Farewell Livecode...?

[richmond62]

Well . . . here's a thought:

How about downloading, let's say LC 8.1.10, and seeing if that will behave itself:

https://archive.org/download/live-code- ... -linux-x64

I am not suggesting that as a solution, more as a way of finding out if the phenomenon you
are describing is a recent thing or has "always" been there.

If 8.1.10 behaves itself you can say some more 'sensible' things to LiveCode Central
than simply, "LiveCode doesn't work on Arch Linux derivatives."

[richmond62]

And, just to throw in a dirty question before I go to bed:

If your machine is a dual-boot machine and your other operating system is Windows,
why don't you just run LiveCode on Windows?

[redfield]

How about downloading, let's say LC 8.1.10, and seeing if that will behave itself:

Good idea, will do.

why don't you just run LiveCode on Windows?

I could indeed install Livecode on Windows in order to do some Livecode programming. However the finished application would then not run on my main system, which is EndeavourOS. Windows was on the machine when I bought it, but I usually don't use it at all for anything.

Btw the Support is not interested in digging into this, as I don´t have a license and EndeavourOS is rather uncommon.

[FourthWorld]

EndeavorOS is described by its team as "terminal-centric". If you can run Chrome but not LC I'm surprised, but I suspect ldd will provide good guidance on missing dependencies.

[wsamples]

EndeavorOS is described by its team as "terminal-centric". If you can run Chrome but not LC I'm surprised, but I suspect ldd will provide good guidance on missing dependencies.

Just an FYI to avoid any unnecessary consternation among readers of this thread: EndeavourOS's self description is probably misleading and it has caused some discussion in the their forums. EndeavourOS is a a successor (along with RebornOS) to the defunct Antergos Linux. Its aim is to provide an easily installed, attractive and usable Arch Linux system in a variety of DEs for people who don't want to invest the time in installing and customizing Arch. Livecode can work fine in this and other Arch based distros - including vanilla Arch.

[FourthWorld]

Just an FYI to avoid any unnecessary consternation among readers of this thread: EndeavourOS's self description is probably misleading and it has caused some discussion in the their forums. EndeavourOS is a a successor (along with RenornOS) to the defunct Antergos Linux. Its aim is to provide an easily installed, attractive and usable Arch Linux system in a variety of DEs for people who don't want to invest the time in installing and customizing Arch. Livecode can work fine in this and other Arch based distros - including vanilla Arch.

Thank you for that background, Warren. That gives us all more confidence we can sort out the dependencies to get LC running well on refield's system.

[redfield]

The output of ldd [/PATH/TO/LIVECODE/INSTALLER] is this:

linux-vdso.so.1 (0x00007ffd56967000)
libdl.so.2 => /usr/lib/libdl.so.2 (0x00007f85d3ff8000)
libpthread.so.0 => /usr/lib/libpthread.so.0 (0x00007f85d3ff3000)
libexpat.so.1 => /usr/lib/libexpat.so.1 (0x00007f85d3fc8000)
libfreetype.so.6 => /usr/lib/libfreetype.so.6 (0x00007f85d3ef9000)
libfontconfig.so.1 => /usr/lib/libfontconfig.so.1 (0x00007f85d3ea9000)
libstdc++.so.6 => /usr/lib/libstdc++.so.6 (0x00007f85d3c00000)
libm.so.6 => /usr/lib/libm.so.6 (0x00007f85d3b18000)
libgcc_s.so.1 => /usr/lib/libgcc_s.so.1 (0x00007f85d3e87000)
libc.so.6 => /usr/lib/libc.so.6 (0x00007f85d3932000)
libz.so.1 => /usr/lib/libz.so.1 (0x00007f85d3e6d000)
libbz2.so.1.0 => /usr/lib/libbz2.so.1.0 (0x00007f85d3e5a000)
libpng16.so.16 => /usr/lib/libpng16.so.16 (0x00007f85d38f9000)
libharfbuzz.so.0 => /usr/lib/libharfbuzz.so.0 (0x00007f85d380e000)
libbrotlidec.so.1 => /usr/lib/libbrotlidec.so.1 (0x00007f85d3e4a000)
/lib64/ld-linux-x86-64.so.2 => /usr/lib64/ld-linux-x86-64.so.2 (0x00007f85d4023000)
libgraphite2.so.3 => /usr/lib/libgraphite2.so.3 (0x00007f85d37ec000)
libglib-2.0.so.0 => /usr/lib/libglib-2.0.so.0 (0x00007f85d36af000)
libbrotlicommon.so.1 => /usr/lib/libbrotlicommon.so.1 (0x00007f85d368c000)
libpcre2-8.so.0 => /usr/lib/libpcre2-8.so.0 (0x00007f85d35f1000)

But I don't really know what to do with that now

This is the installer I'm trying to execute:

Screenshot.png (5.08 KiB) Viewed 16082 times

[richmond62]

Well, right know I would ask you:

Which is more important to you?

Sticking with that Linux distro, or being able to run LiveCode on A Linux distro?

So, either stick with your Arch-deriv and forget LiveCode, or install a Debian-deriv and use LiveCode.

You cannot always have everything you want.

[FourthWorld]

The system is missing fontconfig and a good many others, but it runs Chrome?

[wsamples]

Well, right know I would ask you:

Which is more important to you?

Sticking with that Linux distro, or being able to run LiveCode on A Linux distro?

So, either stick with your Arch-deriv and forget LiveCode, or install a Debian-deriv and use LiveCode.

You cannot always have everything you want.

This is wrong and silly advice. His distro of choice will support Livecode. I know because it's the distro I run. He just needs to figure out what his particular installation is missing and install those things.

[wsamples]

Redfield, which DE did you install with EndeavourOS? I'm running the Openbox community version. I just now downloaded the installer for 9.6.3 from the page that Richmond posted in this thread and it runs. My output of 'ldd <installerPath>' is the same as what you got. I can run version 8 of Livecode so it's not an issue of libs being too new. Is it possible the installer download was corrupted? I would download and try again before I started down any deeper rabbit holes.

[redfield]

You cannot always have everything you want.

Well okay, that's quite a truism .

The system is missing fontconfig and a good many others, but it runs Chrome?

But fontconfig is there: /usr/lib/libfontconfig.so.1 (0x00007f85d3ea9000) - or no? Chrome runs without problems.

Redfield, which DE did you install with EndeavourOS?

I installed XFCE. Was also using XFCE on RebornOS, where Livecode worked.

Is it possible the installer download was corrupted? I would download and try again before I started down any deeper rabbit holes.

Done so, no change. I have meanwhile installed Endeavour in a VM, with Gnome as DE. Here the installer executes, however it complains about "Conflicting Apps" and assumes that there is a version of Livecode "already running". The "conflicting app" "-E" is to be closed .

[richmond62]

by redfield » Sat Oct 08, 2022 1:40 pm

richmond62 wrote: ↑
Fri Oct 07, 2022 10:11 pm
You cannot always have everything you want.

Well okay, that's quite a truism .

It is, or, at least to 60 year olds like me it is: but a very large proportion
of the teenagers I teach have not worked that out yet.

Just yesterday I had a 17 year old boy in class who had what had best be described
as a 'hissy fit' in class because I chose to look at another boy's bit of writing first.

Looking at your current endeavours (pun intended), I would be inclined to
reinstall the Linux distro and try again . . .

[FourthWorld]

Looking at your current endeavours (pun intended), I would be inclined to
reinstall the Linux distro and try again . . .

My Linux admin friends describe an evolution to their skills acquisition:

When they start out it's exciting just to get a system running, and when something big goes wrong they reinstall and spend a lot of time getting set up again.

Later they learn to separate data and automate config, so reinstalling is less painful.

But at some point they acquire the confidence to fix issues in place, and reinstalling becomes a thing of the past.

In this case, if the system is working in all respects but the LiveCode installer, I'd be especially reluctant to suggest system reinstall.

It's beginning to look like carefully placed symlinks for things like fontconfig may do the trick, that they're present but not where LC expects them.

As an Ubuntu fan I have it easy, since it's an officially supported distro (even if "official" support seems limited to older versions).

But given the decreasing effort the team devotes to Linux-specific enhancements, using anything outside the recommended distros may become a question of which is easier: replacing the distro you love, or the language you love.

There are plenty of distros. And there are plenty of tools for writing software. Which love is greater is of course a subjective matter. The heart wants what the heart wants.

[wsamples]

Redfield, which DE did you install with EndeavourOS?

I installed XFCE. Was also using XFCE on RebornOS, where Livecode worked.

Is it possible the installer download was corrupted? I would download and try again before I started down any deeper rabbit holes.

Done so, no change. I have meanwhile installed Endeavour in a VM, with Gnome as DE. Here the installer executes, however it complains about "Conflicting Apps" and assumes that there is a version of Livecode "already running". The "conflicting app" "-E" is to be closed .
[/quote]

It seems there may be two problems, one peculiar to your system that prevents the installer from running at all and another that causes the installer to abort which may be signs of something bigger. When I tried the installer here the other day, I saw it launched and ran the first couple of steps but didn't go so far as to install. Seeing your latest post I tried to complete the install but I get the same aborted result you report. This is a new issue. It also occurs now with installers for Indy versions that I had previously installed. 'strace' shows that the process gets stuck waiting for a response with the message "Resource temporarily unavailable". I can't make any deeper sense out of strace's output, but it's possible that a new lib version isn't behaving quite as expected. I will look into whether or not this affects other dialogs or file operations in Livecode as I have time.

There's some irony in that you were successful running Livecode in Xfce on Reborn. Xfce has been the subject of some past discussion here as many of us have found it not usable due to a focus conflict between various elements of the Livecode interface. I can't remember which Arch spin I tried it with but I found it unworkable. If nothing else, Livecode and Linux can be a mysterious - and mystifying - combination

Understandably you want to run Livecode in the distro you're happiest with and without the overhead of running it inside a VM. I wonder what would happen if you were to install Livecode on a VM in a supported distro - where you can "expect" it to work - and then move the .runrev directory from the VM to your base machine. It's a bit of extra work but it may give you the result you want.