1 Installation Instructions
2 *************************
4 Copyright (C) 1994, 1995, 1996, 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2004, 2005,
5 2006, 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
7 Copying and distribution of this file, with or without modification,
8 are permitted in any medium without royalty provided the copyright
9 notice and this notice are preserved. This file is offered as-is,
10 without warranty of any kind.
12 0.1 Basic Installation
13 ======================
15 Briefly, the shell commands ‘./configure; make; make install’ should
16 configure, build, and install this package. The following more-detailed
17 instructions are generic; see the ‘README’ file for instructions
18 specific to this package. Some packages provide this ‘INSTALL’ file but
19 do not implement all of the features documented below. The lack of an
20 optional feature in a given package is not necessarily a bug. More
21 recommendations for GNU packages can be found in *note Makefile
22 Conventions: (standards)Makefile Conventions.
24 The ‘configure’ shell script attempts to guess correct values for
25 various system-dependent variables used during compilation. It uses
26 those values to create a ‘Makefile’ in each directory of the package.
27 It may also create one or more ‘.h’ files containing system-dependent
28 definitions. Finally, it creates a shell script ‘config.status’ that
29 you can run in the future to recreate the current configuration, and a
30 file ‘config.log’ containing compiler output (useful mainly for
31 debugging ‘configure’).
33 It can also use an optional file (typically called ‘config.cache’ and
34 enabled with ‘--cache-file=config.cache’ or simply ‘-C’) that saves the
35 results of its tests to speed up reconfiguring. Caching is disabled by
36 default to prevent problems with accidental use of stale cache files.
38 If you need to do unusual things to compile the package, please try
39 to figure out how ‘configure’ could check whether to do them, and mail
40 diffs or instructions to the address given in the ‘README’ so they can
41 be considered for the next release. If you are using the cache, and at
42 some point ‘config.cache’ contains results you don't want to keep, you
43 may remove or edit it.
45 The file ‘configure.ac’ (or ‘configure.in’) is used to create
46 ‘configure’ by a program called ‘autoconf’. You need ‘configure.ac’ if
47 you want to change it or regenerate ‘configure’ using a newer version of
50 The simplest way to compile this package is:
52 1. ‘cd’ to the directory containing the package's source code and type
53 ‘./configure’ to configure the package for your system.
55 Running ‘configure’ might take a while. While running, it prints
56 some messages telling which features it is checking for.
58 2. Type ‘make’ to compile the package.
60 3. Optionally, type ‘make check’ to run any self-tests that come with
61 the package, generally using the just-built uninstalled binaries.
63 4. Type ‘make install’ to install the programs and any data files and
64 documentation. When installing into a prefix owned by root, it is
65 recommended that the package be configured and built as a regular
66 user, and only the ‘make install’ phase executed with root
69 5. Optionally, type ‘make installcheck’ to repeat any self-tests, but
70 this time using the binaries in their final installed location.
71 This target does not install anything. Running this target as a
72 regular user, particularly if the prior ‘make install’ required
73 root privileges, verifies that the installation completed
76 6. You can remove the program binaries and object files from the
77 source code directory by typing ‘make clean’. To also remove the
78 files that ‘configure’ created (so you can compile the package for
79 a different kind of computer), type ‘make distclean’. There is
80 also a ‘make maintainer-clean’ target, but that is intended mainly
81 for the package's developers. If you use it, you may have to get
82 all sorts of other programs in order to regenerate files that came
83 with the distribution.
85 7. Often, you can also type ‘make uninstall’ to remove the installed
86 files again. In practice, not all packages have tested that
87 uninstallation works correctly, even though it is required by the
90 8. Some packages, particularly those that use Automake, provide `make
91 distcheck', which can by used by developers to test that all other
92 targets like ‘make install’ and ‘make uninstall’ work correctly.
93 This target is generally not run by end users.
95 0.2 Compilers and Options
96 =========================
98 Some systems require unusual options for compilation or linking that
99 the ‘configure’ script does not know about. Run ‘./configure --help’
100 for details on some of the pertinent environment variables.
102 You can give ‘configure’ initial values for configuration parameters
103 by setting variables in the command line or in the environment. Here is
106 ./configure CC=c99 CFLAGS=-g LIBS=-lposix
108 *Note Defining Variables::, for more details.
110 0.3 Compiling For Multiple Architectures
111 ========================================
113 You can compile the package for more than one kind of computer at the
114 same time, by placing the object files for each architecture in their
115 own directory. To do this, you can use GNU ‘make’. ‘cd’ to the
116 directory where you want the object files and executables to go and run
117 the ‘configure’ script. ‘configure’ automatically checks for the source
118 code in the directory that ‘configure’ is in and in ‘..’. This is known
121 With a non-GNU ‘make’, it is safer to compile the package for one
122 architecture at a time in the source code directory. After you have
123 installed the package for one architecture, use ‘make distclean’ before
124 reconfiguring for another architecture.
126 On MacOS X 10.5 and later systems, you can create libraries and
127 executables that work on multiple system types--known as "fat" or
128 "universal" binaries--by specifying multiple ‘-arch’ options to the
129 compiler but only a single ‘-arch’ option to the preprocessor. Like
132 ./configure CC="gcc -arch i386 -arch x86_64 -arch ppc -arch ppc64" \
133 CXX="g++ -arch i386 -arch x86_64 -arch ppc -arch ppc64" \
134 CPP="gcc -E" CXXCPP="g++ -E"
136 This is not guaranteed to produce working output in all cases, you
137 may have to build one architecture at a time and combine the results
138 using the ‘lipo’ tool if you have problems.
140 0.4 Installation Names
141 ======================
143 By default, ‘make install’ installs the package's commands under
144 ‘/usr/local/bin’, include files under ‘/usr/local/include’, etc. You
145 can specify an installation prefix other than ‘/usr/local’ by giving
146 ‘configure’ the option ‘--prefix=PREFIX’, where PREFIX must be an
149 You can specify separate installation prefixes for
150 architecture-specific files and architecture-independent files. If you
151 pass the option ‘--exec-prefix=PREFIX’ to ‘configure’, the package uses
152 PREFIX as the prefix for installing programs and libraries.
153 Documentation and other data files still use the regular prefix.
155 In addition, if you use an unusual directory layout you can give
156 options like ‘--bindir=DIR’ to specify different values for particular
157 kinds of files. Run ‘configure --help’ for a list of the directories
158 you can set and what kinds of files go in them. In general, the default
159 for these options is expressed in terms of ‘${prefix}’, so that
160 specifying just ‘--prefix’ will affect all of the other directory
161 specifications that were not explicitly provided.
163 The most portable way to affect installation locations is to pass the
164 correct locations to ‘configure’; however, many packages provide one or
165 both of the following shortcuts of passing variable assignments to the
166 ‘make install’ command line to change installation locations without
167 having to reconfigure or recompile.
169 The first method involves providing an override variable for each
170 affected directory. For example, `make install
171 prefix=/alternate/directory' will choose an alternate location for all
172 directory configuration variables that were expressed in terms of
173 ‘${prefix}’. Any directories that were specified during ‘configure’,
174 but not in terms of ‘${prefix}’, must each be overridden at install time
175 for the entire installation to be relocated. The approach of makefile
176 variable overrides for each directory variable is required by the GNU
177 Coding Standards, and ideally causes no recompilation. However, some
178 platforms have known limitations with the semantics of shared libraries
179 that end up requiring recompilation when using this method, particularly
180 noticeable in packages that use GNU Libtool.
182 The second method involves providing the ‘DESTDIR’ variable. For
183 example, ‘make install DESTDIR=/alternate/directory’ will prepend
184 ‘/alternate/directory’ before all installation names. The approach of
185 ‘DESTDIR’ overrides is not required by the GNU Coding Standards, and
186 does not work on platforms that have drive letters. On the other hand,
187 it does better at avoiding recompilation issues, and works well even
188 when some directory options were not specified in terms of ‘${prefix}’
191 0.5 Optional Features
192 =====================
194 If the package supports it, you can cause programs to be installed
195 with an extra prefix or suffix on their names by giving ‘configure’ the
196 option ‘--program-prefix=PREFIX’ or ‘--program-suffix=SUFFIX’.
198 Some packages pay attention to ‘--enable-FEATURE’ options to
199 ‘configure’, where FEATURE indicates an optional part of the package.
200 They may also pay attention to ‘--with-PACKAGE’ options, where PACKAGE
201 is something like ‘gnu-as’ or ‘x’ (for the X Window System). The
202 ‘README’ should mention any ‘--enable-’ and ‘--with-’ options that the
205 For packages that use the X Window System, ‘configure’ can usually
206 find the X include and library files automatically, but if it doesn't,
207 you can use the ‘configure’ options ‘--x-includes=DIR’ and
208 ‘--x-libraries=DIR’ to specify their locations.
210 Some packages offer the ability to configure how verbose the
211 execution of ‘make’ will be. For these packages, running `./configure
212 --enable-silent-rules' sets the default to minimal output, which can be
213 overridden with ‘make V=1’; while running `./configure
214 --disable-silent-rules' sets the default to verbose, which can be
215 overridden with ‘make V=0’.
217 0.6 Particular systems
218 ======================
220 On HP-UX, the default C compiler is not ANSI C compatible. If GNU CC
221 is not installed, it is recommended to use the following options in
222 order to use an ANSI C compiler:
224 ./configure CC="cc -Ae -D_XOPEN_SOURCE=500"
226 and if that doesn't work, install pre-built binaries of GCC for HP-UX.
228 On OSF/1 a.k.a. Tru64, some versions of the default C compiler cannot
229 parse its ‘<wchar.h>’ header file. The option ‘-nodtk’ can be used as a
230 workaround. If GNU CC is not installed, it is therefore recommended to
235 and if that doesn't work, try
237 ./configure CC="cc -nodtk"
239 On Solaris, don't put ‘/usr/ucb’ early in your ‘PATH’. This
240 directory contains several dysfunctional programs; working variants of
241 these programs are available in ‘/usr/bin’. So, if you need ‘/usr/ucb’
242 in your ‘PATH’, put it _after_ ‘/usr/bin’.
244 On Haiku, software installed for all users goes in ‘/boot/common’,
245 not ‘/usr/local’. It is recommended to use the following options:
247 ./configure --prefix=/boot/common
249 0.7 Specifying the System Type
250 ==============================
252 There may be some features ‘configure’ cannot figure out
253 automatically, but needs to determine by the type of machine the package
254 will run on. Usually, assuming the package is built to be run on the
255 _same_ architectures, ‘configure’ can figure that out, but if it prints
256 a message saying it cannot guess the machine type, give it the
257 ‘--build=TYPE’ option. TYPE can either be a short name for the system
258 type, such as ‘sun4’, or a canonical name which has the form:
262 where SYSTEM can have one of these forms:
267 See the file ‘config.sub’ for the possible values of each field. If
268 ‘config.sub’ isn't included in this package, then this package doesn't
269 need to know the machine type.
271 If you are _building_ compiler tools for cross-compiling, you should
272 use the option ‘--target=TYPE’ to select the type of system they will
275 If you want to _use_ a cross compiler, that generates code for a
276 platform different from the build platform, you should specify the
277 "host" platform (i.e., that on which the generated programs will
278 eventually be run) with ‘--host=TYPE’.
283 If you want to set default values for ‘configure’ scripts to share,
284 you can create a site shell script called ‘config.site’ that gives
285 default values for variables like ‘CC’, ‘cache_file’, and ‘prefix’.
286 ‘configure’ looks for ‘PREFIX/share/config.site’ if it exists, then
287 ‘PREFIX/etc/config.site’ if it exists. Or, you can set the
288 ‘CONFIG_SITE’ environment variable to the location of the site script.
289 A warning: not all ‘configure’ scripts look for a site script.
291 0.9 Defining Variables
292 ======================
294 Variables not defined in a site shell script can be set in the
295 environment passed to ‘configure’. However, some packages may run
296 configure again during the build, and the customized values of these
297 variables may be lost. In order to avoid this problem, you should set
298 them in the ‘configure’ command line, using ‘VAR=value’. For example:
300 ./configure CC=/usr/local2/bin/gcc
302 causes the specified ‘gcc’ to be used as the C compiler (unless it is
303 overridden in the site shell script).
305 Unfortunately, this technique does not work for ‘CONFIG_SHELL’ due to an
306 Autoconf bug. Until the bug is fixed you can use this workaround:
308 CONFIG_SHELL=/bin/bash /bin/bash ./configure CONFIG_SHELL=/bin/bash
310 0.10 ‘configure’ Invocation
311 ===========================
313 ‘configure’ recognizes the following options to control how it
318 Print a summary of all of the options to ‘configure’, and exit.
322 Print a summary of the options unique to this package's
323 ‘configure’, and exit. The ‘short’ variant lists options used only
324 in the top level, while the ‘recursive’ variant lists options also
325 present in any nested packages.
329 Print the version of Autoconf used to generate the ‘configure’
333 Enable the cache: use and save the results of the tests in FILE,
334 traditionally ‘config.cache’. FILE defaults to ‘/dev/null’ to
339 Alias for ‘--cache-file=config.cache’.
344 Do not print messages saying which checks are being made. To
345 suppress all normal output, redirect it to ‘/dev/null’ (any error
346 messages will still be shown).
349 Look for the package's source code in directory DIR. Usually
350 ‘configure’ can determine that directory automatically.
353 Use DIR as the installation prefix. *note Installation Names:: for
354 more details, including other options available for fine-tuning the
355 installation locations.
359 Run the configure checks, but stop before creating any output
362 ‘configure’ also accepts some other, not widely useful, options. Run
363 ‘configure --help’ for more details.