1 Compiling and installing LyX
2 ============================
4 Quick compilation guide
5 -----------------------
7 These four steps will compile, test and install LyX:
9 0) Linux users beware: if compiling the Qt frontend, you need
10 qt and qt-devel packages of the same version to compile LyX.
12 1) ./configure --with-frontend=qt4
13 configures LyX according to your system.
14 When compiling for Qt, you may have to set
15 --with-qt-dir=<path-to-your-qt-installation>
16 if the environment variable QTDIR is not set.
22 runs the program so you can check it out.
25 will install it. You can use "make install-strip" instead
26 if you want a smaller binary.
29 Note for Subversion checkouts
30 -----------------------------
32 If you have checked this out from Subversion, you need to have:
36 Then type "./autogen.sh" to build the needed configuration
37 files and proceed as stated below.
39 You will also probably need GNU m4 (perhaps installed as gm4).
44 First of all, you will also need a recent C++ compiler, where recent
45 means that the compilers are close to C++ standard conforming.
46 Compilers that are known to compile LyX are gcc 2.95.x and later
47 and Digital C++ version 6.1 and later. Please tell us your experience
50 It is _not_ possible to compile LyX with gcc 2.7.x and 2.8.x.
52 LyX 1.4.x makes great use of C++ Standard Template Library (STL).
53 This means that gcc users will have to install the relevant libstdc++
54 library to be able to compile this version of LyX. Users of gcc 2.95.x
55 will have to install the STLPort version of these libraries as the
56 ones that come with gcc 2.95.x are too broken for us to use.
58 LyX has been tested with Qt 4.1.5. The only special point to
59 make is that you must ensure that both LyX and the Qt libraries are
60 compiled with the same C++ compiler.
62 Note that if Qt is using Xft2/fontconfig, you may need to install the
63 latex-xft-fonts package (at ftp://ftp.lyx.org/pub/lyx/contrib/) to get
64 maths symbols displayed properly. To find out, type:
66 ldd `which lyx` | grep fontconfig
68 at the console. Both RH8 and Debian unstable distributions are known
71 If, however, your version of Qt does not use fontconfig, then TeX
72 fonts should be added to the font path. 'man xset' is your friend.
74 * Other things to note
76 If you make modifications to files in src/ (for example by applying a
77 patch), you will need to have the GNU gettext package installed, due
78 to some dependencies in the makefiles. You can get the latest version
80 ftp://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/gettext/
82 To use the thesaurus, you will need to install libAikSaurus, available
84 http://aiksaurus.sourceforge.net/
86 The two following programs should be available at configuration time:
88 o LaTeX2e should be correctly setup for the user you are logged in
89 as. Otherwise, LyX will not be able to run a number of tests. Note
90 that users can run these tests manually with Edit>Reconfigure.
92 o Python 2.3 or newer installed to be able to import older LyX files
93 with the lyx2lyx script (this script is called automatically when
100 LyX can be configured using GNU autoconf utility which attempts to guess
101 the configuration needed to suit your system. The standard way to use it
102 is described in the file INSTALL.autoconf. In most cases you will be able
103 to create the Makefile by typing
107 For more complicated cases, LyX configure takes the following specific
110 o --with-frontend=FRONTEND that allows to specify which frontend you
111 want to use. There is no default value: this switch is required.
113 o --with-extra-lib=DIRECTORY that specifies the path where LyX will
114 find extra libraries (qt4) it needs. Defaults to NONE
115 (i.e. search in standard places). You can specify several
116 directories, separated by colons.
118 o --with-extra-inc=DIRECTORY that gives the place where LyX will find
119 extra headers. Defaults to NONE (i.e. search in standard places).
120 You can specify several directories, separated by colons.
122 o --with-extra-prefix[=DIRECTORY] that is equivalent to
123 --with-extra-lib=DIRECTORY/lib --with-extra-inc=DIRECTORY/include
124 If DIRECTORY is not specified, the current prefix is used.
126 o --with-version-suffix will install LyX as lyx-<version>, e.g. lyx-1.4.1
127 The LyX data directory will be something like <whatever>/lyx-1.4.1/.
128 Additionally your user configuration files will be found in e.g.
131 You can use this feature to install more than one version of LyX
132 on the same system. You can optionally specify a "version" of your
133 own, by doing something like :
134 ./configure --with-version-suffix=-latestsvn
136 Note that the standard configure options --program-prefix,
137 --program-suffix and the others will not affect the shared LyX
138 directory etc. so it is recommended that you use --with-version-suffix
139 (or --prefix) instead.
141 o --enable-optimization=VALUE enables you to set optimization to a
142 higher level as the default (-O), for example --enable-optimization=-O3.
144 o --disable-optimization - you can use this to disable compiler
145 optimization of LyX. The compile may be much quicker with some
146 compilers, but LyX will run more slowly.
148 There are also flags to control the internationalization support in
151 o --disable-nls suppresses all internationalization support,
152 yielding a somewhat smaller code.
154 o --with-included-gettext forces the use of the included GNU gettext
155 library, although you might have another one installed.
157 o --with-catgets allows to use the catget() functions which can
158 exist on your system. This can cause problems, though. Use with
161 o You can also set the environment variable LINGUAS to a list of
162 language in case you do not want to install all the translation
163 files. For example, if you are only interested in German and
164 Finnish, you can type (with sh or bash)
165 export LINGUAS='de fi'
166 before running configure.
168 Moreover, the following generic configure flags may be useful:
170 o --prefix=DIRECTORY specifies the root directory to use for
171 installation. [defaults to /usr/local]
173 o --datadir=DIRECTORY gives the directory where all extra LyX
174 files (documentation, templates and layout definitions)
176 [defaults to ${prefix}/share/lyx${program_suffix}]
178 o --bindir=DIRECTORY gives the directory where the lyx binary
179 will be installed. [defaults to ${prefix}/bin]
181 o --mandir=DIRECTORY gives the directory where the man pages will go.
182 [defaults to ${prefix}/man]
184 o --enable-maintainer-mode enables some code that automatically
185 rebuilds the configure script, makefiles templates and other useful
186 files when needed. This is off by default on releases, to avoid
189 Note that the --with-extra-* commands are not really robust when it
190 comes to use of relative paths. If you really want to use a relative path
191 here, you can prepend it with "`pwd`/".
193 If you do not like the default compile flags used (-g -O2 on gcc), you can
194 set CXXFLAGS variable to other values as follows:
196 o CXXFLAGS='-O2' (sh, bash)
197 o setenv CXXFLAGS '-O2' (csh, tcsh)
199 Similarly, if you want to force the use of some specific compiler, you can
200 give a value to the CXX variable.
202 If you encounter problems, please read the section 'Problems' at the end of
205 In particular, the following options could be useful in some desperate
208 o --enable-debug will add debug information to your binary. This
209 requires a lot more disk space, but is a must if you want to try to
210 debug problems in LyX. The default is to have debug information
211 for development versions and prereleases only.
213 o --enable-warnings that make the compiler output more warnings during
214 the compilation of LyX. Opposite is --disable-warnings. By default,
215 this flag is on for development versions only.
217 o --enable-assertions that make the compiler generate run-time
218 code which checks that some variables have sane values. Opposite
219 is --disable-assertions. By default, this flag is on for
220 development versions only.
222 o --enable-stdlib-debug adds some debug code in the standard
223 library; this slows down the code, but has been helpful in the
224 past to find bugs. By default, this flag is on for development
227 o --enable-concept-checks adds some compile-time checks. There is no
228 run-time penalty. By default, this flag is on for development
231 o --without-latex-config that disables the automatic detection of your
232 latex configuration. This detection is automatically disabled if
233 latex cannot be found. If you find that you have to use this
234 flag, please report it as a bug.
237 Compiling and installing LyX
238 ----------------------------
240 Once you've got the Makefile created, you just have to type:
247 Since the binaries with debug information tend to be huge (although
248 this does not affect the run-time memory footprint), you might want
249 to strip the lyx binary. In this case replace "make install" with
253 BTW: in the images subdirectory there is also a small icon "lyx.xpm",
254 that can be used to display lyx-documents in filemanagers.
256 If configure fails for some strange reason
257 ------------------------------------------
259 Even when configure fails, it creates a Makefile. You always can check
260 the contents of this file, modify it and run 'make'.
262 Compiling For Multiple Architectures
263 ------------------------------------
265 You can compile LyX for more than one kind of computer at the same
266 time, by placing the object files for each architecture in their own
267 directory. To do this, you must use a version of `make' that supports
268 the `VPATH' variable, such as GNU `make'. `cd' to the directory where
269 you want the object files and executables to go and run the
270 `configure' script. `configure' automatically checks for the source
271 code in the directory that `configure' is in and in `..'.
273 If you have to use a `make' that does not supports the `VPATH'
274 variable, you have to compile LyX for one architecture at a time in
275 the source code directory. After you have installed LyX for one
276 architecture, use `make distclean' before reconfiguring for another
279 Preparing a binary distribution for the use of others
280 ------------------------------------------------------
282 o Compile LyX with the right compiler switches for your
283 architecture. Make sure you use the --without-latex-config switch
284 of configure, since others might not be interested by your
287 o Create a file README.bin describing your distribution and
288 referring to *you* if problems arise. As a model, you can use the
289 file development/tools/README.bin.example, which can be a good
292 o Type `make bindist'. This will create a file
293 lyx-1.xx.yy-bin.tar.gz. Rename it to reflect you architecture
294 and the peculiarities of your build (e.g. static vs. dynamic).
296 o Check that everything is correct by unpacking the distribution
297 in some private place and running it. In particular, check the
298 output of `ldd lyx' to know which libraries are really needed.
300 o Upload your binary file to ftp.devel.lyx.org:/pub/incoming, and
301 notify larsbj@lyx.org.
307 This section provides several hints that have been submitted by LyX
308 team member or users to help compiling on some particular
309 architectures. If you find that some of this hints are wrong, please
312 o On SUN Sparc Solaris 8, you need gnumake. The LyX makefiles do not
313 work with Solaris make.
315 The Solaris ar seg-faults trying to build the insets library. You
316 will need to use the ar from the GNU binutils for this subdirectory.
318 o LyX can be compiled on Tru64 Unix with either GNU's gcc or the default
321 There are no Alpha-specific problems with gcc.
323 The following notes all refer to compilation with the Compaq cxx compiler.
325 LyX cannot be compiled on Tru64 Unix 4.0d or 4.0e with the default cxx
326 compiler. You should upgrade to at least cxx V6.2, to be found at
327 ftp::/ftp.compaq.com/pub/products/C-CXX/tru64/cxx/CXX622V40.tar. Users
328 running Tru64 Unix 4.0f and greater should have no real problems compiling
331 cxx V6.2 will compile LyX out of the box.
332 cxx V6.3-020 is also known to work, although there is a bug in
333 /usr/include/cxx/deque that will break compilation in FormPreferences.C.
334 Compaq are investigating, but a patch that works /now/ is:
336 --- /usr/include/cxx/deque_safe Mon Mar 4 21:09:50 2002
337 +++ /usr/include/cxx/deque Mon Mar 4 21:09:00 2002
340 if (size() >= x.size())
341 erase(copy(x.begin(), x.end(), begin()), end());
343 - copy(x.begin() + size(), x.end(),
344 - inserter(*this,copy(x.begin(),x.begin()+size(),begin())));
346 + const_iterator mid = x.begin() + difference_type(size());
347 + copy(x.begin(), mid, begin());
348 + insert(end(), mid, x.end());
354 At the time of writing, cxx V6.5-026 is the latest cxx compiler. It is
355 /not/ recommended. The compiler itself appears to be both buggy and
356 extremely bloated (trebling the size of the stripped LyX binary).
358 In order to compile LyX with the cxx compiler, you should run configure
359 with the following flags:
360 CXX='cxx -std strict_ansi'
361 CXXFLAGS='-nopure_cname -nocleanup -ptr /tmp/lyx_cxx_repository -O2'
363 The -nopure_cname flag is needed for compilers V6.3 and above because
364 LyX makes use of functions like popen, pclose that are defined in the
365 c version of <stdio.h> but are not formally part of any c/c++ standard.
366 They are not, therefore, included in the <cstdio> header file.