1 $Id: INSTALL.win32,v 1.13 2003/02/02 04:01:29 sam Exp $
3 INSTALL file for the Windows9x/2k/XP version of the VLC media player
9 If you have already built VLC (see below) or are using a binary release,
12 You can also run VLC from a dos command box, in which case you'll be able
13 to use the command line arguments. You can obtain a list of these command
14 line arguments by typing 'vlc --help'.
15 To store a debug log of the current VLC session, you can use
16 'vlc -vvvvv --intf=logger nameofyourvideofile', but this will unfortunatly
17 disable the GUI. You will end-up with a vlc.log file in your current directory.
19 If you want to play a DVD, run VLC and click on the Disc option in the
20 interface. You then have to type your drive letter followed by a colon in
21 the 'Device name' box (eg. 'D:' if this is the letter for your dvdrom drive).
23 Building VLC from the source code
24 =================================
26 If you want to do the tricky job of building VLC from sources, you can do it
29 - natively on Windows, using MSYS+MINGW (www.mingw.org)
30 (MSYS is a minimal build environnement to compile unixish projects under
31 windoze. It provides all the common unix tools like sh, gmake...)
33 - natively on Windows, using cygwin (www.cygwin.com) with or without the
36 - or on Linux, using the mingw32 cross-compiler
38 Getting the right tools
39 =======================
41 - cross-compiling with mingw32:
42 All the necessary tools you need can be found on the videolan web site:
43 http://www.videolan.org/vlc/windows.html
45 You first need to download a linux cross-compiler version of mingw32.
46 (for Debian GNU/Linux users, there is a mingw32 package)
48 You must also not forget to install the extra development packages if you want
49 to build the DirectX, GTK and SDL plugins.
51 - compiling natively on Windoze with MSYS+MINGW:
52 You will need to download and install the latest MSYS (version 1.0.7 as
54 The installation is really easy. Begin with the MSYS auto-installer and once
55 this is done, extract MINGW into c:\msys\1.0\mingw. You also have to remember
56 to remove the make utility included with MINGW as it conflicts with the one
57 from MSYS (just rename or remove c:\msys\1.0\mingw\bin\make.exe).
59 http://www.mingw.org/download.shtml
60 http://prdownloads.sourceforge.net/mingw/MSYS-1.0.7-i686-2.exe
61 http://prdownloads.sourceforge.net/mingw/MinGW-1.1.tar.gz
63 You must also not forget to install the extra development packages if you want
64 to build the DirectX, GTK and SDL plugins.
65 (http://www.videolan.org/vlc/windows.html)
67 - compiling natively on Windoze with cygwin:
68 You will need to download and run the setup.exe app from cygwin's web site
70 I'm personnaly running the experimental distribution (and gcc-3.2) with the
71 exception of the autoconf tool for which I'm using the autoconf-devel-2.52-4
72 package (I had problems with 2.53a-1). You will need to make sure you install
73 at least the gcc-mingw, mingw-runtime and w32api packages.
75 NOTE: by default, the GTK package is configured to be installed in
76 /usr/local/gtk-win32, if you want to change this path, then you need to edit
77 the gtk-win32/bin/gtk-config file and change "gtk_dir=" accordingly.
78 The same is true for the SDL package, it is installed in
79 /usr/local/SDL-1.2.3-win32 by default and you need to change "prefix=" in
80 SDL-1.2.3-win32/i386-mingw32msvc/bin/sdl-config if you plan to extract the
81 archive in a different directory.
83 - compiling natively on Windoze with cygwin:
84 You will need to download and install cygwin (www.cygwin.com).
86 You must also not forget to install the extra development packages if you want
87 to build the DirectX, GTK and SDL plugins.
88 (http://www.videolan.org/vlc/windows.html)
93 The best way to configure the build process of VLC is to use the
96 See `./configure --help' for more information.
98 If you are cross-compiling from Debian, you can use something
102 CC=i586-mingw32msvc-gcc CXX=i586-mingw32msvc-g++ \
103 ./configure --host=i586-mingw32msvc --build=i386-linux \
104 --with-gtk-config-path=/usr/local/gtk-win32/bin \
105 --with-sdl-config-path=/usr/local/SDL-1.2.3-win32/i386-mingw32msvc/bin \
106 --with-directx=/usr/local/dxheaders \
107 --with-dvdcss-tree=../libdvdcss-win
109 If you are cross-compiling using the mingw32 package provided by
110 www.videolan.org, you have to use something along those lines:
113 CC=i586-mingw32msvc-gcc CXX=i586-mingw32msvc-g++ \
114 PATH=/usr/local/cross-tools/bin:$PATH \
115 ./configure --host=i586-mingw32msvc --build=i386-linux \
116 --with-gtk-config-path=/usr/local/gtk-win32/bin \
117 --with-sdl-config-path=/usr/local/SDL-1.2.3-win32/i386-mingw32msvc/bin \
118 --with-directx=/usr/local/dxheaders \
119 --with-dvdcss-tree=../libdvdcss-win
121 If you are compiling natively on Windoze, then you can use something
125 --with-gtk-config-path=/c/dev/gtk-win32/bin \
126 --with-sdl-config-path=/c/dev/SDL-1.2.3-win32/i386-mingw32msvc/bin \
127 --with-directx=/c/dev/dxheaders \
128 --with-dvdcss-tree=../libdvdcss-win
130 If you are using cygwin, you can build VLC with or without the unix emulation
131 layer (without is usually better). To build without the emulaion layer, use
134 CC="gcc -mno-cygwin" CXX="g++ -mno-cygwin" \
136 --with-gtk-config-path=/cygdrive/c/dev/gtk-win32/bin \
137 --with-sdl-config-path=/cygdrive/c/dev/SDL-1.2.3-win32/i386-mingw32msvc/bin \
138 --with-directx=/cygdrive/c/dev/dxheaders \
139 --with-dvdcss-tree=../libdvdcss-win
140 If you want to use the emulation layer, then just omit the CC="gcc -mno-cygwin"
141 CXX="g++ -mno-cygwin" line.
143 Note: when using the --with-dvdcss-tree you need to compile the libdvdcss tree
149 Have a look at the generated Makefile.opts file, you may want to choose
150 which modules will be compiled as plugins, and which ones will remain in
151 the core application. The configure script tries to guess for you.
153 Once configured, to build VLC you have to:
155 If you are cross-compiling from Debian or compiling natively on Windoze,
156 then just run `make'.
158 If you are cross-compiling using the mingw32 package provided by
159 www.videolan.org, run `PATH=/usr/local/cross-tools/bin:$PATH make'.
161 Building Win32 interface with bcc32 (Borland's compiler)
162 ========================================================
163 (This stage is only necessary if you want to use the Win32 native interface.
164 If you are happy with the GTK interface, then you can skip this section)
166 1) Install Borland C++ Builder, you will need bpr2mak and make.
168 2) Make sure you have the bpr2mak and bcmake (NOT make!) commands in $PATH,
169 they can be symlinks to the Borland bpr2mak and make utilities, or wrappers
170 that call them through Wine if you are cross-compiling from Linux.
172 3) Configure VLC as usual with the --enable-intfwin flag and build it.
174 Well done, now you're ready to use VLC!
175 =======================================