wxWidgets/wxPython/BUILD.win32.txt

Building wxPython on Win32
--------------------------


Building wxPython for use on win32 systems is a fairly simple process
consisting of just a few steps.  However depending on where you get
your sources from and what your desired end result is, there are
several permutations of those steps.  At a high level the basic steps
are:

     1. Get the sources
     2. Build the wxWindows DLL
     3. Build and Install wxPython

We'll go into more detail of each of these steps below, but first a
few bits of background information on tools.

I use a tool called SWIG (http://www.swig.org) to help generate the
C++ sources used in the wxPython extension module.  However you don't
need to have SWIG unless you want to modify the *.i files.  I've made
several modifications to SWIG specific to wxPython's needs and so the
modified sources are included in the wx CVS at .../wxPython/wxSWIG.
But because of the size and since most people won't need it my SWIG is
not included in the wxPythonSrc tarball.  You'll need to get it from
CVS or a CVS snapshot.

If you need to modify the *.i files for wxPython then change to the
.../wxPython/wxSWIG directory and run:

      nmake -f makefile.vc

Then you'll need to change a flag in the setup.py script as described
below so the wxPython build process will use SWIG if needed.

I use the new Python Distutils tool to build wxPython.  It is included
with Python 2.0, but if you want to use Python 1.5.2 or 1.6 then
you'll need to download and install Distutils 1.0 from
http://www.python.org/sigs/distutils-sig/

I use Microsoft Visual C++ 6.0 (5.0 with the service packs should work
also) to compile the wxPython C++ sources.  Since I am using Distutils
it should be easier now to build with other win32 compilers such as
the free mingw32 or Borland compilers, but I havn't tried them yet.
If anybody wants to try it I'll take any required patches for the
setup script and for these instructions.



UNICODE
-------

To build the version of wxWindows/wxPython that uses the unicode
version of the Win32 APIs, just follow the steps below with these
changes:

    a. You'll need the MSLU runtime DLL and import lib. The former can
       be downloaded from Microsoft, the latter is part of the latest
       Platform SDK from Microsoft (see msdn.microsoft.com for
       details).  An alternative implementation of import lib can be
       downloaded from http://libunicows.sourceforge.net

    b. Add "UNICODE=1 MSLU=1" to the nmake command line when building
       wxWindows.

    c. Add "UNICODE=1" to the setup.py commandline when building
       wxPython.

    d. See the notes in CHANGES.txt about unicode.


And now on to the fun stuff...




1. Get the sources
------------------

A. You can either use a tarball with the released version of the
   source code for wxWindows/wxPython, or you can get current
   development sources from the CVS repository.  (Some information
   about annonymous CVS access is at the http://wxwindows.org/cvs.htm
   site.)  The advantage of using CVS is that you can easily update as
   soon as the developers check in new sources or fixes.  The
   advantage of using a released version is that it usually has had
   more thorough testing done.  You can decide which method is best
   for you.  The released version file is named
   wxPythonSrc-[version].tar.gz and is available from the wxPython
   website at http://wxpython.org/download.php.  You can use WinZip to
   unpack it if you don't have tar and gzip.


B. Once you get the sources be sure to put them in a path without a
   space in it (i.e., NOT c:\Program Files\wx) and set an environment
   variable named WXWIN to the top level directory.  For example:

         set WXWIN=c:\wx\wxPythonSrc-2.4.0.4

   You'll probably want to add that line to your autoexec.bat or
   System Properties depending on the type of system you are on.


C. Change to the %WXWIN%\include\wx\msw directory and copy setup0.h to
   setup.h and then edit setup.h.  This is how you control which parts
   of wxWindows are compiled into or left out of the build, simply by
   turning options on or off.  I have the following differences from
   the default setup0.h in my setup.h, but you can experiment with
   other settings if you like:


	 WXWIN_COMPATIBILITY_2_2	0
         wxDIALOG_UNIT_COMPATIBILITY	0
	 wxUSE_DEBUG_CONTEXT		1
	 wxUSE_MEMORY_TRACING		1
         wxUSE_CMDLINE_PARSER		0
	 wxUSE_FSVOLUME			0
         wxUSE_DIALUP_MANAGER		0
	 wxUSE_DYNAMIC_LOADER		0
         wxUSE_TREELAYOUT		0
	 wxUSE_MS_HTML_HELP		0
         wxUSE_POSTSCRIPT		1


    ** NEW **
    Be sure that wxUSE_GLCANVAS is defined to be 0 as wxPython now
    keeps its own copy of the glcanvas sources and expects that it is
    not in the main library.  This is done to reduce the number of
    dependant DLLs on the core library and therefore help reduce
    startup time.



2. Build the wxWindows DLL
---------------------------

A. Although MSVC project files are provided I always use the makefiles
   to build wxWindows because by default the flags are compatible with
   Python, (and I make sure they stay that way.)  You would have to
   edit the project files a bit to make it work otherwise.


B. There are three different types of wxWindows DLLs that can be
   produced by the VC makefile simply by providing a flag on the nmake
   command-line, I call the three types DEBUG, FINAL, and HYBRID.
   Here are some more details:

      DEBUG Specified with "FINAL=0" and produces a DLL named
            wxmsw[version]d.dll.  This DLL is compiled with full
            debugging information and with the __WXDEBUG__ macro set,
            which enables some debugging-only code in wxWindows such
            as assertions and failure log messages.  The /MDd flag is
            used which means that it is linked with the debugging
            version of the C runtime library and also that you must
            use the debugging version of Python, (python_d.exe and
            pythonXX_d.dll) which also means that all extensions
            loaded by Python should also have the _d in the name.
            With this option you can use the MSVC debugger to trace
            though the Python interpreter, as well as the code for the
            wxPython extension and the wxWindows DLL.

      FINAL Specified with "FINAL=1" and produces a DLL named
            wxmsw[version].dll.  This DLL is compiled with optimizations
            turned on and without debugging information and without
            __WXDEBUG__.  The /MD flag is used which means that you
            can use this version with the standard python.exe.

     HYBRID Specified with "FINAL=hybrid" and produces a DLL named
            wxmsw[version]h.dll.  This DLL is almost the same as the
            FINAL version except the __WXDEBUG__ is used which means
            that you will get extra runtime assertions and validations
            from wxWindows.  If any of these fail then they are turned
            into a Python exception that you can catch and deal with
            in your code.  This is the version that I use when making
            the binary installer for win32.


   Since different DLL names and object file directories are used you
   can build all three types if you like.


C. Change to the %WXWIN%\src\msw directory and type the following command,
   using the value for FINAL that you want:

         nmake -f makefile.vc dll FINAL=hybrid

   Your machine will then crunch away for possibly a long time,
   depending on your hardware, and when it's done you should have a
   DLL and some library files in %WXWIN%\lib.


D. You'll either need to add %WXWIN%\lib to the PATH or copy the DLL
   file to a directory already on the PATH so the DLL can be found at
   runtime.  Another option is to copy the DLL to the directory that
   the wxPython pacakge is installed to, for example,
   c:\Python22\lib\site-packages\wxPython.


E. You can test your build by changing to one of the directories under
   %WXWIN%\samples or %WXWIN\demos and typing (using the right FINAL flag):

        nmake -f makefile.vc FINAL=hybrid WXUSINGDLL=1

   and then executing the resulting .exe file.




3. Build and Install wxPython
-----------------------------

A. As mentioned previouslly, wxPython is built with the standard
   Python Distutils tool.  If you are using Python 2.0 or later you
   are all set, otherwise you need to download and install Distutils
   1.0 from http://www.python.org/sigs/distutils-sig/.


B. Change to the root wxPython directory and look at the setup.py
   file.  This is the script that configures and defines all the
   information that Distutils needs to build wxPython.  There are some
   options near the begining of the script that you may want or need
   to change based on what options you have selected up to this point,
   (type of DLL built, sources from tar.gz or from CVS, etc.)  You can
   either change these flags directly in setup.py or supply them on
   the command-line.

        BUILD_GLCANVAS Set to zero if you don't want to build the
                       Open GL canvas extension module.

             BUILD_OGL Set to zero if you don't want to build the
                       Object Graphics Library extension module.

             BUILD_STC Set to zero if you don't want to build the
                       wxStyledTextCtrl (the Scintilla wrapper)
                       extension module.

              USE_SWIG If you have edited any of the *.i files you
                       will need to set this flag to non-zero so SWIG
                       will be executed to regenerate the wrapper C++
                       and shadow python files.

	          etc.


C. To build and install wxPython you simply need to execute the
   setup.py script.  If you have more than one version of Python
   installed, be sure to execute setup.py with the version you want to
   build wxPython for.

   Depending on what kind of wxWindows DLL you built there are
   different command-line parameters you'll want to pass to setup (in
   addition to possibly one or more of the above):

         FINAL:     python setup.py install

         DEBUG:     python setup.py build --debug install

         HYBRID:    python setup.py HYBRID=1 install

   NOTE:  If you get an internal compiler error from MSVC then you
   need to edit setup.py and add in the /GX- flag that is normally
   commented out.  Just search for "GX-" and uncomment it so it is put
   into the cflags list.

   If you would like to install to someplace besides the Python
   site-packages directory (such as to your home directory) then you
   can add "--root=<path>" after the "install" command.  To use
   wxPython like this you'll need to ensure that the directory
   containing wxPyrthon is contained in in the PYTHONPATH environment
   variable.


D. At this point you should be able to change into the wxPython\demo
   directory and run the demo:

         python demo.py


E. If you would like to make a test build that doesn't overwrite the
   installed version of wxPython you can do so with one of these
   commands instead of the install command above:

         FINAL:     python setup.py build_ext --inplace

         DEBUG:     python setup.py build_ext --debug --inplace

         HYBRID:    python setup.py HYBRID=1 build_ext --inplace

   This will build the wxPython package in the local wxPython
   directory instead of installing it under your Python installation.
   To run using this test version just add the base wxPython source
   directory to the PYTHONPATH:

         set PYTHONPATH=%WXDIR%\wxPython
         cd %WXDIR%\wxPython\demo
         python demo.py


That's all folks!


-----------------
robin@alldunn.com