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Io Language Addons (and making them work in Ubuntu)

words by Brian Racer

My last post detailed how to compile the Io language from source and install it in Ubuntu (10.10 Maverick). Io has a growing set of addons such as GUI’s, sound and image manipulation, OpenGL, and database support to name a few. However they will not be enabled if you don’t have the proper development libraries installed.

I’ll go through a couple of addons in this article, but if you just want to make sure you have as many dependencies as possible to run the addons here is a line you can paste:

$ sudo apt-get install build-essential cmake libreadline-dev libssl-dev ncurses-dev libffi-dev zlib1g-dev libpcre3-dev libpng-dev libtiff4-dev libjpeg62-dev python-dev libpng-dev libtiff4-dev libjpeg62-dev libmysqlclient-dev libmemcached-dev libtokyocabinet-dev libsqlite3-dev libdbi0-dev libpq-dev libgmp3-dev libogg-dev libvorbis-dev libtaglib-cil-dev libtag1-dev libtheora-dev libsamplerate0-dev libloudmouth1-dev libsndfile1-dev libflac-dev libgl1-mesa-dev libglu1-mesa-dev freeglut3-dev libxmu-dev libxi-dev libxml2-dev libyajl-dev uuid-dev liblzo2-dev zlib1g-dev

You will need to rebuild Io once these are all installed.

I would encourage you to browse the addons/* directory in the Io source tree. There are many good useful addons and samples, although unfortunately there are few that do not seem to currently work or are missing samples, so dust off that book on C

Sockets

sudo apt-get install libevent-dev

Here is a minimal webserver using sockets:

WebRequest := Object clone do(
    cache := Map clone
    handleSocket := method(socket, server,
        socket streamReadNextChunk
        if(socket isOpen == false, return)
        request := socket readBuffer betweenSeq("GET ", " HTTP")         
 
        data := cache atIfAbsentPut(request,
            writeln("caching ", request)
            f := File clone with(request)
            if(f exists, f contents, nil)
        )                                                                
 
        if(data,
            socket streamWrite("HTTP/1.0 200 OK\n\n")
            socket streamWrite(data)
        ,
            socket streamWrite("Not Found")
        )                                                                
 
        socket close
        server requests append(self)
    )
)                                                                        
 
WebServer := Server clone do(
    setPort(7777)
    socket setHost("127.0.0.1")
    requests := List clone
    handleSocket := method(socket,
        WebRequest handleSocket(socket, self)
    )
) start

Lots of other good socket based examples in addons/Socket/samples.

Regex

sudo apt-get install libpcre3-dev

That will install Perl Compatible Regular Expression support for Io. You can use it like:

regex := Regex with("(?\\d+)([ \t]+)?(?\\w+)")
match := "73noises" matchesOfRegex(regex) next

CFFI

During the configure process you might have noticed a message saying Could NOT find FFI (missing: FFI_INCLUDE_DIRS). FFI (foreign function interface) is basically a system that lets us call functions in different programming languages. First make sure you have the development libraries:

$ sudo apt-get install libffi-dev

How FFI functions is very architecture and compiler dependent, and it seems debian places the includes in a location the cmake scripts aren’t looking. I’m not that familiar with cmake and couldn’t find a very elegant solution, so just place the following line in the modules/FindFFI.cmake script:

$ vim modules/FindFFI.cmake
 
# Add the following line
set(FFI_INCLUDE_DIRS /usr/include/x86_64-linux-gnu)
# Above these two
include(FindPackageHandleStandardArgs)
FIND_PACKAGE_HANDLE_STANDARD_ARGS(FFI DEFAULT_MSG FFI_INCLUDE_DIRS FFI_LIBRARIES)

Here is a small program that gets us direct access to libc’s puts(3) function:

CFFI
 
lib := Library clone setName("libc.so.6")
puts := Function with(Types CString) setLibrary(lib) setName("puts")
 
puts "Hello Io!"

Python

sudo apt-get install python-dev

Want to access Python from Io?

# Import a module
sys := Python import("sys")
 
"Which version of python are we running?" println
sys version println
 
"Split a string" println
str := "Brave brave Sir Robin"
str println
string split(str) println
 
"Load a C module (.so)" println
t := Python import("time")
 
writeln("Current time is: ", t time)

Databases

sudo apt-get install libmysqlclient-dev libmemcache-dev libtokyocabinet-dev libsqlite3-dev libdbi0-dev

Io has addons for MySQL, PostgresQL, memcached, Tokyo Cabinet, SQLite and a few others.

Sound

sudo apt-get install libgmp3-dev libogg-dev libvorbis-dev libtaglib-cil-dev libtag1-dev libtheora-dev libsamplerate0-dev libloudmouth1-dev libsndfile1-dev libflac-dev

Various sound processing libraries.

Images

$ sudo apt-get install libpng-dev libtiff4-dev libjpeg62-dev

Various image loading libraries.

GUI

$ sudo apt-get install x11proto-xf86misc-dev xutils-dev libxpm-dev libpango1.0-dev libcairo2-dev libfreetype6-dev 
 
$ sudo apt-get install libclutter-1.0-dev libatk1.0-dev

There is also a GUI called Flux that requires OpenGL support. I wasn’t able to get it working however.

OpenGL

$ sudo apt-get install libgl1-mesa-dev libglu1-mesa-dev freeglut3-dev libxmu-dev libxi-dev

Lots of great examples in addons/OpenGL/samples.

XML and JSON

$ sudo apt-get install libxml2-dev libyajl-dev

If you need to do any XML or JSON parsing.

UUID

$ sudo apt-get install uuid-dev

Support for UUID generator. Seems to be broken however.

Misc

$ sudo apt-get install libreadline-dev libssl-dev ncurses-dev libffi-dev zlib1g-dev liblzo2-dev zlib1g-dev

SSL, archives, REPL history, curses GUI.

Comments (8)

Installing the Io Language in Ubuntu

words by Brian Racer

I have recently begun reading through Bruce Tate’s fun Seven Languages In Seven Weeks book. One of the chapters focuses the Io language and it’s installation can be a little bit non-standard to get it to my liking.

Generally on my development machine when I compile from source I like to install locally to my home directory rather than system wide. This way sudo privileges are not needed plus I just like the idea of keeping these items close to home.

First Io requires the cmake build system so make sure that is available.

$ sudo apt-get install cmake

Next download and extract the source code.

$ wget --no-check-certificate http://github.com/stevedekorte/io/zipball/master -O io-lang.zip
$ unzip io-lang.zip
$ cd stevedekorte-io-[hash]

Io provides a build script, however it is setup to install the language to /usr/local. Since I want it to go in $HOME/local you just need to modify that file. Here is a quick one liner:

$ sed -i -e 's/^INSTALL_PREFIX="\/usr\/local/INSTALL_PREFIX="$HOME\/local/' build.sh

Now build and install.

$ ./build.sh
$ ./build.sh install

Since we are installing into a location our OS doesn’t really know about, we need to configure a few paths.

$ vim ~/.bashrc
export PATH="${HOME}/local/bin:${PATH}"
export LD_LIBRARY_PATH="${HOME}/local/lib:${LD_LIBRARY_PATH}"
 
# You might want these too
export LD_RUN_PATH=$LD_LIBRARY_PATH
export CPPFLAGS="-I${HOME}/local/include"
export CXXFLAGS=$CPPFLAGS
export CFLAGS=$CPPFLAGS
export MANPATH="${HOME}/local/share/man:${MANPATH}"

Lastly restart your shell and type ‘io’ and you should be dropped into Io’s REPL!

A side benefit to this method is you can install anything you build into $HOME/local. Usually you just need to pass the –prefix=$HOME/local parameter when you run a ./configure script.

Comments (12)

Ubuntu 10.4 (Lucid Lynx) and Broadcom BCM4312

words by Brian Racer

This is basically just a repost of the same issue I had when Karmic Koala launched

Ubuntu 10.4 (Lucid Lynx) launched today and I figured it was time to do an install from scratch onto my Dell D830 Latitude laptop. Everything went quite smoothly but when it started up I noticed two issues:

Problem 1: No wireless

I know the Broadcom card inside the laptop isn’t the greatest, but the last two Ubuntu releases it has worked out of the box. The following command enabled the card after a reboot:

sudo apt-get install bcmwl-kernel-source

Problem 2: Really slow DNS lookups (because of IPV6)

As documented on Launchpad, there still doesn’t seem to be an official fix. Strangely disabling IPV6 in /etc/sysctl.conf didn’t solve anything, however disabling it in Firefox at least fixes the issue in the browser. Just type about:config in the address bar, and set network.dns.disableIPv6 to false.

Comments (7)

Mac OS X like Alt-Tab Mouse Selection in Ubuntu

words by Brian Racer

I like how in OS X when I Alt-Tab I can pick a window or icon with a mouse click. I recently figured out how do get Ubuntu to perform in a similar fashion. First we need to install the CompizConfig Settings Manager (yes, you will need to be using compiz for this):

sudo apt-get install compizconfig-settings-manager

Next navigate the system menu to System -> Preferences -> CompizConfig Settings Manager. The app should start so next scroll down to the Window Management section and click on Static Application Switcher. Next click the Behavior tab and the last option will be ‘Allow Mouse Selection‘. Enable that check-box and exit the application.

It’s not quite as nice as OS X – you can only select by clicking, just mousing over won’t make each item the active target, but it’s better than nothing!

Comments (2)

Ubuntu 9.10 (Karmic Koala) and Broadcom BCM4312

words by Brian Racer

Ubuntu 9.10 (Karmic Koala) launched today and I figured it was time to do an install from scratch onto my Dell D830 Latitude laptop. Everything went quite smoothly but when it started up I noticed two issues:

Problem 1: No wireless

I know the Broadcom card inside the laptop isn’t the greatest, but the last two Ubuntu releases it has worked out of the box. The following command enabled the card after a reboot:

sudo apt-get install bcmwl-kernel-source

Problem 2: Really slow DNS lookups (because of IPV6)

Otherwise things seem to be working well, although I don’t understand why they stick with a color scheme that looks like mud.

Comments (14)