Building libc++¶
Getting Started¶
On Mac OS 10.7 (Lion) and later, the easiest way to get this library is to install Xcode 4.2 or later. However if you want to install tip-of-trunk from here (getting the bleeding edge), read on.
The basic steps needed to build libc++ are:
Checkout LLVM:
cd where-you-want-llvm-to-live
svn co http://llvm.org/svn/llvm-project/llvm/trunk llvm
Checkout libc++:
cd where-you-want-llvm-to-live
cd llvm/projects
svn co http://llvm.org/svn/llvm-project/libcxx/trunk libcxx
Checkout libc++abi:
cd where-you-want-llvm-to-live
cd llvm/projects
svn co http://llvm.org/svn/llvm-project/libcxxabi/trunk libcxxabi
Configure and build libc++ with libc++abi:
CMake is the only supported configuration system. Unlike other LLVM projects autotools is not supported for either libc++ or libc++abi.
Clang is the preferred compiler when building and using libc++.
cd where you want to build llvm
mkdir build
cd build
cmake -G <generator> [options] <path to llvm sources>
For more information about configuring libc++ see CMake Options.
make cxx
— will build libc++ and libc++abi.make check-libcxx check-libcxxabi
— will run the test suites.
Shared libraries for libc++ and libc++ abi should now be present in llvm/build/lib. See using an alternate libc++ installation
Optional: Install libc++ and libc++abi
If your system already provides a libc++ installation it is important to be careful not to replace it. Remember Use the CMake option
CMAKE_INSTALL_PREFIX
to select a safe place to install libc++.make install-libcxx install-libcxxabi
— Will install the libraries and the headers
Warning
- Replacing your systems libc++ installation could render the system non-functional.
- Mac OS X will not boot without a valid copy of
libc++.1.dylib
in/usr/lib
.
The instructions are for building libc++ on FreeBSD, Linux, or Mac using libc++abi as the C++ ABI library. On Linux, it is also possible to use libsupc++ or libcxxrt.
It is sometimes beneficial to build outside of the LLVM tree. An out-of-tree build would look like this:
$ cd where-you-want-libcxx-to-live
$ # Check out llvm, libc++ and libc++abi.
$ ``svn co http://llvm.org/svn/llvm-project/llvm/trunk llvm``
$ ``svn co http://llvm.org/svn/llvm-project/libcxx/trunk libcxx``
$ ``svn co http://llvm.org/svn/llvm-project/libcxxabi/trunk libcxxabi``
$ cd where-you-want-to-build
$ mkdir build && cd build
$ export CC=clang CXX=clang++
$ cmake -DLLVM_PATH=path/to/llvm \
-DLIBCXX_CXX_ABI=libcxxabi \
-DLIBCXX_CXX_ABI_INCLUDE_PATHS=path/to/libcxxabi/include \
path/to/libcxx
$ make
$ make check-libcxx # optional
CMake Options¶
Here are some of the CMake variables that are used often, along with a
brief explanation and LLVM-specific notes. For full documentation, check the
CMake docs or execute cmake --help-variable VARIABLE_NAME
.
- CMAKE_BUILD_TYPE:STRING
- Sets the build type for
make
based generators. Possible values are Release, Debug, RelWithDebInfo and MinSizeRel. On systems like Visual Studio the user sets the build type with the IDE settings. - CMAKE_INSTALL_PREFIX:PATH
- Path where LLVM will be installed if “make install” is invoked or the “INSTALL” target is built.
- CMAKE_CXX_COMPILER:STRING
- The C++ compiler to use when building and testing libc++.
libc++ specific options¶
-
LIBCXX_ENABLE_ASSERTIONS
:BOOL
¶ Default:
ON
Build libc++ with assertions enabled.
-
LIBCXX_BUILD_32_BITS
:BOOL
¶ Default:
OFF
Build libc++ as a 32 bit library. Also see
LLVM_BUILD_32_BITS
.
Default:
ON
Build libc++ as a shared library. If
OFF
is specified then libc++ is built as a static library.
-
LIBCXX_LIBDIR_SUFFIX
:STRING
¶ Extra suffix to append to the directory where libraries are to be installed. This option overrides
LLVM_LIBDIR_SUFFIX
.
ABI Library Specific Options¶
-
LIBCXX_CXX_ABI
:STRING
¶ Values:
none
,libcxxabi
,libcxxrt
,libstdc++
,libsupc++
.Select the ABI library to build libc++ against.
-
LIBCXX_CXX_ABI_INCLUDE_PATHS
:PATHS
¶ Provide additional search paths for the ABI library headers.
-
LIBCXX_CXX_ABI_LIBRARY_PATH
:PATH
¶ Provide the path to the ABI library that libc++ should link against.
-
LIBCXX_ENABLE_STATIC_ABI_LIBRARY
:BOOL
¶ Default:
OFF
If this option is enabled, libc++ will try and link the selected ABI library statically.
-
LIBCXX_ENABLE_ABI_LINKER_SCRIPT
:BOOL
¶ Default:
ON
by default on UNIX platforms other than Apple unless ‘LIBCXX_ENABLE_STATIC_ABI_LIBRARY’ is ON. Otherwise the default value isOFF
.This option generate and installs a linker script as
libc++.so
which links the correct ABI library.
-
LIBCXXABI_USE_LLVM_UNWINDER
:BOOL
¶ Default:
OFF
Build and use the LLVM unwinder. Note: This option can only be used when libc++abi is the C++ ABI library used.
libc++ Feature options¶
-
LIBCXX_ENABLE_EXCEPTIONS
:BOOL
¶ Default:
ON
Build libc++ with exception support.
-
LIBCXX_ENABLE_RTTI
:BOOL
¶ Default:
ON
Build libc++ with run time type information.
libc++ Feature options¶
The following options allow building libc++ for a different ABI version.
-
LIBCXX_ABI_VERSION
:STRING
¶ Default:
1
Defines the target ABI version of libc++.
-
LIBCXX_ABI_UNSTABLE
:BOOL
¶ Default:
OFF
Build the “unstable” ABI version of libc++. Includes all ABI changing features on top of the current stable version.
LLVM-specific options¶
-
LLVM_LIBDIR_SUFFIX
:STRING
¶ Extra suffix to append to the directory where libraries are to be installed. On a 64-bit architecture, one could use
-DLLVM_LIBDIR_SUFFIX=64
to install libraries to/usr/lib64
.
-
LLVM_BUILD_32_BITS
:BOOL
¶ Build 32-bits executables and libraries on 64-bits systems. This option is available only on some 64-bits unix systems. Defaults to OFF.
-
LLVM_LIT_ARGS
:STRING
¶ Arguments given to lit.
make check
andmake clang-test
are affected. By default,'-sv --no-progress-bar'
on Visual C++ and Xcode,'-sv'
on others.
Using Alternate ABI libraries¶
Using libsupc++ on Linux¶
You will need libstdc++ in order to provide libsupc++.
Figure out where the libsupc++ headers are on your system. On Ubuntu this
is /usr/include/c++/<version>
and /usr/include/c++/<version>/<target-triple>
You can also figure this out by running
$ echo | g++ -Wp,-v -x c++ - -fsyntax-only
ignoring nonexistent directory "/usr/local/include/x86_64-linux-gnu"
ignoring nonexistent directory "/usr/lib/gcc/x86_64-linux-gnu/4.7/../../../../x86_64-linux-gnu/include"
#include "..." search starts here:
#include <...> search starts here:
/usr/include/c++/4.7
/usr/include/c++/4.7/x86_64-linux-gnu
/usr/include/c++/4.7/backward
/usr/lib/gcc/x86_64-linux-gnu/4.7/include
/usr/local/include
/usr/lib/gcc/x86_64-linux-gnu/4.7/include-fixed
/usr/include/x86_64-linux-gnu
/usr/include
End of search list.
Note that the first two entries happen to be what we are looking for. This may not be correct on other platforms.
We can now run CMake:
$ CC=clang CXX=clang++ cmake -G "Unix Makefiles" \
-DLIBCXX_CXX_ABI=libstdc++ \
-DLIBCXX_CXX_ABI_INCLUDE_PATHS="/usr/include/c++/4.7/;/usr/include/c++/4.7/x86_64-linux-gnu/" \
-DCMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=Release -DCMAKE_INSTALL_PREFIX=/usr \
<libc++-source-dir>
You can also substitute -DLIBCXX_CXX_ABI=libsupc++
above, which will cause the library to be linked to libsupc++ instead
of libstdc++, but this is only recommended if you know that you will
never need to link against libstdc++ in the same executable as libc++.
GCC ships libsupc++ separately but only as a static library. If a
program also needs to link against libstdc++, it will provide its
own copy of libsupc++ and this can lead to subtle problems.
$ make cxx
$ make install
You can now run clang with -stdlib=libc++.