INSTALLING OBC FROM SOURCE ON A UNIX MACHINE

Version 3

First, check if a binary distribution exists for your machine: this may save you a lot of effort, since it is necessary to install the Objective CAML system before recompiling obc, but not in order to run a binary distribution.

If you do want or need to rebuild obc, here are basic instructions.

1. Clone the repository, and check out a specific release

   $ git clone http://github.com/Spivoxity/obc-3 -b release-3.2 $ cd obc-3

   Also install the prerequisites needed for the build. On Debian:

   $ sudo apt-get install build-essential ocaml-nox \ libgtksourceview2.0-dev

2. Change to the directory obc-3, and type

   $ autoreconf

   $ ./configure

   If your machine has an x86, amd64 or ARM processor, then the runtime system will be built to include a just-in-time translator from the OBC bytecode into native machine code. You can disable the JIT by specifying --disable-jit. The JIT is based on a virtual machine model similar to the one provided by GNU Lightning, and would be easy to port to other architectures.

   The default is also to build the GUI debugger. Doing so requires some GTK stuff to be installed, but you can disable it by specifying --disable-debugger.

   Various checks on your machine will be performed. If the results are good enough, the rest of the installation will go smoothly; but if they are bad, then you probably won't notice until the next part fails.

   If you want a version of obc that can be built without X windows being present on the build machine, then add the flag --without-x. The X libraries are loaded dynamically when the display is opened in XYplane, so Oberon programs do not depend on the presence of X to run, even if they have been built on a system configured for X -- unless, that is, they actually use XYplane.

   And if you want to install in some place other than /usr/local, you can type e.g.

   ./configure --prefix=/usr/mike

   There are other options too: specifically, it's possible to disable dynamic linking on systems that don't support it.

3. Type "make". This builds the various parts of the system. It takes only a minute or two on a modern workstation or laptop. The makefiles use the VPATH feature of GNU make in order to support build directories (see below).

4. Check the last two or three lines of output from the build process: they should be identical:

   The factorial of 20 is 2432902008176640000
   The factorial of 20 is 2432902008176640000
   The factorial of 20 is 2432902008176640000

   Three lines appear if you have built the JIT-based runtime: one as a template, one showing the results from the JIT, and another showing results from the bytecode interpreter, which is also used to support debugging.

   If you feel like running some more tests, some regression tests can be found in the 'test' sub-directory. Typing "make test" will automatically run the whole test suite, showing differences in the code generated and in the output of the test programs.

5. If you want to check out the X windows implementation of XYplane, type

   make tartan ./tartan

   This compiles and runs a program that displays a dynamic random meta-tartan pattern. Type 'q' to exit.

6. Type

   sudo make install

   The obc compiler and tools will be installed in /usr/local/bin, /usr/local/lib/obc, and /usr/local/man/man1.

-- Mike Spivey