Building luafilesystem for Lua for Windows

Question

I haven't a clue when it comes to building makefiles - I am trying to build luafilesystem in Windows 7 x86 for use with Lua for Windows. I have scoured the internet for tutorials but I just can't figure it out. I got as far as to run NMAKE in the Developer Command Prompt but I received the following error:

C:\Users\Me\Desktop\luafilesystem-master\luafilesystem-master>nmake -f Makefile.win

Microsoft (R) Program Maintenance Utility Version 12.00.21005.1 Copyright (C) Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.

cl /c /Fosrc\lfs.obj /MD /O2 /I"c:\lua5.1\include" src\lfs.c Microsoft (R) C/C++ Optimizing Compiler Version 18.00.30723 for x86 Copyright (C) Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.

lfs.c

src\lfs.c(63) : fatal error C1083: Cannot open include file: 'lua.h': No such file or directory

NMAKE : fatal error U1077: '"C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft Visual Studio 12.0\VC\BIN\cl.EXE"' : return code '0x2'

Stop.

I'm not sure what I'm doing wrong. There was no lua.h in the set of files I downloaded directly from the official LuaFileSystem repository.

All I want is to install lfs to use in lua. If you can't figure out what I'm doing wrong but happen to know an easier way, please share. I hope I've provided enough information. Thanks.

Answer 1

You need to have the Lua interpreter you are compiling against to be compiled and available on your computer to access its header files (lua.h and few others) and Lua library/dll files. After you compile the right version of Lua interpreter you need (whether Lua 5.1 or Lua 5.2), set the environmental variables (or update the paths in the make file) LUA_LIBDIR, LUA_INC and LUA_LIB to point to your lua-folder, lua-folder\src, and the lua lib correspondingly.