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 Coop threads are not yet thoroughly tested; once they are, they will
  77 be enabled by default.  The interaction with blocking I/O is pretty ad
  78 hoc at the moment.  In our experience, bugs in the thread support do
  79 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 file would be
 106 `/home/jimb/guile-snap/INSTALL').  Then you might say:
 107
 108   export GUILE_LOAD_PATH=/home/jimb/guile-snap
 109
 110 if you're using Bash or any other Bourne shell variant, or
 111
 112   setenv GUILE_LOAD_PATH /home/jimb/guile-snap
 113
 114 if you're using CSH or one of its variants.
 115
 116 If you built Guile in a separate directory from the source tree, then
 117 you'll need to include your build directory in the GUILE_LOAD_PATH as
 118 well.  For example, if you built in a subdirectory of the source tree
 119 called `pentium', you might say:
 120
 121   export GUILE_LOAD_PATH=/home/jimb/guile-snap:/home/jimb/guile-snap/pentium
 122
 123
 124 Building a Statically Linked Guile ========================================
 125
 126 Sometimes it's useful to build a statically-linked version of the
 127 Guile executable.  It's helpful in debugging, and for producing
 128 stand-alone executables for distribution to machines you don't
 129 control.
 130
 131 To do this, set the LDFLAGS environment variable to `-static' before
 132 you configure, or before you run the `make' command to build the
 133 executable.
 134
 135
 136 Generic Instructions for Building Auto-Configured Packages ================
 137
 138 To compile this package:
 139
 140 1.  Configure the package for your system.  In the directory that this
 141 file is in, type `./configure'.  If you're using `csh' on an old
 142 version of System V, you might need to type `sh configure' instead to
 143 prevent `csh' from trying to execute `configure' itself.
 144
 145 The `configure' shell script attempts to guess correct values for
 146 various system-dependent variables used during compilation, and
 147 creates the Makefile(s) (one in each subdirectory of the source
 148 directory).  In some packages it creates a C header file containing
 149 system-dependent definitions.  It also creates a file `config.status'
 150 that you can run in the future to recreate the current configuration.
 151 Running `configure' takes a minute or two.
 152
 153 To compile the package in a different directory from the one
 154 containing the source code, you must use GNU make.  `cd' to the
 155 directory where you want the object files and executables to go and
 156 run `configure' with the option `--srcdir=DIR', where DIR is the
 157 directory that contains the source code.  Using this option is
 158 actually unnecessary if the source code is in the parent directory of
 159 the one in which you are compiling; `configure' automatically checks
 160 for the source code in `..' if it does not find it in the current
 161 directory.
 162
 163 By default, `make install' will install the package's files in
 164 /usr/local/bin, /usr/local/lib, /usr/local/man, etc.  You can specify
 165 an installation prefix other than /usr/local by giving `configure' the
 166 option `--prefix=PATH'.  Alternately, you can do so by changing the
 167 `prefix' variable in the Makefile that `configure' creates (the
 168 Makefile in the top-level directory, if the package contains
 169 subdirectories).
 170
 171 You can specify separate installation prefixes for machine-specific
 172 files and machine-independent files.  If you give `configure' the
 173 option `--exec_prefix=PATH', the package will use PATH as the prefix
 174 for installing programs and libraries.  Normally, all files are
 175 installed using the same prefix.
 176
 177 `configure' ignores any other arguments that you give it.
 178
 179 If your system requires unusual options for compilation or linking
 180 that `configure' doesn't know about, you can give `configure' initial
 181 values for some variables by setting them in the environment.  In
 182 Bourne-compatible shells, you can do that on the command line like
 183 this:
 184         CC='gcc -traditional' DEFS=-D_POSIX_SOURCE ./configure
 185
 186 The `make' variables that you might want to override with environment
 187 variables when running `configure' are:
 188
 189 (For these variables, any value given in the environment overrides the
 190 value that `configure' would choose:)
 191 CC              C compiler program.
 192                 Default is `cc', or `gcc' if `gcc' is in your PATH.
 193 INSTALL         Program to use to install files.
 194                 Default is `install' if you have it, `cp' otherwise.
 195 INCLUDEDIR      Directory for `configure' to search for include files.
 196                 Default is /usr/include.
 197
 198 (For these variables, any value given in the environment is added to
 199 the value that `configure' chooses:)
 200 DEFS            Configuration options, in the form '-Dfoo -Dbar ...'
 201 LIBS            Libraries to link with, in the form '-lfoo -lbar ...'
 202
 203 If you need to do unusual things to compile the package, we encourage
 204 you to teach `configure' how to do them and mail the diffs to the
 205 address given in the README so we can include them in the next
 206 release.
 207
 208 2.  Type `make' to compile the package.
 209
 210 3.  Type `make install' to install programs, data files, and
 211 documentation.
 212
 213 4.  You can remove the program binaries and object files from the
 214 source directory by typing `make clean'.  To also remove the
 215 Makefile(s), the header file containing system-dependent definitions
 216 (if the package uses one), and `config.status' (all the files that
 217 `configure' created), type `make distclean'.
 218
 219 The file `configure.in' is used as a template to create `configure' by
 220 a program called `autoconf'.  You will only need it if you want to
 221 regenerate `configure' using a newer version of `autoconf'.