Overview ======== This file is here for those who are building/exploring OMPI in its source code form, most likely through a developer's tree (i.e., a SVN checkout). Use of GNU Autoconf, Automake, and Libtool ========================================== If you are building OMPI/MPI from a developer's tree, you must first use fairly recent versions of the GNU tools Autoconf, Automake, and Libtool. As of this writing, you need at least Autoconf v2.58, Automake v1.7 (or better), and Libtool v1.5. You can check what versions you have installed with the following: shell$ autoconf --version shell$ automake --version shell$ libtool --version If you need newer versions, you are *strongly* encouraged to heed the following advice: NOTE: On MacOS/X, the default "libtool" program is different than the GNU libtool. You must download and install the GNU version. 1. Unless your OS distribution has easy-to-use binary installations, the sources can be can be downloaded from: ftp://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/autoconf/ ftp://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/automake/ ftp://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/libtool/ 2. Build and install the tools in the following order: 2a. Autoconf 2b. Automake 2c. Libtool 3. You MUST install all three tools into the same prefix directory. These three tools are somewhat inter-related, and if they're going to be used together, they MUST share a common installation prefix. 3a. It is *strongly* encouraged that you do not install your new versions over the OS-installed versions. This could cause other things on your system to break. Instead, install into $HOME/local, or /usr/local, or wherever else you tend to install "local" kinds of software. 3b. In doing so, be sure to prefix your $path with the directory where they are installed. For example, if you install into $HOME/local, you may want to edit your shell startup file (.bashrc, .cshrc, .tcshrc, etc.) to have something like: # For bash/sh: export PATH=$HOME/local/bin:$PATH # For csh/tcsh: set path = ($HOME/local/bin $path) 3c. Ensure to set your $path *BEFORE* you configure/build/install the three packages. 4. All three packages require two simple commands to build and install (where PREFIX is the prefix discussed in 3, above). shell$ cd autoconf-2.58 shell$ ./configure --prefix=PREFIX shell$ make all install --> if on csh or tcsh, run the "rehash" command shell$ cd ../automake-1.7 shell$ ./configure --prefix=PREFIX shell$ make all install shell$ cd ../libtool-1.5 shell$ ./configure --prefix=PREFIX shell$ make all install --> if on csh or tcsh, run the "rehash" command Autoconf and Automake build and install very quickly; Libtool will take a minute or two. 5. You can now run OMPI's top-level "autogen.sh" script. This script will invoke the GNU Autoconf, Automake, and Libtool commands in the proper order and setup to run OMPI's top-level "configure" script. Running autogen.sh may take several minutes. It's not very exciting to watch. :-) 5a. You generally need to run autogen.sh whenever the file "configure.ac" changes, or any files in the config/ directory change (the config/ directory is where a lot of "include" files for OMPI's configure script live). 5b. You do *NOT* need to re-run autogen.sh if you modify a Makefile.am. 5c. Note that "autogen.sh" automatically traverses the entire OMPI tree, running the GNU tools in all MCA modules. This is not always necessary. As you become more familiar with the OMPI sources, you will come to understand the when you only need to re-generate the top-level configure script, and when you need to re-generate *all* configure scripts (it's complicated -- not described here -- when in doubt, do them all). If you only need to re-generate the top-level configure script, you can run: shell$ autogen.sh -l (i.e., "local" mode) which will prevent autogen.sh from traversing all the MCA modules. 5d. Similarly, if you only need to regenerate the configure script in a since MCA module directory, cd into that module's directory and run autogen.sh in there directly. shell$ cd src/mca/pml/teg shell$ ../../../../autogen.sh