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Getting started

For windows

Install the compiler
Compile Gene source
Compile the generated C code
Using UltraEdit as an IDE

For Linux (not yet ready)

1. For windows

This section will explain how to get started using the compiler under windows systems. Before you begin, you should download the compiler. This can be found in the download section

1.1 Install the compiler

Create a directory (for instance 'c:\gene')
copy the exe to that directory
Create a sub directory called 'units'. This directory contains all the common units that gene can use. (for instance 'c:\gene\units)
Copy all the common units into this directory. They form a seperate project and can be either downloaded from the download section or, for the latest version, check the tigris homepage

1.2 Compile Gene source

At the command prompt, in the directory where gene is located, type 'gene05 Filename' where Filename is the full path and name of the project unit to compile. If there are no errors in the source, Gene will generate C source and header files for each project and library in the project unit. If the project is very big, it will split the C source file into multiple files. The name of each source and header file group consists out of the name of the process or lib as defined in the project unit + the sequence number of the file + '.c' for the source file and '.h' for the header file.

If there are errors in the project unit, an 'errors.log' file will be generated in the same directory as the project unit containing all of the error messages.

ex:
Suppose we have a source project file called 'test.gen' containing 2 processes: x and y
to compile, type at the prompt:

c:\gene\gene05 "c:\my projects\test1\test.gen"

When there are no errors in the source, the following files will be generated:

c:\my projects\test1\x.c

c:\my projects\test1\x.h

(c:\my projects\test1\x.mak)

c:\my projects\test1\y.c

c:\my projects\test1\y.h

(c:\my projects\test1\y.mak)

When there are errors, a message will be displayed, and the following file will be generated:

c:\my projects\test1\errors.log

1.3 Compile the generated C code

Gene 0.5 generates pure C code and should be pretty portable apart from the manner of casting which does not work on all compilers (needs to be corrected) . Although It generate it's a make file, it is best to create your own. The generated make files are curently only in the borland dialect and are not up to date. If you want to use a compiler that uses a different make, please feel free to add an option into the compiler and modify the CGenerator.gen unit.

Although Gene is case insensitive, this should not bother the C code cause external names of functions are handled case sensitive, so you can link the object files as usual.

Next is a step by step explanation for compiling gene 0.5:

borland C++ 5.5

This is a free version of the borland compiler which you can download here. Don't forget to configure the compiler before using it. Here's another explanation for installing and configuring the compiler.

Note: you need to setup tasm.exe properly before you can compile. You do this by creating a text file called 'tasm.cfg' in the bin directory of the borland compiler. Put the statement '-kh32768' (without quotes) in the file. This will set the Hash table size of the assembler to a proper size. Without this, the compiler wont compile any gene projects.

Create a make file. Here's a good tutorial on make files. Here, you can find a generic makefile template that you can use. Gene 0.5 generates it's make file (based on the generic template) but for the time being, it is best to create you're own.
run make. To be certain that you use the correct make file, use the syntax 'make -filename.mak' where filename is the name of the make file you just created.

borland C++ builder

This is not a free compiler, so you need to buy a licence for it. It gives powerfull debug facilities though, so it can be interesting.

Note2: Builder has only been tested with version 5. Other versions might give problems.

Start C++ builder
Close all open projects
Open the C file you want to compile. If there are multiple files, select the last one (with the biggest increment number at the end of the filename)
When asked to create a project, select yes
Go to the project - options dialog and:

in the linker tab, you can (but don't have to) turn of 'use dynamic RTL'
Turn off most warnings. The code will generate a lot of warnings which can be ignored. If you don't do this, larger projects will not compile due to too many warnings.

Add the libs that were included in the make file by right clicking on the project in the project pane and selecting 'add'. You don't have to do this for the windows libs, those are included automatically.
Run or select project - make to compile the code.

1.4 Using UltraEdit as an IDE

UltraEdit is a shareware text editor that offers customisable syntax highlighting and tool configuration possibities. This can make life a whole lot easier. There is a definition file included of the gene language so you can have syntax highlighting. Follow these steps to install it:

Start UltraEdit
Go to Advanced/configuration/Syntax Highlighting and click on the 'open' button
Copy the content of the gene definition file into the wordfile.txt of UltraEdit
Save wordfile.txt

You can also use UltraEdit to compile the Gene code. To do this, you need to:

Go to Advanced/Tool Configuration
In the command edit box: write 'path\gene05.exe "%f"' where path is the location of Gene. Notice that there are double quotes surrounding %f.
Give it a usable menu item name such as 'Compile gene'
select 'windows program'
preferably, but not necessary: select 'save active file' which will make certain that the file is saved before compilation
press insert to add the menu command

When this is done, you can select advanced/Compile gene to perform a compilation on the currently active text file. If you have the errors.log file also open, you can emmidiatly see the output of the compilation.

2. For Linux

This section is not yet ready.