Maze Builder

Build and download mazes interactively or using the command-line interface (CLI). Export the maze straight to a Wavefront object or PNG file. Rapidly prototype the design process by going from example level to polished scene. Exports can then be integrated into game engines and renderers like Unity, Godot, Blender and so forth.

Commands and Help Message

        Usages: maze_builder.exe [OPTION(S)]... [OUTPUT]
        Generates mazes and exports to different formats
        Example: maze_builder.exe -r 10 -c 10 -a binary_tree > out_maze.txt
          -a, --algorithm    dfs, sidewinder, binary_tree [default]
          -s, --seed         seed for the mt19937 generator [default=0]
          -r, --rows         maze rows [default=100]
          -y, --height       maze height [default=1]
          -c, --columns      maze columns [default=100]
          -d, --distances    show distances in the maze
          -i, --interactive  No effect
          -o, --output       [.txt], [.png], [.obj], [stdout[default]]
          -h, --help         display this help message
          -v, --version      display program version

Run the binary_tree maze-generating algorithm with long arguments:

maze_builder.exe --rows=25 --columns=25 --seed=42 --algorithm=binary_tree --output=bt.obj

Run the dfs maze-generating algorithm with short arguments:

maze_builder.exe -r 25 -c 25 -s 42 -a binary_tree -o dfs.obj

CMake

This project uses CMake 3.2 or greater as the build and test system. CMake can use FetchContent to get SDL and Catch2 from the web. The SDL app requires modern hardware supporting OpenGL 3.0 or greater.

The first build step is to navigate to this local repo where it was cloned.

The following are the CMake options I use for this project:

CMake Option	Default	Description
MAZE_BUILD_DESKTOP_EXAMPLES	OFF	Build with desktop examples enabled (CLI, Voxels, Http).
MAZE_BUILD_WEB_EXAMPLES	OFF	Build with web examples enabled (Voxels, MazeBuilderJS).
MAZE_BUILD_TESTS	OFF	Build with testing maze_builder_lib via Catch2.
CMAKE_CXX_COMPILER	cmake	Building with a specific compiler.
CMAKE_TOOLCHAIN_FILE	cmake	Building with a specific toolchain. Useful for Emscripten builds.
CMAKE_BUILD_TYPE	RelWithDebInfo	The build type is case-sensitive. It can determine compiler optimizations and performance. MinSizeRel, Release, RelWithDebInfo, Debug.

Configure the CMake files:

cmake -S . -B build -DCMAKE_CXX_COMPILER:STRING=clang++ -DCMAKE_BUILD_TYPE:STRING=Release -DMAZE_BUILD__DESKTOP_EXAMPLES_:BOOLEAN=1

Build: cmake --build build

Test: ctest --test-dir build --verbose

Configure for the web using Emscripten and their toolchain file:

cmake -S . -B . -DCMAKE_TOOLCHAIN_FILE=${my/emsdk/repo}/upstream/emscripten/cmake/Modules/Platform/Emscripten.cmake 

Where ${my/emsdk/repo} is the directory containing the Git repo for Emscripten.

Scripts

There is a Ruby script ruby mazes.rb and a Python script python3 solver.py to play with maze generation and finding paths. The Ruby script is expected to generate PNG files representing mazes, and then the Python script loads PNG files and tries to determine if a maze exists.

Dependenceis

• gem install chunky_png
• pip install numpy pillow networkx

Web application

Check out the web app!

The web app can be run locally with the provided secure_http_server.py script, and then open the browser to http://localhost:8000.

Resources

• Mazes for Programmers Book
• Craft
• Dear ImGui
• SDL
• Catch2