RESULT! (was: Re: Building on Windows from scratch - follow up)

[Geert Janssens]

Thank you for my feedback. It's nice to hear my effort is appreciated.

Your suggestion to move the installation of html help to the top is very useful. I'll check if this 
is possible and if so will make the necessary changes.

Geert

On Tuesday 29 April 2014 20:08:59 Wm Tarr wrote:
> On 28/04/2014 10:09, Geert Janssens wrote:
> > Lastly, how to use my repository ?
> > - Download the bootstrap_win_dev.vbs script. It has some
> > documentation at the beginning. Running it is mostly a
> > double-click. This will prepare a c:\gcdev directory with the
> > minimal tools required to run install.sh - Start msys
> > (c:\gcdev\mingw\msys\1.0\msys.bat)
> > - cd /c/gcdev/gnucash-on-windows.git
> > - install.sh
> > 
> > Please test and provide feedback.
> 
> Wooooohoooo!
> 
> I think I may be the first reporting like this, if I am not then I
> happily join others who have reported success.
> 
> It works!  I am now proudly running
> ===
> GnuCash 2.6.99
> The GnuCash personal finance manager. The GNU way to manage your
> money! This copy was built from git rev acad5a0+ on 2014-04-29
> ===
> 
> First my congratulations and thanks to Geert and anyone else that has
> worked on this.  I think you deserve a beer / coffee / beverage of
> choice for the amazing effort you must have put in.
> 
> I thank you, personally, and expect others will too once the
> significance of this becomes clear [1]
> 
> I do not exaggerate when I say that this experience is an order of
> magnitude different to the last time I attempted to build GnuCash
> under Win.
> 
> Note: only one real glitch (attempt to build svn) was encountered and
> has already been fixed (thanks for prompt attention, Geert).
> 
> Note regarding human interaction: a human needs to get involved in
> specifying gncdev/hh for the HTML Help, but because the build takes
> some time and the HH happens part way through I was busy doing
> something else when the licence, directory choice dialogue, etc. came
> up and dismissed them thinking they were to do with something else. 
> My suggestion is that if there are no other dependencies the
> ===
> add_step inst_hh
> ===
> is done right at the beginning / as soon as possible in install.sh
> while the human is still paying attention.  Everything after that
> will run by itself unless there is an error (in my experience).
> 
> 
> 
> Some timings for those interested.
> 
> 12:48 downloaded bootstrap_win_dev.vbs and started it off
>             (it wouldn't run by itself here so I started it in a
> console with cscript.exe <path-to-this-script> as mentioned in the
> script itself which worked fine)
> 18:58 I had a working GnuCash 2.6.99
> 
> that is 6 hours and 10 minutes and would have been less if I hadn't
> come across the svn problem (now fixed as mentioned above) and gone
> through the inst_hh section 3 times because I'm a dumb human and
> wasn't reading the instructions properly -- though my excuse is that
> inst_hh should be near the top because I'd have been paying attention
> then!  That is my excuse and I am sticking to it :)
> 
> Anyway, my last attempt to build GnuCash on Windows (some time ago)
> used to take around a day for each build attempt and never produced
> anything that I'd have shared with anyone else.  Today I have
> something that works and I'm looking at getting python bindings in
> next, i.e. I am thinking ahead already.
> 
> In case anyone thinks I've got really powerful kit, take a look at my
> specs: ===
> TOSHIBA Satellite P30
> Enclosure Type: Notebook
> 
> 3.20 gigahertz Intel Mobile Pentium 4
> 8 kilobyte primary memory cache
> 512 kilobyte secondary memory cache
> Hyper-threaded (2 total)
> 
> 1280 Megabytes Usable Installed Memory
> 
> Windows XP Home Edition Service Pack 3
> ===
> 
> See? No bitcoins for me, BUT, I have built GnuCash!  I'd wager almost
> everyone reading this here has a more powerful system; but if you
> don't let us not get involved in a reverse pissing contest, my point
> is to say you don't need the best kit / latest Win to do this; in
> fact reading between the lines I think a more recent Win version
> might be a hindrance, but we won't know until other people, hopefully
> bolstered by this message start trying it out and reporting back.
> 
> [1]  I think the significance of building GnuCash on Win will be shown
> in a broadening of the number of people that will contemplate looking
> at code, testing here and there and so on.
> 
> I raise a glass of English cider to you all.
> 
> Good evening, best wishes and thanks