Dolphin Linux build testing and evaluation for packaging

[Callum]

Hello there,

I've been hanging around here on and off for a while, I'm sure people know me.

Well, since Dolphin is now much nicer with Linux, I've decided to start trying to get the Linux build working again, and I have finally got it working although there are issues.

I am a packager, I package both RPM and DEB packages (and reading about how to make Arch Linux packages too) for Linux distributions. I want to make packages for Dolphin so it can be easily installed on any RPM (Red Hat, CentOS, Fedora, etc) or DEB (Debian, Ubuntu, Linux Mint, etc) based Linux distribution, but there are issues:

1. The fact that Dolphin keeps all its settings and plugins in prepackaged folders in a preset directory is the biggest issue. Since I plan to put the Dolphin binary in /usr/bin (where it should be put), the settings need to be created where the current user has read/write access, such as the users home directory (where settings should be kept), for example, /home/foobar/.dolphin is the best place to doing it (just a note, my packages won't install the settings to the home folder, they have to be created by Dolphin itself). Plugins should probably be kept in /usr/lib.

2. Dolphin still seems to be quite temperamental under Linux, I've had crashes and freezes and it seems to try ALSA's patience a bit (see the buffer underruns from the terminal emulator window in my screenshot). It is sure as hell a lot faster under Linux than Windows though =P

That seems to be it so far from me. I'm pretty sure a lot of people here have no clue in hell about what I'm talking about in this topic, but hopefully the developers of Dolphin are listening and can help me out a bit. =) I wasn't sure where to put this discussion so I put it both here and on the EmuTalk forums.

Thanks guys.

[boogerlad]

post on google code itself. or nakee

[xalixo]

PLEASE!! PLEASE!! PLEASE!! package this for linux. Please can the developers talk to this guy so it can happen. There is no download for us linux users and it just doesn't work using wine (that is a bit crazy anyway, emulating it twice, the console to windows and then windows to linux!!). I only have a netbook running linux so I have no other option. Please.

[boogerlad]

wine is not emulation.

[PSPFanatic]

lol

Wine
Is
Not an
Emulator

[xalixo]

Alright fine then, compatibility layer, whatever, it still doesn't work with dolphin. I know the linux developer walked out on the project and they said they weren't going to support linux anymore, but this guy has got it working and he is willing to package it for the main distributions! Thank you callum! And thankyou developers for creating dolphin in the first place. I've heard people say dolphin works better in linux anyway, so if the developers are reading this please talk to callum.

[ector]

I'm listening. Sorry for not seeing the thread earlier. Packaging for Dolphin would be great, it's just that noone on the project, including me even though I did the original linux port, know anything about how it's done

Basically, the entire User/ directory under Dolphin should be remapped to use ~/.dolphin or whatever like you say. This should be a pretty small code change, hopefully. If you can get it working and have a patch ready, I'll submit it for sure.

Not sure I agree that plugins should be in /usr/lib - they're not exactly useful for any other programs. On the other hand, Linux doesn't really have the concept of a "program folder" so maybe that's what makes sense anyway...

But, Dolphin faster on Linux? I've only ever seen it go slower than on Windows (if you compare builds of the same "bitness", linux64 vs win64 for example). And yeah, it's very temperamental :p

[Edo]

Thanks Callum, that would be great to have a package.

Ector can you tell us what distrib you used to do the original port? Or if you have any suggestion?

I got some troubles making it to work on Ubuntu Jaunty 32bits - 2Go RAM - Intel Quad-Core - Dolphin R4286
It compiles... but when I start an ISO, it says "(0) : fatal error C9999: *** exception during compilation ***"
The same ISO works fine with "wine Dolphin.exe", but the FPS are dead slow.
Any idea?

[loicm]

(09-09-2009, 08:41 PM)Callum Wrote: 1. The fact that Dolphin keeps all its settings and plugins in prepackaged folders in a preset directory is the biggest issue. Since I plan to put the Dolphin binary in /usr/bin (where it should be put),(...). Plugins should probably be kept in /usr/lib.

The binary should go in /usr/games (it's been a Freedesktop spec for a while, even though legacy packages might still install in /usr/bin), the plugins would probably fit in /usr/share/dolphin (or /usr/share/dolphin-###, since there's already a Dolphin application, the KDE file manager, could be dolphin-emu or whatever the Dolphin devs find more appropriate).

You could have a look at Desmume packaging in Debian, since it's team-maintained and thus more up-to-date/correct (plus it's Debian ), see for example the package page. Maybe someone in Debian Games Team would be interested, even though it's not sure, but if one is they could help.

(09-09-2009, 08:41 PM)Callum Wrote: the settings need to be created where the current user has read/write access, such as the users home directory (where settings should be kept), for example, /home/foobar/.dolphin is the best place to doing it (just a note, my packages won't install the settings to the home folder, they have to be created by Dolphin itself)

Or you could use the XDG standard for config dirs, by using the environment variables, which on most systems would give /home/foobar/.config/dolphin-###. See the spec at http://standards.freedesktop.org/basedir-spec/basedir-spec-latest.html

[PrismSub7]

But, does Debian allow Dolphin in the main repository?
Their policy might conflict with such a file like VolumeCreator.cpp.