Building SDL with Borland's C++ compilers.

by David Snopek and updated by Dominique Louis ( Last updated : 30th June 2003 ).

These instructions cover how to compile SDL and its included test programs using either Borland C++ Builder 5, 6 for Windows, C++ Builder for Linux ( AKA Kylix 3 ) or the free Borland C++ command-line compiler.

Extract the files

Unzip the Borland.zip archive into this directory. Do not unzip it into any other directory because the makefiles ( *.mak ) and project files ( *.bpr ) use relative paths to refer to the SDL sources. This should create a directory named "Borland" inside of the top level SDL source directory.

Using Borland C++ Builder 5, 6 for Windows

Inside of the "Borland" directory there is a "bcb6" directory that contains a number of Builder project files. Double-click on the "libSDL.bpg" file icon. Once Builder has started click on the "Projects" menu on the menu-bar and go down to "Build All Projects" option.
This will proceed to build SDL ( with Borland's calling convention ), SDLmain, and all the test programs. Currently, all the test programs are dynamically linked to Sam Lantinga's SDL.dll.

NOTE : Borland's "lib" format and Microsoft's "lib" format are incompatible.  
If you wish to dynamically link to the SDL library supplied by Sam Lantinga in each release, I have created the correct *.libs for SDL 1.2.4 and they exist in the "/lib" directory.
If you would like to create the *.lib files yourself, you will need to make use of Borland's "implib.exe" utility.

IMPLIB works like this: 

    IMPLIB (destination lib name) (source dll)

For example,

    IMPLIB SDL.lib SDL.dll

This assumes that SDL.dll was compiled with Visual C++ or similar.

To learn more about the difference between Borland's and Microsoft's *.lib format please read the article here.


NOTE : The C++ Builder for Windows project format, is not compatible with the Kylix 3 project format, hence the reason why they are in separate directories.

Using the free Borland C++ command-line compiler

The free Borland compiler can be downloaded at no charge from the Borland website . Make sure that it is installed and properly configured.

Open an MS-DOS Prompt. Change to the "Borland\freebcc" directory under the SDL source directory. Type "make -f SDL.mak" to build SDL and "make -f SDLmain.mak". There are also makefiles for all of the test programs, if you wish to build them. All .exes and DLLs are created in the "test" SDL directory. Ify ou would like to create the DLL and all the test applications, I have thrown together a basic batchfile called "makeall.bat" which should create everything in the right order.

Output files

No matter which compiler you used, three important files should have been produced: Both of the *.lib files will need to be added to all the projects that use SDL and SDL.dll must be placed some where the Windows dynamic linker can find it (either in your project directory or on the system path, C:\WINDOWS\SYSTEM).

Using Borland C++ Builder for Linux ( AKA Kylix 3 )

Inside of the "Borland" directory there is a "k3" directory that contains a number of Builder project files. Double-click on the "libSDL.bpg" file icon. Once Builder has started click on the "Projects" menu on the menu-bar and go down to "Build All Projects" option. This will proceed to build all the test programs. 
Linux users do not need *.lib files as the Shared Object is linked right into the project ( very neat actually, Windows should do this sort of thing as it is a lot easier for the developer ).
NOTE : The C++ Builder for Windows project format, is not compatible with the Kylix 3 project format, hence the reason why they are in separate directories.

On Mandrake 8.1 the shared objects for SDL are located in the /usr/lib directory as libSDL_*.so and the Mesa OpenGL shared objects are located in /usr/X11R6/lib as libGL*.so

So if your setup is different you may need to change the project file so that they re-link to the ones on your system.

On Mandrake 8.1 the headers files are located at /usr/include/SDL/. So if you you have not installed the development RPMs ( usually named libSDL-devel* ) for SDL ( not included ) you may have to change the include directory within some of the projects.

Known Problems

The only known problem is that I ( Dominique Louis ), was unable to create the projects that rebuilt the SDL shared objects under Linux, due to time constraints and my lack of intimate knowledge of Linux.

Test programs

Some of the test programs require included media files ( *.wav; *.bmp etc ). All the test programs are now created in the "test" directory, where the media files are ( usually ) so they should be ready to go.