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Technology news and Jobs 
The Linux distillery Make Firefox fly: building from a minefield of source
The Linux distillery Make Firefox fly: building from a minefield of source | Make Firefox fly: building from a minefield of source |
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| by David M Williams | |
| Monday, 30 June 2008 | |
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Page 4 of 5 By default, Firefox will download programs into the Download folder under your home directory. Move back there and then unpack the tarball.[david@dmw firefox-3.0]$ cd ~ [david@dmw ~]$ cd Download [david@dmw Download]$ ls firefox-3.0-source.tar.bz2 [david@dmw Download]$ tar -xjf firefox-3.0-source.tar.bz2 [david@dmw Download]$ ls firefox-3.0-source.tar.bz2 mozilla To kick of the process for your computer, execute a local script called configure, like this: [david@dmw Download]$ cd mozilla [david@dmw mozilla]$ ./configure -enable-application=browser You will see pages of text fly by, where the configure script checks just what your system offers. This will include messages like checking host system type... i686-pc-linux-gnu checking whether the C compiler (gcc) works... yes checking for as... /usr/bin/as checking that static assertion macros used in autoconf tests work... yes checking for 64-bit OS... no checking for ANSI C header files... yes checking for int16_t... yes checking for trouble comparing to zero near std::operator!=()... no and so on. Before long you will notice the messages change; instead of checking, they are now creating: creating widget/Makefile creating xpfe/components/windowds/Makefile creating toolkit/crashreporter/Makefile creating jpeg/Makefile and on and on. Loads of new Makefiles have been constructed, all crafted specifically to match your very computer and its capabilities. The Makefiles contain all the instructions necessary to build each and every module and component that makes up Firefox. Although there are a large number, you can kick off the whole kablooey with just one simple command [david@dmw mozilla]$ make The make command will open the Makefile in the current directory, and begin compiling and building code as per the instructions contained within. Now go watch a movie, go out for dinner, or go up a level on World of Warcraft: this is going to take a while! Finally, finally, the process will complete. Let's check out the new executable. A new folder, dist (for "distributable" or "distribution"), has been made and in here we find the executable files and libraries. [david@dmw mozilla]$ cd dist/bin [david@dmw bin]$ ls -s firefox-bin 12 firefox-bin [david@dmw bin]$ ./firefox-bin & [23050] The new Firefox starts up! You'll know it is different right away from the previously installed version because it is brandished 'Minefield' and not 'Firefox.' What's going on? CONTINUED |
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