of its framebuffer back
ends.

The other problem is that most
GLES examples I found on the net were using a sofware GLES lib and
not the intel one.

That is true, although for many devices software rendering is the only
option. I experimented a little with Vincent, which seemed to work very
well and fast for simple examples on my ipaq.> Jean-Gr?goire

-----Message d’origine----- De : jean-gregoire.foulon [mailto:xxxxx]
e la part de Peter Mackay Envoy? : lundi 23 mai 2005 18:07 ? :
sdl at libsdl.org Objet : [SDL] Re: Current state of WinCE / Pocket PC

Hi Jean-Gregoire,

Thanks especially for the information regarding your approach to PPC
development. You may be interested in PocketHAL, which may run
faster than GAPI on devices that support better (GETRAWFRAMEBUFFER or
whatnot).

In the past I’ve used PocketHAL, but I’d really like to keep to a
single development environment for my PC and Pocket PC (and
eventually Mac) work, which SDL could do, with a nudge.

The cube3d version of SDL is also tempting to consider, thank you for
telling me about it. Particularly because they’ve got OpenGL ES too.
Do you know if it works indentically to SDL when creating an OpenGL
window using SDL_SetVideoMode?

Peter

Jean-Gregoire wrote:

Hello,

I am working for a project that needs a relativly fast display on a
PDA. As I don’t like to use the emulator, I wanted my project to
run on PC and PDA to be able to develop on PC and juste test my
code on the PDA from time to time. So I tried to use the SDL 1.2.8
version on my PDA ( the so called unsupported version), and I had a
few problems compiling it, I had to patch the some files to be able
to catch SDL_KEY events. As I didn’t need all the functionalities
of the SDL and that I needed to catch some windows events, I
switched to tinyPTC/GAPI for the moment.

I also compiled the freetype library which is needed by the SDL_ttf
but I didn’t use the SDL_ttf (I will probably do if I finally use
the SDL for my project). I might come back to SDL because I found
an interesting port, used in a fps game, that is openGLES enabled.
It looks like intel did some relevant changes to make it work with
its 2700g chip. I have no time nor skills to maintain the pocketPC
version, but it would be interesting to have an official working
version of SDL on WinCE.

here is the url where you can download cube3D and the port of SDL
for arm pocketPC (you have to download the whole game to get all
the libs)
http://sourceforge.net/project/showfiles.php?group_id=91993

-----Message d’origine----- De :
sdl-bounces+jean-gregoire.foulon=fr.thalesgroup.com at libsdl.org
[mailto:xxxx]D e la part de Peter Mackay Envoy? : lundi 23 mai 2005
13:14 ? : sdl at libsdl.org Objet : [SDL] Current state of WinCE /
Pocket PC

Hello,

After using it for years on PC, I would really like to use SDL on
Pocket PC. There seem to be a couple of unofficial ports of SDL to
Windows CE, like Arisme’s and Dmitry Yakimov’s.

Arisme’s: http://arisme.free.fr/ports/SDL.php

Dmitry’s:
http://www.activekitten.com/pbc_download/sdl_wince_0.7.zip

I’ve managed to get Arisme’s port to work for a simple example -
setting up the screen and clearing it to a solid colour, exiting on
SDL_QUIT or SDL_KEYDOWN. If there are any problems with the port I
may not have encountered them yet. I believe this port is used in
PocketScumm (which works great on my iPaq) so that leaves me with
some confidence.

http://arisme.free.fr/PocketScumm/index.php

I’m not used Dmitry’s port, basically because I found Arisme’s
first.

On the PC though, I heavily use SDL_image and SDL_ttf, which I
might need to find ports for or compile them myself.

I was wondering, if anyone out there is actively using an SDL port,
or even the official unsupported SDL version? From reading previous
posts to the list I know people are interested in using SDL on
Windows CE, but I don’t know if they’ve been successful. Any hints,
experiences, or advice would be gratefully received.

Kind regards,

Peter

_______________________________________________ SDL mailing list
SDL at libsdl.org http://www.libsdl.org/mailman/listinfo/sdl

_______________________________________________ SDL mailing list
SDL at libsdl.org http://www.libsdl.org/mailman/listinfo/sdl

9

Hello,

Thanks for your reply Sam. That’s great news!

I think your suggested approach is a good idea. I will contact the
various port authors to see what features need to be patched, what
states their ports are in and so on. Hopefully they will be keen to
coordinate with me to get their features patched in.

I think the difficulty will arise since at least one of the ports are
not with a recent version of SDL, so it might need to be carefully
forward-ported to the latest version.

Just to make sure I’ve not left anyone out, I need to contact:

Arisme (arisme at free dot fr)
Dmitry Yakimov (support at activekitten dot com)
Cube Engine / Intel (e-mail unknown)

A cube engine forum page…

http://www.cubeengine.com/forum.php4?action=display_thread&thread_id=521

…indicates that the port was done by some guys at Intel for a GDC
conference. I’ll look into finding out who did the SDL port. For me,
tracking down the cube port authors is slightly lower priority, since
their port was primarily to get OpenGL ES running, which is likely not
the focus of the current WinCE SDL effort.

Anyway, have I left anyone out? Does anyone know of any other ports
floating around the web?

Thanks again everyone for your keen interest in SDL and Pocket PC,

Peter

Sam Lantinga wrote:>>Judging by Jean-Gregoire’s post there is significant interest in an

official WinCE version of SDL. I would really like to hear Sam’s take on
the idea, whether he’d be happy to have the best parts of the various
ports patched into SDL.

Yes, I’m happy to incorporate WinCE patches into SDL, as long as they work
correctly and don’t break other ports. My only reluctance would be that I
don’t have any way of testing them myself, so I would suggest coordinating
with the various WinCE ports available to get one meta-patch that can be
added to CVS.

See ya,
-Sam Lantinga, Software Engineer, Blizzard Entertainment

10

Hi Todd,

I meant to ask, are 32bpp bitmaps a feature which SDL lacks due to a bug
or an incomplete BMP loader? From what I’ve read in MSDN, the reserved
byte in a RGBQUAD should be set to zero.

I’ve never thought of BMP as a format which supports an alpha channel
(I’ve only used PNGs and TGAs when I needed per-pixel alpha).

Incidentally, what app do you use to save a 32-bit BMP?

Thanks,

Peter

Todd Lang wrote:> I am currently developing a small turn-based space conquest game using SDL

on the PocketPC platform (and the Compact Framework). I have SDL with a
patch to load 32bpp bitmaps (so I can support transparency without
SDL_Image) and I have also managed to compile in the SDL_gfx library in to
the dll. I have not, as yet, tried to port SDL_ttf. I have tried this on
various models of PocketPC devices extending back to the very first model (a
friend of mine had it lying around). Basically, if it can be called a
PocketPC device, SDL seems to work on it.

I have also created a compact framework compatible wrapper around the whole
thing.

The performance has been excellent, thus far. You don’t get any hardware
surfaces, but it’s only working with 240x320, so it’s more than powerful
enough.

If you would like a copy of the compiled dlls, please let me know and I can
provide them. (Contingent on my checking the licenses for SDL and SDL_gfx
to make sure I can do that).

Todd Lang

-----Original Message-----
From: sdl-bounces+todd.lang=kiyote.ca at libsdl.org
[mailto:sdl-bounces+todd.lang=kiyote.ca at libsdl.org] On Behalf
Of Peter Mackay
Sent: May 23, 2005 7:14 AM
To: sdl at libsdl.org
Subject: [SDL] Current state of WinCE / Pocket PC

Hello,

After using it for years on PC, I would really like to use
SDL on Pocket
PC. There seem to be a couple of unofficial ports of SDL to
Windows CE,
like Arisme’s and Dmitry Yakimov’s.

On the PC though, I heavily use SDL_image and SDL_ttf, which I might
need to find ports for or compile them myself.

I was wondering, if anyone out there is actively using an SDL port, or
even the official unsupported SDL version? From reading previous posts
to the list I know people are interested in using SDL on Windows CE, but
I don’t know if they’ve been successful. Any hints, experiences, or
advice would be gratefully received.

Kind regards,

Peter

SDL mailing list
SDL at libsdl.org
http://www.libsdl.org/mailman/listinfo/sdl

11

Hello,

I 'll check pocketHAL but I agre with you on the point of keeping a
single development environment for PC and Pocket PC. It may interest
me if it allows me to use VGA mode on the Dell X50v as easily as GAPI
does with 240x320.

I did try SDL on a Dell Axim x50v, and interestingly enough, the
underlying OS somehow automatically scaled the image up for us. This
scaling is abysmally slow, and we are looking in to how you add the flag
to your executable to trigger the OS into thinking you can allocate a VGA
screen.

It should, and I think it’s well tested. As far as I know it’s been used
in many commercial games. The other main PDA lib is called GAPIDraw,
which strangely enough now uses PocketHAL as one of its framebuffer back
ends.

By the way, we did some fairly exhaustive tests with GAPIDraw and we found
no circumstance where GAPIDraw outperformed SDL. The advangtages you
would have with GAPIDraw would be the built-up library support around the
drawing functions. ie - Pixel-perfect collision masks, etc.

Todd Lang

12

I meant to ask, are 32bpp bitmaps a feature which SDL lacks due to a bug
or an incomplete BMP loader? From what I’ve read in MSDN, the reserved
byte in a RGBQUAD should be set to zero.

My understanding was that Microsoft finally released a specification for
32bpp bitmap files. It’s not a bug in SDL, they just implemented the
specification as published. (Which is what they should be doing.) The
patch is about 10 lines…I still have my patched file, but for the life
of me I cannot find the post where I found the original patched linked
from.

I’ve never thought of BMP as a format which supports an alpha channel
(I’ve only used PNGs and TGAs when I needed per-pixel alpha).

I only patched it in (instead of using PNGs or TGAs) because the base SDL
library only supports loading bitmaps, and we could not get the SDL_image
library to compile for the PocketPC. It requires linking to some 3rd
party dlls, which would cannot obtain (nor should we due to the licensing
restrictions), so patching in alpha support for bitmaps was our only
workable alternative.

What we do is actually bzip2 compress the bitmaps and load them from the
decompression stream, so the footprint of the graphics files is actually
pretty darn small.

Incidentally, what app do you use to save a 32-bit BMP?

Photoshop 7 and higher offers you many, many different formats to save
your bitmaps as. X8R8G8B8 is the mode I use to write out my 32bpp
bitmaps.

Todd Lang

13

Working on a game targeting portable devices using SDL. Had to fix a bug on keyboard input to get arrow keys to work right (submitted to CVS). Having difficulty with SDL_Image on winCE, though SDL_LoadImage() works properly. A couple winCE only crash bugs that may or may not be SDL related. (I’ve got good debug tools for linux and windows desktop, very little for winCE)

14

I’m actively using SDL, SDL_image and even SDL_mixer on PocketPC 2003.

There’s some videos (rough quality, don’t complain:) at: http://
www.sci.fi/~abisoft/luax/

The programs are actually LuaX scripts, so no C coding is necessary
(but studying the build system & included libraries may be useful for
you anyhow). If you don’t insist on C, LuaX should be much nicer and
more productive, imho. Speed is roughly the same.

-ak

Peter Mackay kirjoitti 23.5.2005 kello 14.13:> Hello,

After using it for years on PC, I would really like to use SDL on
Pocket PC. There seem to be a couple of unofficial ports of SDL to
Windows CE, like Arisme’s and Dmitry Yakimov’s.

Arisme's:
http://arisme.free.fr/ports/SDL.php

Dmitry's:
http://www.activekitten.com/pbc_download/sdl_wince_0.7.zip

I’ve managed to get Arisme’s port to work for a simple example -
setting up the screen and clearing it to a solid colour, exiting on
SDL_QUIT or SDL_KEYDOWN. If there are any problems with the port I
may not have encountered them yet. I believe this port is used in
PocketScumm (which works great on my iPaq) so that leaves me with
some confidence.

http://arisme.free.fr/PocketScumm/index.php

I’m not used Dmitry’s port, basically because I found Arisme’s first.

On the PC though, I heavily use SDL_image and SDL_ttf, which I
might need to find ports for or compile them myself.

I was wondering, if anyone out there is actively using an SDL port,
or even the official unsupported SDL version? From reading previous
posts to the list I know people are interested in using SDL on
Windows CE, but I don’t know if they’ve been successful. Any hints,
experiences, or advice would be gratefully received.

Kind regards,

Peter

SDL mailing list
SDL at libsdl.org
http://www.libsdl.org/mailman/listinfo/sdl

15

I can help you set up MS’s PocketPC emulator, so you in fact can test
without hardware.

Whether you want to… is a totally different issue, of course. :slight_smile:

Sam Lantinga kirjoitti 24.5.2005 kello 10.06:>> Judging by Jean-Gregoire’s post there is significant interest in an

official WinCE version of SDL. I would really like to hear Sam’s
take on
the idea, whether he’d be happy to have the best parts of the various
ports patched into SDL.

Yes, I’m happy to incorporate WinCE patches into SDL, as long as
they work
correctly and don’t break other ports. My only reluctance would be
that I
don’t have any way of testing them myself, so I would suggest
coordinating
with the various WinCE ports available to get one meta-patch that
can be
added to CVS.

See ya,
-Sam Lantinga, Software Engineer, Blizzard Entertainment

SDL mailing list
SDL at libsdl.org
http://www.libsdl.org/mailman/listinfo/sdl

16

It’s actually very easy to enable/disable individual formats in
SDL_image, so all the dependencies (third party dlls) you mean should
actually be optional.

(not that this applies to you, only wanted to set it straight so
others don’t get wrong impression :slight_smile:

-ak

Todd Lang kirjoitti 24.5.2005 kello 16.16:> I only patched it in (instead of using PNGs or TGAs) because the

base SDL
library only supports loading bitmaps, and we could not get the
SDL_image
library to compile for the PocketPC. It requires linking to some 3rd
party dlls, which would cannot obtain (nor should we due to the
licensing
restrictions), so patching in alpha support for bitmaps was our only
workable alternative.

17

Have you tried the eVC++ debug tools? I used them at the surface,
and they seemed rather cool. :slight_smile: Directly debugging the app running
on the connected device.

Yet, I’m a non-IDE person otherwise, so am touching those only when
really needed. But then, they did help.

-ak

cal at splitreflection.com kirjoitti 24.5.2005 kello 10.22:> Working on a game targeting portable devices using SDL. Had to fix

a bug on keyboard input to get arrow keys to work right (submitted
to CVS). Having difficulty with SDL_Image on winCE, though
SDL_LoadImage() works properly. A couple winCE only crash bugs
that may or may not be SDL related. (I’ve got good debug tools for
linux and windows desktop, very little for winCE)

SDL mailing list
SDL at libsdl.org
http://www.libsdl.org/mailman/listinfo/sdl

18

My understanding was that Microsoft finally released a specification for
32bpp bitmap files. It’s not a bug in SDL, they just implemented the
specification as published. (Which is what they should be doing.) The
patch is about 10 lines…I still have my patched file, but for the life
of me I cannot find the post where I found the original patched linked
from.

By the way, the 32-bit BMP support is in SDL_image in CVS.

-Sam Lantinga, Software Engineer, Blizzard Entertainment
19

Hello,

Just to give everyone an update:

Thanks to Dmitry and Arisme’s hard work, progress on the Pocket PC bug
fix of SDL is going well. I have a small app up and running, and it
seems to catch keys properly.

Once we are confident that our patches work properly and don’t break
other builds I would like to submit a diff file with our fixes. I would
also like to submit updated project files for Pocket PC, targeting the
Windows CE platforms which are commonly available out there. This means
not just ARM support, but MIPS, SH3, x86 and emulator too.

After the bug fix patch has been submitted we can work on adding
Arisme’s GAPI video driver.

One thing which I would like feedback on though is one of our additions
caused by a bug in eMbedded Visual C++'s emulator compiler. At the
moment public SDL functions are marked with SDLCALL, but only in header
files. The emulator’s compiler does not implicitly carry the calling
convention from a function’s declaration to its definition (whereas all
other compilers apparently do), causing compile problems with the
emulator target.

Dmitry did the work of adding SDLCALL to the function definitions, and
it seems to compile and work fine under Visual C++ 7 and eMbedded VC++
4. I don’t know about GCC or other compilers. If the changes break other
builds, then we will have to either find a tidy workaround or just not
support the emulator target. I’d much rather not support the emulator
target, if it will break builds.

Kind regards,

Peter> Yes, I’m happy to incorporate WinCE patches into SDL, as long as they

work correctly and don’t break other ports. My only reluctance would
be that I don’t have any way of testing them myself, so I would
suggest coordinating with the various WinCE ports available to get
one meta-patch that can be added to CVS.

See ya, -Sam Lantinga, Software Engineer, Blizzard Entertainment

20

Just to interject here…we applied Arisme’s GAPI work (and other changes)
to the 1.2.8 codebase and compiled a dll for the PocketPC. What we found
was that from the base 1.2.8 codebase the framerate fell about 10% in
240x320 mode. In 480x640 mode, the framerate fell about 90%.

For benchmarks on our Dell Axim x50 and Dell Axim x50v:
x50 (240x320) - Slightly modified 1.2.8: 103 fps
x50 (240x320) - GAPI patched 1.2.8: 93 fps
x50v (480x640) - Slightly modified 1.2.8: 9 fps (emulation kicks in)
x50v (480x640) - GAPI patched 1.2.8: 20 fps

Then, we did an experiment and allocated a 240x320 surface on the x50v.
It surprised the heck out of us by scaling up the surface for us. Very
handy.
x50v (240x320) - GAPI patched 1.2.8: 38 fps

Now, I’m not saying we patched everything correctly. In fact, I’m pretty
sure we didn’t since our code no longer responds to screen taps and
whatnot. But those are our preliminary numbers and the VGA versus QVGA
performance is pretty discouraging. Given that it was hooking in to the
GAPI backend, I was hoping for a framerate increase compared to the raw
SDL framebuffer.

So, I look forward to the work the others are doing to integrate this code
properly. I’m more than willing to test anything if a compiled ARM binary
dll can be supplied.

Todd Lang
@Todd_Lang