[Libevent-users] Windows build impossible

[Toby Douglass]

Kalin Nakov wrote:
> Hi,
> 
> I saw that libevent has some .dsp and .dsw files, but the sources are
> completely unbuildable. First HAVE_CONFIG is not defined in the project,
> also some WIN32 defines are re-defined in the code, some types are 
> undefined
> and have to be manually defined, functions are used which are 
> unavailable in
> windows (gettimeofday, etc). Are there any document with steps on how to
> build libevent on windows, or the windows port is unsupported? If it is
> unsupported, I could make a contribution and make it buildable on 
> windows if
> you want since I intend to use it.

Unfortunately for the Windows developers, VC isn't the supported Win32 
build platform for libevent, which to some extent is why the build is in 
the shape it's in.

There's actually a general problem here, which is simply that the UNIX 
bods don't have a Win32 build environment easily available to them and 
the Win32 bods don't have a UNIX build environment easily available to them.

(Easily available in both the sense of physical availability and the 
knowledge required to operate the build effectively).

My view in this is that the Win32 and UNIX builds should be entirely 
independent.  There should be three source directories, one for common 
code, one for UNIX specific code, one for Windows specific code.  There 
should be two separate builds, one for UNIX (up to the UNIX bods how 
best to do that) and one for Windows (which should be VC - preferably 
version 6, since not everyone has or wants the later versions, but this 
is a difficult request, since it's not strictly possible to now obtain 
older versions of VC).

I've some intention to sort out the build along these lines, but I've 
been distracted by IOCP work.