Inside the log you will see this:

1configure:3668: checking for sdl-config
2configure:3686: found /bin/sdl-config
3configure:3699: result: /bin/sdl-config
4configure:3707: checking for SDL - version >= 1.2.0
5configure:3798: gcc -o conftest.exe -g -O2 -I/usr/local/cross-tools/i386-mingw32msvc/include/SDL -D_GNU_SOURCE=1 -Dmain=SDL_main   conftest.c  -L/usr/local/cross-tools/i386-mingw32msvc/lib -lmingw32 -lSDLmain -lSDL -mwindows >&5
6configure:3748:17: SDL.h: No such file or directory
7
8configure:3801: $? = 1
9configure: program exited with status 1

And just below that, the test-program that tries to include an SDL.h (header-file):

1| #include <stdio.h>
2| #include <stdlib.h>
3| #include <string.h>
4| #include "SDL.h"

For some reason that file isn't in one of the include-directories (default is /usr/include, but the GCC compile-command also defines /usr/local/cross-tools/i386-mingw32msvc/include/SDL as a directory where include-files can be found).

Bah...that SDL package really is broken 😀
Use this for sdl-config, or edit (😉) yours to set correct prefix=/usr

where do i place this file? do i replace i386-mingw32msvc-sdl-config ?

if its in the BIN folder, then replacing it makes no difference.

i am a newb at compiling etc. however i want to learn (from experience not theory), it is very late here now, 1:45am and as such i am gonna leave this till tomorrow... sorry.

thank you all for persisting in helping me with this, it is greatly appreciated. 😀

No problem franpa. I hope to be able to make my own DOSBox compile soon, so whatever gets documented here will help me too 😀

Yes, you replace the sdl-config in msys/1.0/bin (and delete the other one). Make sure if you type sdl-config --prefix it gives you:
/usr

Good luck 😀

franpa wrote:

i am a newb at compiling etc. however i want to learn

Me too, and I'm glad someone (i.e. you 🙄) is asking those questions.
I guess there are quite some people who can benefit from this thread. 😀

gulikoza wrote:

delete the install file 😀 (this is actually SDL fault, install should be uppercased)

Ouch!! I got hit by this too when I tried to install SDL using MSYS.
But the INSTALL-file *is* in upper-case - it is MSYS (or maybe make?) that does a case-insensitive search for 'install' and comes up with INSTALL as a satisfied target.

Changing the target from 'install:' to 'install::' forces the install-target to always be executed.

*) I noticed that 'cat InStAlL' worked just fine, so it is either the utility or the POSIX-emulation that is allowing the case-insensitive operation.

Maybe totally screw those sdl-mingw sources and use the regular source archive.
Don't remember having such problems.

MiniMax wrote:

Changing the target from 'install:' to 'install::' forces the install-target to always be executed.

Yeah - executed, but with a totally wrong result!! The symlink they make for sdl-config to i386-mingw32msvc-sddl-config is totally wrong.

Instead of

1install:
2        cp -rv bin include lib share $(prefix)/
3        @ln -sf i386-mingw32msvc-sdl-config $(prefix)bin/sdl-config

It should read:

1install::
2        cp -rv bin include lib share $(prefix)/
3        @(cd $(prefix)/bin && \
4                ln -sf i386-mingw32msvc-sdl-config sdl-config)

wd wrote:

Maybe totally screw those sdl-mingw sources and use the regular source archive.
Don't remember having such problems.

Might be easier, but I will would like to try to find the minimal set of changes necessary to have DOSBox compile with MSYS.

But it looks like the sdl-config file is totally hosed!

It starts by defining

prefix=/usr/local/cross-tools/i386-mingw32msvc

That can be overriden by invoking the dosbox-0.70/configure with

./configure --with-sdl-prefix=/usr

but then, when sdl-config emits the compiler-flags:

echo -I${prefix}/include/SDL -D_GNU_SOURCE=1 -Dmain=SDL_main

I get hit again because the SDL Makefile do *not* copy the include files to /usr/include/SDL, but to plain /usr/include (which is dangerous because not all the headers have a nice SDL_ prefix).

Well not only easier but as it looks much more painfree. Wasn't more
than the autogen/configure/make/make install thing for me. Dunno.

MiniMax wrote:

That can be overriden by invoking the dosbox-0.70/configure with

./configure --with-sdl-prefix=/usr

Nope - that don't work.

I wonder if I have a wrong SDL-package?? I took SDL-devel-1.2.11-mingw32.tar.gz, a non-source package. Maybe a source package will be better?

hm yes. I recall that the devel package is just a zip of an installed tree.
no need to do a make or a configure in there.

Okay - now we are making progress. I changed that

prefix=/usr/local/cross-tools/i386-mingw32msvc

in sdl-config to prefix=/usr and did a ./configure on dosbox-0.70. Only warnings was about missing SDL_net and libSDL_sound.

Yes!!!! I have a DOSBox!!

Qbix wrote:

hm yes. I recall that the devel package is just a zip of an installed tree.
no need to do a make or a configure in there.

I think you are right. But sdl-config needs to be tweaked to emit the right paths and flags.

Is there a make-target for making an zip-archive similar to a normal DOSBox distribution?

But sdl-config needs to be tweaked to emit the right paths and flags.

But that's not normal imo, should be done automatically.

wd wrote:

But sdl-config needs to be tweaked to emit the right paths and flags.

But that's not normal imo, should be done automatically.

Maybe if you download and install an SDL source-distro. Then configure and make will probably generate a functional sdl-config. But with SDL-devel-1.2.11-mingw32.tar.gz the supplied i386-mingw32msvc-sdl-config is totally wrong.