Viewer 2 Microsoft Windows Builds

Work in progress These instructions are not yet complete or debugged as of March 22, 2011.

When finished, we hope this page will constitute a complete recipe for compiling viewer 2 from source on a Windows machine.

Philosophy: to keep it brief, this page should only include steps we KNOW ARE NEEDED, not random hints. Extra details or open issues can go on the talk page.

Note: Following this recipe will probably take 6 to 12 hours of wall-clock time, and 2 to 6 hours of your time, if you're starting from a fresh Windows XP/Vista/7 system.

Establish your programming environment

This is needed for compiling any viewer based on the LL open source code, but only needs to be done once.

Install Visual Studio 2010 (Express is OK)
Click here to download Visual C++ Express - current version is VS2010
Install Windows SDK for Windows 7 and .NET Framework 4 (ISO) or Windows SDK for Windows 7 and .NET Framework 4 (Web Install)
Install DirectX SDK (June 2010)
Run Microsoft Update, and keep running it until no updates are needed. This may take 6~8 iterations on older versions of windows.
Install other development tools
- Unicode NSIS (Nullsoft Scriptable Install System)
  This is the package installer used to build Setup.exe.
- CMake
  This should be version 2.8.4 (or above in the 2.8.x series). Ensure that any older versions aren't in your PATH environment variables.
- Cygwin
  When you run the cygwin setup utility make sure you have selected to install unzip (under "Archive"), patchutils, flex, bison (all located under "devel"), and curl (under "Web") which are not part of the default install. Do not install Cygwin Python or Mercurial. You won't need to use the Cygwin shell for anything; just have the binaries accessible to the regular command line via your PATH.
- Python (either Python.org Standard Python or ActivePython)
  Note: build scripts support Python 2.6, not 2.7 yet. (Update: Version 2.7.1 works fine --Eamon Mayo 13:43, 30 May 2011 (PDT))
- Mercurial (either TortoiseHg or Mercurial Hg)
- (optional) Notepad++
  You need to use an editor that conforms to the Coding Standard. In particular, you must not check in files with DOS line endings except in very limited circumstances; see How to avoid DOS line endings in Windows tools.

Note: If the installer for a particular package does not update your PATH environment setting you will have to do this manually.

Important: The native Cygwin python and hg do not work very well and should be avoided.

If necessary, use the following shell scripts to update your Cygwin installation to use the Windows native versions of these apps:

Override cygwin's python:

 if [ -f /usr/bin/python.exe ]; then
   mv /usr/bin/python.exe /usr/bin/cygwin-python.exe
 fi
 cp /cygdrive/c/Python26/python.exe /usr/bin/python.exe

Override cygwin's mercurial:

 if [ -f /usr/bin/hg.exe ]; then
   mv /usr/bin/hg.exe /usr/bin/cygwin-hg.exe
 fi
 cp /cygdrive/c/Program\ Files/Mercurial/hg.exe /usr/bin/hg.exe

Rename cygwin's link to allow VS2010 linker to run:

 if [ -f /usr/bin/link.exe ]; then
   mv /usr/bin/link.exe /usr/bin/cygwin-link.exe
 fi

Needed modifications to CMake to correct improper flag usage (until this is corrected by the makers of CMake). These changes will also help keep CMake backwards compatible for those who are still working on older code base viewers (non-VS2010 build). (Added by WolfPup Lowenhar 17:56, 26 May 2011 (PDT))

 Edit Windows-cl.cmake and change the following:
 (this is file is located in 32-bit > C:\Program Files\CMake 2.8\share\cmake-2.8\Modules\Platform
                             64bit> C:\Program Files(x86)\CMake 2.8\share\cmake-2.8\Modules\Platform )
 replace line 156 with:
 
 IF(MSVC10)
   SET(CMAKE_CXX_FLAGS_INIT "/DWIN32 /D_WINDOWS /W3 /EHsc /GR")
 ELSEIF(NOT MSVC10)
   SET(CMAKE_CXX_FLAGS_INIT "/DWIN32 /D_WINDOWS /W3 /Zm1000 /EHsc /GR")
 ENDIF(MSVC10)
 
 replace line 172 with:
 
 IF(MSVC10)
   SET(CMAKE_CXX_FLAGS_INIT "/DWIN32 /D_WINDOWS /W3 /GX /GR")
 ELSEIF(NOT MSVC10)
   SET(CMAKE_CXX_FLAGS_INIT "/DWIN32 /D_WINDOWS /W3 /Zm1000 /GX /GR")
 ENDIF(MSVC10)
 
 replce line 184 with :
 
 IF(MSVC10)
   SET(CMAKE_CXX_FLAGS_INIT "/DWIN32 /D_WINDOWS /W3 /GX /GR")
 ELSEIF(NOT MSVC10)
   SET(CMAKE_CXX_FLAGS_INIT "/DWIN32 /D_WINDOWS /W3 /Zm1000 /GX /GR")
 ENDIF(MSVC10)

Configure VS2010

Instructions needed here to set up internal paths

Set up your source code tree

Plan your directory structure ahead of time. If you are going to be producing changes or patches you will be cloning a copy of an unaltered source code tree for every change or patch you make, so you might want to have all this work stored in it's own directory.

To get a copy of the source code tree:

Open up a DOS/Command window
Make a directory to contain it (it is strongly suggested to name it viewer-development)
Go into that directory
Do hg init
Do hg pull http://hg.secondlife.com/viewer-development

Example: ((specific snapshot example TBD))

Let's say some time has gone by since you have performed the previous steps and now you want to develop a change or work on a jira. You will

Go into viewer-development (or whatever you named the master source tree copy)
Do hg pull
Do hg update
Move up one level from viewer-development
Do hg clone viewer-development VWR-nnnnn (where nnnnn is the jira number, or clone to a name of your choosing if there is not jira number)

Set up Autobuild

You have two choices to set up your autobuild environment

Modify your path statement to include the autobuild bin directory

Install Autobuild into Python, by running one of the following at the command line:
- easy_install autobuild (note the underscore)
- pip install autobuild

Instructions for setting up Fmod needed here

Configuring and compiling the viewer

At the command line in the source tree's root directory (presumably a directory you have cloned from viewer-development, as it is not a good idea to work in viewer-development, unless you are only compiling for youself) e.g. C:\linden\VWR-12345\) run:

autobuild configure -c [CONFIGURATION]

...where [CONFIGURATION] is one of those listed at Building the Viewer with Autobuild#Build a desired configuration (ReleaseOS, RelWithDebInfoOS, DebugOS)

Then run:

autobuild build -c [CONFIGURATION] --no-configure

There are some useful switches to know about, so your commands may look like this:

autobuild configure -c ReleaseOS -- -DLL_TESTS:BOOL=OFF -DPACKAGE:BOOL=OFF
autobuild build -c ReleaseOS --no-configure

Note: It is possible to use autobuild to do both the configure step (only needed once) and the build step with one command. I find it is clearer and saves a bit of time if these steps are done separately.

Alternative way to compile using the IDE

The autobuild configure step will create the build-vc100 directory at the root of the source tree which contains the SecondLife.sln solution file. The solution is fully configured and ready to be built inside the IDE. Open it and compile.

Iteratively fix things until the compile succeeds

If you encounter errors during building or configuration, check the talk page and report useful experiences there.

Running your newly built viewer

Make a shortcut for Drive:\your-path\build-vc100\newview\Release\secondlife-bin.exe

Right-click the shortcut, Properties, and set "Start in:" to Drive:\your-path\indra\newview

Common Issues/Bugs/Glitches And Solutions

Getting help:
- Subscribe to OpenSource-Dev Mailing List (subscribe) and post your question there.
- For faster response, find a free IRC client program and join #opensl on freenode, the general open source viewer discussion and development channel. Hopefully a helpful person is online when you ask your question.

Eliminate annoying popup:
- If you are compiling with the IDE and keep getting a popup along the lines of "click here to improve your experience" follow the registry edit instructions just before "Was this information helpful?" at this link http://support.microsoft.com/kb/981741

References

Tip of the hat to Nicky_Perian for User:Nicky_Perian/Visual_Studio_10_Autobuild