Birds Bot Manager (BBM)

Compiling & Installing from source
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** This is only for people who are happy with compiling C/C++ code, and preferably
** have some experience with the GNU compiler toolchain (gcc / g++)


****************************************************************************************
** I will use UNIX style paths throughout this document - i.e. I will use "/" as the
** directory pathname separator instead of the MS-DOS "\" character. Anyone who writes 
** code under Win32 knows that "under the hood" win32 understands the UNIX style paths,
**  and using the "\" causes problems in C/C++.
****************************************************************************************


You will need working version of Perl, and a win32 version of the gcc c/c++ compiler.

Perl can be found from many places - head over to www.perl.com if you aren't
sure where to go next, and look for a win32 binary distribution.

You need the MingW32 C++ compiler. If you don't already have it installed
then go grab it now. Use your favourite search engine, or head over to
www.mingw.org, or grab a copy from the "resources" section on my page.

I usually grab the "crtdll" version, as it works fine.

** NOTE **
If you get the gcc version "2.95.2" - the current version as at the time of writing -
then you will also have to grab and apply the "quote-fix" patch (available from the
same page) , or you will get a compilation error in util.cpp.

Download the BBM source and unpack it into its own directory. DO NOT
unpack it directly into the Half-Life directory. Choose somewhere else
(e.g. C:/sourcecode/bbm)

Make sure you use something like WinZip or tar/gunzip to unpack it that 
understands long filenames.

You will want to edit the Makefile in the C:/sourcecode/bbm/src directory to
set the location of your half-life installation.

Create a directory called "bbm" within your Half-Life directory. This is
where the BBM runtime library and all of its bots and data will be located.

Issue a "make" in the bbm/src directory. If all goes well you will end up
with a file called BBM.DLL in your Half-Life/bbm directory and also a file
called BBM.LIB in the C:/sourcecode/bbm/lib library directory.

To test that it works, edit the "liblist.gam" file int either the HalfLife/valve directory 
or the directory of your MOD (e.g. HalfLife/cstrike) and change
the "gamedll" entry to load "../BBM/BBM.DLL", then try starting and running the game.

At this stage there are no bots installed, but the botmanager should load
and run in a transparent manner, allowing you to play a normal multiplayer game.

If the game seems to start ok (i.e. no errors) then you have passed the first
hurdle.

Compiling and Installing a Bot
------------------------------

Now that the BotManager is installed, lets compile and install a Bot for it to use.

Change directory to the "sample_bot" directory that came with the source.
Edit the Makefile in this directory to correctly set the location of your
HalfLife directory.

Do a "make". This should complete without errors and place a file called
"sample.dll" into the half-life/bbm/sample directory.

You should also create a BBM config file "bbm.cfg" in the HalfLife/bbm directory.
There is an example bbm.cfg file in the bbm/src/util directory supplied with the
source code.

Start a game, and issue the console command "loadbot sample" to load the
bot class. If you see encouraging messages then you can try the console command "addbot"
to create a bot of this class.

You should see a bot be created, with various debugging messages printed to
your HUD. This particular bot is pretty stupid, so don't expect very much. It
currently serves as a testbed for the various bbm features, and also as something
for programmers to look at when getting started.

If this all works, then take some time to look at & play with the "sample_bot"
source. It is quite short and shows some of the features of BBM.


General Information on Installing Bots
--------------------------------------

To create a new botclass (e.g. called "slaybot") you must complete these steps:

* Compile your bot source code & link against the BBM.LIB library to produce
  a loadable module called "slaybot.dll".

* put this DLL into a subdirectory called "slaybot" inside the BBM runtime directory.
  (i.e. your DLL ends up as "HalfLife/bbm/slaybot/slaybot.DLL")


Now you should be able to start HalfLife and load your botclass with the console command
"loadbot slaybot".

You can add bots of this class into the game one at a time with the console command 
"addbot slaybot" once the library is loaded.

* Optionally, to have BBM automatically load your bot class on startup, you can edit the
  config file Half-Life/bbm/bbm.cfg and put "slaybot" into the "[bots]" section.