Configuration

To configure CMake to build in <mcrl2>/build, and assuming that the sources are in <mcrl2>/src, make sure <mcrl2>/build exists before continuing with the following steps. There are three ways to configure CMake:

Graphically
A graphical user interface cmake-gui is available on all platforms (in Linux you may have to install it separately, it is, e.g., currently in the cmake-qt-gui package in the PPA for Ubuntu installations). Use of this user interface is mostly self-explanatory.
CCMake

A user-friendly command-line interface is provided by the ccmake executable. Example usage is as follows (from the directory <mcrl2>/build):

ccmake <mcrl2>/src

From the interface you are presented with, you can choose the options explained below.

Command-line

CMake can also be run directly from the command line. This is recommended only for experienced users who need to configure the build from a script. To set a configuration variable, use the -D<FLAG=option> command-line option.

Example usage is as follows (from the directory <mcrl2>/build):

cmake <mcrl2>/src -DFLAG=option

To install mCRL2 to <installdir>, with all default settings, you can issue the command:

cmake <mcrl2>/src -DCMAKE_INSTALL_PREFIX=<installdir>

Windows

When configuring on Windows, the 64-bit generator of Visual Studio 2017 is needed. In case of CMake version 3.13 or lower, in cmake-gui select the generator Visual Studio 15 2017 Win64. In case of CMake version 3.14 or higher, in cmake-gui select the generator Visual Studio 15 2017 and select x64 as the “Optional platform for generator”.

All three methods allow you to change the value of CMake configuration variables. Below, we describe the meaning of these variables. Note that in the graphical user interfaces, some advanced settings are initially hidden.

Note

For a typical installation of mCRL2, the default settings are acceptable for all the options listed below. The only common change is in the path to which mCRL2 must be installed, which can be set using CMAKE_INSTALL_PREFIX. If you are not interested in the meaning of detailed configuration settings, you can safely skip to Compilation.

Note

Values of the flags are cached and are case insensitive. This implies that when changing a single value, all other flags remain the same.

BOOST_ROOT

Default:: Automatically detected

Specifies the path to the Boost libraries. This is normally automatically detected, but may have to be set manually when Boost was compiled manually, or when detection fails.

CMAKE_BUILD_TYPE

Default: Release

This variable controls the type of build when using a single-configuration generator like the Makefile generator. This variable has no effect for Visual Studio projects as they contain multiple-configurations.

Release Compile with optimisations enabled. Debug information is not generated.
Debug Compile with extra checks, less optimisation and with generation of debug symbols.
RelwithDebInfo

Same as Release, except that debug information is also generated.

Warning

Historically, some extra checks were enabled in this mode. There may therefore still be differences in behaviour, compared to the Release setting.
MinSizeRel Same as Release, but instructs the compiler to optimise for size.
CMAKE_INSTALL_PREFIX

Default: /usr/local/

The installation prefix for mCRL2. All mCRL2 files will be installed there.

BUILD_SHARED_LIBS

Default: ON

ON Generate shared libraries, to which the executables link.
OFF Generate static libraries, which are linked into the executables. This increases the size of executables dramatically.
MCRL2_ENABLE_EXPERIMENTAL

Default: OFF

ON Compile experimental tools.
OFF Do not compile experimental tools.
MCRL2_ENABLE_DEPRECATED

Default: OFF

ON Compile deprecated tools.
OFF Do not compile deprecated tools.
MCRL2_ENABLE_PROFILING

Default: OFF

ON Enable profiling when executing tools.
OFF Disable profiling when executing tools.
MCRL2_ENABLE_TEST_TARGETS

Default: OFF

ON Generate test targets. This option needs to be enabled in combination with BUILD_TESTING to execute library tests. If not enabled, only tool tests are executed when BUILD_TESTING is enabled.
OFF Disable profiling when executing tools.
MCRL2_MAN_PAGES

Default: ON

ON Enable generation of manual pages.
OFF Disable generation of manual pages.
MCRL2_ENABLE_GUI_TOOLS

Default: ON

ON Compile graphical tools (diagraphica, ltsgraph, ltsview, mcrl2-gui, lpsxsim, mcrl2ide).
OFF Do not compile graphical tools.
BUILD_TESTING

Default: ON

ON Execute tests after successful build. The tests that are exeuted are determined by the MCRL2_ENABLE_TEST_TARGETS configuration variable.
OFF Do not execute tests.
CTAGS

Default: /PATH/WITH/FILE/ctags

This variable specifies the location where Ctags can be found. Ctags is a program that generates an index (or tag) file of names found in source and header files of various programming languages.

Qt5_DIR

This variable specifies the location where Qt can be found.

Windows

It should be set to <path_to_Qt_dir>\<Qt_version>\msvc2017_64\lib\cmake\Qt5.

Mac OS X

On Mac, this variable should have the value <Qt_dir>/qtbase/lib/cmake/Qt5, <Qt_dir> is the path to the directory where Qt was installed.

Linux

On Linux, the right path is generally automatically detected.