How to properly build GUI on Windows?

[DanH-ER]

When I build the Visual Studio project on Windows the resulting GUI app has the sheets and tree views disabled, is missing the preferences window, and just generally looks different that the official release from the website. So my question is how do I build the same UI that's in the official release? Is there a config or build flag step I'm missing?

The instructions in the readme only describe how to build Mac and Linux, not Windows.

[JeromeMartinez]

We definitely lack of doc about building GUIs, and not something we are focused on especially because we want to change that in a (far...) future. It will change one day, when we have the tile to refactor everything about the GUI (no ETA as it is not a priority of our sponsors).

In practice the official GUI does not currently use WxWidgets (the one you built, and the one we used a long time ago on Windows, now it is used only on Linux and macOS free version) but use the Borland C++ Builder version (you need Embarcadero, Embarcadero C++ Builder, Embarcadero bought Borland C++ Builder) or the UWP version (you'll get the version for the Windows Store).

[DanH-ER]

I downloaded the community edition of Embarcadero and I can build the UI in 32 bit mode but when I try to build the 64 bit version I get errors similar to this...

[ilink64 Error] Error: Unresolved external 'ZenLib::ZtringListListF::ZtringListListF()' referenced from C:\REPOS\MEDIAINFO\PROJECT\BCB\GUI\WIN64\RELEASE\PREFERENCES.O

I built the BCB ZenLib project first, in both 32 and 64 bit, so I'm not sure what is causing this.

Also I can't seem to build MediaInfoLib at all. The 32 bit version throws errors complaining about int128u and the the 64 bit version complains about __uuifof.

Since you guys use this for the official build I assume you don't have these errors. Any tips on what might be causing them?

[DanH-ER]

Never mind I see that the release script uses the 32bit GUI and the DLLs from Visual Studio. I think I see how it works.

[cjee21]

Documenting how I managed to build the Windows GUI here to help others and for my future reference. Thanks to #788 (comment) and #788 (comment) for giving me an idea.

How to build Windows GUI

1. Install the following required software on a Windows PC:
   • C++Builder Community Edition (https://www.embarcadero.com/products/cbuilder/starter)
   • Git for Windows (https://gitforwindows.org/)
2. Create an empty folder. We'll call this MediaInfoDevelopment for this guide.
3. Clone the following MediaInfo dependencies to MediaInfoDevelopment using Git:
   • https://github.com/MediaArea/MediaInfoLib
   • https://github.com/MediaArea/ZenLib
   • https://github.com/MediaArea/zlib
4. Clone MediaInfo (this repository) to MediaInfoDevelopment.
   • If you intend to contribute to MediaInfo, fork the repository on GitHub first and clone your fork instead.
5. The MediaInfoDevelopment folder should now have the following folders:
   • MediaInfo
   • MediaInfoLib
   • ZenLib
   • zlib
6. Build MediaInfo dependencies by opening the following in C++Builder and selecting Project>Build:
   • MediaInfoDevelopment\ZenLib\Project\BCB\ZenLib_Proj.groupproj
   • MediaInfoDevelopment\zlib\contrib\BCB\zlib_Proj.groupproj
7. Copy MediaInfo_i386.dll from the official distribution to MediaInfoDevelopment\MediaInfo\Project\BCB\GUI\Win32\Release unless you want to build it yourself.
8. Open MediaInfoDevelopment\MediaInfo\Project\BCB\MediaInfo_Proj.groupproj in C++Builder.
9. Build MediaInfo GUI by selecting Project>Build.
10. You should now be able to Run MediaInfo and see the GUI appear.