Mono C# Bindings for Unreal 4

[anonymous_user_fa4a31eb]

@;13136

Yes that’s why the title is modern c++ but he also works for Microsoft and explains some stuff for C# too.

Can you be more specific? I don’t want to trawl through hours of video to find some “stuff” that you are talking about.

@;13136

Ofc it compiles it down to bytecode at compile time instead to IR which the clr will turn into bytecode at runtime. I telling you this because for some reason you seem to think that there is a problem with UE and a VM.

And what makes you think that this system has manual memory management?

[KITATUS]

Seems to be getting rather hostile in here.

Some people want it, some people don’t. They’ve been shown the cons and have their own pros, so don’t bite their heads off for wanting to use C#. Personally, I’m happy using Blueprint now as apposed to coding, it’s a nice change of scenery. And yes, I’m a C# user

[anonymous_user_48d0c7fc1 (anonymous_user_48d0c7fc)]

Just to kind of chime in with respect to the whole “C# will be slow” FUD: .NET/Mono in general is going to be less performant than C++, but for reasons of scripting typically you don’t actually care about the performance impact so long as you’re not doing anything that’s particularly intensive (like physics simulations). You’re typically not going to be pushing it hard enough that the VM’s JIT will harm performance in a way that you will actually notice.

Besides, if you really want to complain about performance of scripting systems, let’s all think back to the days of UnrealScript or even interpreted scripting languages! Ah, those were the good ole’ days.

[anonymous_user_47069605]

Indeed. Please take all further C# performance discussion to another thread as it is not constructive at all here.
Thank you.

[anonymous_user_aadad8ed]

count the seconds to see something done

[Mr_SquarePeg]

@;12237

We are currently looking at releasing v1 of our C# implementation by June. We are also planning on an evaluation, indie, and pro build of the plugin.

Great to hear how ambitious the community is with embedding mono. One word of caution is on the GC side of things. You’ll want to use SGEN for an embedded Mono implementation. Otherwise you’ll start running into memory thunking issues pretty quickly. Embedding Mono is no small task in UE4 and requires some serious thought as to what the outcome should be for UE4 developers. Are you looking calling the engine or calling the C# DLL? What about integration with BluePrints?

Also another word of caution. Our solution takes advantage of the existing macros in the engine used for declaring BluePrint exposure such as UFUCTION() UCLASS() UPROPERTY() macros decorated across the codebase using a clever little macro setup that is engaged by the UBT.

================

Right now we have a C# based UE4.DLL which can be included in any standard C# compiler as well as used by our own compiler built directly into the UE4 Editor. On the C++ side we have a MonoRuntime and Script Engine Plugin for Engine as well as a Script Editor Plugin for Editor.

The UE4 C# library currently as it stands binds to the entire Game Framework sanely as well as any inherited classes that the Game Framework uses. So this includes common game logic UClasses like Actor, PlayerController, and Pawn (just to name a few). We have also binded Core and several other necessary parts of the engine.

You will have a few setup steps in C++ before you can begin using the Plugins with your game. You’ll need to setup the Plugin in your Game DLL. We are working on ways to overcome this step to make this feel as natural as possible to C# developers.

We also provide a Script Editor which lives inside of the UE4 Editor which allows developers to write and compile C# directly in UE4! We use the mcs to compile C# scripts into DLLs which are placed alongside the C++ Binaries.

We are shooting for the most natural Unreal Coding experience possible in C#.

Here are some screenshots:

Hey - Just curious will this be similar to coding inside unity3D? I am not trying to compare engines. I am trying to get someone to port a plugin from the Unity3D Asset store to Unreal 4. Basically a traffic simulator asset.

Will you guys be charging for the C# Bindings/Script Editor as well?

Any response is appreciated

[anonymous_user_ce8ae603]

That looks really promissing, my question is:

Will there be any form of Intellisense / code completion in the plugin and how quick would it respond?
I’m asking because my experience with the intellisense of Visual Studio 2013 with UE4 is totally unacceptable, refering to my other thread here:
https://forums.unrealengine.com/showthread.php?2355-Visual-Studio-2013-Intellisense-is-REALLY-slow&p=13905&posted=1#post13905

[Shadowriver]

@;13966

C++ is really hard to parse that’s why intellisense seems so slow. C# support in VS is extremely well polished.

It’s not hard to parse, but .NET system (not only C#. C# it just one way of using .NET) have functions etc. indexed a lot better when C++ has ton of header files that need to be reparse all the time

[tatoforever]

@;

That is nice. I have just one question, what kind of stuff will you wrap and how will you do it?

(I am not a C# guy so it might not make sense what I am asking)

Will you try to wrap every unreal class like AActor? I don’t know how hard this will be and maybe it’s even easier to wrap these things in C++ cli. Or will you wrap the lower level engine stuff like accessing the mouse, FVector etc and then rewrite the gameplay code in C#?

Either way this will be a huge undertaking and I am willing to help.

You got a point, why not C++/CLI?

[anonymous_user_48d0c7fc1 (anonymous_user_48d0c7fc)]

@tatoforever;14494

You got a point, why not C++/CLI?

If you’re going for C++/CLI, you’re going for roughly the same process of wrapping things anyways. On top of that, Mono doesn’t have a C++/CLI compiler.

[tatoforever]

If you’re going for C++/CLI, you’re going for roughly the same process of wrapping things anyways. On top of that, Mono doesn’t have a C++/CLI compiler.

I’m aware that mono doesn’t compile such an ugly language, was just following the other guys question.

[Mr_SquarePeg]

Hey, Just thought I would share this - Microsoft has / going to open source it C# compiler and some of its .NET technologies

Microsoft open sources more of its .Net technologies | ZDNet

[anonymous_user_2253ece8]

Hi, everyone on this thread,

I am the founder of xInterop Software and the author of xInterop NGen++, a C# wrapper generator C++ DLL at http://www.xinterop.com, you may want to take a look at how it can do for you.

We would like to give out 5 copy of xInterop NGen++ Standard version with distribution licenses for free. What we expect from you is a free DEMO copy of your final game software for us to demonstrate how you use xInterop NGen++, that is all.

If you are interested in using C# with Unreal, and would like to write C# on top of Unreal C++, Please contact me for the free license. You can also express your interest in this thread.

Thanks,

[Martin_Bean]

Hi, everyone on this thread,

I am the founder of xInterop Software and the author of xInterop NGen++, a C# wrapper generator C++ DLL at http://www.xinterop.com, you may want to take a look at how it can do for you.

We would like to give out 5 copy of xInterop NGen++ Standard version with distribution licenses for free. What we expect from you is a free DEMO copy of your final game software for us to demonstrate how you use xInterop NGen++, that is all.

If you are interested in using C# with Unreal, and would like to write C# on top of Unreal C++, Please contact me for the free license. You can also express your interest in this thread.

Thanks,

[/QUOTE]

Why attach it to a game? What if a team of dev’s(not tied to a studio/game/project) wants to make C# bindings for UE4 available for everyone?

[Shadowriver]

@;15224

Hey, Just thought I would share this - Microsoft has / going to open source it C# compiler and some of its .NET technologies

Microsoft open sources more of its .Net technologies

Quastion is if somebody will produce something diffrent and multiplatform out of it (if thats even possible) and with more suitable licence, Mono is the one will benefit out of this the most

[vincemektek]

Hi, everyone on this thread,

I am the founder of xInterop Software and the author of xInterop NGen++, a C# wrapper generator C++ DLL at http://www.xinterop.com, you may want to take a look at how it can do for you.

We would like to give out 5 copy of xInterop NGen++ Standard version with distribution licenses for free. What we expect from you is a free DEMO copy of your final game software for us to demonstrate how you use xInterop NGen++, that is all.

If you are interested in using C# with Unreal, and would like to write C# on top of Unreal C++, Please contact me for the free license. You can also express your interest in this thread.

Thanks,

[/QUOTE]

Hey . Nice to see you on this thread. Thanks again for the software evaluation a few months ago. The main issue with this approach with UE4 though is that I don’t believe PINVOKES are the best approach for UE4/Mono support.

The Mono Runtime offers some pretty awesome embedding capabilities that allow you to effectively create a PINVOKE’LESS script binding using the low-level Mono embedding API. This is our approach with our Plugin which provides access to the powerful embedding API in Mono to UE4.

[sandboxgod]

Hey guys I’ve been silently monitoring this thread in the background. I wish you guys good luck.

[Mr_SquarePeg]

So any further news on this?

[robert.manuszewski]

Hey guys, I just wanted to let you know that we’ve been working on making it easier for people to add their own scripting integrations. More info can be found >here<.

[anonymous_user_2253ece8]

@;15689

Hey . Nice to see you on this thread. Thanks again for the software evaluation a few months ago. The main issue with this approach with UE4 though is that I don’t believe PINVOKES are the best approach for UE4/Mono support.

The Mono Runtime offers some pretty awesome embedding capabilities that allow you to effectively create a PINVOKE’LESS script binding using the low-level Mono embedding API. This is our approach with our Plugin which provides access to the powerful embedding API in Mono to UE4.

Hi, ,

Good to see you here too, I did not know your C++ Library is for UE. Just went back to find the class names you sent to me, ha, you were actually trying to wrap the UE engine module. It should have worked for you if you had kept consulting me. We have been able to wrap so many complicated C++ libraries without issues. We currently don’t support mono though, only windows .NET.

FYI, mono/xamarin uses P/Invoke to wrap C++ DLLs as well.

Best wish to the launch of your software.

Regards,

http://www.xinterop.com