Installing for hikogui development

This guide explains how to install hikogui for developing hikogui itself. For installing the hikogui library as part of an application see the hikogui_hello_world example application.

Table of contents:

• Windows 10

Windows 10

Install requirements:

• The latest Microsoft Visual Studio or Microsoft Visual Studio Preview from https://visualstudio.microsoft.com/ with the following options installed:
  • C++ core desktop features
  • C++ CMake tools
  • Test Adapter for Google Test
  • Windows 10 SDK
• git from: https://git-scm.com/
• The Vulkan SDK from: https://www.lunarg.com/vulkan-sdk/ with the following options installed:
  • The Vulkan SDK Core (Always Installed)
  • Vulkan Memory Allocator header.
• optional: vcpkg from: https://github.com/microsoft/vcpkg
• optional: RenderDoc (for Vulkan debugging) from: https://renderdoc.org/
• optional: Doxygen (for documentation generation) from: https://www.doxygen.nl/

Install vcpkg (optional)

HikoGUI will use the dependencies installed on the system, but it can use vcpkg to install the dependencies if available.

Run the following commands from the "Developer Command Prompt" to install vcpkg:

git clone git@github.com:microsoft/vcpkg.git

cd vcpkg
bootstrap-vcpkg.bat

vcpkg.exe integrate install --feature-flags=manifests

You should get the following message:

Applied user-wide integration for this vcpkg root.
CMake projects should use: "-DCMAKE_TOOLCHAIN_FILE=C:/<path>/vcpkg/scripts/buildsystems/vcpkg.cmake"

Clone this project

Clone the hikogui repository on your machine:

git clone git@github.com:hikogui/hikogui.git

Building and running with "Microsoft Visual Studio"

You can then open the hikogui directory as a directory-based project inside visual studio.

To build:

1. Select x64-MSVC-Debug from the project Configuration pull down menu.
2. Project / Generate Cache menu option
3. Build / Build All menu option
4. Select hikogui_demo.exe from the Select Startup Item... pull-down menu.
5. Debug / Start Debugging

Note: A "Window Security Alert" may show up, this is due to the RenderDoc API creating a network server so that the RenderDoc application can remotely communicate to the hikogui_demo application.

Building and running using the "Developer Command Prompt"

cd hikogui
mkdir build
cd build
 
cmake .. -DCMAKE_VERBOSE_MAKEFILE=ON -DBUILD_SHARED_LIBS=OFF
 
cmake --build . --config Debug
 
cmake --install . --config Debug --prefix install

install\tests\hikogui_tests.exe
 
install\examples\hikogui_demo\hikogui_demo.exe

Building and running using the "Developer Command Prompt" with vcpkg

cd hikogui
mkdir build
cd build
 
cmake .. -DCMAKE_VERBOSE_MAKEFILE=ON \
         -DBUILD_SHARED_LIBS=OFF \
         -DVCPKG_TARGET_TRIPLET=x64-windows-static \
         -DCMAKE_TOOLCHAIN_FILE=C:/tools/vcpkg/scripts/buildsystems/vcpkg.cmake
 
cmake --build . --config Debug
 
cmake --install . --config Debug --prefix install

install\tests\hikogui_tests.exe
 
install\examples\hikogui_demo\hikogui_demo.exe

Just-in-time debugging with Visual Studio

When a hikogui application hits a break-point while not running with a debugger the Windows 10 CRT will try to start the just-in-time debugger as a fallback.

A common problem in Windows 10 are the missing registry entries for the jit debugger to work.

The fix is to add a DWORD Value of Auto, with Value data of 1, to the following registry keys:

• HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\AeDebug - DWORD "Auto" : Value (1)
• HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\WOW6432Node\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\AeDebug - DWORD "Auto" : Value (1)

See Just in time debugging.