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 NetBSD: Perry Metzger says, "Guile will build under NetBSD only using
  33     gmake -- the native make will not work.  (gmake is in our package
  34     system, so this will not be a problem when we packagize 1.3.)"
  35
  36 What You Get ==============================================================
  37
  38 The `configure' script examines your system, and adapts Guile to
  39 compile and run on it.
  40
  41 The `make' command builds several things:
  42 - An executable file `guile/guile', which is an interactive shell for
  43   talking with the Guile Scheme interpreter.
  44 - An object library `libguile/.libs/libguile.a', containing the Guile Scheme
  45   interpreter, ready to be linked into your programs.
  46
  47 To install Guile, type `make install'.  This installs the executable
  48 and libraries mentioned above, as well as Guile's header files and
  49 Scheme libraries.
  50
  51 Make also builds shared libraries, on systems that support them.
  52 Because of the nature of shared libraries, before linking against
  53 them, you should probably install them; `make install' takes care of
  54 this.
  55
  56
  57 Flags Accepted by Configure ===============================================
  58
  59 If you run the configure script with no arguments, it should examine
  60 your system and set things up appropriately.  However, there are a few
  61 switches specific to Guile you may find useful in some circumstances.
  62
  63 --enable-maintainer-mode --- If you have automake, autoconf, and
  64 libtool installed on your system, this switch causes configure to
  65 generate Makefiles which know how to automatically regenerate
  66 configure scripts, makefiles, and headers, when they are out of date.
  67 The README file says which versions of those tools you will need.
  68
  69 --with-threads --- Build a Guile executable and library that supports
  70 cooperative threading.  If you use this switch, Guile will also build
  71 and install the QuickThreads non-preemptive threading library,
  72 libqt.a, which you will need to link into your programs after
  73 libguile.a.  That is, you should pass the switches -lguile -qt to your
  74 linker.
  75
  76 Cooperative threads are not yet thoroughly tested; once they are, they
  77 will be enabled by default.  The interaction with blocking I/O is
  78 pretty ad hoc at the moment.  In our experience, bugs in the thread
  79 support do not affect you if you don't actually use threads.
  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 enabled by default; you only need to use this option (as
  85 `--enable-dynamic-linking=no') if you want to build a Guile which does
  86 not support dynamic linking.
  87
  88 This option has no effect on systems that do not support shared
  89 libraries.
  90
  91 --disable-shared --- Do not build shared libraries.  Normally, Guile
  92 will build shared libraries if your system supports them.  Guile
  93 always builds static libraries.
  94
  95
  96 Using Guile Without Installing It =========================================
  97
  98 If you want to run Guile without installing it, set the environment
  99 variable `GUILE_LOAD_PATH' to a colon-separated list of directories,
 100 including the directory containing this INSTALL file.  If you used a
 101 separate build directory, you'll need to include the build directory
 102 in the path as well.
 103
 104 For example, suppose the Guile distribution unpacked into a directory
 105 called `/home/jimb/guile-snap' (so the full name of this INSTALL file
 106 would be `/home/jimb/guile-snap/INSTALL').  Then you might say, if
 107 you're using Bash or any other Bourne shell variant,
 108
 109   export GUILE_LOAD_PATH=/home/jimb/guile-snap
 110
 111 or if you're using CSH or one of its variants:
 112
 113   setenv GUILE_LOAD_PATH /home/jimb/guile-snap
 114
 115
 116 Building a Statically Linked Guile ========================================
 117
 118 Sometimes it's useful to build a statically-linked version of the
 119 Guile executable.  It's helpful in debugging, and for producing
 120 stand-alone executables for distribution to machines you don't
 121 control.
 122
 123 To do this, set the LDFLAGS environment variable to `-static' before
 124 you configure, or before you run the `make' command to build the
 125 executable.
 126
 127
 128 Generic Instructions for Building Auto-Configured Packages ================
 129
 130 To compile this package:
 131
 132 1.  Configure the package for your system.  In the directory that this
 133 file is in, type `./configure'.  If you're using `csh' on an old
 134 version of System V, you might need to type `sh configure' instead to
 135 prevent `csh' from trying to execute `configure' itself.
 136
 137 The `configure' shell script attempts to guess correct values for
 138 various system-dependent variables used during compilation, and
 139 creates the Makefile(s) (one in each subdirectory of the source
 140 directory).  In some packages it creates a C header file containing
 141 system-dependent definitions.  It also creates a file `config.status'
 142 that you can run in the future to recreate the current configuration.
 143 Running `configure' takes a minute or two.
 144
 145 To compile the package in a different directory from the one
 146 containing the source code, you must use GNU make.  `cd' to the
 147 directory where you want the object files and executables to go and
 148 run `configure' with the option `--srcdir=DIR', where DIR is the
 149 directory that contains the source code.  Using this option is
 150 actually unnecessary if the source code is in the parent directory of
 151 the one in which you are compiling; `configure' automatically checks
 152 for the source code in `..' if it does not find it in the current
 153 directory.
 154
 155 By default, `make install' will install the package's files in
 156 /usr/local/bin, /usr/local/lib, /usr/local/man, etc.  You can specify
 157 an installation prefix other than /usr/local by giving `configure' the
 158 option `--prefix=PATH'.  Alternately, you can do so by changing the
 159 `prefix' variable in the Makefile that `configure' creates (the
 160 Makefile in the top-level directory, if the package contains
 161 subdirectories).
 162
 163 You can specify separate installation prefixes for machine-specific
 164 files and machine-independent files.  If you give `configure' the
 165 option `--exec_prefix=PATH', the package will use PATH as the prefix
 166 for installing programs and libraries.  Normally, all files are
 167 installed using the same prefix.
 168
 169 `configure' ignores any other arguments that you give it.
 170
 171 If your system requires unusual options for compilation or linking
 172 that `configure' doesn't know about, you can give `configure' initial
 173 values for some variables by setting them in the environment.  In
 174 Bourne-compatible shells, you can do that on the command line like
 175 this:
 176         CC='gcc -traditional' DEFS=-D_POSIX_SOURCE ./configure
 177
 178 The `make' variables that you might want to override with environment
 179 variables when running `configure' are:
 180
 181 (For these variables, any value given in the environment overrides the
 182 value that `configure' would choose:)
 183 CC              C compiler program.
 184                 Default is `cc', or `gcc' if `gcc' is in your PATH.
 185 INSTALL         Program to use to install files.
 186                 Default is `install' if you have it, `cp' otherwise.
 187 INCLUDEDIR      Directory for `configure' to search for include files.
 188                 Default is /usr/include.
 189
 190 (For these variables, any value given in the environment is added to
 191 the value that `configure' chooses:)
 192 DEFS            Configuration options, in the form '-Dfoo -Dbar ...'
 193 LIBS            Libraries to link with, in the form '-lfoo -lbar ...'
 194
 195 If you need to do unusual things to compile the package, we encourage
 196 you to teach `configure' how to do them and mail the diffs to the
 197 address given in the README so we can include them in the next
 198 release.
 199
 200 2.  Type `make' to compile the package.
 201
 202 3.  Type `make install' to install programs, data files, and
 203 documentation.
 204
 205 4.  You can remove the program binaries and object files from the
 206 source directory by typing `make clean'.  To also remove the
 207 Makefile(s), the header file containing system-dependent definitions
 208 (if the package uses one), and `config.status' (all the files that
 209 `configure' created), type `make distclean'.
 210
 211 The file `configure.in' is used as a template to create `configure' by
 212 a program called `autoconf'.  You will only need it if you want to
 213 regenerate `configure' using a newer version of `autoconf'.