1 Compiling and installing LyX
2 ============================
4 Quick compilation guide
5 -----------------------
7 These four steps will compile, test and install LyX:
10 configures LyX to your system. By default, LyX configures
11 the xforms frontend, use --with-frontend=qt to build a Qt
18 runs the program so you can check it out.
21 will install it. You can use "make install-strip" instead
22 if you want a smaller binary.
25 Note for CVS checkouts
26 ----------------------
28 If you have checked this out from CVS, you need to have
29 automake, autoconf, and gettext installed. Then,
30 type "./autogen.sh" to build the needed configuration
31 files and proceed as stated below.
33 You will also probably need GNU m4 (perhaps installed as gm4).
38 First of all, you will also need a recent C++ compiler, where recent
39 means that the compilers are close to C++ standard conforming.
40 Compilers that are known to compile LyX are egcs 1.1.x, gcc 2.95.x and
41 later, and Digital C++ version 6.1 and later. Please tell us your
42 experience with other compilers. It is _not_ possible to compile LyX
43 with gcc 2.7.x and 2.8.x, and this is not likely to change in the
46 Note that, contrary to LyX 1.0.x, LyX 1.3.x makes great use of C++
47 Standard Template Library (STL); this means that gcc users will have
48 to install the relevant libstdc++ library to be able to compile this
53 Both an Xforms and Xpm libraries should be installed to compile LyX.
54 It is imperative that you have the correct versions of these
55 libraries, and their associated header files.
57 The xforms library has been very recently updated to version 1.0.
58 This version has been released under the LGPL (Lesser General Public
59 License), and the availability of the source means that many bugs that
60 have been plaguing LyX have been fixed in xforms. You are advised to
61 upgrade to xforms 1.0 to enjoy all these new fixes.
62 In fact, LyX 1.3.0 no longer supports versions of xforms older than 0.89.5.
64 You can get the source from
65 http://world.std.com/~xforms/
66 ftp://ncmir.ucsd.edu/pub/xforms/OpenSource/xforms-1.0-release.tgz
67 ftp://ftp.lyx.org/pub/xforms/OpenSource/xforms-1.0-release.tgz
69 If you use a rpm-based linux distribution, such as RedHat or Mandrake,
70 we recommend that you grab a version of xforms from
71 ftp://ftp.lyx.org/pub/lyx/contrib
72 Look for the xforms-1.0-release.src.rpm or the binary libforms*.i386.rpm.
74 In addition, you must have libXpm version 4.7 or newer.
78 LyX has been tested with both Qt 2.x and 3.x libraries. The only special
79 point to make is that you must ensure that both LyX and the Qt libraries
80 are compiled with the same C++ compiler.
82 Note that if Qt is using Xft2/fontconfig, you may need to install the
83 latex-ttf-fonts package, tobe found on ftp://ftp.lyx.org/ to get maths
84 symbols displayed properly. To find out, type:
85 ldd `which lyx` | grep fontconfig
86 at the console. Both RH8 and Debian unstable distributions are known
89 If, however, your version of Qt does not use fontconfig, then the
90 /usr/local/share/lyx/xfonts directory (or equivalent) should be added to
91 the font path. This is done automatically by LyX if LyX is run on
92 the local machine, and the X server supports Postscript fonts. If, however,
93 you're running LyX remotely, then you'll have to do this step yourself.
94 'man xset' is your friend.
96 * Other things to note
98 If you make modifications to files in src/ (for example by applying a
99 patch), you will need to have the GNU gettext package installed, due
100 to some dependencies in the makefiles. You can get the latest version
102 ftp://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/gettext/gettext-0.11.4.tar.gz
104 LyX contains a hack to work around this, but you should not rely too
107 To use the thesaurus, you will need to install libAikSaurus, available
109 http://aiken.clan11.com/aiksaurus/
111 The two following programs should be available at configuration time:
113 o Perl (at least 5.002) is needed for the reLyX script. reLyX will
114 not be installed if perl is not found. If the environment
115 variable PERL is set to point to some program, this value will be
116 used, even if the program does no exist (this can be useful if
117 the machine on which LyX is built is not the one where it will
120 o LaTeX2e should be correctly setup for the user you are logged in
121 as. Otherwise, LyX will not be able to run a number of tests. Note
122 that users can run these tests manually with Edit>Reconfigure.
124 Finally, you will need to have python 1.5.2 or newer installed to be
125 able to import older LyX files with the lyx2lyx script (this script is
126 called automatically when opening a file).
129 Creating the Makefile
130 ---------------------
132 LyX can be configured using GNU autoconf utility which attempts to guess
133 the configuration needed to suit your system. The standard way to use it
134 is described in the file INSTALL.autoconf. In most cases you will be able
135 to create the Makefile by typing
139 For more complicated cases, LyX configure takes the following specific
142 o --with-frontend=FRONTEND that allows to specify which frontend you
143 want to use. Default is "xforms", and the other possible value is
146 o --with-extra-lib=DIRECTORY that specifies the path where LyX will
147 find extra libraries (Xpm, xforms, qt) it needs. Defaults to NONE
148 (i.e. search in standard places). You can specify several
149 directories, separated by colons.
151 o --with-extra-inc=DIRECTORY that gives the place where LyX will find
152 xforms headers. Defaults to NONE (i.e. search in standard places).
153 You can specify several directories, separated by colons.
155 o --with-extra-prefix[=DIRECTORY] that is equivalent to
156 --with-extra-lib=DIRECTORY/lib --with-extra-inc=DIRECTORY/include
157 If DIRECTORY is not specified, the current prefix is used.
159 o --with-version-suffix will install LyX as lyx-<version>, e.g. lyx-1.3.1
160 The LyX data directory will be something like <whatever>/lyx-1.3.1/.
161 Additionally your user configuration files will be found in e.g.
164 You can use this feature to install more than one version of LyX
165 on the same system. You can optionally specify a "version" of your
166 own, by doing something like :
167 ./configure --with-version-suffix=-latestcvs
169 Note that the standard configure options --program-prefix,
170 --program-suffix and the others will not affect the shared LyX
171 directory etc. so it is recommended that you use --with-version-suffix
172 (or --prefix) instead.
174 o --enable-optimization=VALUE enables you to set optimization to a
175 higher level as the default (-O), for example --enable-optimization=-O3.
177 o --disable-optimization - you can use this to disable compiler
178 optimization of LyX. The compile may be much quicker with some
179 compilers, but LyX will run more slowly.
181 o --enable-debug will add debug information to your binary. This
182 requires a lot more disk space, but is a must if you want to try to
183 debug problems in LyX. The default is to have debug information
184 for development versions and prereleases only.
186 There are also flags to control the internationalization support in
189 o --disable-nls suppresses all internationalization support,
190 yielding a somewhat smaller code.
192 o --with-included-gettext forces the use of the included GNU gettext
193 library, although you might have another one installed.
195 o --with-catgets allows to use the catget() functions which can
196 exist on your system. This can cause problems, though. Use with
199 o You can also set the environment variable LINGUAS to a list of
200 language in case ou do not want to install all the translation
201 files. For example, if you are only interested in German and
202 Finnish, you can type (with sh or bash)
203 export LINGUAS='de fi'
204 before running configure.
206 Moreover, the following generic configure flags may be useful:
208 o --prefix=DIRECTORY specifies the root directory to use for
209 installation. [defaults to /usr/local]
211 o --datadir=DIRECTORY gives the directory where all extra LyX
212 files (lyxrc example, documentation, templates and layouts
213 definitions) will be installed.
214 [defaults to ${prefix}/share/lyx${program_suffix}]
216 o --bindir=DIRECTORY gives the directory where the lyx binary
217 will be installed. [defaults to ${prefix}/bin]
219 o --mandir=DIRECTORY gives the directory where the man pages will go.
220 [defaults to ${prefix}/man]
222 Note that the --with-extra-* commands are not really robust when it
223 comes to use of relative paths. If you really want to use a relative path
224 here, you can prepend it with "`pwd`/".
226 If you do not like the default compile flags used (-g -O2 on gcc), you can
227 set CXXFLAGS variable to other values as follows:
229 o CXXFLAGS='-O2' (sh, bash)
230 o setenv CXXFLAGS '-O2' (csh, tcsh)
232 Similarly, if you want to force the use of some specific compiler, you can
233 give a value to the CXX variable.
235 If you encounter problems, please read the section 'Problems' at the end of
238 In particular, the following options could be useful in some desperate
241 o --enable-warnings that make the compiler output more warnings during
242 the compilation of LyX. Opposite is --disable-warnings. By default,
243 this flag is on for development versions only.
245 o --enable-assertions that make the compiler generate run-time
246 code which checks that some variables have sane values. Opposite
247 is --disable-assertions. By default, this flag is on for
248 development versions only.
250 o --without-latex-config that disables the automatic detection of your
251 latex configuration. This detection is automatically disabled if
252 latex cannot be found. If you find that you have to use this
253 flag, please report it as a bug.
256 Compiling and installing LyX
257 ----------------------------
259 Once you've got the Makefile created, you just have to type:
266 Since the binaries with debug information tend to be huge (although
267 this does not affect the run-time memory footprint), you might want
268 to strip the lyx binary. In this case replace "make install" with
272 BTW: in the images subdirectory there is also a small icon "lyx.xpm",
273 that can be used to display lyx-documents in filemanagers.
275 If configure fails for some strange reason
276 ------------------------------------------
278 Even when configure fails, it creates a Makefile. You always can check
279 the contents of this file, modify it and run 'make'.
281 Compiling For Multiple Architectures
282 ------------------------------------
284 You can compile LyX for more than one kind of computer at the same
285 time, by placing the object files for each architecture in their own
286 directory. To do this, you must use a version of `make' that supports
287 the `VPATH' variable, such as GNU `make'. `cd' to the directory where
288 you want the object files and executables to go and run the
289 `configure' script. `configure' automatically checks for the source
290 code in the directory that `configure' is in and in `..'.
292 If you have to use a `make' that does not supports the `VPATH'
293 variable, you have to compile LyX for one architecture at a time in
294 the source code directory. After you have installed LyX for one
295 architecture, use `make distclean' before reconfiguring for another
298 Preparing a binary distribution for the use of others
299 ------------------------------------------------------
301 o Compile LyX with the right compiler switches for your
302 architecture. Make sure you use the --without-latex-config switch
303 of configure, since others might not be interested by your
306 o Create a file README.bin describing your distribution and
307 referring to *you* if problems arise. As a model, you can use the
308 file development/tools/README.bin.example, which can be a good
311 o Type `make bindist'. This will create a file
312 lyx-1.xx.yy-bin.tar.gz. Rename it to reflect you architecture
313 and the peculiarities of your build (e.g. static vs. dynamic).
315 o Check that everything is correct by unpacking the distribution
316 in some private place and running it. In particular, check the
317 output of `ldd lyx' to know which libraries are really needed.
319 o Upload your binary file to ftp.devel.lyx.org:/pub/incoming, and
320 notify larsbj@lyx.org.
326 This section provides several hints that have been submitted by LyX
327 team member or users to help compiling on some particular
328 architectures. If you find that some of this hints are wrong, please
331 o If you have problems indicating that configure cannot find a part of
332 the xforms or Xpm library, use the --with-extra-lib and --with-extra-inc
333 options of configure to specify where these libraries reside.
335 o Configure will seemingly fail to find xpm.h and forms.h on linux
336 if the kernel headers are not available. Two cases are possible:
338 - you have not installed the kernel sources. Then you should
339 install them or at least the kernel-headers package (or
340 whatever it is called in your distribution).
342 - you have the sources, but you did a 'make mrproper' in the
343 kernel directory (this this removes some symbolic links that
344 are needed for compilation). A 'make symlinks' in linux kernel
347 o if you are using RedHat Linux 7.x, you must make sure you have the
348 latest updated gcc and related packages installed (at least -85),
349 or LyX will not compile or will be mis-compiled.
351 o if you get an error message when compiling LyX that looks like this :
353 ../../src/minibuffer.h:17: using directive `Object' introduced
354 ambiguous type `_ObjectRec *'
356 then you need to upgrade the version of the xforms library you have
359 o On solaris 2.6, you may have to compile with --with-included-string
360 if compiling with gcc 2.95.2.
362 o LyX can be compiled on Tru64 Unix with either GNU's gcc or the default
365 There are no Alpha-specific problems with gcc.
367 The following notes all refer to compilation with the Compaq cxx compiler.
369 LyX cannot be compiled on Tru64 Unix 4.0d or 4.0e with the default cxx
370 compiler. You should upgrade to at least cxx V6.2, to be found at
371 ftp::/ftp.compaq.com/pub/products/C-CXX/tru64/cxx/CXX622V40.tar. Users
372 running Tru64 Unix 4.0f and greater should have no real problems compiling
375 cxx V6.2 will compile LyX out of the box.
376 cxx V6.3-020 is also known to work, although there is a bug in
377 /usr/include/cxx/deque that will break compilation in FormPreferences.C.
378 Compaq are investigating, but a patch that works /now/ is:
380 --- /usr/include/cxx/deque_safe Mon Mar 4 21:09:50 2002
381 +++ /usr/include/cxx/deque Mon Mar 4 21:09:00 2002
384 if (size() >= x.size())
385 erase(copy(x.begin(), x.end(), begin()), end());
387 - copy(x.begin() + size(), x.end(),
388 - inserter(*this,copy(x.begin(),x.begin()+size(),begin())));
390 + const_iterator mid = x.begin() + difference_type(size());
391 + copy(x.begin(), mid, begin());
392 + insert(end(), mid, x.end());
398 At the time of writing, cxx V6.5-026 is the latest cxx compiler. It is
399 /not/ recommended. The compiler itself appears to be both buggy and
400 extremely bloated (trebling the size of the stripped LyX binary).
402 In order to compile LyX with the cxx compiler, you should run configure
403 with the following flags:
404 CXX='cxx -std strict_ansi'
405 CXXFLAGS='-nopure_cname -nocleanup -ptr /tmp/lyx_cxx_repository -O2'
407 The -nopure_cname flag is needed for compilers V6.3 and above because
408 LyX makes use of functions like popen, pclose that are defined in the
409 c version of <stdio.h> but are not formally part of any c/c++ standard.
410 They are not, therefore, included in the <cstdio> header file.