Hello, my name is Mark Balantzyan, an aspiring developer and Google Summer of Code 2019 applicant. It took much varied realizations of discernment between what is permissible in C and C++ but not in D during my development of this proof of concept. I would hope to say I have ported it, however I am not entirely sure as the output complains of linker errors though producing an executable.

I attach a link to an archive containing the source with executable, just sharing here in the newsgroup. It is a standard pong game with AI that appears to need an Intel 80836 PE32 environment to run (16-bit/DOS maybe?), and I was not able to test it on my machines. Just sharing it here for ideas.

The original is at https://github.com/flightcrank/pong.git .

N.B. Further of my research showed to me that such exe's need managed headers (mentioning dot net version preceded by BSJB, or something to that order).

Regards,
Mark

Link to D-ported pong (pongd):

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1kWltW8k6J6v_XTXwLBJNLzChox72Ko3x/view?usp=sharing

On Friday, 26 April 2019 at 01:24:21 UTC, mbalantz wrote:
> Hello, my name is Mark Balantzyan, an aspiring developer and Google Summer of Code 2019 applicant. It took much varied realizations of discernment between what is permissible in C and C++ but not in D during my development of this proof of concept. I would hope to say I have ported it, however I am not entirely sure as the output complains of linker errors though producing an executable.

A few questions:
* What are the linker errors?
* What hardware architecture are you running on?
* Is it truly bare metal, are is there an underlying OS?
* Looking at the source code, it appears SDL is doing the heavy lifting.  Perhaps it is SDL that needs porting?

Mike

On 2019-04-28 5:43 p.m., Mike Franklin wrote:
> On Friday, 26 April 2019 at 01:24:21 UTC, mbalantz wrote:
>> Hello, my name is Mark Balantzyan, an aspiring developer and Google Summer of Code 2019 applicant. It took much varied realizations of discernment between what is permissible in C and C++ but not in D during my development of this proof of concept. I would hope to say I have ported it, however I am not entirely sure as the output complains of linker errors though producing an executable.
> 
> A few questions:
> * What are the linker errors?
> * What hardware architecture are you running on?
> * Is it truly bare metal, are is there an underlying OS?
> * Looking at the source code, it appears SDL is doing the heavy lifting.  Perhaps it is SDL that needs porting?
> 
> Mike
> 
> 
* The linker errors complain about undefined symbols and mention alphanumeric strings as reference, containing the SDL binding for D keywords and SDL keywords as per the functions that used them in the pongd.d file.

* I downloaded and installed the dmd compiler on x86_64 Windows 10 Education on an AMD Ryzen 1950X. Therefore:

* ..it is not truly baremetal. I intended to share it to show a demo, and then maybe we could look into reverse engineering it to be baremetal. Though I don't know if I picked a good demo for running baremetal (i.e. a pong game).

* Yes, it is quite dependent on SDL. Porting SDL to D would be no small task, I would think? I tried using the bindbc bindings provided in D's library to provide the SDL. Though that is not sufficient? The linker errors complain of undefined symbols for a lot of SDL functions.

Thanks for you reply,
Mark

On Friday, 3 May 2019 at 23:20:13 UTC, mbalantz wrote:

> * The linker errors complain about undefined symbols and mention alphanumeric strings as reference, containing the SDL binding for D keywords and SDL keywords as per the functions that used them in the pongd.d file.

I'm sorry, but I don't fully understand.  Please copy and paste a few of the errors here.

> * I downloaded and installed the dmd compiler on x86_64 Windows 10 Education on an AMD Ryzen 1950X. Therefore:

I think DMD is fine if you want to do bare-metal programming on x86_64.

> * ..it is not truly baremetal. I intended to share it to show a demo, and then maybe we could look into reverse engineering it to be baremetal. Though I don't know if I picked a good demo for running baremetal (i.e. a pong game).

What I'm able to ascertain from this is that you've ported a pong game to SDL, not to bare metal.  If SDL were ported to bare metal, then it would probably work because SDL abstracts the architecture and platform for you.

> * Yes, it is quite dependent on SDL. Porting SDL to D would be no small task, I would think? I tried using the bindbc bindings provided in D's library to provide the SDL. Though that is not sufficient? The linker errors complain of undefined symbols for a lot of SDL functions.

Yes, porting SDL to D would be a big task.  I don't think it's necessary though because D has good support for binding to C APIs.  You can try compiling with -betterC to see if that gets rid of some of the linker errors you're encountering.  Otherwise, I'd need to see the linker output to understand what's going on.

Mike

On 2019-05-03 4:31 p.m., Mike Franklin wrote:
> On Friday, 3 May 2019 at 23:20:13 UTC, mbalantz wrote:
> 
>> * The linker errors complain about undefined symbols and mention alphanumeric strings as reference, containing the SDL binding for D keywords and SDL keywords as per the functions that used them in the pongd.d file.
> 
> I'm sorry, but I don't fully understand.  Please copy and paste a few of the errors here.
> 
>> * I downloaded and installed the dmd compiler on x86_64 Windows 10 Education on an AMD Ryzen 1950X. Therefore:
> 
> I think DMD is fine if you want to do bare-metal programming on x86_64.
> 
>> * ..it is not truly baremetal. I intended to share it to show a demo, and then maybe we could look into reverse engineering it to be baremetal. Though I don't know if I picked a good demo for running baremetal (i.e. a pong game).
> 
> What I'm able to ascertain from this is that you've ported a pong game to SDL, not to bare metal.  If SDL were ported to bare metal, then it would probably work because SDL abstracts the architecture and platform for you.
> 
>> * Yes, it is quite dependent on SDL. Porting SDL to D would be no small task, I would think? I tried using the bindbc bindings provided in D's library to provide the SDL. Though that is not sufficient? The linker errors complain of undefined symbols for a lot of SDL functions.
> 
> Yes, porting SDL to D would be a big task.  I don't think it's necessary though because D has good support for binding to C APIs.  You can try compiling with -betterC to see if that gets rid of some of the linker errors you're encountering.  Otherwise, I'd need to see the linker output to understand what's going on.
> 
> Mike
> 
> 

Thanks again for getting back to me. Sorry, forgot to include linker output. The errors are Error 42: symbol undefined and "linker exited status 21"

As follows:

PS C:\Users\mbala\workspace\D\pongd_actual\source> dmd pongd.d -odC:\Users\mbala\workspace\D\pongd\out\production\pongd\obj -ofpongd -IC:\Users\mbala\Download
s\SDL2-2.0.9\x86_64-w64-mingw32\include\SDL2 -LC:\Users\mbala\Downloads\SDL2-2.0.9-win32-x64\SDL2.dll
pongd.d(399): Deprecation: switch case fallthrough - use 'goto case;' if intended
pongd.d(401): Deprecation: switch case fallthrough - use 'goto case;' if intended
pongd.d(403): Deprecation: switch case fallthrough - use 'goto default;' if intended
OPTLINK (R) for Win32  Release 8.00.17
Copyright (C) Digital Mars 1989-2013  All rights reserved.
http://www.digitalmars.com/ctg/optlink.html
OPTLINK : Warning 9: Unknown Option : NOIC
:\Users\mbala\Downloads\SDL2-2.0.9-win32-x64\SDL2.dll
 Warning 2: File Not Found :\Users\mbala\Downloads\SDL2-2.0.9-win32-x64\SDL2.dll
C:\Users\mbala\workspace\D\pongd\out\production\pongd\obj\pongd.obj(pongd)
 Error 42: Symbol Undefined __D6bindbc3sdl4bindQj8SDL_QuitPUNbNiZv
C:\Users\mbala\workspace\D\pongd\out\production\pongd\obj\pongd.obj(pongd)
 Error 42: Symbol Undefined __D6bindbc3sdl4bind8sdlvideo17SDL_DestroyWindowPUNbNiPSQCaQBwQBvQBt10SDL_WindowZv
C:\Users\mbala\workspace\D\pongd\out\production\pongd\obj\pongd.obj(pongd)
 Error 42: Symbol Undefined __D6bindbc3sdl4bind9sdlrender19SDL_DestroyRendererPUNbNiPSQCdQBzQByQBw12SDL_RendererZv
C:\Users\mbala\workspace\D\pongd\out\production\pongd\obj\pongd.obj(pongd)
 Error 42: Symbol Undefined __D6bindbc3sdl4bind10sdlsurface15SDL_FreeSurfacePUNbNiPSQCbQBxQBwQBu11SDL_SurfaceZv
C:\Users\mbala\workspace\D\pongd\out\production\pongd\obj\pongd.obj(pongd)
 Error 42: Symbol Undefined __D6bindbc3sdl4bind9sdlrender17SDL_RenderPresentPUNbNiPSQCbQBxQBwQBu12SDL_RendererZv
C:\Users\mbala\workspace\D\pongd\out\production\pongd\obj\pongd.obj(pongd)
 Error 42: Symbol Undefined __D6bindbc3sdl4Çäï9Çâëre¨er14SDL_RÇàîCopyPUNbNiPSQByÐuÐtÐr12Çèñ╔Çâ£DaQCwÐvÐt11Çä£TexturePxSQEcQDyÐx7ÇàÒct8Çå╝ctxPQBdZi
C:\Users\mbala\workspace\D\pongd\out\production\pongd\obj\pongd.obj(pongd)
 Error 42: Symbol Undefined __D6bindbc3sdl4bind9sdlrender17SDL_UpdateTexturePUNbNiPSQCbQBxQBwQBu11SDL_TexturePxSQDdQCzQCy7sdlrect8SDL_RectPxviZi
C:\Users\mbala\workspace\D\pongd\out\production\pongd\obj\pongd.obj(pongd)
 Error 42: Symbol Undefined __D6bindbc3sdl4bindQj8SDL_InitPUNbNikZi
C:\Users\mbala\workspace\D\pongd\out\production\pongd\obj\pongd.obj(pongd)
 Error 42: Symbol Undefined __D6bindbc3sdl4bind10sdlsurface12SDL_FillRectPUNbNiPSQByQBuQBtQBr11SDL_SurfacePxSQDaQCwQCv7sdlrect8SDL_RectkZi
C:\Users\mbala\workspace\D\pongd\out\production\pongd\obj\pongd.obj(pongd)
 Error 42: Symbol Undefined __D6bindbc3sdl4bind10sdlsurface15SDL_SetColorKeyPUNbNiPSQCbQBxQBwQBu11SDL_SurfaceikZi
C:\Users\mbala\workspace\D\pongd\out\production\pongd\obj\pongd.obj(pongd)
 Error 42: Symbol Undefined __D6bindbc3sdl4bind9sdlpixels10SDL_MapRGBPUNbNiPxSQBvQBrQBqQBo15SDL_PixelFormathhhZk
C:\Users\mbala\workspace\D\pongd\out\production\pongd\obj\pongd.obj(pongd)
 Error 42: Symbol Undefined __D6bindbc3sdl4bind8sdlerror12SDL_GetErrorPUNbNiZPxa
C:\Users\mbala\workspace\D\pongd\out\production\pongd\obj\pongd.obj(pongd)
 Error 42: Symbol Undefined __D6bindbc3sdl4bind10sdlsurface11SDL_LoadBMPFNbNiPxaZPSQCaQBwQBvQBt11SDL_Surface
C:\Users\mbala\workspace\D\pongd\out\production\pongd\obj\pongd.obj(pongd)
 Error 42: Symbol Undefined __D6bindbc3sdl4Çäï9Çâëre¨er28SDL_CreateTextureFromS¨facePUNbNiPSQCmÐiÐhÐf12Çä▓RÇà¥╔Çâ£DoÐkÐj10ÇâÍsÇå╣11ÇäÑÇçãZÇâÑEzÐvÐuÐsÇå£ÇçÝ
C:\Users\mbala\workspace\D\pongd\out\production\pongd\obj\pongd.obj(pongd)
 Error 42: Symbol Undefined __D6bindbc3sdl4Çäï9Çâëre¨er27SDL_CreateWÇâÜowAßRÇàø╔PUNbNiiikPPSQCpÐlÐk8Çâ╝video10Çä╗ÇåÁÇäíDwÐsÐrÐp12ÇäøÇêÃZi
C:\Users\mbala\workspace\D\pongd\out\production\pongd\obj\pongd.obj(pongd)
 Error 42: Symbol Undefined __D6bindbc3sdl4bind8sdltimer9SDL_DelayPUNbNikZv
C:\Users\mbala\workspace\D\pongd\out\production\pongd\obj\pongd.obj(pongd)
 Error 42: Symbol Undefined __D6bindbc3sdl4bind9sdlrender15SDL_RenderClearPUNbNiPSQBzQBvQBuQBs12SDL_RendererZi
C:\Users\mbala\workspace\D\pongd\out\production\pongd\obj\pongd.obj(pongd)
 Error 42: Symbol Undefined __D6bindbc3sdl4bind11sdlkeyboard20SDL_GetKeyboardStatePUNbNiPiZPh
C:\Users\mbala\workspace\D\pongd\out\production\pongd\obj\pongd.obj(pongd)
 Error 42: Symbol Undefined __D6bindbc3sdl4bind9sdlevents14SDL_PumpEventsPUNbNiZv
C:\Users\mbala\workspace\D\pongd\out\production\pongd\obj\pongd.obj(pongd)
 Error 42: Symbol Undefined __D6bindbc3sdl4bind8sdltimer12SDL_GetTicksPUNbNiZk
C:\Users\mbala\workspace\D\pongd\out\production\pongd\obj\pongd.obj(pongd)
 Error 42: Symbol Undefined __D6bindbc3sdl4bind8sdlvideo17SDL_GetWindowSizePUNbNiPSQCaQBwQBvQBt10SDL_WindowPiQcZv
Error: linker exited with status 21
PS C:\Users\mbala\workspace\D\pongd_actual\source>

On Friday, 3 May 2019 at 23:49:23 UTC, mbalantz wrote:

> Thanks again for getting back to me. Sorry, forgot to include linker output. The errors are Error 42: symbol undefined and "linker exited status 21"
>
> As follows:
>
> PS C:\Users\mbala\workspace\D\pongd_actual\source> dmd pongd.d -odC:\Users\mbala\workspace\D\pongd\out\production\pongd\obj -ofpongd -IC:\Users\mbala\Download
> s\SDL2-2.0.9\x86_64-w64-mingw32\include\SDL2 -LC:\Users\mbala\Downloads\SDL2-2.0.9-win32-x64\SDL2.dll
> pongd.d(399): Deprecation: switch case fallthrough - use 'goto case;' if intended
> pongd.d(401): Deprecation: switch case fallthrough - use 'goto case;' if intended
> pongd.d(403): Deprecation: switch case fallthrough - use 'goto default;' if intended
> OPTLINK (R) for Win32  Release 8.00.17
> Copyright (C) Digital Mars 1989-2013  All rights reserved.
> http://www.digitalmars.com/ctg/optlink.html
> OPTLINK : Warning 9: Unknown Option : NOIC
> :\Users\mbala\Downloads\SDL2-2.0.9-win32-x64\SDL2.dll
>  Warning 2: File Not Found :\Users\mbala\Downloads\SDL2-2.0.9-win32-x64\SDL2.dll
> C:\Users\mbala\workspace\D\pongd\out\production\pongd\obj\pongd.obj(pongd)
>  Error 42: Symbol Undefined __D6bindbc3sdl4bindQj8SDL_QuitPUNbNiZv
> C:\Users\mbala\workspace\D\pongd\out\production\pongd\obj\pongd.obj(pongd)
>  Error 42: Symbol Undefined __D6bindbc3sdl4bind8sdlvideo17SDL_DestroyWindowPUNbNiPSQCaQBwQBvQBt10SDL_WindowZv
> C:\Users\mbala\workspace\D\pongd\out\production\pongd\obj\pongd.obj(pongd)
>  Error 42: Symbol Undefined __D6bindbc3sdl4bind9sdlrender19SDL_DestroyRendererPUNbNiPSQCdQBzQByQBw12SDL_RendererZv
> C:\Users\mbala\workspace\D\pongd\out\production\pongd\obj\pongd.obj(pongd)
>  Error 42: Symbol Undefined
[..]

I donwloaded your code again, and the pongd.exe file contains a trojan:Win32/Fuery.!cl.  Not sure if that's a false positive, but it certainly wasn't encouraging.

What bothers me is why do you have a pongd.exe file if you're having trouble linking.  Seems very suspcious.  Where did that .exe come from if you're having trouble getting a build?

I see the message from optlink.  This is a linker (created by Walter, I think) that is used to link 32-bit code on Windows.  Try compiling with -w64 instead.  -w64 will create a 64-bit binary and will use either LLVM's linker or Visual Studio's linker depending on which one it finds first.

Next, I see you are compiling pongd.d, but you're not compiling the code in the bindbc directory and I think that is the source of your linker errors.  You'll need to compile the bindbc directory to object code and link that in to you final executable.

Mike

On 2019-05-03 5:30 p.m., Mike Franklin wrote:

> I donwloaded your code again, and the pongd.exe file contains a trojan:Win32/Fuery.!cl.  Not sure if that's a false positive, but it certainly wasn't encouraging.
> 

Yes, I realize there's something funny going on every time I compile the pongd.d file on my Windows box. I once took a look at the assembly of one of the pongd.exe's I compiled and saw that control flow quickly proceeded to a buffer overflow. That occurred during one of my builds, wasn't sure if it was going to happen again or for anyone else. Sorry for that trouble.


> I see the message from optlink.  This is a linker (created by Walter, I think) that is used to link 32-bit code on Windows. Try compiling with -w64 instead.  -w64 will create a 64-bit binary and will use either LLVM's linker or Visual Studio's linker depending on which one it finds first.
> 
> Next, I see you are compiling pongd.d, but you're not compiling the code in the bindbc directory and I think that is the source of your linker errors.  You'll need to compile the bindbc directory to object code and link that in to you final executable.
> 
> Mike

Going to work on it. Again, sorry for that possible virus. I have to clean up my computer, not trying to spread viruses around.

Thank you,
Mark

On 2019-05-03 6:15 p.m., mbalantz wrote:
> On 2019-05-03 5:30 p.m., Mike Franklin wrote:
> 
>> I donwloaded your code again, and the pongd.exe file contains a trojan:Win32/Fuery.!cl.  Not sure if that's a false positive, but it certainly wasn't encouraging.
>>
> 
> Yes, I realize there's something funny going on every time I compile the pongd.d file on my Windows box. I once took a look at the assembly of one of the pongd.exe's I compiled and saw that control flow quickly proceeded to a buffer overflow. That occurred during one of my builds, wasn't sure if it was going to happen again or for anyone else. Sorry for that trouble.
> 
> 
>> I see the message from optlink.  This is a linker (created by Walter, I think) that is used to link 32-bit code on Windows. Try compiling with -w64 instead.  -w64 will create a 64-bit binary and will use either LLVM's linker or Visual Studio's linker depending on which one it finds first.
>>
>> Next, I see you are compiling pongd.d, but you're not compiling the code in the bindbc directory and I think that is the source of your linker errors.  You'll need to compile the bindbc directory to object code and link that in to you final executable.
>>
>> Mike
> 
> Going to work on it. Again, sorry for that possible virus. I have to clean up my computer, not trying to spread viruses around.
> 
> Thank you,
> Mark
> 

Hello Mike and D community,

-w64 didn't work in my installation, perhaps if you please provide me a list of steps with -w64 in it, it may succeed? Also, my C:\D\dmd2\windows\bin64 directory only contains one file, libcurl.dll. Therefore maybe this is why -w64 is not found.

I share two files here (I got rid of the one flagged likely erroneously as a trojan): one is a text file showing output of steps I performed after trying to link all the object files in my bindbc directory along with the pongd.obj; and I put here a link to a zip archive of the build directory WITHOUT the .exe, which does in fact still get created after optlink, for security reasons.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1HD6tbm0xUJBjYON6y6JSTqZl3JDSz6f3/view?usp=sharing

^^(linkall-pongd-output.txt)

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1eHMtxVKmxwgYzqeOwgcNZWdnltqZPiHh/view?usp=sharing

^^ pong-in-d.zip

I might have to start a new thread as this is getting less and less about trying to demo against baremetal and more about getting my pong file to compile/be ported into D, of which I'd still have some interest.

Thank you,
Mark

On Saturday, 4 May 2019 at 03:06:40 UTC, mbalantz wrote:

> Hello Mike and D community,
>
> -w64 didn't work in my installation, perhaps if you please provide me a list of steps with -w64 in it, it may succeed?

Sorry, I meant -m64, not -w64.  Type `dmd --help` to see a list of flags you can pass to the compiler

> Also, my C:\D\dmd2\windows\bin64 directory only contains one file, libcurl.dll.

Your 64-bit libraries will be found in C:\D\dmd2\windows\lib64

phobos64.lib is the D standard library (Phobos) + the D runtime in one file.


In general, for each source file you'll do

dmd -c -m64 file1.d
dmd -c -m64 file2.d
dmd -c -m64 file3.d
etc.

Of course you'll also have to pass the appropriate -I flags for your imports.

That will create a file1.obj, file2.obj, and file3.obj object files.  When you have all your source files compiled to object files then you wan to link the object files to create the .exe.

dmd -m64 file1.obj file2.obj file3.obj -o=pongd.exe

This last invocation of `dmd` will not compile any code because there aren't any .d files.  Instead `dmd` will pass all of the .obj files to the linker on your system to generate an .exe file.

What are you using for your development environment?  You can download Visual D (https://github.com/dlang/visuald/releases) and use Visual Studio if that's the development environment you're most comfortable with.

> I might have to start a new thread as this is getting less and less about trying to demo against baremetal and more about getting my pong file to compile/be ported into D, of which I'd still have some interest.

Post to the "Learn" forum for these kinds of questions.

Mike

On Saturday, 4 May 2019 at 03:56:42 UTC, Mike Franklin wrote:

> dmd -m64 file1.obj file2.obj file3.obj -o=pongd.exe

Sorry, that should be `-of=pongd.exe`.  See the output of `dmd --help`

Mike