Documentation/4.0/Developers/Build Instructions

For the latest Slicer documentation, visit the read-the-docs.

PREREQUISITES

To avoid
Common errors,
we
STRONGLY
recommend to read the
Prerequisites
section.

CHECKOUT slicer source files

Two options: svn or git-svn

To make review and integration of your welcome contributions, we recommends the use of git-svn

Note that even if you use svn to check out Slicer source code, you will need to have git installed to checkout and build other libraries. YES, you need to install the things listed in the prerequisites !.

Using git-svn

 git clone git://github.com/Slicer/Slicer.git
 cd Slicer
 git svn init http://svn.slicer.org/Slicer4/trunk
 git update-ref refs/remotes/git-svn refs/remotes/origin/master
 git checkout master
 git svn rebase

Consider reading the following page: Slicer guide to git-svn

Using svn

cd MyProjects
svn co http://svn.slicer.org/Slicer4/trunk Slicer4

CONFIGURE and generate Slicer solution files

You can configure and generate Slicer solution files using either ccmake or cmake-gui.

Per-platform instructions

Windows

• Recommended: cmake-gui
  • Configure using default options.
• Remarks:

1. If you downloaded the Qt binary then qmake will be detected and all paths will be set automatically.
2. If you built your own Qt (e.g. in Debug mode for use with the designer) set the QT_QMAKE_EXECUTABLE in cmake-gui.QT_QMAKE_EXECUTABLE should be set to the path of the qmake.exe file, which is inside the bin directory (for example, /path/to/qt-everywhere-opensource-build-4.7.4/bin/qmake.exe).
3. Windows doesn't support path longer than 260 characters, please make sure that the total path name of your Slicer-build directory is no longer than 50 characters ( for example c:\work\Slicer\Slicer-Superbuild (32 characters) is fine)

Unix-like

• Recommended: ccmake
  • Configure using the following commands. By default CMAKE_BUILD_TYPE is set to Debug.

mkdir Slicer4-SuperBuild-Debug
cd Slicer4-SuperBuild-Debug
ccmake -DQT_QMAKE_EXECUTABLE:FILEPATH=/path/to/QtSDK-1.2/Desktop/Qt/474/gcc/bin/qmake ../Slicer4

• Remarks:

1. Using top-level directory name like Slicer-Superbuild-Release or Slicer-Superbuild-Debug is recommended.

General information

Two projects are generated by either cmake, ccmake or cmake-gui.

One of them is in the top-level bin directory Slicer4-Superbuild and the other one is in the subdirectory Slicer-build:

Slicer4-Superbuild/Slicer-build

1. The first project in Slicer4-Superbuild manages all the external dependencies of Slicer (VTK, ITK, Python, ...). To build Slicer for the first time, run make (or build the solution file in Visual Studio) in Slicer4-Superbuild, which will update and build the external libraries and if successful will then build the subproject Slicer-build.
   
2. The second project in Slicer4-Superbuild/Slicer-build is the "traditional" build directory of Slicer. After local changes in Slicer (or after an svn update on the source directory of Slicer), only running make (or building the solution file in Visual Studio) in Slicer4-Superbuild/Slicer-build is necessary (the external libraries are considered built and up to date).
   
3. Warning: An important amount of disk space is required to compile Slicer in Debug (>10GB on Windows)

Workaround firewall blocking git protocol

• Some firewall will be blocking the git protocol, a possible workaround is to configure Slicer disabling the option Slicer_USE_GIT_PROTOCOL. Then http protocol will be used instead. Consider also reading https://github.com/commontk/CTK/issues/33

Notes for advanced users

• By default, if CMake finds Java on your machine, it automatically builds Java CLIs. If you don't want any Java in your Slicer (or if you don't want to install Java on your Mac Os X), you can pass -DCMAKE_DISABLE_FIND_PACKAGE_Java:BOOL=TRUE when configuring Slicer.
• Same applies for OpenSSL: CMAKE_DISABLE_FIND_PACKAGE_OpenSSL:BOOL=TRUE can be passed when building Slicer for packaging.

BUILD Slicer4

After configuration, start the build process in the Slicer4-SuperBuild directory

Per-platform instructions

Windows

• Open Slicer4-SuperBuild\Slicer.sln in Visual Studio
• Select your build configuration. Usually Release of Debug
• Build the ALL_BUILD project.

• If you make local changes to Slicer4, open the solution file located in the directory Slicer4-SuperBuild/Slicer-build instead. You should then be able to either build all projects or just a specific one.

Unix-like

 cd ~/Projects/Slicer4-SuperBuild
 make -j<NUMBEROFCORES>

RUN Slicer

Per-platform instructions

Windows

Run Slicer4-SuperBuild/Slicer-build/Slicer.exe

Unix-like

Run Slicer4-SuperBuild/Slicer-build/Slicer

DEBUG Slicer

Per-platform instructions

Windows

• Make sure you build Slicer using the Debug configuration.
• Open a windows terminal cmd.exe
• Execute the following command:

 cd \path\to\Slicer4-SuperBuild\Slicer-build
 Slicer.exe --VisualStudio Slicer.sln

Unix-like

NA

Common errors

error: ‘class QList<QString>’ has no member named ‘reserve’

/nfs/Users/blowekamp/QtSDK/Desktop/Qt/474/gcc/include/QtCore/qdatastream.h: In function ‘QDataStream& operator>>(QDataStream&, QList<T>&) [with T = QString]’:
/nfs/Users/blowekamp/QtSDK/Desktop/Qt/474/gcc/include/QtCore/qstringlist.h:247:   instantiated from here
/nfs/Users/blowekamp/QtSDK/Desktop/Qt/474/gcc/include/QtCore/qdatastream.h:246: error: ‘class QList<QString>’ has no member named ‘reserve’

You have multiple Qt versions installed on your machine. Try removing the Qt version installed on the system.

libarchive.so: undefined reference to `SHA256_Update'

Linking CXX executable ../../../../../bin/MRMLLogicCxxTests
/home/benjaminlong/work/slicer/Slicer4-Superbuild-Debug/LibArchive-install/lib/libarchive.so: undefined reference to `SHA256_Update'
/home/benjaminlong/work/slicer/Slicer4-Superbuild-Debug/LibArchive-install/lib/libarchive.so: undefined reference to `SHA256_Final'
/home/benjaminlong/work/slicer/Slicer4-Superbuild-Debug/LibArchive-install/lib/libarchive.so: undefined reference to `SHA256_Init'
/home/benjaminlong/work/slicer/Slicer4-Superbuild-Debug/LibArchive-install/lib/libarchive.so: undefined reference to `MD5_Init'

Solution:

cd Slicer-superbuild
rm -rf LibArchive-*
make -j4

Details:

• http://na-mic.org/Mantis/view.php?id=1616
• http://viewvc.slicer.org/viewvc.cgi/Slicer4?view=revision&revision=18923
• http://viewvc.slicer.org/viewvc.cgi/Slicer4?view=revision&revision=18969

A tool returned an error code from "Performing configure step for ..."

Older CMake versions had some problems building complex projects on Windows7 (see more details in: http://cmake.org/Bug/view.php?id=12957). Make sure you use the required CMake version.

A tool returned an error code from "Performing download step (git clone) for ..."

CMake has problems cloning git repositories on Windows7. See more details in http://cmake.org/Bug/view.php?id=12564

If you think the described problem is the same as you have, please add your specific error message to the bug report (the more people report the problem the sooner it will be fixed).

No rule to make target `/usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libGL.so'

See http://techtidings.blogspot.com/2012/01/problem-with-libglso-on-64-bit-ubuntu.html

X11 Window errors at start time

X Error: BadWindow (invalid Window parameter) 3
  Extension:    137 (Uknown extension)
  Minor opcode: 4 (Unknown request)
  Resource id:  0x4200199
X Error: BadWindow (invalid Window parameter) 3
  Extension:    137 (Uknown extension)
  Minor opcode: 4 (Unknown request)
  Resource id:  0x42001a6
X Error: BadWindow (invalid Window parameter) 3
  Extension:    137 (Uknown extension)
  Minor opcode: 4 (Unknown request)
  Resource id:  0x42001b3

Solution:

• Reinstall Nvidia drivers (that also rewrite the xorg.conf file).

error C2061: syntax error : identifier 'ssize_t'

4>1>Compiling...
4>1>version.c
4>1>c:\chene\winbin64\slicer4\cmcurl\urldata.h(585) : error C2061: syntax error : identifier 'ssize_t'
4>1>c:\chene\winbin64\slicer4\cmcurl\urldata.h(593) : error C2365: 'fread' : redefinition; previous definition was 'function'
4>1>        C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft Visual Studio 9.0\VC\include\stdio.h(248) : see declaration of 'fread'
4>1>c:\chene\winbin64\slicer4\cmcurl\urldata.h(610) : error C2059: syntax error : '}'

Solution:

* See #A_tool_returned_an_error_code_from_.22Performing_configure_step_for_....22

Platform Notes

• Linux Ubuntu: if you have odd rendering artifacts, try disabling visual effects (System/Appearance/Visual Effects)
• Unix-Like: remember that "make" wrapping calls to pull source makes it very much not idempotent; re-running make after a build error may get past the previously encountered error. Kind of like re-compiling LaTeX many times to fix references.
• Windows: If build was OK, but it Slicer doesn't start (gives the error: [bin/Release/SlicerQT-real.exe] exit abnormally - Report the problem.) then one possible root cause is that you have a copy of Python26.dll in your windows system directory (e.g., c:\Windows\System32\python26.dll). The solution is to rename or remove the python dll in the system directory. See more details here: http://www.na-mic.org/Bug/view.php?id=1180