zig-sokol-crossplatform-starter

A template for an app that runs on iOS, Android, PC and Mac. Built using the Zig programming language, and using the floooh/sokol graphics/app library. Also, taken inspiration from kubkon/zig-ios-example, MasterQ32/ZigAndroidTemplate, and cnlohr/rawdrawandroid

sokol_served_three_ways.mp4

Clone

Important

This projects uses submodules. Make sure to include them.

git clone --recurse-submodules https://github.com/geooot/zig-sokol-crossplatform-starter.git

Required Dependencies

You will need the latest 0.12.x (master) release of Zig, you can find it here. Last tested with version 0.12.0-dev.1828+225fe6ddb.

For iOS

xcode
xcodegen, which can be installed with brew install xcodegen
Edit build.zig with APP_NAME and BUNDLE_PREFIX changed as necessary.

For Android

Android SDK install with ANDROID_HOME environment variable set.
Java JDK, and keytool (should be included in JDK install). $JAVA_HOME should be set to the install location
bundletool, which can be installed with brew install bundletool.
Edit build.zig with ANDROID_ prefixed constants as necessary. You probably only need to change *_VERSION const's to match what you have installed in your android SDK (check $ANDROID_HOME).
Edit build.zig with APP_NAME and BUNDLE_PREFIX changed as necessary.

For PC/Mac

Nothing! Just zig build run.

Build and Run

Make sure to perform the edits and get the dependencies described in "Required Dependencies" before continuing below.

$ zig build run      # builds and runs executable on your computer

$ zig build          # builds everything (iOS, android, your computer)

$ zig build ios      # generates iOS project (in zig-out/MyApp.xcodeproj).
                     # You have to open xcode and build from there

$ zig build android  # builds android apks (in zig-out/MyApp.apks).
                     # You have to use `bundletool install-apks --apks=MyApp.apks` to install it to a device.
                     # But you use the `.aab` file when submitting to Google Play.

$ zig build default  # builds a executable for your computer

Quirks and Features

Features

Ability to build for your PC, iOS, and Android
Android App Bundle support.
XCode project is an artifact. Configuration using YAML instead (thanks to xcodegen)
Pretty easy to modify build system (thanks to Zig).
Small binaries, fast loading times!

Quirks

Not really easy to debug for android. Surprisingly the xcode debugger works pretty well.
Still need XCode to finish the build for iOS. It's needed for code signing and final linking.

Things that would be cool to add in the future

In no particular order

Move sokol-zig to be a zig dependency rather than a git submodule
Can we get rid of the dependency on xcodegen and bundletool? I think we can at least use zig package manager to fetch those dependencies on build. We need zip support (xcodegen releases itself as a zip file rather than a tarball) and single file download support (bundletool packages itself as a single .jar) to make that possible.
- Even crazier idea: reimplement xcodegen and bundletool as zig libraries.
In my sleep I still think about kubkon/zig-ios-example since it doesn't require generating a xcode project at all. I think in reality, people might need some xcode project generation support, but like...
Github Action CI/CD workflows.
Add minimal WASM/WASI builds (lets move past emscripten).

License

This is Public Domain software with the UNLICENSE license. All code except for the following exceptions are under the UNLICENSE license.

build/auto-detect.zig falls under the MIT License [See here].
deps/sokol-zig (and sokol in general) fall under the Zlib license [[See here]].