\chapter{Building and Installing VMime\label{chapter_building}}

% ============================================================================
\section{Introduction}

If no pre-build packages of VMime is available for your system, or if for some
reason you want to compile it yourself from scratch, this section will guide
you through the process.

% ============================================================================
\section{What you need}

To build VMime from the sources, you will need the following:

\begin{itemize}
\item a working C++ compiler with good STL implementation and also a good
support for templates (for example, \href{http://gcc.gnu.org/}{GNU GCC}) ;
\item \href{http://www.scons.org/}{SCons} build system, or the
autoconf/automake tool chain ;
\item an usable iconv() implementation (see
\href{http://www.gnu.org/software/libiconv/}{libiconv of GNU Project}) ;
\item the \href{http://www.gnu.org/software/gsasl/}{GNU SASL Library} if you
want SASL\footnote{Simple Authentication and Security Layer} support ;
\item the \href{http://www.gnu.org/software/gnutls/}{GNU TLS Library} if you
want SSL and TLS\footnote{Transport Layer Security} support ;
\end{itemize}

% ============================================================================
\section{Obtaining source files}

You can download a package containing the source files of the latest release
of the VMime library from the \href{http://www.vmime.org/}{VMime web site}.

You can also obtain the current development version from the CVS. VMime's CVS
repository can be checked out from anonymous CVS with the following
instructions. When prompted for a password for {\em anonymous}, simply press
Enter key.

\begin{verbatim}
   cvs -d:pserver:anonymous@cvs.vmime.org:/cvsroot/vmime login
   cvs -z3 -d:pserver:anonymous@cvs.vmime.org:/cvsroot/vmime co -P vmime
\end{verbatim}

% ============================================================================
\section{Compiling and installing}

There are two possibilities for compiling VMime: using SCons building system,
or using the Autotools.

\vnote{MS Visual C++ users, you can skip this section as a project file
is provided in the distribution tarball.}

SCons is only used for development purposes, and so it is recommended that you
use Autotools to build the project as it is a more portable solution, and is
likely to work out-of-the-box on your computer. Thus, we will not describe
the process of compiling VMime using SCons here.

\vnote{Windows users, you can use MinGW and MSYS\footnote{See on the MinGW
website: http://www.mingw.org/} to install a POSIX compatible environment
on top of Windows. This allow executing configure scripts and Makefiles on
Windows}.

Before compiling VMime, you should run the {\vcode configure} script to
detect some parameters specific to your platform. Go into the directory where
you extracted the tarball and type:

\begin{verbatim}
   $ ./configure
\end{verbatim}

This will create a file named {\vcode config.hpp} in the {\vcode vmime/}
directory, with the parameters detected for your platform. You should modify
this file only if you know what you are doing!

If you want to enable or disable some features in VMime, you can obtain some
help by typing {\vcode ./configure --help}. The defaults should be OK though.

Next, you can start the compilation process:

\begin{verbatim}
   $ make
\end{verbatim}

Please wait a few minutes will the compilation runs (you should have some time
to have a coffee right now!). If you get errors during the compilation, be
sure your system meet the requirements given at the beginning of the chapter.
You can also try to get a newer version (from the CVS, for example) or to
get some help on VMime user forums.

If everything has been compiled successfully, you can install the library and
the development files on your system:

\begin{verbatim}
   # make install
\end{verbatim}

\vnote{you must do that with superuser rights (root) if you chose to install
the library into the default location (ie: /usr/lib and /usr/include).}

Now, you are done! You can jump to the next chapter to know how to use VMime
in your program...