Compiling WeiDU

Last updated on: Mar 2, 2019

• Setting up the build environment
  • Windows
  • GNU/Linux
  • macOS
  • Elkhound
• Compiling WeiDU
  • If this is the first time you compile
  • If you have compiled before
  • Finally

Setting up the build environment

Minimum required OCaml version: 4.03

Windows

Building WeiDU requires and/or is facilitated by the following:

• Native OCaml (typically compiled with MinGW), obtained from ocaml.org.
• A Cygwin-based *nix toolchain, particularly binutils and make from the Devel group. Perl is also required, but is normally installed by default. Optionally also git (Devel), openssh (Net), zip (Archive) and upx (Utils).
• Cygwin-hosted MinGW-GCC, called mingw-gcc-core (Devel) or some such.
• Elkhound (vide infra). For less configuration, place the elkhound binary in Cygwin's /bin directory. Bear in mind the make process does not like paths with spaces.

Once your environment is up, open the Cygwin terminal and wait for it to finish setting up your home folder. By default, this will be at c:\cygwin\home\<user>, where <user> is your Windows user name. This is where you will want to place your WeiDU source code and the Cygwin terminal is what you will want to use when you compile the source. Within the Cygwin environment, your home folder will have the shorthand ~ (tilde).

GNU/Linux

WeiDU requires OCaml, including the native compilers, and a basic GCC toolchain. Different distributions package these differently. Perl is also required, but is normally installed by default. You may additionally want/need git, hevea, texlive, zip and upx. HeVeA and TexLive are only needed to build the documentation and zip and upx are used in making the distributable archives (upx is optional).

WeiDU additionally requires Elkhound (vide infra). Place the executable on your path and allow Elkhound to be executed as a program, for example, by using the terminal command

chmod +x path/to/elkhound

macOS

1. Make sure you have Xcode installed. You probably don't need Xcode per se but apparently it is the conventional way of obtaining some of the necessary programs (make, gcc, etc.). You may be able to download and install Xcode's command-line tools from Apple Developer without having to download and install all of Xcode.
2. Install MacPorts or HomeBrew.
3. Install Perl. HomeBrew and MacPorts both seems to package it.
4. Use MacPorts or HomeBrew to install OCaml. Note where OCaml was installed.
5. Optionally, install UPX. UPX is used to compress the compiled programs, but is not available for all platforms.
6. Obtain Elkhound (vide infra) and place the executable on your path. Allow Elkhound to be executed as a program, for example, by using the terminal command

   chmod +x path/to/elkhound

Elkhound

The source and build instructions are available at GitHub. There are also compiled executables for some platforms available under Releases

Compiling WeiDU

If this is the first time you compile

1. Obtain WeiDU's source code. The recommended way is by using git:

   git clone git://github.com/WeiDUorg/weidu.git relative/place/where/you/want/it

   Bear in mind WeiDU builds distribution packages to the directory one level up from where the source is located.
2. Enter the directory where you put WeiDU's source code. Copy the file ./sample.Configuration to ./Configuration. Open the file and change the value for OCAMLDIR for your platform to the directory in which the OCaml binaries are located.

If you have compiled before

1. Make sure you have the up-to-date WeiDU source. The recommended way is by using git (from inside the directory where you keep your WeiDU source code):

   git pull origin

2. If the file ./sample.Configuration has been changed, recreate ./Configuration and reapply any changes you have made to it.

Finally

3. Check out the branch you wish to compile WeiDU from. If you are building a stable version, check out the master branch. If your are building a beta version, check out the devel branch. From inside your WeiDU source directory, you check out a branch with:

   git checkout <branch>

   where <branch> is the branch you wish to check out.
4. Run make. Relevant build targets are
   • clean
   • weidu
   • weinstall
   • tolower
   • doc
   • windows_zip
   • linux_zip
   • osx_zip
   • src_zip

The *_zip targets produce an archive in .. that is suitable for distribution. If you are not developing WeiDU, you probably want one of windows_zip, linux_zip or osx_zip.