xcodegnustep

Building Xcode Project Using GNUstep Makefile Does Not Open Application Window, buildtool Can't Find English.lproj

I completed the CurrencyConverter example using Xcode 2.5 on Mac OS X Tiger 10.4.11, which I called CurrencyConverter2 since it was my second attempt. Since I've read that GNUstep is compatible with the Mac OS X Tiger version of Cocoa, I wanted to try building this Xcode project in GNUstep, which I am interested in learning.

I was able to install GNUstep on a VM running FreeBSD 12.0. I created a Makefile called GNUmakefile. Here are the contents of GNUmakefile:

include $(GNUSTEP_MAKEFILES)/common.make

APP_NAME = CurrencyConverter2
CurrencyConverter2_OBJC_FILES = main.m ConverterController.m Converter.m
CurrencyConverter2_RESOURCE_FILES = Info.plist English.lproj/MainMenu.nib

include $(GNUSTEP_MAKEFILES)/application.make

When building the program using gmake, it appears that everything was built correctly:

This is gnustep-make 2.7.0. Type 'gmake print-gnustep-make-help' for help.
Running in gnustep-make version 2 strict mode.
Making all for app CurrencyConverter2...
Creating CurrencyConverter2.app/....
gmake[3]: Warning: File 'main.m' has modification time 21869 s in the future
 Compiling file main.m ...
 Compiling file ConverterController.m ...
 Compiling file Converter.m ...
 Linking app CurrencyConverter2 ...
gmake[3]: warning:  Clock skew detected.  Your build may be incomplete.
 Creating CurrencyConverter2.app/Resources...
 Creating stamp file...
 Creating CurrencyConverter2.app/Resources/Info-gnustep.plist...
 Creating CurrencyConverter2.app/Resources/CurrencyConverter2.desktop...
 Copying resources into the app wrapper...

However, when I try to open CurrencyConverter2.app, the main window does not show up at all.

My hunch is that for some reason my Makefile is not recognizing English.lproj/MainMenu.nib.

I also tried using a tool called buildtool that is able to build Xcode projects using GNUstep, but it complained that it couldn't find English.lproj even though it is in the directory that I ran buildtool.

Solution

  • When converting a Mac app to GNUstep, you need to make a GNUstep-specific Info-plist template that roughly mirrors Info.plist (which is Mac-only).

    At build time, the Info-plist template is used to generate two files: Info-gnustep.plist, and the app's .desktop (freedesktop.org desktop entry) file.

    Info-gnustep.plist contains Info entries used at loadtime/runtime, such as the name of the principal class, the main-menu nibfile to load, etc.

    The app's .desktop file contains Info entries used for registering the app with the desktop-environment/file-browser, such as the app's desktop-menu category, the executable path, supported MIME types, etc. (Note: 'make install' currently doesn't register a GNUstep app with the desktop environment; In order for an installed GNUStep app to appear in the desktop menus, its .desktop file - found in its Resources folder - must be manually registered using the 'desktop-file-install' command-line tool.)

    The Info-plist template should be named, "{APP_NAME}Info.plist", and can contain a standard XML-format plist, or a simple text-list format:

    {
   {KEY1} = {VALUE1};
   {KEY2} = {VALUE2};
   ...
}

    For CurrencyConverter2, create a textfile named "CurrencyConverter2Info.plist" in the same directory as the Makefile, with the contents:

    {
    ApplicationName = CurrencyConverter2;
    FreeDesktopCategories = ("Utility", "X-GNUstep");
    NSExecutable = "CurrencyConverter2";
    NSMainNibFile = "MainMenu.nib";
    NSPrincipalClass = NSApplication;
    NSRole = Application;
}

    GNUstep-make will automatically find CurrencyConverter2Info.plist, so it doesn't need an entry in the Makefile.

    Unrelated to the Info-plist template issue, you can also make these changes to your Makefile: