general/other Vice (Versatile Commodore Emulator)

ProphetOfDoom

ProphetOfDoom

Hi,
Has anyone had any luck running VICE, specifically the C64 emulator, on FreeBSD? I see it is in ports but not packages (it's marked as broken). And I understand we shouldn't mix packages and ports. So I'm basically wondering if anyone has successfully built the vanilla sources distributed by the VICE project themselves?
There is a C64 cartridge whose code I want to reverse-engineer for a hobby project of mine, and I was hoping to have a Commodore emulator on FreeBSD so I don't need to involve Linux. I've nothing against Linux - this is just a convenience thing because I have so much of the other software I need already installed on FreeBSD (I'm on a metered internet connection so I don't really want to switch to Ubuntu and re-download everything).
Thanks.
 
ProphetOfDoom said:
I see it is in ports but not packages (it's marked as broken).
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It's not?

It does seem to have a bunch of build errors on -CURRENT: https://portsfallout.com/fallout?port=emulators/vice$. Probably due to the recent LLVM changes in -CURRENT, I had some weird build issue with emulators/fs-uae on -CURRENT, specifically on i386, due to those changes too.

Packages for latest and quarterly on 13.1 AMD64 should be there. No build issues being reported there:
http://beefy14.nyi.freebsd.org/data/131amd64-quarterly/53d87890986f/logs/vice-3.7.log
http://beefy16.nyi.freebsd.org/data/131amd64-default/e20ee3cf0f70/logs/vice-3.7.log
 
I can confirm VICE works perfectly fine on FreeBSD. It's one of the most important tools when doing (cross-)development for the C64, using it all the time. Should also be pretty helpful for reverse engineering with its integrated "monitor".
SirDice said:
It does seem to have a bunch of build errors on -CURRENT: https://portsfallout.com/fallout?port=emulators/vice$. Probably due to the recent LLVM changes in -CURRENT
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Definitely, I had a similar issue with fvwm3. clang-15 promoted a few warnings to errors by default. I see the intent of course, but still think it's a stupid decision, breaking builds of existing software. Of course nothing you can't fix with a few additional CFLAGS.

Well, let's see whether the maintainer fixes it soon. If not, I might have a look there ;)
 
zirias@ said:
Of course nothing you can't fix with a few additional CFLAGS.
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Yeah, in my case I had to add --no-check-dynamic-relocations due to the linker barfing on 'incorrect addend values'. Which happened only on the i386 builds.
 
SirDice said:
Yeah, in my case I had to add --no-check-dynamic-relocations due to the linker barfing on 'incorrect addend values'. Which happened only on the i386 builds.
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Oh, that's an "esoteric" one :cool: ... I was only thinking about the typical -Wno-error=xyz flags. Well, good thing you identified and fixed it! 👍
 
BTW, I'm on a secret mission to make FreeBSD a preferred platform for C64 coding 😏 (so, if VICE stays broken on -CURRENT for too long, I'll probably have a look indeed....)

This game (still a preview, the next preview is currently in work) was developed entirely on FreeBSD! https://csdb.dk/release/?id=228828

Tools used:
editors/vim (ok, just my preferred editor)
devel/gmake (cause GNU make is available on more platforms ....)
devel/cc65 (for the ca65 cross-assembler and the ld65 linker coming with it)
devel/exomizer ("cruncher", create a self-decrunching executable placing stuff at various fixed addresses)
emulators/vice (test and debug, can consume symbols from ca65/ld65)
 
Hi,
I got the information about the precompiled package being broken from freshports, btw. https://www.freshports.org/emulators/vice
But maybe I'm going on outdated information. I'll try again later.
@zirias have you ever tried CBM PRG Studio?

Commodore development utilities for Windows

CBM prg Studio is a windows application which allows you to write BASIC and machine code programs and create a .prg file from it. The .prg file can then be ran on a real or emulated machine. It also includes a character editor, sprite editor, screen designer and many other useful tools.
www.ajordison.co.uk
I might try and get it working via Wine. I literally don't have a Windows machine. Tbh though I don't hold out much hope. It looks like a complex piece of software and my experience with Wine is that if you go "off the beaten track" you'll just get a ton of bugs.
Lol @ "you collected all the cabbages" btw. 🤣
 
ProphetOfDoom said:
@zirias have you ever tried CBM PRG Studio?
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I didn't, but that's just because I'm not used to "IDEs" in general, I prefer my good old vim and a build process that just relies on "make".

ProphetOfDoom said:
I might try and get it working via Wine. I literally don't have a Windows machine. Tbh though I don't hold out much hope. It looks like a complex piece of software and my experience with Wine is that if you go "off the beaten track" you'll just get a ton of bugs.
Click to expand...
Well, it relies entirely on .NET and in my experience, such software works fine. At least, I do use CharPad and SpritePad (both Windows/.NET) from time to time with wine to create some C64 graphics. Would be a nice project to create replacements for them that are opensource and rely on Qt, but time is limited :(

ProphetOfDoom said:
Lol @ "you collected all the cabbages" btw. 🤣
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Heh .... well, I didn't come up with this, after all, the game is a remake of some AmigaBASIC game :cool:
 
I've already been told off by SirDice for making generalisations about Stone Age people.
SirDice said:
(modern humans) think they were essentially stupid. We still refuse to believe they managed to move and even erect 20 ton blocks of stone.
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It wasn't all about cabbages. Cabbages only took up 80% of their time.
 
My main bad experience with Wine came from trying to run a BASIC compiler/IDE called Blitz3D. It was utterly broken on Wine. It kept inserting extra newlines in documents, pasting text when not told to, filling tree views with duplicate information. The debugger was broken too. It was basically completely unusable.
 
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