Requirements ============ OpenAxiom currenly requires a Lisp system for its runtime support. OpenAxiom is known to build with the GNU Common Lisp (GCL versions 2.6.7 or 2.6.8), Steel Bank Common Lisp (SBCL version 1.0.22 or higher, except 1.0.29), CLisp (version 2.44.x or higher), and ECL (version higher than 11.1.1), Clozure CL (version 1.3 or higher). So, if you already have any of the above mentioned Lisp systems, your are good to go. Otherwise, you would need to install any of the Lisp environment mentioned above -- SBCL is the default Lisp system used by OpenAxiom developers. Note that a functional Lisp system (e.g. SBCL, GCL, CLisp, ECL, or Clozure CL) is needed only to build OpenAxiom. They are not needed once the system is installed. Finally, you would need a C++ compiler. It is also recommended that you install X11 development headers and libraries, especially Xpm, and QT development headers and libraries. Windows (MingW/MSYS) users do not need X11 components, but they would need a functional QT SDK (version 4.6 or higher.) Ah, one more note: OpenAxiom requires GNU Make. 1. Lisp prerequisite ----------------- If you are missing a Lisp system, you need to get one. 2. Building OpenAxiom ------------------ It is assumed you have already downloaded open-axiom source tarball, e.g. open-axiom-1.5.0.tar.bz2. 2.a. Decompress the OpenAxiom source tarball tar jfxv open-axiom-1.5.0.tar.bz2 2.b. Configure OpenAxiom It is highly recommended that you build OpenAxiom in a directory different from the one that contains its sources. For example, you may create a directory sibling to open-axiom-1.5.0 and build the system from there: mkdir oa-build cd oa-build ../open-axiom-1.5.0/configure It is possible to tell configure where to put the final OpenAxiom executables. By default, when you just type in configure like above, it will configure the system with prefix /usr/local. You can instead say where you want it to be installed, let's say /banana/space. You would then have typed ../open-axiom-1.5.0/configure --prefix=/banana/space If you want to compile OpenAxiom with a specific Lisp system then you should supply the option --with-lisp= where stands for the executable name of the Lisp of your choice. For example, you might want to add --with-lisp=sbcl to the configuration line if you plan to use the SBCL system; or you can specify --with-lisp=ecl if you want to use the ECL system. Note also that OpenAxiom can coexist with other flavours of AXIOM. 2.c. Make the system Just type make or make 2>&1 | tee build.log if you would like to inspect the build messages later on -- but most users probably don't. 2.d. Have some coffee 2.e. Have more coffee It can take from 20min to more than 2 hours to build, depending on the compute power of the build machine and the base Lisp system. 3. Installing OpenAxiom -------------------- Once the build (step 2.) has gone successfully, you may optionally try to regress-test the system -- it can take hours. 3.a. [optional] make check 2>&1 | tee tests.log 3.b. The system is ready to install If you configured the system to install in a place that needs special privilege, e.g. /usr/local that requires administrator write, please make sure that you've gained the adequate privileges. Then, type: make install 3.c. The system is ready for use After step 3.b., your should have a script called `open-axiom', in /usr/local/bin or /banana/space/bin or /whichever/prefix/you/used/bin, ready for use. 4. Enjoy ----- We would like to hear from you. Send us comments and suggestions at open-axiom-help@lists.sf.net About Make ========== OpenAxiom build system requires GNU Make. It might theoretically be possible to cram the Makefiles so that they can work with a large set of Make programs. However, doing so will not be cost effective. GNU Make has been ported to virtually any system current OpenAxiom can build one. Consequently, the GNU Make requirement is not a stringent requirement. It just reflects reality. So, if you're using a system where "make" is not GNU Make, then try "gmake" instead. Gabriel Dos Reis