1 Explain the cmake build system for wireshark
5 To find out the current state of the cmake implementation for
6 Wireshark, please take a look at "What needs to be done?" below.
11 How to get started with cmake (Unix/Linux and Win32/64)?
14 What needs to be done?
17 How to get started with cmake (Unix/Linux and Win32/64)?
18 ========================================================
20 You can find documentation on cmake at: http://www.cmake.org/
22 cmake is designed to support out of tree builds. So much so, that
23 in tree builds do not work properly in all cases.
25 How to do out of tree build (Unix/Linux):
27 2) Assuming, you are in the top directory of the wireshark source
31 5) cmake [options] ../<Name_of_WS_source_dir>
32 6) make (or cmake --build .)
33 7) (as root) umask 0022 && make install
36 In step 5) you may need to override the defaults for features. Common
39 # Disable the POSIX capbabilities check
42 # Enable debugging symbols
43 -DCMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=Debug
49 -DENABLE_HTML_GUIDES=ON
50 -DENABLE_PDF_GUIDES=ON
52 # Make ccache and clang work together
53 -DCMAKE_C_FLAGS='-Qunused-arguments'
55 # Force Python path on Windows. May be needed if Cygwin's
56 # /usr/bin/python is present and is a symlink
57 # http://public.kitware.com/Bug/view.php?id=13818
58 -DPYTHON_EXECUTABLE=c:/Python27/python
60 # Disable building an application bundle (Wireshark.app) on OS X
61 -DENABLE_APPLICATION_BUNDLE=OFF
63 # Qt Creator expects .cbp files when used with CMake.
64 -G "CodeBlocks - Unix Makefiles"
65 -G "CodeBlocks - NMake Makefiles"
68 After running cmake, you can always run "make help" to see
69 a list of all possible make targets.
72 Cmake honors user umask for creating directories as of now:
73 http://public.kitware.com/Bug/view.php?id=9620
74 To get predictable results please set umask explicitly.
76 How to do an out of tree build using Visual C++ 2013:
77 [This is used for the 2.x release builds, support for VS2010 and VS2012
78 is included, but hasn't been tested.]
79 0) Install cmake (currently 3.1.3 or later is recommended). You can use chocolatey,
81 1) Follow https://www.wireshark.org/docs/wsdg_html_chunked/ChSetupWin32.html
83 1a) Set the library search path.
84 If you set WIRESHARK_BASE_DIR,
85 %WIRESHARK_BASE_DIR%\wireshark-%WIRESHARK_TARGET_PLATFORM%-libs will
86 be used as the top-level library directory.
87 If you set WIRESHARK_LIB_DIR, it will be used as the top-level library
88 directory. This definition will require changing for different builds (x86 & x64).
89 1b) set WIRESHARK_TARGET_PLATFORM=win32 (or win64)
90 1c) set QT5_BASE_DIR=C:\Qt\5.4.1\5.4\msvc2013_opengl (must match the Qt component path
92 1d) If you want to use Visual Studio to build rather than msbuild from the command line,
93 make sure that the path to Cygwin is available to GUI applications.
94 2) mkdir c:\wireshark\build or as appropriate for you.
95 You will need one build directory for each bitness (win32, win64) you wish to build.
96 3) cd into the directory from 2) above.
97 4) Run the following to generate the build files:
98 cmake -DENABLE_CHM_GUIDES=on xxx path\to\sources
99 where path\to\sources is the absolute or relative path to the wireshark source tree
100 and xxx is replaced with one of the following:
101 nothing - This will build a VS solution for win32 using the latest version of VS found (preferred).
102 -G "Visual Studio 12" ("12" builds for VS2013. Use "11" for VS2012 or "10" for VS2010.)
103 -G "NMake Makefiles" - to build an nmake makefile.
104 -G "Visual Studio 12 Win64" (to build an x64 version you must add the "Win64", Win32 is the default)
105 5) Run one of the following to build Wireshark:
106 msbuild /m /p:Configuration=RelWithDebInfo wireshark.sln (preferred).
107 Open Wireshark.sln in Windows Explorer to build in Visual Studio
108 nmake /X- VERBOSE=1 (or cmake --build . -- VERBOSE=1 ) (if you generated nmake files).
109 Subsequent changes to source files and CMakeLists.txt will be automagically detected
110 and new build files generated, i.e. step 4) doesn't need to be run again.
111 Changes to the build environment, e.g. QT_BASE_DIR aren't detected so you must delete the
112 build dir and start form step 2) again.
113 6) The executables can be run from the appropriate directory, e.g. run\RelWithDebInfo for VS solutions
114 or run\ for NMake files.
115 7) To build an installer, build the nsis_package_prep and then the nsis_package projects, e.g.
116 msbuild /m /p:Configuration=RelWithDebInfo nsis_package_prep.vcxproj
117 msbuild /m /p:Configuration=RelWithDebInfo nsis_package.vcxproj
122 - Can create project files for many IDEs including Qt Creator, Visual Studio,
124 - Fast, builds in parallel in Visual Studio or msbuild with the /m flag
125 - Easier to understand/learn
126 - Doesn't create any files in the source tree in case of out of tree builds
127 - One build infrastructure for all of our tier 1 platforms (including Windows)
128 - Out of tree builds permits both Win32 and Win64 builds without requiring a "clean" when swapping.
133 - Everyone who wants to build from source needs cmake
134 - Current state of documentation isn't really better than
135 Autotools documentation. In some respects it's even worse
136 (you need to buy a book to get an explanation as to how
143 All the executables now build from clean source on:
144 * 32 bit openSUSE 11.3: (gnu)make and gcc
147 * 32 bit Ubuntu 10.04
148 * 64 bit Ubuntu 14.04
149 * 64 bit Debian Wheezy
152 * 32 bit Windows using Visual C++ 2013
153 * 64 bit Windows using Visual C++ 2013
156 The Buildbot runs CMake steps on Ubuntu, Win32, Win64, OS X, and Solaris.
157 Windows packages are built using CMake steps.
159 What needs to be done?
160 ======================
162 - Add back platform specific objects.
163 - Fix places in the cmake files marked as todo.
164 - Guides are not installed.
165 - Build source package (using CPack).
166 This is obsolete if we decide to release VCS snapshots instead
167 - Build packages using CPack: tarball, Windows installer + PortableApps, OS X
168 installer dmg, RPM, SVR4. This includes setting OS target version stuff
169 appropriately for OS X. We currently use NSIS for the Windows installer but
170 should probably use WiX instead.
171 - Add support for cmake configurations.
172 - Automatically figure out if *shark is running from the build directory
173 (making WIRESHARK_RUN_FROM_BUILD_DIRECTORY unnecessary like it is with
178 run/qtshark: Mach-O 64-bit x86_64 executable
180 so what you're running from the build directory is the executable
181 itself. autofoo includes libtool in our case, so what you're running
182 from the build directory is a script that then runs the executable,
183 and the executable is in a .libs directory; the code that checks for
184 "running from the build directory?" checks for that. The actual
185 executable isn't supposed to be run directly - it's expected to be run
186 by the wrapper script and might not even work if run directly, as it
187 won't find the relevant shared libraries.
189 We could perhaps check for the executable being in a "run" directory
190 instead, if the build drops it there. However, it's possible, at
191 least on OS X, to copy the executable to another directory and have
192 it run, so the guarantee that it's in a "run" directory is not as
194 - Get plugins loading when running *shark from the build directory.
195 That might involve handling ".libs" and "run" differently. The chance
196 that a random directory the executable was ultimately placed in would
197 be named "run" might also be a bit bigger than the chance that it's
199 - Get cross-compilation working (or ensure it does). It works with autofoo--and
201 - Handle -DFORTIFY_SOURCE=2 appropriately. (Do a Web search for
202 "cmake fortify" for some information.)
203 - Define the GTK_DISABLE_ and GDK_DISABLE_ values as appropriate if we
204 care about supporting the GTK+ version.
205 - Install the freedesktop integration files (wireshark.desktop,
206 wireshark-mime-package.xml, etc.).
209 Links regarding cmake
210 =====================
211 The home page of the cmake project
212 http://www.cmake.org/
214 The home page of the cmake project documentation
215 http://www.cmake.org/Wiki/CMake
217 About cmake in general and why KDE4 uses it
218 http://lwn.net/Articles/188693/
220 Introductory/tutorial presentation
221 http://ait.web.psi.ch/services/linux/hpc/hpc_user_cookbook/tools/cmake/docs/Cmake_VM_2007.pdf
223 Introductory article in Linux Journal
224 http://www.linuxjournal.com/node/6700/print
227 http://www.cmake.org/Wiki/CMake_Useful_Variables
230 http://www.cmake.org/Wiki/CMake_FAQ
232 Additional cmake modules
233 http://code.google.com/p/cmake-modules/