Category Archives: MongoDB

3D Programming, C#, C++, MongoDB, Projects, Sandbox, Topics, Unity, Win32

Bouncing Around a Bit Today

Leave a comment

Building C++ supporting libraries on my small dev machine. Looking at another pass of C++/CLI work and some more thinking about motion capture options.

I’ve built zlib and bzlib2 yesterday. To get these building with VS 2017 I built them with their standard build procedures (which appeared to build 32 bit libraries) and then created visual studio 2017 projects to build the same pieces using fresh settings.

I’ve got boost, openssl, opencv and the mongodb c and c++ libraries on my list for today. The mongodb libraries are my primary target here though all of the above are of interest. This is also what is driving my CMake reading as several of these libraries use CMake for their builds.

I’m pretty interested in C++/CLI as a way to get access to C and C++ functionality from C#. Given the productivity that C# provides, access to C and C++ APIs and libraries from that environment would help quite a bit. My primary driver was access to the Win32 file ID API for some file management work, but Win32 APIs keep coming up now and again. I do need to take a look as some newer C# libraries that Malcolm suggested that may provide pre-packaged access here.

In the past, I’ve run into build issues when combining C# and C++/CLI in the same project. I expect this was setup issues so I’m now looking to take a more serious look at this.

The motion capture work will start out with OpenCV and getting my web cams running with code behind them to process the images. I’m thinking that pre-recording things and then post processing might be a good idea…using a light strobe to synchronize things could simplify time sync as well. Much to consider…

Next Steps

I’ve got boost, zlib and libbz2 built on boojum now. Next step will be to test the installs with a small program or two. Hoping that all went well and I have usable, native, win64 libraries available.

Once those have been checked out I’ll take another run at building the MongoDB drivers…this time on boojum rather than chaos. Boojum has a shorter history and is distinctly less cluttered than chaos so I’m hoping that this just works. Expecting less than that though…I’ll probably need to dig deeper into he CMake configs to get where I want to go. I’ll update as I move forward…now off to lunch though.

C++, MongoDB, Projects, Topics

Need to Learn More About CMake

Leave a comment

I’ve been looking at using MongoDB from C++ and trying to build the MongoDB C and C++ driver code. So far, the build files that CMake has generated on my main development box (targeting Visual Studio 2017) have pulled in cygwin header files and generated various other problems. I don’t really understand why the tool would be getting confused like this, but I want a better understanding of how CMake decides where to look for build files and configuration and how to control that.

I’m sure that having cygwin and visual studio on the same machine should be a workable configuration so I expect there are ways to keep CMake from pulling in the wrong files.

Hoping to get to the point where I can cleanly build these drivers and get them working in some 64 bit visual C++ code.

C#, C++, MongoDB, Projects, Sandbox, Topics

Giving up on MongoDB from C++ for now

Leave a comment

I’ve tried building this thing using CMake and Visual Studio and CMake seems to keep picking up cygwin headers for Visual Studio builds and I can’t seem to make things better. For now not worth the pain. I’m probably going back to C# with C++/CLI to get this working with C APIs and C# for MongoDB access.

I’m certain that I could get this building with enough effort. The code looks reasonable and I can put together the projects myself. I’m not all that inclined to go there though as I’d have to re-do this every time through. I’m not familiar enough with CMake to try modifying that part of the process.

Ok…not quite giving up. I did find that CMake appears to be adding a cygwin header folder to the projects. If I manually remove this from them the build goes further. The default build configuration appears to be 32 bit which is also an issue for me. Perhaps I’ll do a little more before I completely give up.

C++, MongoDB, Projects, Sandbox

C++ MongoDB Driver Circles within Circles…

Leave a comment

Looking at getting a bit of C++ file processing code done for some home sandbox tooling reasons. Grabbed the source code.

Source code asks for boost as a polyfill for C++ 2017 (optional and something else) with MSVC 2017. Grabbed boost. Got to build boost, really would like to build the full kit if I’m going to build it at all. Grabber zlib and libbz2. Now looking at any other dependencies needed to build a reasonably complete boost build locally.

Heading off to see the Captain Marvel movie and will continue with this (along with some presentation prep I need to do this weekend and some overflow work items I need to look into). Should be an interesting if busy weekend…

This is once again reminding me why C# and Java are so much more productive than C++ for many things. In C# I’d nuget the mongodb drivers. Up to date versions of any supporting libraries would be pulled in as needed and I’d be writing code in short order. I love C++ for its power and flexibility, but as a tool to get higher level logic in place it is not holding up well…

Add in building bjam to build boost with and then grabbing CMake to build the mongodb drivers with…making sure that the build processes find the right compiler (I’ve had at least one run where my build grabbed the g++ compiler out of the path even though the visual studio tools were there as well.

C#, MongoDB, Projects, Sandbox

Started adding mongodb support to C# code

Leave a comment

I started adding in concrete MongoDB support to the tool code I’m building. Last night I incorporated the drivers into the solution and set up the connection code for the database. My initial attempt to directly use the C++/CLI object to push a record into the database failed but I expect to add a class that is properly serializable to BSON tonight and get volume information persistence working. I still need to get a better handle on updates in MongoDB. I know there are various sorts of atomic test and set sorts of operations on documents and in order to make this work properly with concurrent access, I need to understand those operations and use them to ensure that updates don’t ‘walk’ on themselves.

When I have a bit more time to type, I’ll add in more details on the MongoDB driver work and the approaches I’m using.