INSTALL

   1 Brief Installation Instructions ===========================================
   2
   3 To build Guile on unix, there are two basic steps:
   4
   5         1. Type "./configure", to configure the package for your system.
   6         2. Type "make", to build the package.
   7
   8 Generic instructions for configuring and compiling GNU distributions
   9 are included below.
  10
  11
  12 Special Instructions For Some Systems =====================================
  13
  14 We would like Guile to build on all systems using the simple
  15 instructions above, but it seems that a few systems still need special
  16 treatment.  If you can send us fixes for these problems, we'd be
  17 grateful.
  18
  19 SunOS 4.1: Guile's shared library support seems to be confused, but
  20     hey; shared libraries are confusing.  You may need to configure
  21     Guile with a command like:
  22         ./configure --disable-shared
  23     For more information on `--disable-shared', see below, "Flags
  24     Accepted by Configure".
  25
  26 HP/UX: GCC 2.7.2 (and maybe other versions) have trouble creating
  27     shared libraries if they depend on any non-shared libraries.  GCC
  28     seems to have other problems as well.  To work around this, we
  29     suggest you configure Guile to use the system's C compiler:
  30         CC=cc ./configure
  31
  32
  33 What You Get ==============================================================
  34
  35 The `configure' script examines your system, and adapts Guile to
  36 compile and run on it.
  37
  38 The `make' command builds several things:
  39 - An executable file `guile/guile', which is an interactive shell for
  40   talking with the Guile Scheme interpreter.
  41 - An object library `libguile/.libs/libguile.a', containing the Guile Scheme
  42   interpreter, ready to be linked into your programs.
  43
  44 To install Guile, type `make install'.  This installs the executable
  45 and libraries mentioned above, as well as Guile's header files and
  46 Scheme libraries.
  47
  48 Make also builds shared libraries, on systems that support them.
  49 Because of the nature of shared libraries, before linking against
  50 them, you should probably install them; `make install' takes care of
  51 this.
  52
  53
  54 Flags Accepted by Configure ===============================================
  55
  56 If you run the configure script with no arguments, it should examine
  57 your system and set things up appropriately.  However, there are a few
  58 switches specific to Guile you may find useful in some circumstances.
  59
  60 --enable-maintainer-mode --- If you have automake, autoconf, and
  61 libtool installed on your system, this switch causes configure to
  62 generate Makefiles which know how to automatically regenerate
  63 configure scripts, makefiles, and headers, when they are out of date.
  64 The README file says which versions of those tools you will need.
  65
  66 --with-threads --- Build a Guile executable and library that supports
  67 cooperative threading.  If you use this switch, Guile will also build
  68 and install the QuickThreads non-preemptive threading library,
  69 libqt.a, which you will need to link into your programs after
  70 libguile.a.  That is, you should pass the switches -lguile -qt to your
  71 linker.
  72
  73 Coop threads are not yet thoroughly tested; once they are, they will
  74 be enabled by default.  The interaction with blocking I/O is pretty ad
  75 hoc at the moment.  In our experience, bugs in the thread support do
  76 not affect you if you don't actually use threads.
  77
  78 At the moment, threads are known not to work with the NetBSD 1.2
  79 assembler.
  80
  81 --enable-dynamic-linking --- Build a Guile executable and library
  82 providing Scheme functions which can load a shared library and
  83 initialize it, perhaps thereby adding new functions to Guile.  This
  84 feature is not yet thoroughly tested; once it is, it will be enabled
  85 by default.  This option has no effect on systems that do not support
  86 shared libraries.
  87
  88 --disable-shared --- Do not build shared libraries.  Normally, Guile
  89 will build shared libraries if your system supports them.  Guile
  90 always builds static libraries.
  91
  92
  93 Using Guile Without Installing It =========================================
  94
  95 If you want to run Guile without installing it, set the environment
  96 variable `GUILE_LOAD_PATH' to a colon-separated list of directories,
  97 including the directory containing this INSTALL file.  If you used a
  98 separate build directory, you'll need to include the build directory
  99 in the path as well.
 100
 101 For example, suppose the Guile distribution unpacked into a directory
 102 called `/home/jimb/guile-snap' (so the full name of this file would be
 103 `/home/jimb/guile-snap/INSTALL').  Then you might say:
 104
 105   export GUILE_LOAD_PATH=/home/jimb/guile-snap
 106
 107 if you're using Bash or any other Bourne shell variant, or
 108
 109   setenv GUILE_LOAD_PATH /home/jimb/guile-snap
 110
 111 if you're using CSH or one of its variants.
 112
 113 If you built Guile in a separate directory from the source tree, then
 114 you'll need to include your build directory in the GUILE_LOAD_PATH as
 115 well.  For example, if you built in a subdirectory of the source tree
 116 called `pentium', you might say:
 117
 118   export GUILE_LOAD_PATH=/home/jimb/guile-snap:/home/jimb/guile-snap/pentium
 119
 120
 121 Building a Statically Linked Guile ========================================
 122
 123 Sometimes it's useful to build a statically-linked version of the
 124 Guile executable.  It's helpful in debugging, and for producing
 125 stand-alone executables for distribution to machines you don't
 126 control.
 127
 128 To do this, set the LDFLAGS environment variable to `-static' before
 129 you configure, or before you run the `make' command to build the
 130 executable.
 131
 132
 133 Generic Instructions for Building Auto-Configured Packages ================
 134
 135 To compile this package:
 136
 137 1.  Configure the package for your system.  In the directory that this
 138 file is in, type `./configure'.  If you're using `csh' on an old
 139 version of System V, you might need to type `sh configure' instead to
 140 prevent `csh' from trying to execute `configure' itself.
 141
 142 The `configure' shell script attempts to guess correct values for
 143 various system-dependent variables used during compilation, and
 144 creates the Makefile(s) (one in each subdirectory of the source
 145 directory).  In some packages it creates a C header file containing
 146 system-dependent definitions.  It also creates a file `config.status'
 147 that you can run in the future to recreate the current configuration.
 148 Running `configure' takes a minute or two.
 149
 150 To compile the package in a different directory from the one
 151 containing the source code, you must use GNU make.  `cd' to the
 152 directory where you want the object files and executables to go and
 153 run `configure' with the option `--srcdir=DIR', where DIR is the
 154 directory that contains the source code.  Using this option is
 155 actually unnecessary if the source code is in the parent directory of
 156 the one in which you are compiling; `configure' automatically checks
 157 for the source code in `..' if it does not find it in the current
 158 directory.
 159
 160 By default, `make install' will install the package's files in
 161 /usr/local/bin, /usr/local/lib, /usr/local/man, etc.  You can specify
 162 an installation prefix other than /usr/local by giving `configure' the
 163 option `--prefix=PATH'.  Alternately, you can do so by changing the
 164 `prefix' variable in the Makefile that `configure' creates (the
 165 Makefile in the top-level directory, if the package contains
 166 subdirectories).
 167
 168 You can specify separate installation prefixes for machine-specific
 169 files and machine-independent files.  If you give `configure' the
 170 option `--exec_prefix=PATH', the package will use PATH as the prefix
 171 for installing programs and libraries.  Normally, all files are
 172 installed using the same prefix.
 173
 174 `configure' ignores any other arguments that you give it.
 175
 176 If your system requires unusual options for compilation or linking
 177 that `configure' doesn't know about, you can give `configure' initial
 178 values for some variables by setting them in the environment.  In
 179 Bourne-compatible shells, you can do that on the command line like
 180 this:
 181         CC='gcc -traditional' DEFS=-D_POSIX_SOURCE ./configure
 182
 183 The `make' variables that you might want to override with environment
 184 variables when running `configure' are:
 185
 186 (For these variables, any value given in the environment overrides the
 187 value that `configure' would choose:)
 188 CC              C compiler program.
 189                 Default is `cc', or `gcc' if `gcc' is in your PATH.
 190 INSTALL         Program to use to install files.
 191                 Default is `install' if you have it, `cp' otherwise.
 192 INCLUDEDIR      Directory for `configure' to search for include files.
 193                 Default is /usr/include.
 194
 195 (For these variables, any value given in the environment is added to
 196 the value that `configure' chooses:)
 197 DEFS            Configuration options, in the form '-Dfoo -Dbar ...'
 198 LIBS            Libraries to link with, in the form '-lfoo -lbar ...'
 199
 200 If you need to do unusual things to compile the package, we encourage
 201 you to teach `configure' how to do them and mail the diffs to the
 202 address given in the README so we can include them in the next
 203 release.
 204
 205 2.  Type `make' to compile the package.
 206
 207 3.  Type `make install' to install programs, data files, and
 208 documentation.
 209
 210 4.  You can remove the program binaries and object files from the
 211 source directory by typing `make clean'.  To also remove the
 212 Makefile(s), the header file containing system-dependent definitions
 213 (if the package uses one), and `config.status' (all the files that
 214 `configure' created), type `make distclean'.
 215
 216 The file `configure.in' is used as a template to create `configure' by
 217 a program called `autoconf'.  You will only need it if you want to
 218 regenerate `configure' using a newer version of `autoconf'.