kicad/Documentation/compiling/COMPILING.txt

Compiling KiCad from Source
===========================
KiCad Documentation Team
Last revised on 12-mars-2012 by jp Charras

Introduction
------------
This is a generic guide how to compile kicad from scratch. On windows and linux.
If you need something more distribution specific or the experimental mac-osx port
read the other documents in the Documentation/compiling folder.

Installation of Tools
---------------------
On windows:

Get msys and mingw here:
http://mingw.org/
msys sets up a development environment that allows the bash shell to run.
mingw are a set of tools that run on windows or under msys.  You will need
at least the following mingw packages: make, gcc, g++, binutils, autoconf, and
automake.

On linux:

Install "mesa".  Use your package manager to install the
development libaries.

After a fresh install you need the following packages to compile and run
KiCad from source.

* bzr     - Bazaar version control system
* CMake   - Cross-platform make
* GLUT    - The OpenGL Utility Library
* wxGTK or wxWidgets  - The wxWidgets GUI toolkit with GTK+ bindings

* Boost   - Collection of portable C++ source libraries
boost will be automagically downloaded and copied in kicad sources tree,
the first time you compile kicad.

Useful, but not required:
* Doxygen - Documentation system for several programming languages

KiCad uses the Bazaar version control system to track source code changes,
and download the boost libraries needed by Kicad.
Be sure you bzr install also includes bzrtools.
boost libraries will be downloaded the first time you build Kicad.

Compiler and basic development tools
-------------
Make sure g++, make and other tools are in your path.
If windows, then try running g++ and make from within your msys bash shell.

PLEASE NOTE: g++ 4.7.1 at least (possibly the 4.7.x series) is known to
miscompile pcbnew (it get zones wrong) with -O2; using -O1 is a suitable
workaround until they fix the compiler.

Install or Build wxWidgets
--------------------------

WARNING:
 see wxWidgets_patch_notes.txt for patches and issues in wxWidgets.

If on Windows, download
http://sourceforge.net/projects/wxwindows/files/wxAll/2.9.3/wxWidgets-2.9.3.zip/download
or a newer version.
Do NOT use previous versions which all have annoying issues for KiCad.
Start msys so you have a bash shell.
Note also since 2.9 versions no need to build a "debug" version of the wxWidgets library,
the release abd the debug version are same.

Unzip the wxWidgets zip file into the build directory.  Change directories into
there, and then:

    mkdir Release
    cd Release
    ../configure --enable-unicode --enable-monolithic=no --disable-shared --with-opengl
    make

    and under Linux, but not under Windows:
    sudo make install that install wxWidgets libs and headers in /usr/local/


If on linux, you can use your package manager to install the
development versions of the wxWidgets packages which include the C++ headers. An
alternative is to build static libaries from source. Verify that wx-config is in
your path by running it from a command prompt. Linux users then go to next step.

Install CMake
-------------
If windows, download the installation binary for windows from cmake.org.
Install that and choose to add cmake to your path during installation.  You
will have to restart and command shells for the new path to take effect.
Verify that cmake is in your path by trying to run it from a command prompt.


If linux, use your package manager to install cmake. You should get cmake 2.6.4
or later. If only an older one is available in your package repository, build
cmake from source. Verify that cmake is in your path by trying to run it from a
command prompt.


Obtain Sources
--------------
You can use the Launchpad repository or a tar file for this.  See the wiki.
To download files from  Launchpad repository, you should install bazaar (bzr) that is a
version control system like subversion, mercurial, git...

Launchpad repository handle 2 branches for KiCda sources:
- a testing branch (used by developers)
- a stable branch (a copy of the testing branch, when this testing branch is near a stable state))

Testing branch:
bzr branch lp:kicad kicad_testing

Stable branch:
bzr branch lp:kicad/stable kicad_stable

Components and Footprints libraries
bzr branch lp:~kicad-lib-committers/kicad/library kicad_libraries

Documentation and translations:
bzr branch lp:~kicad-developers/kicad/doc kicad_doc

Create Makefiles with CMake
---------------------------
If windows, go into your msys shell.  Linux and windows users both then make
two "out of source" build directories:
    cd <kicadSource>
    mkdir -p build/release
    mkdir build/debug   (if you want a debug version of KiCad)
    cd build/release

On either cmake command line shown below, you can optionally include
    -DCMAKE_INSTALL_PREFIX=<finallInstallDir>

If windows, run the following command:
    cmake -G "MSYS Makefiles" -DCMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=Release -DwxWidgets_ROOT_DIR=<wxInstallDir> ../../

If linux, run instead the following command:
    cmake -DCMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=Release ../../

Take a look at CMakeCache.txt, and in particular CMAKE_INSTALL_PREFIX, which
gives the final install directory. If not what you want, edit it with a text
editor and re-run the same cmake command again, but with no
-DCMAKE_INSTALL_PREFIX given on the command line.

Compiling with Make
------------------~
You compile Kicad here.  You will only need to do step 8) again when one of the
CMakeLists.txt files change.  If windows, you must be in your msys shell.
On either platform then:

    cd <kicadSource>/build/release
    make
    [sudo] make install

You are now done unless you want to make a Debug build.


Compiling a Debug version
-------------------------
    cd <kicadSource>/build/debug

On either cmake command line shown below, you can optionally include
-DCMAKE_INSTALL_PREFIX=<finallInstallDir> before the final ../../ argument.
Although normally you do not install the Debug binaries, you can debug them
where they were built.

If windows, run the following command:
    cmake -G "MSYS Makefiles" -DCMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=Debug -DwxWidgets_ROOT_DIR=<wxInstallDir> ../../
where <wxInstallDir> is <wxWidgets path>/Release

If linux, run instead the following command:
    cmake -DCMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=Debug -DwxWidgets_USE_DEBUG=ON ../../

Make the Debug binaries:
    make

Note: that it is easy to build only a specific binary such as pcbnew alone:
    make pcbnew


See ./cmake_config.txt for customizing the KiCad build setting.