Prism Engine

First version of the engine was written using OpenGL. However I decided to move to Vulkan due to two reasons. Developing on macOS is very limited - currently it supports only up to version 4.1 of OpenGL. Second reason is that I like to have more control over what is happening, therefore Vulkan suits my needs more.

Setting Up Vulkan Environment Variables

To build and run this project correctly, you need to install the Vulkan SDK and configure the environment variables on your system.

First, install the Vulkan SDK from LunarG Vulkan SDK.

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Windows

1. Set the environment variables:

   • VULKAN_SDK → path to your Vulkan SDK installation, e.g.:

     C:\VulkanSDK\1.4.321.0
     

   • Add the Vulkan bin directory to your PATH:

      C:\VulkanSDK\1.4.321.0\bin
     

2. Restart your terminal to apply the changes.

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macOS

1. Set the environment variables in your shell configuration file (~/.zshrc or ~/.bash_profile):

   export VULKAN_SDK=PATH_TO_VULKAN_SDK
   export DYLD_LIBRARY_PATH=$VULKAN_SDK/lib:$DYLD_LIBRARY_PATH
   export VK_ICD_FILENAMES=$VULKAN_SDK/share/vulkan/icd.d/MoltenVK_icd.json
   export VK_LAYER_PATH=$VULKAN_SDK/share/vulkan/explicit_layer.d
   export PATH=$VULKAN_SDK/bin:$PATH
   

2. Apply the changes:

   source ~/.zshrc   # or source ~/.bash_profile
   

Building the project

Windows

On Windows the project includes a setup.bat script that prepares a build folder and generates a Visual Studio solution.

1. Open PowerShell or Command Prompt.

2. Change into the project root if necessary:

   cd path\to\project

3. Run the setup script:

   .\setup.bat

   • The script will generate a build directory and create a .sln file (Visual Studio solution) inside build.
   • Wait for the script to finish. If it fails, check the console output for missing tools or permissions.

4. Open the solution:

   • In File Explorer, navigate to build\ and double-click the generated *.sln file.
   • Or from the command line:

     start build\YourSolution.sln

5. Build and run inside Visual Studio:

   • Select the configuration (Debug/Release) and platform (x86/x64) as appropriate.
   • Build the solution (Build → Build Solution) and run (Debug → Start Debugging or Start Without Debugging).

Notes:

• If you need a clean rebuild, delete the build folder and re-run setup.bat.

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macOS

On macOS the repository provides build.sh and run.sh.

1. Open Terminal and change to the project root:

   cd /path/to/project

2. Make sure the scripts are executable (first time only):

   chmod +x ./build.sh ./run.sh

3. Build:
   • Normal build:

     ./build.sh

   • Clean:

     ./build.sh --clean

     The --clean flag performs a full clean.

• Release build:

  ./build.sh --release

  The --release flag instructs the build script to produce optimized/release artifacts (instead of debug builds).

4. Run:

   ./run.sh

   ./run.sh --release

   run.sh will execute the produced binary (or start the app) using the artifacts in the build directory. Pass --release to run the artifacts produced by a --release build.

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