Last Updated: Sunday December 27, 2015 Last Change : Sunday December 27, 2015

1. Introduction

This document is the original installation guide of the described software QGIS. The software and hardware descriptions named in this document are in most cases registered trademarks and are therefore subject to the legal requirements. QGIS is subject to the GNU General Public License. Find more information on the QGIS Homepage: http://qgis.org

The details, that are given in this document have been written and verified to the best of knowledge and responsibility of the editors. Nevertheless, mistakes concerning the content are possible. Therefore, all data are not liable to any duties or guarantees. The editors and publishers do not take any responsibility or liability for failures and their consequences. You are always welcome for indicating possible mistakes.

You can download this document as part of the QGIS 'User and Installation Guide' in HTML and PDF format via http://qgis.org. A current version is also available at: http://htmlpreview.github.io/?https://raw.github.com/qgis/QGIS/master/doc/INSTALL.html

Translations of this document can also be downloaded at the documentation area of the QGIS project at http://qgis.org. More information is available via http://qgis.org/en/site/getinvolved/governance/organisation/governance.html#community-resources.

Please visit http://qgis.org for information on joining our mailing lists and getting involved in the project further.

/!\ Note to document writers: Please use this document as the central place for describing build procedures. Please do not remove this notice.

/!\ Note to document writers: This documented is generated from doc/INSTALL.t2t - if you need to edit this document, be sure to edit that file rather than the generated INSTALL document found in the root of the source directory.

2. Overview

QGIS, like a number of major projects (eg. KDE 4.0), uses CMake (http://www.cmake.org) for building from source.

Following a summary of the required dependencies for building:

Required build tools:

• CMake >= 2.8.6
• Flex >= 2.5.6
• Bison >= 2.4

Required build dependencies:

• Qt >= 4.8.0
• Proj >= 4.4.x
• GEOS >= 3.4
• Sqlite3 >= 3.0.0
• GDAL/OGR >= 1.4.x
• Qwt >= 5.0 & (< 6.1 with internal QwtPolar)
• expat >= 1.95
• QScintilla2

Optional dependencies:

• for GRASS providers and plugin - GRASS >= 6.0.0. QGIS may be compiled with GRASS 6 or GRASS 7. It can also be compiled with both GRASS versions in a single build but only if QGIS is not installed with rpath. The desired GRASS version is chosen on runtime by setting LD_LIBRARY_PATH or PATH.
• for georeferencer - GSL >= 1.8
• for postgis support and SPIT plugin - PostgreSQL >= 8.0.x
• for gps plugin - gpsbabel
• for mapserver export and PyQGIS - Python >= 2.3 (2.5+ preferred)
• for python support - SIP >= 4.12, PyQt >= 4.8.3 must match Qt version, Qscintilla2
• for qgis mapserver - FastCGI
• for oracle provider - Oracle OCI library

Indirect dependencies:

Some proprietary formats (eg. ECW and MrSid) supported by GDAL require proprietary third party libraries. QGIS doesn't need any of those itself to build, but will only support those formats if GDAL is built accordingly. Refer to http://gdal.org/formats_list.html ff. for instructions how to include those formats in GDAL.

3. Building on GNU/Linux

3.1. Building QGIS with Qt 4.x

Requires: Ubuntu / Debian derived distro

/!\ Note: Refer to the section Building Debian packages for building debian packages. Unless you plan to develop on QGIS, that is probably the easiest option to compile and install QGIS.

These notes are for Ubuntu - other versions and Debian derived distros may require slight variations in package names.

These notes are for if you want to build QGIS from source. One of the major aims here is to show how this can be done using binary packages for *all* dependencies - building only the core QGIS stuff from source. I prefer this approach because it means we can leave the business of managing system packages to apt and only concern ourselves with coding QGIS!

This document assumes you have made a fresh install and have a 'clean' system. These instructions should work fine if this is a system that has already been in use for a while, you may need to just skip those steps which are irrelevant to you.

3.2. Prepare apt

The packages QGIS depends on to build are available in the "universe" component of Ubuntu. This is not activated by default, so you need to activate it:

1. Edit your /etc/apt/sources.list file.
2. Uncomment all the lines starting with "deb"

Also you will need to be running Ubuntu 'precise' or higher in order for all dependencies to be met.

Now update your local sources database:

sudo apt-get update

3.3. Install build dependencies

(extracted from the control.in file in debian/)

3.4. Setup ccache (Optional)

You should also setup ccache to speed up compile times:

cd /usr/local/bin
sudo ln -s /usr/bin/ccache gcc
sudo ln -s /usr/bin/ccache g++

3.5. Prepare your development environment

As a convention I do all my development work in $HOME/dev/<language>, so in this case we will create a work environment for C++ development work like this:

mkdir -p ${HOME}/dev/cpp
cd ${HOME}/dev/cpp

This directory path will be assumed for all instructions that follow.

3.6. Check out the QGIS Source Code

There are two ways the source can be checked out. Use the anonymous method if you do not have edit privileges for the QGIS source repository, or use the developer checkout if you have permissions to commit source code changes.

1. Anonymous Checkout

cd ${HOME}/dev/cpp
git clone git://github.com/qgis/QGIS.git

2. Developer Checkout

cd ${HOME}/dev/cpp
git clone git@github.com:qgis/QGIS.git

3.7. Starting the compile

I compile my development version of QGIS into my ~/apps directory to avoid conflicts with Ubuntu packages that may be under /usr. This way for example you can use the binary packages of QGIS on your system along side with your development version. I suggest you do something similar:

mkdir -p ${HOME}/apps

Now we create a build directory and run ccmake:

cd QGIS
mkdir build-master
cd build-master
ccmake ..

When you run ccmake (note the .. is required!), a menu will appear where you can configure various aspects of the build. If you want QGIS to have debugging capabilities then set CMAKE_BUILD_TYPE to Debug. If you do not have root access or do not want to overwrite existing QGIS installs (by your packagemanager for example), set the CMAKE_INSTALL_PREFIX to somewhere you have write access to (I usually use ${HOME}/apps). Now press 'c' to configure, 'e' to dismiss any error messages that may appear. and 'g' to generate the make files. Note that sometimes 'c' needs to be pressed several times before the 'g' option becomes available. After the 'g' generation is complete, press 'q' to exit the ccmake interactive dialog.

Now on with the build:

make
make install

It may take a little while to build depending on your platform.

After that you can try to run QGIS:

$HOME/apps/bin/qgis

If all has worked properly the QGIS application should start up and appear on your screen. If you get the error message "error while loading shared libraries", execute this command in your shell.

export LD_LIBRARY_PATH=$LD_LIBRARY_PATH:${HOME}/apps/lib/

3.8. Building Debian packages

Instead of creating a personal installation as in the previous step you can also create debian package. This is done from the QGIS root directory, where you'll find a debian directory.

First you need to install the debian packaging tools once:

apt-get install build-essential

First you need to create an changelog entry for your distribution. For example for Ubuntu Precise:

dch -l ~precise --force-distribution --distribution precise "precise build"

The QGIS packages will be created with:

dpkg-buildpackage -us -uc -b

/!\ Note: Install devscripts to get dch.

/!\ Note: If dpkg-buildpackage complains about unmet build dependencies you can install them using apt-get and re-run the command.

/!\ Note: If you have libqgis1-dev installed, you need to remove it first using dpkg -r libqgis1-dev. Otherwise dpkg-buildpackage will complain about a build conflict.

/!\ Note: By default tests are run in the process of building and their results are uploaded to http://dash.orfeo-toolbox.org/index.php?project=QGIS. You can turn the tests off using DEB_BUILD_OPTIONS=nocheck in front of the build command. The upload of results can be avoided with DEB_TEST_TARGET=test.

The packages are created in the parent directory (ie. one level up). Install them using dpkg. E.g.:

sudo debi

3.9. Building QGIS with Qt 5.x

/!\ Warning: Qt 5 is not officially supported. Building against Qt 5 libraries seems to work quiet well alrady but be prepared that you are one of very few with this setup. We strongly recommend using QGIS with Qt 4.

Python bindings in particular are not expected to be compatible. When Qt 5 is enabled, the build system automatically activates Python 3 and PyQt5 as well. There are no plugins and not even the python code shipped along the QGIS source code is compatible with PyQt5.

You have been warned.

3.10. On Fedora Linux

We assume that you have the source code of QGIS ready and created a new subdirectory called `build` or `build-qt5` in it.

3.10.1. Install build dependencies

dnf install qt5-qtwebkit-devel qt5-qtlocation-devel qt5-qttools-static
qt5-qtscript-devel qca-qt5-devel python3-qt5-devel python3-qscintilla-qt5-devel 
qscintilla-qt5-devel python3-qscintilla-devel python3-qscintilla-qt5
clang flex bison geos-devel gdal-devel sqlite-devel libspatialite-devel
qt5-qtsvg-devel qt5-qtxmlpatterns-devel spatialindex-devel expat-devel proj-devel
qwt-devel gsl-devel postgresql-devel

Make sure that your build directory is completely empty when you enter the following command. Do never try to "re-use" an existing Qt4 build directory. If you want to use `ccmake` or other interactive tools, run the following command in the empty build directory once before starting to use the interactive tools.

cmake -DENABLE_QT5=ON -DWITH_QWTPOLAR=OFF ..

If everything went ok you can finally start to compile. (As usual append a -jX where X is the number of available cores option to make to speed up your build process)

make

Run from the build directory

./output/bin/qgis

Or install to your system

make install

4. Building on Windows

4.1. Building with Microsoft Visual Studio

This section describes how to build QGIS using Visual Studio on Windows. This is currently also how the binary QGIS packages are made (earlier versions used MinGW).

This section describes the setup required to allow Visual Studio to be used to build QGIS.

4.1.1. Visual C++ Express Edition

The free (as in free beer) Express Edition installer is available under:

http://download.microsoft.com/download/c/d/7/cd7d4dfb-5290-4cc7-9f85-ab9e3c9af796/vc_web.exe

You also need the Windows SDK for Windows 7 and .NET Framework 4:

http://download.microsoft.com/download/A/6/A/A6AC035D-DA3F-4F0C-ADA4-37C8E5D34E3D/winsdk_web.exe

4.1.2. Other tools and dependencies

Download and install following packages:

OSGeo4W does not only provide ready packages for the current QGIS release and nightly builds of master, but also offers most of the dependencies needs to build it.

For the QGIS build you need to install following packages from cygwin:

• bison
• flex
• git

and from OSGeo4W (select Advanced Installation):

• expat
• fcgi
• gdal
• grass
• gsl-devel
• iconv
• pyqt4
• qt4-devel
• qwt5-devel-qt4
• sip
• spatialite
• libspatialindex-devel
• python-qscintilla
  This will also select packages the above packages depend on.
  Earlier versions of this document also covered how to build all above dependencies. If you're interested in that, check the history of this page in the Wiki or the SVN repository.

4.1.3. Setting up the Visual Studio project with CMake

/!\ Consider this section as example. It tends to outdate, when OSGeo4W and SDKs move on. ms-windows/osgeo4w/package-nightly.cmd is used for the nightly builds and constantly updated and hence might contain necessary updates that are not yet reflected here.

To start a command prompt with an environment that both has the VC++ and the OSGeo4W variables create the following batch file (assuming the above packages were installed in the default locations):

@echo off
set VS90COMNTOOLS=%PROGRAMFILES%\Microsoft Visual Studio 9.0\Common7\Tools\
call "%PROGRAMFILES%\Microsoft Visual Studio 9.0\VC\vcvarsall.bat" x86

set INCLUDE=%INCLUDE%;%PROGRAMFILES%\Microsoft SDKs\Windows\v7.1\include
set LIB=%LIB%;%PROGRAMFILES%\Microsoft SDKs\Windows\v7.1\lib

set OSGEO4W_ROOT=C:\OSGeo4W
call "%OSGEO4W_ROOT%\bin\o4w_env.bat"
path %PATH%;%PROGRAMFILES%\CMake\bin;c:\cygwin\bin

@set GRASS_PREFIX=c:/OSGeo4W/apps/grass/grass-6.4.4
@set INCLUDE=%INCLUDE%;%OSGEO4W_ROOT%\include
@set LIB=%LIB%;%OSGEO4W_ROOT%\lib;%OSGEO4W_ROOT%\lib

@cmd

Start the batch file and on the command prompt checkout the QGIS source from git to the source directory QGIS:

git clone git://github.com/qgis/QGIS.git

Create a 'build' directory somewhere. This will be where all the build output will be generated.

Now run cmake-gui (still from cmd) and in the Where is the source code: box, browse to the top level QGIS directory.

In the Where to build the binaries: box, browse to the 'build' directory you created.

If the path to bison and flex contains blanks, you need to use the short name for the directory (i.e. C:\Program Files should be rewritten to C:\Progra~n, where n is the number as shown in `dir /x C:\``).

Verify that the 'BINDINGS_GLOBAL_INSTALL' option is not checked, so that python bindings are placed into the output directory when you run the INSTALL target.

Hit Configure to start the configuration and select Visual Studio 9 2008 and keep native compilers and click Finish.

The configuration should complete without any further questions and allow you to click Generate.

Now close cmake-gui and continue on the command prompt by starting vcexpress. Use File / Open / Project/Solutions and open the qgis-x.y.z.sln File in your project directory.

Change Solution Configuration from Debug to RelWithDebInfo (Release with Debug Info) or Release before you build QGIS using the ALL_BUILD target (otherwise you need debug libraries that are not included).

After the build completed you should install QGIS using the INSTALL target.

Install QGIS by building the INSTALL project. By default this will install to c:\Program Files\qgis<version> (this can be changed by changing the CMAKE_INSTALL_PREFIX variable in cmake-gui).

You will also either need to add all the dependency DLLs to the QGIS install directory or add their respective directories to your PATH.

4.1.4. Packaging

To create a standalone installer there is a perl script named 'creatensis.pl' in 'qgis/ms-windows/osgeo4w'. It downloads all required packages from OSGeo4W and repackages them into an installer using NSIS.

The script can be run on both Windows and Linux.

On Debian/Ubuntu you can just install the 'nsis' package.

NSIS for Windows can be downloaded at:

http://nsis.sourceforge.net

And Perl for Windows (including other requirements like 'wget', 'unzip', 'tar' and 'bzip2') is available at:

http://cygwin.com

4.1.5. Packaging your own build of QGIS

Assuming you have completed the above packaging step, if you want to include your own hand built QGIS executables, you need to copy them in from your windows installation into the ms-windows file tree created by the creatensis script.

cd ms-windows/
rm -rf osgeo4w/unpacked/apps/qgis/*
cp -r /tmp/qgis1.7.0/* osgeo4w/unpacked/apps/qgis/

Now create a package.

./quickpackage.sh

After this you should now have a nsis installer containing your own build of QGIS and all dependencies needed to run it on a windows machine.

4.1.6. Osgeo4w packaging

The actual packaging process is currently not documented, for now please take a look at:

ms-windows/osgeo4w/package.cmd

4.2. Building using MinGW

Note: This section might be outdated as nowadays Visual C++ is use to build the "official" packages.

Note: For a detailed account of building all the dependencies yourself you can visit Marco Pasetti's website here:

http://www.webalice.it/marco.pasetti/qgis+grass/BuildFromSource.html

Read on to use the simplified approach with pre-built libraries...

4.2.1. MSYS

MSYS provides a unix style build environment under windows. We have created a zip archive that contains just about all dependencies.

Get this:

http://download.osgeo.org/qgis/win32/msys.zip

and unpack to c:\msys

If you wish to prepare your msys environment yourself rather than using our pre-made one, detailed instructions are provided elsewhere in this document.

4.2.2. Qt

Download Qt opensource precompiled edition exe and install (including the download and install of mingw) from here:

http://qt.nokia.com/downloads/

When the installer will ask for MinGW, you don't need to download and install it, just point the installer to c:\msys\mingw

When Qt installation is complete:

Edit C:\Qt\4.8.0\bin\qtvars.bat and add the following lines:

set PATH=%PATH%;C:\msys\local\bin;c:\msys\local\lib 
set PATH=%PATH%;"C:\Program Files\Subversion\bin" 

I suggest you also add C:\Qt\4.8.0\bin\ to your Environment Variables Path in the windows system preferences.

If you plan to do some debugging, you'll need to compile debug version of Qt: C:\Qt\4.8.0\bin\qtvars.bat compile_debug

Note: there is a problem when compiling debug version of Qt 4.7, the script ends with this message "mingw32-make: *** No rule to make target `debug'. Stop.". To compile the debug version you have to go out of src directory and execute the following command:

c:\Qt\4.8.0 make 

4.2.3. Flex and Bison

Get Flex http://sourceforge.net/project/showfiles.php?group_id=23617&package_id=16424 (the zip bin) and extract it into c:\msys\mingw\bin

4.2.4. Python stuff (optional)

Follow this section in case you would like to use Python bindings for QGIS. To be able to compile bindings, you need to compile SIP and PyQt4 from sources as their installer doesn't include some development files which are necessary.

4.2.4.1. Download and install Python - use Windows installer

(It doesn't matter to what folder you'll install it)

http://python.org/download/

4.2.4.2. Download SIP and PyQt4 sources

http://www.riverbankcomputing.com/software/sip/download http://www.riverbankcomputing.com/software/pyqt/download

Extract each of the above zip files in a temporary directory. Make sure to get versions that match your current Qt installed version.

4.2.4.3. Compile SIP

c:\Qt\4.8.0\bin\qtvars.bat 
python configure.py -p win32-g++ 
make 
make install 

4.2.4.4. Compile PyQt

c:\Qt\4.8.0\bin\qtvars.bat 
python configure.py 
make 
make install 

4.2.4.5. Final python notes

/!\ You can delete the directories with unpacked SIP and PyQt4 sources after a successfull install, they're not needed anymore.

4.2.5. git

In order to check out QGIS sources from the repository, you need a git client. This installer should work fine:

http://msysgit.googlecode.com/files/Git-1.7.4-preview20110204.exe

4.2.6. CMake

CMake is build system used by QGIS. Download it from here:

http://www.cmake.org/files/v2.8/cmake-2.8.2-win32-x86.exe

4.2.7. QGIS

Start a cmd.exe window ( Start -> Run -> cmd.exe ) Create development directory and move into it

md c:\dev\cpp 
cd c:\dev\cpp 

Check out sources from GIT:

git clone git://github.com/qgis/QGIS.git

4.2.8. Compiling

As a background read the generic building with CMake notes at the end of this document.

Start a cmd.exe window ( Start -> Run -> cmd.exe ) if you don't have one already. Add paths to compiler and our MSYS environment:

c:\Qt\4.8.0\bin\qtvars.bat 

For ease of use add c:\Qt\4.8.0\bin\ to your system path in system properties so you can just type qtvars.bat when you open the cmd console. Create build directory and set it as current directory:

cd c:\dev\cpp\qgis 
md build 
cd build 

4.2.9. Configuration

cmakesetup ..  

Note: You must include the '..' above.

Click 'Configure' button. When asked, you should choose 'MinGW Makefiles' as generator.

There's a problem with MinGW Makefiles on Win2K. If you're compiling on this platform, use 'MSYS Makefiles' generator instead.

All dependencies should be picked up automatically, if you have set up the Paths correctly. The only thing you need to change is the installation destination (CMAKE_INSTALL_PREFIX) and/or set 'Debug'.

For compatibility with NSIS packaging scripts I recommend to leave the install prefix to its default c:\program files\

When configuration is done, click 'OK' to exit the setup utility.

4.2.10. Compilation and installation

 make make install 

4.2.11. Run qgis.exe from the directory where it's installed (CMAKE_INSTALL_PREFIX)

Make sure to copy all .dll:s needed to the same directory as the qgis.exe binary is installed to, if not already done so, otherwise QGIS will complain about missing libraries when started.

A possibility is to run qgis.exe when your path contains c:\msys\local\bin and c:\msys\local\lib directories, so the DLLs will be used from that place.

4.2.12. Create the installation package: (optional)

Download and install NSIS from (http://nsis.sourceforge.net/Main_Page)

Now using windows explorer, enter the win_build directory in your QGIS source tree. Read the READMEfile there and follow the instructions. Next right click on qgis.nsi and choose the option 'Compile NSIS Script'.

4.3. Creation of MSYS environment for compilation of QGIS

4.3.1. Initial setup

4.3.1.1. MSYS

This is the environment that supplies many utilities from UNIX world in Windows and is needed by many dependencies to be able to compile.

Download from here:

http://puzzle.dl.sourceforge.net/sourceforge/mingw/MSYS-1.0.11-2004.04.30-1.exe

Install to c:\msys

All stuff we're going to compile is going to get to this directory (resp. its subdirs).

4.3.1.2. MinGW

Download from here:

http://puzzle.dl.sourceforge.net/sourceforge/mingw/MinGW-5.1.3.exe

Install to c:\msys\mingw

It suffices to download and install only g++ and mingw-make components.

4.3.1.3. Flex and Bison

Flex and Bison are tools for generation of parsers, they're needed for GRASS and also QGIS compilation.

Download the following packages:

http://gnuwin32.sourceforge.net/downlinks/flex-bin-zip.php

http://gnuwin32.sourceforge.net/downlinks/bison-bin-zip.php

http://gnuwin32.sourceforge.net/downlinks/bison-dep-zip.php

Unpack them all to c:\msys\local

4.3.2. Installing dependencies

4.3.2.1. Getting ready

Paul Kelly did a great job and prepared a package of precompiled libraries for GRASS. The package currently includes:

• zlib-1.2.3
• libpng-1.2.16-noconfig
• xdr-4.0-mingw2
• freetype-2.3.4
• fftw-2.1.5
• PDCurses-3.1
• proj-4.5.0
• gdal-1.4.1

It's available for download here:

http://www.stjohnspoint.co.uk/grass/wingrass-extralibs.tar.gz

Moreover he also left the notes how to compile it (for those interested):

http://www.stjohnspoint.co.uk/grass/README.extralibs

Unpack the whole package to c:\msys\local

4.3.2.2. GRASS

Grab sources from CVS or use a weekly snapshot, see:

http://grass.itc.it/devel/cvs.php

In MSYS console go to the directory where you've unpacked or checked out sources (e.g. c:\msys\local\src\grass-6.3.cvs)

Run these commands:

export PATH="/usr/local/bin:/usr/local/lib:$PATH"
./configure --prefix=/usr/local --bindir=/usr/local --with-includes=/usr/local/include --with-libs=/usr/local/lib --with-cxx --without-jpeg \
--without-tiff --with-postgres=yes --with-postgres-includes=/local/pgsql/include --with-pgsql-libs=/local/pgsql/lib --with-opengl=windows --with-fftw \
--with-freetype --with-freetype-includes=/mingw/include/freetype2 --without-x --without-tcltk --enable-x11=no --enable-shared=yes \
--with-proj-share=/usr/local/share/proj
make
make install

It should get installed to c:\msys\local\grass-6.3.cvs

By the way, these pages might be useful:

• http://grass.gdf-hannover.de/wiki/WinGRASS_Current_Status
• http://geni.ath.cx/grass.html

4.3.2.3. GEOS

Download the sources:

http://geos.refractions.net/geos-2.2.3.tar.bz2

Unpack to e.g. c:\msys\local\src

To compile, I had to patch the sources: in file source/headers/timeval.h line 13. Change it from:

#ifdef _WIN32

to:

#if defined(_WIN32) && defined(_MSC_VER)

Now, in MSYS console, go to the source directory and run:

./configure --prefix=/usr/local
make
make install

4.3.2.4. SQLITE

You can use precompiled DLL, no need to compile from source:

Download this archive:

http://www.sqlite.org/sqlitedll-3_3_17.zip

and copy sqlite3.dll from it to c:\msys\local\lib

Then download this archive:

http://www.sqlite.org/sqlite-source-3_3_17.zip

and copy sqlite3.h to c:\msys\local\include

4.3.2.5. GSL

Download sources:

ftp://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/gsl/gsl-1.9.tar.gz

Unpack to c:\msys\local\src

Run from MSYS console in the source directory:

./configure
make
make install

4.3.2.6. EXPAT

Download sources:

http://dfn.dl.sourceforge.net/sourceforge/expat/expat-2.0.0.tar.gz

Unpack to c:\msys\local\src

Run from MSYS console in the source directory:

./configure
make
make install

4.3.2.7. POSTGRES

We're going to use precompiled binaries. Use the link below for download:

http://wwwmaster.postgresql.org/download/mirrors-ftp?file=%2Fbinary%2Fv8.2.4%2Fwin32%2Fpostgresql-8.2.4-1-binaries-no-installer.zip

copy contents of pgsql directory from the archive to c:\msys\local

4.3.3. Cleanup

We're done with preparation of MSYS environment. Now you can delete all stuff in c:\msys\local\src - it takes quite a lot of space and it's not necessary at all.

5. Building on MacOS X

In this approach I will try to avoid as much as possible building dependencies from source and rather use frameworks wherever possible.

"Universal", SDK and non-default arch builds require more complex options and some fiddling with the system. It is best to stick with a single, default, architecture build and follow these instructions for an initial build. Included are notes for building on Mac OS X 10.5 (Leopard), 10.6 (Snow Leopard), 10.7 (Lion), 10.8 (Mt. Lion) and 10.9 (Mavericks) (These names will be used throughout the instructions.) Make sure to read each section completely before typing the first command you see.

General note on Terminal usage: When I say "cd" to a folder in a Terminal, it means type "cd " (without the quotes, make sure to type a space after) and then type the path to said folder, then <return>. A simple way to do this without having to know and type the full path is, after type the "cd " part, drag the folder (use the icon in its window title bar, or drag a folder from within a window) from the Desktop to the Terminal, then tap <return>.

Parallel Compilation: On multiprocessor/multicore Macs, it's possible to speed up compilation, but it's not automatic. Whenever you type "make" (but NOT "make install"), instead type:

make -j [#cpus]

Replace [#cpus] with the number of cores and/or processors your Mac has. On recent models with hyperthreading processors this can be double the physical count of processors and cores.

ie: Mac Pro "8 Core" model (2 quad core processors) = 8

ie: Macbook Pro i5 (hyperthreading) = 2 cores X 2 = 4

To find out how many CPUs you have available, run the following in Terminal:

/usr/sbin/sysctl -n hw.ncpu

which can be used in build shell scripts like:

make -j $(/usr/sbin/sysctl -n hw.ncpu)

Note: if you get an error in parallel compilation, try removing the -j # flag, so it's just 'make', or using a smaller number. Sometimes make can hiccup on too many threads.

5.1. Install Developer Tools

Developer tools are not a part of a standard OS X installation. Up through Snow Leopard, the Developer Tools, later called Xcode, were included with the system install disks, though it's best to download the latest version compatible with your system to get important updates fixing various issues. Starting with Lion, Xcode is available as a download and from the App Store.

Downloading Xcode/Developer Tools for up through Snow Leopard requires a free developer account at developer.apple.com. Up through Snow Leopard, get the latest Xcode that is supported for your system. For Lion and above, you can get Xcode from either a free developer account or for a minimal fee from the app store. When installing Xcode up through Snow Leopard, make sure to do a custom install and install the Unix Development or Command Line Tools option.

On Lion, if you have installed Xcode 4.0 - 4.2 and are upgrading to 4.3, it's a good idea to uninstall the old version first with:

sudo /Developer/Library/uninstall-devtools

On Lion and Mt. Lion, using Xcode 4.4+, the developer command line tools can be installed via the Xcode preferences.

Xcode 4.3+ also introduces the clang frontend to the LLVM compiler as default.

Note: In XCODE 4.5 installed from the app store, you need to install the command line tools from XCode -> Preferences -> Downloads and choose command line tools.

http://clang.llvm.org/

The supplied clang version 4 can compile QGIS, but presents many warnings compared to just using LLVM. You can specifically use LLVM by exporting paths to the compilers in Terminal, or shell scripts, prior to building QGIS:

export CC=/usr/bin/llvm-gcc
export CXX=/usr/bin/llvm-g++

If you have trouble building some of the dependencies listed below with clang (e.g. OSG & osgEarth), try using only the LLVM compilers.

5.2. Install Qt4 from disk image

You need a minimum of Qt-4.4.0. I suggest getting the latest (Qt 4, not 5). There is no need for the full Qt SDK, so save yourself some download time and get the frameworks only. This is available in the Libraries section of the Qt download page.

Snow Leopard+ note: If you are building on Snow Leopard+, you will need to decide between 32-bit support in the older Qt Carbon branch, or 64-bit support in the Qt Cocoa branch. Appropriate installers are available for both as of Qt-4.5.2, though they stopped making Carbon packages at Qt 4.7.4. Qt 4.6+ is recommended for Cocoa. Starting with Lion, Carbon may not work properly, if at all. Starting with Qt 4.8, only 64bit Cocoa installers are available.

General note: Support for new system versions in any given Qt version may not be present and may cause a 'This version of Mac OS X is unsupported' error when building QGIS. Try the next Qt version.

PPC note: The readymade Qt Cocoa installers don't include PPC support, you'd have to compile Qt yourself. But, there appear to be issues with Qt Cocoa on PPC Macs anyways. Qt Carbon is recommended on PPC Macs.

http://qt-project.org/downloads

If you want debug frameworks, Qt also provides a separate download with these. These are in addition to the non-debug frameworks.

Earlier OS X systems may need an old Qt version - check the requirements of the current Qt version. To get old Qt downloads, there is an FTP link at the bottom of the download page. Files are in the qt/source (yes, even the binary packages).

Once downloaded open the disk image and run the installer. Note you need admin privileges to install.

Leopard+ note: Qt includes a couple non-framework libraries in /usr/lib. When using a system SDK these libraries will not be found. To fix this problem, add symlinks to /usr/local:

sudo ln -s /usr/lib/libQtUiTools.a /usr/local/lib/
sudo ln -s /usr/lib/libQtCLucene.dylib /usr/local/lib/

These should then be found automatically. Earlier systems may need some help by adding '-L/usr/local/lib' to CMAKE_SHARED_LINKER_FLAGS, CMAKE_MODULE_LINKER_FLAGS and CMAKE_EXE_LINKER_FLAGS in the cmake build.

5.3. Install CMake for OSX

Get the latest source release from here:

http://www.cmake.org/cmake/resources/software.html

Binary installers are available for OS X, but they are not recommended (2.4 versions install in /usr instead of /usr/local, and 2.6+ versions are a strange application). Instead, download the source. NOTE: 2.8.5 is broken for detecting part of Qt. Fixed in 2.8.6. Double-click the source tarball to unpack it, then cd to the source folder and:

./bootstrap --docdir=/share/doc/CMake --mandir=/share/man
make -j [#cpus]
sudo make install

5.3.1. Optional setup: ccache

Xcode 4.4+ note: You will probably not need to install ccache if you are using the clang frontend to LLVM compiler, a setup that already provides fairly quick compile times.

Setup ccache to significantly speed up compile times after initial build. (Switching git branches will again cause longer initial build times unless separate build directories are used for each branch.)

Get the latest source release from here:

http://ccache.samba.org/

Double-click the source tarball to unpack, then, in Terminal.app, cd to the source folder and:

./configure
make
sudo make install

After install, symbolically link compilers to /usr/local/bin/ccache. (Note: this differs from instructions at http://ccache.samba.org/manual.html Changing the /usr/bin:/usr/local/bin order in PATH is not recommended on OS X.

sudo mkdir /usr/local/bin/compilers && cd /usr/local/bin/compilers
sudo ln -s ../ccache gcc
sudo ln -s ../ccache g++
sudo ln -s ../ccache cc
sudo ln -s ../ccache c++

Add the following to the end of your ~/.bash_profile (and optionally ~/.bashrc) to allow your login shell to discover the symbolically linked compilers before /usr/bin compilers and to easily toggle using ccache off, by commenting out the line and starting a new login session in Terminal.

export PATH=/usr/local/bin/compilers:$PATH

If you have trouble building some of the dependencies listed below (e.g. OSG & osgEarth), try bypassing ccache.

5.4. Install development frameworks for QGIS dependencies

Download William Kyngesburye's excellent GDAL Complete package that includes PROJ, GEOS, GDAL, SQLite3, Spatialite, and image libraries, as frameworks. There are also GSL and FreeType frameworks.

http://www.kyngchaos.com/software/frameworks

Once downloaded, open and install the frameworks.

William provides an additional installer package for Postgresql (for PostGIS support). QGIS just needs the libpq client library, so unless you want to setup the full Postgres + PostGIS server, all you need is the client-only package. It's available here:

http://www.kyngchaos.com/software/postgres

Also available is a GRASS application:

http://www.kyngchaos.com/software/grass

Old versions of these packages for older systems are available in the software archive section.

5.4.1. Additional dependencies: General compatibility note

There are some additional dependencies that, at the time of writing, are not provided as frameworks or installers so we will need to build these from source. If you are wanting to build QGIS as a 64-bit application, you will need to provide the appropriate build commands to produce 64-bit support in dependencies. Likewise, for 32-bit support on Snow Leopard, you will need to override the default system architecture, which is 64-bit, according to instructions for individual dependency packages.

Stable release versions are preferred. Beta and other development versions may have problems and you are on your own with those.

5.4.2. Additional dependencies: Expat

Snow Leopard+ note: Snow Leopard includes a usable expat, so this step is not necessary on Snow Leopard or above.

Get the expat sources:

http://sourceforge.net/project/showfiles.php?group_id=10127

Double-click the source tarball to unpack, then, in Terminal.app, cd to the source folder and:

./configure
make
sudo make install

5.4.3. Additional dependencies: Spatialindex

Get the libspatialindex sources:

http://download.osgeo.org/libspatialindex/

Double-click the source tarball to unpack, then, in Terminal.app, cd to the source folder and:

./configure --disable-dependency-tracking CFLAGS=-Os
make
sudo make install

5.4.4. Additional dependencies: Python

Leopard+ note: Starting with Leopard a usable Python is included in the system. This is Python 2.5, 2.6 and 2.7, respectively for Leo, Snow and Lion+. So there is no need to install Python on Leopard and newer. You can still install Python from python.org if preferred.

If installing from python.org, make sure you install the latest Python 2.x from

http://www.python.org/download/

Python 3 is a major change, and may have compatibility issues, so try it at your own risk.

5.4.5. Additional dependencies: SIP

Mt Lion note: SIP 4.15.7 appears to not work on Mt Lion. Install either a prior version to 4.14.6 or a later version 4.16.3+

Retrieve the python bindings toolkit SIP from

http://www.riverbankcomputing.com/software/sip/download

Double-click the source tarball to unpack it, then, in Terminal.app, cd to the source folder. Then for your chosen Python:

python.org Python

python configure.py
make
sudo make install

Leopard system Python

SIP wants to install in the system path -- this is not a good idea. More configuration is needed to install outside the system path:

python configure.py -n -d /Library/Python/2.5/site-packages -b /usr/local/bin \
-e /usr/local/include -v /usr/local/share/sip -s MacOSX10.5.sdk

Snow Leopard system Python

Similar to Leopard, you should install outside the system Python path. Also, you need to specify the architecture you want and make sure to run the versioned python binary (this one responds to the 'arch' command, 'python' does not). Substitute '2.7' for python version and 10.7 for SDK version below for Lion.

If you are using 32-bit Qt (Qt Carbon):

python2.6 configure.py -n -d /Library/Python/2.6/site-packages -b /usr/local/bin \
-e /usr/local/include -v /usr/local/share/sip --arch=i386 -s MacOSX10.6.sdk

For 64-bit Qt (Qt Cocoa), use this configure line:

python2.6 configure.py -n -d /Library/Python/2.6/site-packages -b /usr/local/bin \
-e /usr/local/include -v /usr/local/share/sip --arch=x86_64 -s MacOSX10.6.sdk

Lion+ system Python

Similar to Snow Leopard, you should install outside the system Python path. The SDK option should match the system you are compiling on:

for Lion:

python2.7 configure.py -d /Library/Python/2.7/site-packages -b /usr/local/bin \
-e /usr/local/include -v /usr/local/share/sip --arch=x86_64 -s MacOSX10.7.sdk

for Mt. Lion:

python2.7 configure.py -d /Library/Python/2.7/site-packages -b /usr/local/bin \
-e /usr/local/include -v /usr/local/share/sip --arch=x86_64 -s MacOSX10.8.sdk

for Mavericks:

python2.7 configure.py -d /Library/Python/2.7/site-packages -b /usr/local/bin \
-e /usr/local/include -v /usr/local/share/sip --arch=x86_64 -s MacOSX10.9.sdk

continue...

Then continue with compilation and installation:

make
sudo make install

5.4.6. Additional dependencies: QScintilla2

Retrieve the Qt version of the Scintilla-based text editor widget from

http://www.riverbankcomputing.co.uk/software/qscintilla/download

Double-click the tarball to unpack it. Then, cd to the QScintilla2.x.x source folder in a Terminal.

QScintilla2 wants to install in the system path -- with libraries going into /Library/Frameworks and headers into /usr/include/Qsci -- this is not a good idea, and it also basically breaks the QtDesigner plugin. More configuration is needed to install outside the system path, in /usr/local/:

cd Qt4Qt5

Edit QScintilla-gpl-2.x.x/Qt4Qt5/qscintilla.pro in the following manner:

current line --> new line

target.path = $$[QT_INSTALL_LIBS]  -->  target.path = /usr/local/lib
header.path = $$[QT_INSTALL_HEADERS]  -->  header.path = /usr/local/include

Save the qscintilla.pro file and build the QScintilla2 C++ library:

qmake -spec macx-g++ qscintilla.pro
make -j [#cpus]
sudo make install

adjust the install_name_tool command for the version installed of QScintilla installed:

sudo install_name_tool -id /usr/local/lib/libqscintilla2.11.dylib \
  /usr/local/lib/libqscintilla2.11.dylib

This installs QScintilla2's dylib in /usr/local/lib/ and the header files in /usr/local/include/Qsci/, both of which should be automatically found when building QGIS.

5.4.6.1. Optional setup: QScintilla2 QtDesigner plugin

The plugin allows QScintilla2 widgets to be used within QtDesigner.

cd <QScintilla2 source directory>
cd designer-Qt4Qt5
qmake -spec macx-g++ designer.pro
make
sudo make install

Installs in /Developer/Applications/Qt/plugins/designer/

5.4.7. Additional dependencies: PyQt

Retrieve the python bindings toolkit for Qt from

http://www.riverbankcomputing.com/software/pyqt/download

Double-click the source tarball to unpack it, then, in Terminal.app, cd to the source folder. Then for your chosen Python:

python.org Python

python configure.py -n /usr/local/Qt4.8/qsci
yes

Leopard system Python

PyQt wants to install in the system path -- this is not a good idea. More configuration is needed to install outside the system path:

python configure.py -d /Library/Python/2.5/site-packages -b /usr/local/bin -n /usr/local/Qt4.8/qsci -v /usr/local/share/sip/PyQt4

Snow Leopard system Python

Similar to Leopard, you should install outside the system Python path. Also, you need to specify the architecture you want (requires at least PyQt 4.6), and make sure to run the versioned python binary (this one responds to the 'arch' command, which is important for pyuic4, 'python' does not). Substitute '2.7' for python version and 10.7 for SDK version below for Lion.

If you are using 32-bit Qt (Qt Carbon):

python2.6 configure.py -d /Library/Python/2.6/site-packages -b /usr/local/bin \
-n /usr/local/Qt4.8/qsci -v /usr/local/share/sip/PyQt4 --use-arch i386

For 64-bit Qt (Qt Cocoa), use this configure line:

python2.6 configure.py -d /Library/Python/2.6/site-packages -b /usr/local/bin \
-n /usr/local/Qt4.8/qsci -v /usr/local/share/sip/PyQt4 --use-arch x86_64

Lion, Mt. Lion, and Mavericks system Python

Similar to Snow Leopard, you should install outside the system Python path. But you don't need the use-arch option:

python2.7 configure.py -d /Library/Python/2.7/site-packages -b /usr/local/bin -n /usr/local/Qt4.8/qsci -v /usr/local/share/sip/PyQt4

continue...

make -j [#cpus]
sudo make install

If there is a problem with undefined symbols in QtOpenGL on Leopard, edit QtOpenGL/makefile and add -undefined dynamic_lookup to LFLAGS. Then make again.

5.4.8. Additional dependencies: QScintilla2 Python Module

This will create the Qsci.so module in /Library/Python/2.x/site-packages/PyQt4. Like PyQt, it needs help to not install in system locations.

Snow Leopard: substitute '2.6' for Python version

cd <QScintilla2 source dir>
cd Python
python2.7 configure.py -o /usr/local/lib -n /usr/local/include \
-d /Library/Python/2.7/site-packages/PyQt4 -v /usr/local/share/sip/PyQt4 \
--sip-incdir=/usr/local/include --pyqt-sipdir=/usr/local/share/sip/PyQt4
cat >>Qsci.pro <<EOF
QMAKE_LFLAGS_PLUGIN -= -dynamiclib
QMAKE_LFLAGS_PLUGIN += -bundle
EOF
qmake -spec macx-g++ Qsci.pro
make -j [#cpus]
sudo make install

The -o and -n options should match the QScintilla2 C++ dylib install options.

5.4.9. Additional dependencies: Qwt

The GPS tracking feature uses Qwt.

NOTE: PyQwt is not compatible with PyQt 4.9, so we will skip that.

Download the latest Qwt 6.0 source (6.1 does not work with the QwtPolar in QGIS) from:

http://sourceforge.net/projects/qwt

Double-click the tarball to unpack it. Now, cd to the qwt source folder in a Terminal.

Type these commands to build and install 6.0.x (assumes v6.0.2, adjust commands for other version as needed):

cat >> qwtconfig.pri <<EOF
QWT_CONFIG -= QwtFramework
EOF
qmake -spec macx-g++
make -j [#cpus]
sudo make install

sudo install_name_tool -id /usr/local/qwt-6.0.2/lib/libqwt.6.dylib \
  /usr/local/qwt-6.0.2/lib/libqwt.6.dylib

The Qwt shared library is now installed in /usr/local/qwt-6.0.x (x is the point version). Remember this for QGIS configuration.

5.4.10. Additional dependencies: Bison

The version of bison available by default on Mac OS X is too old so you need to get a more recent one on your system. Download at least version 2.4 from:

ftp.gnu.org/gnu/bison/

Now build and install it to a prefix of /usr/local. Double-click the source tarball to unpack it, then cd to the source folder and:

./configure --disable-dependency-tracking CFLAGS=-Os
make
sudo make install

5.4.11. Additional dependencies: gpsbabel

For integrated GPS Tools functions, a gpsbabel executable is required. You can find this at:

http://www.gpsbabel.org/

Download the GPSBabel OS X package, and copy GPSBabelFE.app from the disk image to /Applications.

5.4.12. Optional dependencies: libfcgi

If you want to use the QGIS Mapserver, you need libfcgi. This is included on systems up through Snow Leopard, but was dropped at Lion. So, on Lion you need to get the source from:

http://www.fastcgi.com/dist/

Grab the latest fcgi SNAP package there. Double-click the source tarball to unpack it, then cd to the source folder and:

./configure --disable-dependency-tracking CFLAGS=-Os
make
sudo make install

5.4.13. Optional dependencies: OSG & osgEarth

If you want the Globe plugin in QGIS (default OFF), OSG and osgEarth are needed.

First, OpenSceneGraph. The main site is very out of date, just go to github:

http://github.com/openscenegraph/osg/tags

Download the latest 3.1 version (you can select a tarball when you hover over the entry). Double-click the source tarball to unpack it. (There is a version numbering oddity in the source, but since we'll be bundling OSG as it's meant to be, it really doesn't matter).

Installation is a bit out of touch with OS X standards, so we'll stage it to a temporary location first. You could stage it to the folder that the OSG source folder is in, or a common staging area like /Users/Shared/unix/osg. Pick a folder not hidden and that doesn't need admin permissions to write to for simplicity.

If you are building on Leopard, its configure forces a old ppc/i386 32bit build. If you want 64bit you need to fix CMakeLists.txt - in a text editor, find the if-block that starts with:

ELSEIF(${OSG_OSX_SDK_NAME} STREQUAL "macosx10.6" OR ${OSG_OSX_SDK_NAME} STREQUAL "macosx10.5")

In that section before the next ELSEIF, change:

ppc;i386

to:

i386;x86_64

and change:

mmacosx-version-min=10.5

to:

mmacosx-version-min=10.6

In a new Terminal cd to the source folder and:

mkdir build
cd build
cmake -D CMAKE_INSTALL_PREFIX=/path/to/some/staging/folder \
-D OSG_COMPILE_FRAMEWORKS=ON \
-D OSG_PLUGIN_SEARCH_INSTALL_DIR_FOR_PLUGINS=OFF \
-D JASPER_LIBRARY=/Library/Frameworks/UnixImageIO.framework \
-D JASPER_INCLUDE_DIR=/Library/Frameworks/UnixImageIO.framework/Headers \
-D TIFF_LIBRARY=/Library/Frameworks/UnixImageIO.framework \
-D TIFF_INCLUDE_DIR=/Library/Frameworks/UnixImageIO.framework/Headers \
..
make
make install
sudo mkdir -p "/Library/Application Support/OpenSceneGraph/PlugIns"

Open the staging folder you chose for the CMAKE_INSTALL_PREFIX option above.

Now move all .frameworks from the lib/ folder in the staging area to /Library/Frameworks. Move the files in the osgPlugins folder in the lib/ folder to /Library/Application Support/OpenSceneGraph/PlugIns. The bin/ executables can be left where they are.

Next up is libzip. Get the latest tarball at:

http://nih.at/libzip/

Double-click the source tarball to unpack it. In a new Terminal cd to the source folder and:

./configure --disable-dependency-tracking --disable-shared CFLAGS=-Os
make
sudo make install

Then it's time for osgEarth. Downloads are also on github:

http://github.com/gwaldron/osgearth/tags

Download a tarball for the latest stable release (sorting can be confusing here). Double-click the source tarball to unpack it.

Note: for now stick with version 2.3. There are compile errors in 2.4 that need attention.

This one also needs an intermediate staging area. Choose a folder similar to OSG.

In a new Terminal cd to the source folder and:

mkdir build
cd build
export PATH="/path/to/osg/staging/folder/bin:$PATH"
cmake -D CMAKE_INSTALL_PREFIX=/path/to/some/staging/folder \
-D CMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=MinSizeRel \
-D OSGEARTH_BUILD_FRAMEWORKS=true \
..
make
make install
sudo mkdir -p "/Library/Application Support/OpenSceneGraph/Headers"

Open the staging folder you chose for the CMAKE_INSTALL_PREFIX option above. Also open the OSG staging path /bin folder from the OSG build.

Move all the .frameworks from the lib/ folder to /Library/Frameworks. Move the files in the osgPlugins folder in the lib/ folder to /Library/Application Support/OpenSceneGraph/PlugIns. Move the osgEarthDrivers folder in the include/ folder to /Library/Application Support/OpenSceneGraph/Headers. (you may need to create this folder) And as for OSG, you can leave the bin/ executables where they are.

5.5. API documentation

If you want to build a local copy of the API docs (like those at http://doc.qgis.org/api) you will need Graphviz and Doxygen installed:

http://www.graphviz.org/Download_macos.php

http://www.stack.nl/~dimitri/doxygen/download.html

Graphviz is simply installed via a regular Mac package installer. Install it first. It will place some of its binaries in /usr/local/bin/.

For Doxygen, compiling the source is recommended over installing the app. Double-click the source tarball to unpack it, then cd to the source folder and:

./configure
make -j [#cpus]
sudo make install

The documentation will be output to the build directory, and if using more complete QGIS.app bundling on install, inside the app in:

QGIS.app/Contents/Resources/doc

5.6. QGIS source

Unzip the QGIS source tarball to a working folder of your choice (/usr/somewhere is not a good choice as it's hidden and requires root privileges). If you are reading this from the source, you've already done this.

If you want to experiment with the latest development sources, go to the github QGIS project page:

http://github.com/qgis/QGIS

It should default to the master branch. Click the Downloads button and select Download .tar.gz. Double-click the tarball to unzip it.

Alternatively, install git from http://git-scm.com and do the following.

Make a specific repository directory somewhere, e.g. ~/QGIS/QGIS, and cd into it. The following will read-only clone the master branch to the directory:

git init
git remote add -f -t master -m master qgisupstream git://github.com/qgis/QGIS.git
git merge qgisupstream

5.7. Configure the build

CMake supports out of source build so we will create a 'build' dir for the build process. OS X uses ${HOME}/Applications as a standard user app folder (it gives it the system app folder icon). If you have the correct permissions you may want to build straight into your /Applications folder. The instructions below assume you are building into a ${HOME}/Applications directory.

You have two interactive options for configuring the build: ccmake or run Terminal commands. ccmake is a curses interface inside Terminal for CMake and allows a tabular layout for viewing and editing ALL available QGIS source CMake options. To get started initially run the Terminal method.

In a Terminal cd to the qgis source folder previously downloaded, then:

mkdir build
cd build
cmake -D CMAKE_INSTALL_PREFIX=~/Applications \
-D CMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=MINSIZEREL -D ENABLE_TESTS=FALSE \
-D WITH_PYSPATIALITE=FALSE \
-D SPATIALINDEX_LIBRARY=/usr/local/lib/libspatialindex.dylib \
-D SPATIALINDEX_INCLUDE_DIR=/usr/local/include/spatialindex \
-D QWT_LIBRARY=/usr/local/qwt-6.0.2/lib/libqwt.dylib \
-D QWT_INCLUDE_DIR=/usr/local/qwt-6.0.2/include \
-D BISON_EXECUTABLE=/usr/local/bin/bison \
..

Note: Don't forget the .. on the last line, which tells CMake to look for the source files in one directory up.

After the initial Terminal configure, you can use ccmake to make further changes:

cd build
ccmake ..

This will automatically find and use the previously installed frameworks, and the GRASS application if installed. Remember to change the Qwt version if a different version was installed, and possibly paths, e.g. for Qwt 6.0.2 installed as a framework use:

-D QWT_LIBRARY=/usr/local/qwt-6.0.2/lib/qwt.framework/qwt \
-D QWT_INCLUDE_DIR=/usr/local/qwt-6.0.2/lib/qwt.framework/Headers \

If you want to use a newer PostgreSQL client than the default Mac OS X version, e.g. install from kyngchaos.com, set the following option to pg_config's path:

-D POSTGRES_CONFIG=/usr/local/pgsql/bin/pg_config \

To build a local copy of the API docs (see API documentation section above):

-D WITH_APIDOC=TRUE \

Snow Leopard note: To handle 32-bit Qt (Carbon), create a 32bit python wrapper script and add arch flags to the configuration:

sudo cat >/usr/local/bin/python32 <<EOF
#!/bin/sh
exec arch -i386 /usr/bin/python2.6 \${1+"\$@"}
EOF

sudo chmod +x /usr/local/bin/python32

cmake -D CMAKE_INSTALL_PREFIX=~/Applications \
-D CMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=MINSIZEREL -D ENABLE_TESTS=FALSE \
-D WITH_INTERNAL_SPATIALITE=FALSE -D WITH_PYSPATIALITE=FALSE \
-D SPATIALINDEX_LIBRARY=/usr/local/lib/libspatialindex.dylib \
-D SPATIALINDEX_INCLUDE_DIR=/usr/local/include/spatialindex \
-D QWT_LIBRARY=/usr/local/qwt-5.2.2/lib/libqwt.dylib \
-D QWT_INCLUDE_DIR=/usr/local/qwt-5.2.2/include \
-D BISON_EXECUTABLE=/usr/local/bin/bison \
-D CMAKE_OSX_ARCHITECTURES=i386 -D PYTHON_EXECUTABLE=/usr/local/bin/python32 \
..

Mapserver note: The QGIS Mapserver feature requires fastcgi support. This is included in Leopard and Snow Leopard, but was dropped at Lion. To build the Mapserver component on Leopard and Snow, add the following line before the last line in the above configuration:

-D WITH_SERVER=TRUE \

On Lion you are on your own to figure out how to install libfcgi and add fcgi support to the system Apache. Not recommended for the average user.

Globe plugin note: If you want the Globe plugin (and you compiled and installed OSG/osgEarth), add the following lines before the last line in the above configuration:

-D WITH_GLOBE=true \
-D OSGEARTH_INCLUDE_DIR="/Library/Application Support/OpenSceneGraph/Headers" \
-D OSG_PLUGINS_PATH="/Library/Application Support/OpenSceneGraph/PlugIns" \

Bundling note: Older Qt versions may have problems with some Qt plugins and QGIS. The way to handle this is to bundle Qt inside the QGIS application. The default is to bundle Qt (and osg/osgEarth, if configured).

Even better for distribution purposes, to also bundle any extra non-framework, non-standard, libs (ie postgres' libpq) set the bundle value to 2:

-D QGIS_MACAPP_BUNDLE=2 \

5.8. Building

Now we can start the build process (remember the parallel compilation note at the beginning, this is a good place to use it, if you can):

make -j [#cpus]

If all built without errors you can then install it:

make install

or, for an /Applications build:

sudo make install

5.9. Post-Install

A couple things to take care of.

gpsbabel

For QGIS to easily find gpsbabel, you need to copy the gpsbabel executable to the QGIS application. Assuming you installed QGIS in your home folder:

cp -fp /Applications/GPSBabelFE.app/Contents/MacOS/gpsbabel ~/QGIS.app/Contents/MacOS/bin/

If you installed in /Applications, adjust the path accordingly and prefix the whole command with 'sudo '.

QGIS Mapserver

See the QGIS Mapserver wiki page at:

http://hub.qgis.org/projects/quantum-gis/wiki/QGIS_Server_Tutorial

for instructions on setting up Apache fastcgi and testing Mapserver, including installing the mod-fastcgi that is missing on Lion.

6. Setting up the WCS test server on GNU/Linux

Requires: Ubuntu / Debian derived distro

These notes are for Ubuntu - other versions and Debian derived distros may require slight variations in package names.

6.1. Preparation

Note the git repo below will change to the default QGIS repo once this work is integrated into master.

git remote add blazek git://github.com/blazek/Quantum-GIS.git git fetch blazek git branch --track wcs2 blazek/wcs2 git checkout wcs2 cd /var/www/ sudo mkdir wcs sudo chown timlinux wcs cd wcs/ mkdir cgi-bin cd cgi-bin/

6.2. Setup mapserver

`sudo apt-get install cgi-mapserver`

Set the contents of cgi-bin/wcstest-1.9.0 to:

  #! /bin/sh
  MS_MAPFILE=/var/www/wcs/testdata/qgis-1.9.0/raster/wcs.map
  export MS_MAPFILE
  /usr/lib/cgi-bin/mapserv

Then do:

  chmod +x cgi-bin/wcstest-1.9.0
  mkdir -p /var/www/wcs/testdata/qgis-1.9.0/raster/
  cd /var/www/wcs/testdata/qgis-1.9.0/raster/
  cp -r /home/timlinux/QGIS/tests/testdata/raster/* .

Edit wcs.map and set the shapepath to this:

  SHAPEPATH "/var/www/wcs/testdata/qgis-1.9.0/raster"

Then create /var/www/wcs/7-wcs.qgis.org.conf setting the contents to this:

  <VirtualHost *:80>
  ServerName wcs.qgis.org
  ServerAdmin tim@linfiniti.com

  LogLevel warn
  LogFormat "%h %l %u %t \"%r\" %>s %b \"%{Referer}i\" \"%{User-Agent}i\" \"%{forensic-id}n\"" combined
  CustomLog /var/log/apache2/wcs_qgis.org/access.log combined
  ErrorLog /var/log/apache2/wcs_qgis.org/error.log

  DocumentRoot /var/www/wcs/html

  ScriptAlias /cgi-bin/ /var/www/wcs/cgi-bin/
  <Directory "/var/www/wcs/cgi-bin">
        AllowOverride None
        Options +ExecCGI -MultiViews +SymLinksIfOwnerMatch
        Order allow,deny
        Allow from all
  </Directory>

  RewriteEngine on
  RewriteRule /1.9.0/wcs /cgi-bin/wcstest-1.9.0 [PT]

  </VirtualHost>

6.3. Create a home page

  mkdir html
  vim html/index.html

Set the contents to:

  This is the test platform for QGIS' wcs client. You can use these services
  from QGIS directly (to try out WCS for example) by pointing your QGIS to:
  http://wcs.qgis.org/1.9.0/wcs

6.4. Now deploy it

  sudo mkdir /var/log/apache2/wcs_qgis.org
  sudo chown www-data /var/log/apache2/wcs_qgis.org
  cd /etc/apache2/sites-available/
  sudo ln -s /var/www/wcs/7-wcs.qgis.org.conf .
  cd /var/www/wcs/
  sudo a2ensite 7-wcs.qgis.org.conf
  sudo /etc/init.d/apache2 reload

6.5. Debugging

  sudo tail -f /var/log/apache2/wcs_qgis.org/error.log

7. Setting up a Jenkins Build Server

Assumption: You know how to make a working build environment and want to deploy it under Jenkins for continuous integration testing now.

These notes are terse, I will expand on them later as the need arises. The procedure is:

• Install Jenkins and get it configured according to your own preferences
• Make sure you have the git, github, junit etc plugins installed. A complete list of the plugins I have installed follows (note that you almost certainly don't need evey plugin listed here):
  • External Monitor Job Type Plugin
  • LDAP Plugin
  • pam-auth
  • javadoc
  • ant
  • Jenkins Subversion Plug-in
  • Git Plugin
  • Maven 2 Project Plugin
  • Jenkins SLOCCount Plug-in
  • Jenkins Sounds plugin
  • Jenkins Translation Assistance plugin
  • ruby-runtime
  • Jenkins CVS Plug-in
  • Coverage/Complexity Scatter Plot PlugIn
  • Status Monitor Plugin
  • Git Parameter Plug-In
  • github-api
  • GitHub plugin
  • Jenkins Violations plugin
  • git-notes Plugin
  • Twitter plugin
  • Jenkins Cobertura Plugin
  • Jenkins Gravatar plugin
  • Jenkins SSH Slaves plugin
• Create a Job called 'QGIS'
• Use the following options for your job:
  • Job Name: QGIS
  • Job Type: Build a free-style software project
  • Tick enable project based security (you need to elsewhere configure your Jenkins security to per project settings)
  • Allow Anonymous user Read and Discover access
  • Set the github project to https://github.com/qgis/QGIS/
  • Set source code management to Git
  • Set repository url to git://github.com/qgis/QGIS.git
  • In advanced repository url settings set refspec to :

    +refs/heads/master:refs/remotes/origin/master
    

  • Set branch to build to master
  • Repository Browser: Auto
  • Build triggers: set to Poll SCM and set schedule to * * * * * (polls every minute)
  • Build - Execute shell and set shell script to:

      cd build
      cmake ..
      xvfb-run --auto-servernum --server-num=1 \
               --server-args="-screen 0 1024x768x24" \
               make Experimental || true
      if [ -f Testing/TAG ] ; then
         xsltproc ../tests/ctest2junix.xsl \
           Testing/`head -n 1 < Testing/TAG`/Test.xml > \
           CTestResults.xml
      fi
    

  • Add Junit post build action and set 'Publish Junit test result report' to: build/CTestResults.xml
  • Email notification: Send separate e-mails to individuals who broke the build
  • Jenkins sounds - set up sounds for Failure, Success and Unstable.
  • Save
  Now open the Job dash board and push something to QGIS and wait a minute to validate automated builds work.
  Note: You will need to log in to the Jenkins user account and go to /var/lib/jenkins/jobs/QGIS/workspace, then make a build directory and run the initial cmake setup and then do test build. This process is the same as described elsewhere in this doc.
  I based some of the set up from this nice blog article here:
  http://alexott.blogspot.com/2012/03/jenkins-cmakectest.html

8. Debug output and running tests

If you are interested in seeing embedded debug output, change the following CMake option:

-D CMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=DEBUG (or RELWITHDEBINFO)

This will flood your terminal or system log with lots of useful output from QgsDebugMsg() calls in source code.

If you would like to run the test suite, you will need to do so from the build directory, as it will not work with the installed/bundled app. First set the CMake option to enable tests:

-D ENABLE_TESTS=TRUE

Then run all tests from build directory:

cd build
make test

To run all tests and report to http://dash.orfeo-toolbox.org/index.php?project=QGIS

cd build
make Experimental

You can define the host name reported via 'make Experimental' by setting a CMake option:

-D SITE="my.domain.org"

To run specific test(s) (see 'man ctest'):

cd build
# show listing of tests, without running them
ctest --show-only

# run specific C++ or Python test(s) matching a regular expression
ctest --verbose --tests-regex SomeTestName

9. Authors and Acknowledgments

The following people have contributed to this document:

• Windows MINGW Section
  • Tim Sutton, Godofredo Contreras 2006
  • CMake additions Magnus Homann 2007
  • Python additions Martin Dobias 2007
  • With thanks to Tisham Dhar for preparing the initial msys environment

• Windows MSVC Section (Detailed install)
  • David Willis 2007
  • MSVC install additions Tim Sutton 2007
  • PostgreSQL, Qt compile, SIP, Python, AutoExp additions Juergen Fischer 2007

• Windows MSVC Section (Simplified install)
  • Tim Sutton 2007
  • Juergen Fischer 2007
  • Florian Hillen 2010

• OSX Section
  • Tim Sutton 2007
  • With special thanks to Tom Elwertowski and William Kyngesburye
  • Larry Shaffer 2012

• GNU/Linux Section
  • Tim Sutton 2006
  • Debian package section: Juergen Fischer 2008

• WCS Test Server Section
  • Tim Sutton, Radim Blazek 2012

• Jenkins CI Configuration
  • Tim Sutton 2012

• Latex Generator
  • Tim Sutton 2011

• Debug Output/Tests Section
  • Larry Shaffer 2012, by way of 'Test Friday' Tim Sutton