Problems with installation on Ubuntu 14.04?

GDevelop general
1

Hi

I’ve followed the instructions for installation of gdevelop for Ubuntu:
sudo add-apt-repository ppa:florian-rival/gdevelop
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install gdevelop

However, it appears that I’m unable to install - here’s the output:

apt-get install gdevelop
Reading package lists… Done
Building dependency tree
Reading state information… Done
E: Unable to locate package gdevelop

Can you let me know what’s wrong?

Many thanks

Carl

2

Hi,

GDevelop is only available on 64 bits linux.

3

Is there a technical reason for this? :confused:
Many of the kids at our local CoderDojo only have access to older machines that run Ubuntu compiled for i386.
Thanks.

4

Mainly because we don’t have 32 bits OS to test this software on it. Also, it would be difficult to crosscompile 32 bits when the software is executed on a 64 bits OS (and 64 bits is the future, so the choice was quickly made).
I also doubt you will be able to use GDevelop on very old machines (only very old machines don’t support 64 bits OSes).

You can build GDevelop on it following the instructions here : github.com/4ian/GD

5

I did build it following the provided instructions and aside from it taking about an hour, it was a success and it is running smoothly! :smiley:

I don’t think there is much difficulty left in compiling for i386 on amd64 since Debian Multiarch.

E.g., to built for i386 on Ubuntu amd64, you only need sudo apt-get install g++-multilib binutils-multiarch and have make provide -m32 gcc flag [src].

To test, you can just run it as you would; amd64 is backwards-compatible.

Please enable i386 build on Launchpad, it will work perfectly! :smiley:
Perhaps not on Pentium IIs, but on ~Core2Duos with 2GB RAM running i386 Linuces, for sure!

Thank you.

6

Great, why don’t you install a Linux 64 bits on your computers ? (Intel Core 2 Duo supports 64 bits OSes)

7

Indeed. But with only e.g. 2GB RAM, a handful of browser tabs eats the whole available memory up about twice as fast on 64-bit builds compared to 32-bit. With not a lot of RAM, 32-bit OS really makes sense if one wants to avoid swapping.

stackoverflow.com/questions/2543 … ystem-on-a

8

And while I have both, most kids at our CoderDojo inherit the old computers from their parents and so:

  1. the computers are older, 32-bit OS often makes sense, and
  2. they have what they have. If asked, we recommend 32-bits becuase the system is generally more responsive.

Please consider enabling the i386 build on Launchpad.

9

It can be done (but I’m not responsible of the Launchpad repo, it’s 4ian’s repo, the main dev of this software).
I’m actually trying to do that for the Fedora/OpenSUSE/ArchLinux repo (build.opensuse.org/package/show … r/gdevelop)

If we enable i386, then we’ll disable x64 builds because i386 can be used for both (the con of the x64 would be that we can compile native games for i386).

10

Actually, x64 builds are a bit more optimized for 64-bit-capable CPUs, use some additional instructions, have access to more general purpose CPU registers, … One definitely should prefer a 64-bit build on a 64-bit OS. So if there’s no question of having too much load on your servers, I’d suggest just leaving both architectures enabled. :slight_smile:

You might not notice it, but a better option might be to provide a configuration option, the target architecture the game maker wants to build for?

11

But the libs provided with GDevelop (libGDCore.so, libGDCpp.so …) need to be compiled in the same architecture than GDevelop. That’s the main problem.

EDIT : By the way, i386 build on Fedora KDE gives weird results : the GUI is completly messed up (seem that oxygen doesn’t install a GTK theme for the i386 GTK)…

EDIT : In fact, just the runtime libraries compiled for i386 are needed, so it might be possible. But, it still tough to implement correctly (I put it in the ideas for future features trello.com/c/hjCdj8tH/20-abilit … -x64-linux). I think we can enable the i386 build even without this feature.

12

Plus the ability to crosscompile, so I won’t need Windows machine to build game for Windows (all worthy compilers support crosscompiling between OSs so…)

13

I was able to install Wine and then install the 32-bit Windows Gdevelop for my system

14

Thank you sooo much, totally works for me. :slight_smile:

15

If gdevelop is dependent on 64bit, why does it install/launch/work on 32 bit windows? I have it on a netbook at the moment.

16

GD is exclusive 64bits for Ubuntu, GD for Windows is the same for both 32 and 64bits.