2 ==============================================================================
4 These instructions are for people using Apple's Mac OS X (pronounced
7 From the developer's point of view, OS X is a sort of hybrid Mac and
8 Unix system, and you have the option of using either traditional
9 command line tools or Apple's IDE Xcode.
14 To build SDL using the command line, use the standard configure and make
21 You can also build SDL as a Universal library (a single binary for both
22 32-bit and 64-bit Intel architectures), on Mac OS X 10.7 and newer, by using
23 the gcc-fat.sh script in build-scripts:
27 CC=$PWD/../build-scripts/gcc-fat.sh CXX=$PWD/../build-scripts/g++-fat.sh ../configure
31 This script builds SDL with 10.5 ABI compatibility on i386 and 10.6
32 ABI compatibility on x86_64 architectures. For best compatibility you
33 should compile your application the same way.
35 Please note that building SDL requires at least Xcode 4.6 and the 10.7 SDK
36 (even if you target back to 10.5 systems). PowerPC support for Mac OS X has
37 been officially dropped as of SDL 2.0.2.
39 To use the library once it's built, you essential have two possibilities:
40 use the traditional autoconf/automake/make method, or use Xcode.
42 ==============================================================================
43 Caveats for using SDL with Mac OS X
44 ==============================================================================
46 Some things you have to be aware of when using SDL on Mac OS X:
48 - If you register your own NSApplicationDelegate (using [NSApp setDelegate:]),
49 SDL will not register its own. This means that SDL will not terminate using
50 SDL_Quit if it receives a termination request, it will terminate like a
51 normal app, and it will not send a SDL_DROPFILE when you request to open a
52 file with the app. To solve these issues, put the following code in your
53 NSApplicationDelegate implementation:
56 - (NSApplicationTerminateReply)applicationShouldTerminate:(NSApplication *)sender
58 if (SDL_GetEventState(SDL_QUIT) == SDL_ENABLE) {
60 event.type = SDL_QUIT;
61 SDL_PushEvent(&event);
64 return NSTerminateCancel;
67 - (BOOL)application:(NSApplication *)theApplication openFile:(NSString *)filename
69 if (SDL_GetEventState(SDL_DROPFILE) == SDL_ENABLE) {
71 event.type = SDL_DROPFILE;
72 event.drop.file = SDL_strdup([filename UTF8String]);
73 return (SDL_PushEvent(&event) > 0);
79 ==============================================================================
80 Using the Simple DirectMedia Layer with a traditional Makefile
81 ==============================================================================
83 An existing autoconf/automake build system for your SDL app has good chances
84 to work almost unchanged on OS X. However, to produce a "real" Mac OS X binary
85 that you can distribute to users, you need to put the generated binary into a
86 so called "bundle", which basically is a fancy folder with a name like
89 To get this build automatically, add something like the following rule to
92 bundle_contents = APP_NAME.app/Contents
93 APP_NAME_bundle: EXE_NAME
94 mkdir -p $(bundle_contents)/MacOS
95 mkdir -p $(bundle_contents)/Resources
96 echo "APPL????" > $(bundle_contents)/PkgInfo
97 $(INSTALL_PROGRAM) $< $(bundle_contents)/MacOS/
99 You should replace EXE_NAME with the name of the executable. APP_NAME is what
100 will be visible to the user in the Finder. Usually it will be the same
101 as EXE_NAME but capitalized. E.g. if EXE_NAME is "testgame" then APP_NAME
102 usually is "TestGame". You might also want to use `@PACKAGE@` to use the package
103 name as specified in your configure.in file.
105 If your project builds more than one application, you will have to do a bit
106 more. For each of your target applications, you need a separate rule.
108 If you want the created bundles to be installed, you may want to add this
109 rule to your Makefile.am:
111 install-exec-hook: APP_NAME_bundle
112 rm -rf $(DESTDIR)$(prefix)/Applications/APP_NAME.app
113 mkdir -p $(DESTDIR)$(prefix)/Applications/
114 cp -r $< /$(DESTDIR)$(prefix)Applications/
116 This rule takes the Bundle created by the rule from step 3 and installs them
117 into "$(DESTDIR)$(prefix)/Applications/".
119 Again, if you want to install multiple applications, you will have to augment
120 the make rule accordingly.
123 But beware! That is only part of the story! With the above, you end up with
124 a bare bone .app bundle, which is double clickable from the Finder. But
125 there are some more things you should do before shipping your product...
127 1) The bundle right now probably is dynamically linked against SDL. That
128 means that when you copy it to another computer, *it will not run*,
129 unless you also install SDL on that other computer. A good solution
130 for this dilemma is to static link against SDL. On OS X, you can
131 achieve that by linking against the libraries listed by
133 sdl-config --static-libs
135 instead of those listed by
139 Depending on how exactly SDL is integrated into your build systems, the
140 way to achieve that varies, so I won't describe it here in detail
142 2) Add an 'Info.plist' to your application. That is a special XML file which
143 contains some meta-information about your application (like some copyright
144 information, the version of your app, the name of an optional icon file,
145 and other things). Part of that information is displayed by the Finder
146 when you click on the .app, or if you look at the "Get Info" window.
147 More information about Info.plist files can be found on Apple's homepage.
150 As a final remark, let me add that I use some of the techniques (and some
151 variations of them) in Exult and ScummVM; both are available in source on
152 the net, so feel free to take a peek at them for inspiration!
155 ==============================================================================
156 Using the Simple DirectMedia Layer with Xcode
157 ==============================================================================
159 These instructions are for using Apple's Xcode IDE to build SDL applications.
163 The first thing to do is to unpack the Xcode.tar.gz archive in the
164 top level SDL directory (where the Xcode.tar.gz archive resides).
165 Because Stuffit Expander will unpack the archive into a subdirectory,
166 you should unpack the archive manually from the command line:
168 cd [path_to_SDL_source]
171 This will create a new folder called Xcode, which you can browse
172 normally from the Finder.
174 - Building the Framework
176 The SDL Library is packaged as a framework bundle, an organized
177 relocatable folder hierarchy of executable code, interface headers,
178 and additional resources. For practical purposes, you can think of a
179 framework as a more user and system-friendly shared library, whose library
180 file behaves more or less like a standard UNIX shared library.
182 To build the framework, simply open the framework project and build it.
183 By default, the framework bundle "SDL.framework" is installed in
184 /Library/Frameworks. Therefore, the testers and project stationary expect
185 it to be located there. However, it will function the same in any of the
189 /Local/Library/Frameworks
190 /System/Library/Frameworks
193 There are two "Build Styles" (See the "Targets" tab) for SDL.
194 "Deployment" should be used if you aren't tweaking the SDL library.
195 "Development" should be used to debug SDL apps or the library itself.
197 - Building the Testers
198 Open the SDLTest project and build away!
200 - Using the Project Stationary
201 Copy the stationary to the indicated folders to access it from
202 the "New Project" and "Add target" menus. What could be easier?
204 - Setting up a new project by hand
205 Some of you won't want to use the Stationary so I'll give some tips:
206 * Create a new "Cocoa Application"
207 * Add src/main/macosx/SDLMain.m , .h and .nib to your project
208 * Remove "main.c" from your project
209 * Remove "MainMenu.nib" from your project
210 * Add "$(HOME)/Library/Frameworks/SDL.framework/Headers" to include path
211 * Add "$(HOME)/Library/Frameworks" to the frameworks search path
212 * Add "-framework SDL -framework Foundation -framework AppKit" to "OTHER_LDFLAGS"
213 * Set the "Main Nib File" under "Application Settings" to "SDLMain.nib"
217 - Building from command line
218 Use pbxbuild in the same directory as your .pbproj file
221 You can send command line args to your app by either invoking it from
222 the command line (in *.app/Contents/MacOS) or by entering them in the
223 "Executables" panel of the target settings.
225 - Implementation Notes
226 Some things that may be of interest about how it all works...
228 As defined in the SDL_main.m file, the working directory of your SDL app
229 is by default set to its parent. You may wish to change this to better
231 * You have a Cocoa App!
232 Your SDL app is essentially a Cocoa application. When your app
233 starts up and the libraries finish loading, a Cocoa procedure is called,
234 which sets up the working directory and calls your main() method.
235 You are free to modify your Cocoa app with generally no consequence
236 to SDL. You cannot, however, easily change the SDL window itself.
237 Functionality may be added in the future to help this.
240 Known bugs are listed in the file "BUGS.txt".