Windows

In order to target Windows, you may use either C++ or Neko. Native C++ should result in the best performance, and is recommended when distributing to users. Neko can be valuable, because it leverages the same native layer for Lime, but the application code is compiled instantly for the Neko VM. This should mean almost instant compile-times, and being a VM, sometimes a logical error in your project can be more easily found when testing there.

You can use "windows" as the target when using "lime" commands:

lime test windows

This will use C++ by default. You can target Neko using the "-neko" flag:

lime test windows -neko

Theoretically, cross-desktop builds (such as Windows from Mac) could be supported using Neko, but currently there are a few small issues that prevent this from fully working.

Currently, Windows uses only 32-bit builds, and supports all versions of Windows from XP to current. You will need to install Visual Studio C++ in order to make C++ builds, we recommend using Visual Studio C++ Express 2010, which is free, and supports XP and up, simply. Installing newer versions can sometimes affect backward compatibility.

The windowing is handled by SDL 2, so issues (or improvements) in access to the platform, in event input or unique elements of the platform may flow from there. Currently, all desktop builds for Windows use Win32, so they are not compatible with the Windows "modern" interface of Windows 8. Exploration has been made to consider support of Windows RT, the primary barrier is that Windows RT does not support OpenGL. Although it may be possible to support DirectX, it is much more practical to continue a single rendering API. For this reason, we have been watching the ANGLE project, but for now, Windows support is only for Windows desktop.