Lover

Lover is a open source command line build system and runner for Love2D projects inspired by Cargo.

Wiki | CLI usage | Constants

Features

Easy cross-platform building

You can easily build your game for all supported platforms with a single command.

Automatic dependency management

Love binaries required for building are downloaded automatically and can easily be managed by using Lover commands.

Finally a good run command

When using lover run you can pass arguments to your game and even --flags.

Most tools like Makefile and Cargo will treat all flags as their own and not allow such things.

lover run someArgument --someFlag --gameMode=survival

Default environment variables

You can access certain constants like the game's version by the use of os.getenv().

local version = os.getenv("LOVER_VERSION")

learn more

Simple command line interface

Lover has a simple and easy to use command syntax (at least I hope).

Supported platforms

• ✅ Full support: The platform is fully supported and should work
• 🟡 Partial support: The platform mostly works but you may encounter issues
• 📁 Planned: Support will be implemented in future
• ⭕ Not yet needed: The platform is not widely used. If you want support for it you can open an issue and it will be implemented.
• ❗ Testers/maintainers needed: someone is needed to test and/or maintain the platform
• ❌ Impossible: The platform is currently impossible to implement

Build targets

Name	Arch	Alias	Status
Universal LOVE file		love	✅
Linux AppImage	x86_64	linux	✅
Linux AppImage	x86_32		❌
Windows	x86_64	win64	✅
Windows	x86_32	win32	✅
MacOS			❗
Web			📁
Android			📁
Nintendo 3DS 3DSX			📁
Nintendo 3DS CIA			📁
Nintendo Wii U			❗
Nintendo Switch			❗

Please also see the compatibility matrix.

The love target is runnable on all platforms, but require LÖVE to be installed.

Lover tool

Platform	Arch	Status
Linux	x86_64	✅
Linux	x86_32	⭕
Windows	x86_64	✅
Windows	x86_32	⭕
MacOS		❗

Compiling

Lover is written in Rust and managed by Cargo.

Install Cargo on your system then open the terminal in the Lover's source directory and run:

cargo build

or

cargo run

to just run it.

Read the documentation for more info.

Why?

I wanted to create a simple expandable and universal system for building, running and managing Love2D projects.

This is a replacement for my previous project Love2D Universal which utilized a single Makefile, however a global system-wide tool is a way better approach. A single script setup for a large project is not a good idea, as organization is not great for such big scripts and implementing a lot of advanced features is not easy. Also this tool does not require installing as much software as Love2D Universal and has a nice error handling and warnings.

This tool is also very similar to Cargo which manages Rust projects.

Used crates

• reqwest: Sending HTTP requests and downloading files
• serde: Serializing structs
• serde_json: JSON parsing and serde support
• toml: TOML parsing and serde support
• zip: Managing ZIP archives
• image: Handling image files
• dirs: Finding system directories on various platforms
• regex: Using regular expressions on strings
• ansi_term: Styling terminal output
• backhand: Modifying, creating and parsing SquashFS