Compiling on Windows using MSVC

Requirements

Compiling and installing the dependencies

It is highly recommended to use vcpkg as package manager.

After you successfully built vcpkg you can easily install the required libraries:

vcpkg install zlib zstd curl[winssl] openal-soft libvorbis libogg libjpeg-turbo sqlite3 freetype luajit gmp jsoncpp gettext sdl2 --triplet x64-windows

Don't forget about IrrlichtMt. The easiest way is to clone it to lib/irrlichtmt:

for /F %i in (misc\irrlichtmt_tag.txt) do git clone --depth 1 --branch %i https://github.com/minetest/irrlicht.git lib\irrlichtmt

curl is optional, but required to read the serverlist, curl[winssl] is required to use the content store.
openal-soft, libvorbis and libogg are optional, but required to use sound.
luajit is optional, it replaces the integrated Lua interpreter with a faster just-in-time interpreter.
gmp and jsoncpp are optional, otherwise the bundled versions will be compiled
gettext is optional, but required to use translations.

There are other optional libraries, but they are not tested if they can build and link correctly.

Use --triplet to specify the target triplet, e.g. x64-windows or x86-windows.

Compile Minetest

a) Using the vcpkg toolchain and CMake GUI

Start up the CMake GUI
Select Browse Source... and select DIR/minetest
Select Browse Build... and select DIR/minetest-build
Select Configure
Choose the right visual Studio version and target platform. It has to match the version of the installed dependencies
Choose Specify toolchain file for cross-compiling
Click Next
Select the vcpkg toolchain file e.g. D:/vcpkg/scripts/buildsystems/vcpkg.cmake
Click Finish
Wait until cmake have generated the cash file
If there are any errors, solve them and hit Configure
Click Generate
Click Open Project
Compile Minetest inside Visual studio.

b) Using the vcpkg toolchain and the commandline

Run the following script in PowerShell:

cmake . -G"Visual Studio 15 2017 Win64" -DCMAKE_TOOLCHAIN_FILE=D:/vcpkg/scripts/buildsystems/vcpkg.cmake -DCMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=Release -DENABLE_GETTEXT=OFF -DENABLE_CURSES=OFF
cmake --build . --config Release

Make sure that the right compiler is selected and the path to the vcpkg toolchain is correct.

Windows Installer using WiX Toolset

Requirements:

In the Visual Studio 2017 Installer select Optional Features -> WiX Toolset.

Build the binaries as described above, but make sure you unselect RUN_IN_PLACE.

Open the generated project file with Visual Studio. Right-click Package and choose Generate. It may take some minutes to generate the installer.

3.0 KiB Raw Blame History