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<div class="moz-cite-prefix">An update. Have had some luck on IRC,
and am progressing with QtCreator and have put some notes for news
here on what I've learned to get past my roadblocks:<br>
<br>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="https://community.kde.org/Amarok/Development/Hacking_On_Amarok_HowTo">https://community.kde.org/Amarok/Development/Hacking_On_Amarok_HowTo</a><br>
<br>
Am still blocked on Kdevelop so anyone using Kdevelop on Amarok is
invited to help out, get me running and debugging in that and to
update the Kdevelop notes on the wiki above.<br>
<br>
Alas, activity on the dev list looks pretty dead of late. A wake
up call to any Kdevelop users then to at least help make entry for
newbs easier and keep Amarok dev alive before hibernating too
deeply ;-)<br>
<br>
Regards,<br>
<br>
Bernd.<br>
<br>
Bernd Wechner wrote:<br>
</div>
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<font face="Calibri">So far, all seems good. I have Amarok
building and gitting fine. Now setting my naivite aside again
for a moment and resting easy that I am not posting a question
before but after hours of reading and trying I turn towards
willing mentors with this question.<br>
<br>
I have worked extensively with Visual Studio in C# and in
Eclipse with Python in recent years (and plenty of other IDEs
and languages over time). And generally I'm blown away by a
couple of things that I'm finding joy with on Amarok yet:<br>
<br>
1) I build and run in debug mode, so set break points, inspect
variables, single step, trace and profile and more<br>
2) I can look at end generally edit windows, dialog boxes
controls, widgets and HTML pages visually at or close to
WYSIWYG. <br>
<br>
But on Amarok I'm focussed on this page:<br>
<br>
<a moz-do-not-send="true" class="moz-txt-link-freetext"
href="https://community.kde.org/Amarok/Development/Hacking_On_Amarok_HowTo">https://community.kde.org/Amarok/Development/Hacking_On_Amarok_HowTo</a><br>
<br>
And with it I have the project open in Kdevelop, tick. <br>
<br>
I can build it in Kdevelop, tick.<br>
<br>
I can't debug it. Cross.<br>
<br>
So I get as far as configuring launches and faced with a complex
ritual and little guidance ... stuck. Here's a work flow to my
first few quizzically cocked eyebrows:<br>
</font>
<ol>
<li><font face="Calibri">I click <b>Configure launches</b> on
the <b>R</b><b>u</b><b>n</b> menu, and the <b>Lau</b><b>nch
Configurations</b> dialog box appears, tick.</font></li>
<li><font face="Calibri">I see in the unlabelled list box on
left (UI design cross, as I can't intuit what its listing
and can't name it), I see <b>Global</b> and <b>amarok</b>,
tick (I like seeing amarok).</font></li>
<li><font face="Calibri">I click amarok and nothing happens but
a neat little text on right suggest to me I should click <b>Add
</b><b>N</b><b>ew</b>, so I do.</font></li>
<li><font face="Calibri">A confusing little drop down leaps at
me on which stands <b>Application</b> (good, likely
candidate), <b>Plasmoid Launcher </b>(no idea what that
is, shelf a small research effort later), <b>Sc</b><b>ript
application</b> (can guess what this is but not real
confident how it from Application), and then three amarok
utilities, but not amarok. The utilities are <b>amarok_afttagger</b>,
<b>amzdownloader</b>, <b>amarokcollectionscanner</b>.</font></li>
<ul>
<li><font face="Calibri">First cocked eyebrow: Why is amarok
not listed here? Three utilities yes, but not the main
application, the player itself? <br>
</font></li>
</ul>
<li><font face="Calibri">I run with <b>Application</b> which
creates under amarok in the list box at left, two children,
<b>New Application Launcher</b> and under it <b>De</b><b>bug</b>,
tick, getting somewhere.</font></li>
<li><font face="Calibri">Under <b>Executable</b>, <b>P</b><b>roject
</b><b>T</b><b>arget</b> on right I see a drop down again,
and again, only the three utilities listed.</font></li>
<ul>
<li><font face="Calibri">Second cocked eyebrow: Same as first
and probably same reason and the same issue, but why is
amarok not listed?</font></li>
</ul>
<li><font face="Calibri">So I have to go not with <b>Project
Target</b>, because amarok apparently is not a project
(note to self, it surely should be, what is broken here?)
but with <b>Executable</b>, the alternative below it.</font></li>
<li><font face="Calibri">Under <b>E</b><b>x</b><b>ecutable</b>
I can browse to a binary, and in fact I can browse to the
binary I just built, in theory but ...</font></li>
<ul>
<li><font face="Calibri">Which binary did I just build? Double
back to the main Kdevelop window check the <b>Build </b>output
and get lost ... cannot find it anywhere.</font></li>
<li><font face="Calibri">I find a line "[ 79%] Built target
amarok", but unlike my comfortable experience with other
IDEs not showing me where amarok is, so I do a lot of
cmake research, hours and hours of cmake research to
conclude that: cmake is run to create a build director
which seems to be a complete copy of the source directory
with makefiles, and then make is run to build it. So a two
step build process: cmake to create a build folder, then
make to make the build folder.</font></li>
<li><font face="Calibri">Frustratingly though I have two build
directories:<br>
~/kde/build/amarok<br>
~/kde/src/amarok/build<br>
Cross - compexity mounting!</font></li>
<li><font face="Calibri">I finally work out why. When I build
by "standard means", I used:<br>
cmake -DCMAKE_INSTALL_PREFIX=$HOME/kde
-DCMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=debugfull $HOME/kde/src/amarok<br>
run from within </font><font face="Calibri"><font
face="Calibri">~/kde/build/amarok<br>
</font>and Kdevelop I presume created </font><font
face="Calibri">~/kde/src/amarok/build</font><font
face="Calibri">
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</font> and built in there.</li>
</ul>
<li>Decide it's time I got checked if some kind soul who uses an
IDE to work on amarok can't mentor me a little and save me
more hours of reading and learning to just get me running!</li>
</ol>
<p>On my second expectation (to see the Amarok GUI elements in a
visual editor) I'm even further behind, my tentative impression
is that Kdevelop won't provide that but Qt Creator will. But to
be honest my cocked eyebow is raised sooner than with Kdevelop.
If I follow the scan guide here:<br>
</p>
<p><font face="Calibri"><a moz-do-not-send="true"
class="moz-txt-link-freetext"
href="https://community.kde.org/Amarok/Development/Hacking_On_Amarok_HowTo">https://community.kde.org/Amarok/Development/Hacking_On_Amarok_HowTo</a><br>
</font></p>
<p><font face="Calibri">which says simply: Navigate to the Amarok
source directory and select the file CMakeLists.txt<br>
</font></p>
<p><font face="Calibri">Unsurprising Qt Creator opens it as a text
file and is no better than gedit for me. Cocked eyebrow is
raised, and what gives? Haven't done hours of work here yet,
but getting in early and saying:<br>
</font></p>
<p><font face="Calibri">Guys, if you help me with this I'll
improve this WIki page with what I learn:<br>
</font></p>
<p><font face="Calibri"><a moz-do-not-send="true"
class="moz-txt-link-freetext"
href="https://community.kde.org/Amarok/Development/Hacking_On_Amarok_HowTo">https://community.kde.org/Amarok/Development/Hacking_On_Amarok_HowTo</a><br>
</font></p>
<p><font face="Calibri">Can we do that? <br>
<br>
I've opted to look closely at Amarok because it ticks some big
boxes for me that Rythmbox and Banshee didn't, among which is
it actually builds ;-), but there are significant others. But
I would like to be able to tweak it and contribute if I can,
but time is a premium and I'm already hurting for time I sunk
into this to date, so if anyone wants to hold my hand a little
and let me call them honorable mentor, to get me rolling and
my teeth into stuff that matters I'm happy to update wikis and
docs to help other newbs. I cna only promise I won't waste
your time with trivial questions the answer to which is
already easy to find on-line ;-).<br>
</font></p>
<p><font face="Calibri">Thanks in advance!<br>
</font></p>
<p><font face="Calibri">Bernd.<br>
</font>
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