The default "Debug Editor" mode will produce a beast of UE4Editor that we can't debug it thoroughly, for vs2022 needs over 10G memory to load relative pdbs and retrieve debug information, eventually our computer is over burden, and vs2022 corrupts, so we never so much as trigger a debug point.
After several mends, vs2022 IDE still corrupts at beginning of debugging, so we have to seek help from WinDbg or QtCreator.
There are two main causes why UE4Editor is so big:
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The original build tool action is 'Modular' which generates many dlls and every dll contains a portion of the same low level library code. So we change the action to 'Monolithic':
ue\Engine\Source\Programs\UnrealBuildTool\Configuration\TargetRules.cs... public TargetLinkType LinkType { get { // return (LinkTypePrivate != TargetLinkType.Default) ? LinkTypePrivate : ((Type == global::UnrealBuildTool.TargetType.Editor) ? TargetLinkType.Modular : TargetLinkType.Monolithic); return (LinkTypePrivate != TargetLinkType.Default) ? LinkTypePrivate : ((Type == global::UnrealBuildTool.TargetType.Editor) ? TargetLinkType.Monolithic : TargetLinkType.Monolithic); } set { LinkTypePrivate = value; } } ...But I have tried building in monolithic mode, it's a suicide, literately, there are many duplicated symbols generated which fail the building. We have to return to modular mode.
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Every call on logging macro carves '__FILE__' or '__FUNCTION__' in the binary which will also inflate the executable. So we change these macros to nonsense:
ue\Engine\Source\Runtime\Core\Public\Misc\Build.h
... #define EUHAT_MINIMIZE 1 #if UE_BUILD_DEBUG #if EUHAT_MINIMIZE #ifndef DO_GUARD_SLOW #define DO_GUARD_SLOW 0 #endif #ifndef DO_CHECK #define DO_CHECK 0 #endif #ifndef DO_ENSURE #define DO_ENSURE 0 #endif #ifndef STATS #define STATS ((WITH_UNREAL_DEVELOPER_TOOLS || !WITH_EDITORONLY_DATA || USE_STATS_WITHOUT_ENGINE || USE_MALLOC_PROFILER || FORCE_USE_STATS) && !ENABLE_STATNAMEDEVENTS) #endif #ifndef ALLOW_DEBUG_FILES #define ALLOW_DEBUG_FILES 1 #endif #ifndef ALLOW_CONSOLE #define ALLOW_CONSOLE 0 #endif #ifndef NO_LOGGING #define NO_LOGGING 0 #endif #else #ifndef DO_GUARD_SLOW ...
We should notice NO_LOGGING is false, I attempted to set it true, but a lot of errors occured.
At the end of ueDbg\Engine\Source\Runtime\Core\Public\Logging\LogMacros.h
... #if EUHAT_MINIMIZE #undef UE_LOG #undef UE_LOG_CLINKAGE #undef UE_CLOG #undef UE_SUPPRESS #undef UE_SECURITY_LOG #define UE_LOG(CategoryName, Verbosity, Format, ...) #define UE_LOG_CLINKAGE(CategoryName, Verbosity, Format, ...) #define UE_CLOG(Condition, CategoryName, Verbosity, Format, ...) #define UE_SUPPRESS(...) {} #define UE_SECURITY_LOG(...) #endif
And if we wanna debug inline functions, modify this place:
ue\Engine\Saved\UnrealBuildTool\BuildConfiguration.xml
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8" ?> <Configuration xmlns="https://www.unrealengine.com/BuildConfiguration"> <BuildConfiguration> <bAllowXGE>true</bAllowXGE> <bUseInlining>0</bUseInlining> </BuildConfiguration> </Configuration>
'bAllowXGE' means to turn on IncreBuild, while the prerequisite is we have very big memory.
There are still some nasty things to do:
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Invoking empty macro is considered as a warning 4390, existing unused variables is considered as warning 4101, they will cease ue4 compilation.
ue\Engine\Source\Runtime\Core\Public\Windows\WindowsPlatformCompilerSetup.h
#pragma warning (error: 4100 4102 4103 4109 4112 4113 4114 4115 4116 4117 4119 4120 4121 4122 4123 4124 4125 4127 4129 4130 4131 4132 4133 4137 4138 4141 4142 4143 4144 4145 4146 4150 4152 4153 4154 4155 4156 4157 4158 4159 4160 4161 4162 4163 4164 4166 4167 4168 4172 4174 4175 4176 4177 4178 4179 4180 4181 4182 4183 4185 4186 4187 4188 4189 4190 4191 4192 4193 4194 4195 4196 4197 4199) #pragma warning (error: 4301 4302 4303 4306 4308 4309 4310 4313 4314 4315 4316 4318 4319 4321 4322 4323 4324 4325 4326 4327 4328 4329 4330 4333 4334 4335 4336 4337 4338 4340 4343 4344 4346 4348 4352 4353 4355 4356 4357 4358 4359 4362 4364 4366 4367 4368 4369 4374 4375 4376 4377 4378 4379 4380 4381 4382 4383 4384 4387 4389 4391 4392 4393 4394 4395 4396 4397 4398 4399)
ue\Engine\Source\Programs\UnrealBuildTool\Platform\Windows\VCToolChain.cs
... // Set warning level. if (Target.WindowsPlatform.Compiler != WindowsCompiler.Intel) { // Restrictive during regular compilation. // Euhat Modified //Arguments.Add("/W4"); Arguments.Add("/wd4101"); Arguments.Add("/W0"); } ... // Prevents the linker from displaying its logo for each invocation. Arguments.Add("/NOLOGO"); // Euhat modified Arguments.Add("/FORCE:MULTIPLE"); ...'FORCE:MULTIPLE' means just to pick the first one of the same name symbols instead of complaining as a link error.
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ue\Engine\Plugins\Slate\SlateInsights\Source\SlateInsights\Private\SlateInsightsModule.cpp
//IMPLEMENT_MODULE((UE::SlateInsights::FSlateInsightsModule), SlateInsights);
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ue\Engine\Source\Runtime\AudioMixer\Public\AudioMixerDevice.h
// make it public FAudioPlatformDeviceInfo PlatformInfo;
ue\Engine\Plugins\Media\BinkMedia\Source\BinkMediaPlayer\Private\BinkMediaPlayerPCH.h
... //return mix->GetNumDeviceChannels(); return mix->PlatformInfo.NumChannels; ... //DECLARE_LOG_CATEGORY_EXTERN(LogBink, Log, All); ...
ue\Engine\Plugins\Media\BinkMedia\Source\BinkMediaPlayer\Private\BinkMediaPlayerModule.cpp
//DEFINE_LOG_CATEGORY(LogBink);
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ue\Engine\Plugins\Runtime\AR\Microsoft\HoloLensAR\Source\HoloLensTargetPlatform\HoloLensTargetPlatform.Build.cs
bEnableUndefinedIdentifierWarnings = false;
The last thing kept in mind is don't build the whole resolution, for simultaneous compilations of projects can easily run out of memory. Just right click Engine/EU4 and build UE4Editor only.
ps: We use UnrealEngine-4.27.2-release.zip in this article.