MINGW PORT OF ICARUS VERILOG Copyright 2003 Stephen Williams Icarus Verilog source can be compiled with the mingw C/C++ compilers to get a Windows binary that does not require the POSIX compatibility cruft of the Cygwin.dll library. The resulting program can be run with or without Cygwin, so this is the preferred Windows distribution form. The configure scripts automatically detect that the compilers in use are the mingw compilers and will configure the Makefiles appropriately. However, the mingw tools do not include all the other tools around the compiler, including the shell interpreter for the configure script, bison, flex, gperf, etc. Therefore, you still need Cygwin to compile Icarus Verilog, even if you don't need the Cygwin compilers. There are also a few precompiled library prerequisites that you need. * Some Preliminary Comments The Windows port of Icarus Verilog is the most difficult of all the ports. The Windows system off the shelf is completely stripped, devoid of any support for software development. Everything needed to compile Icarus Verilog must be collected from various sources and stitched together by hand. Normal human beings with a basic understanding of software development can do this, but some patience (and access to the internet) is required. You may choose to print these instructions. I have no plans to intentionally support MSVC++ compilation. Don't ask. * Summary of Prerequisites This is a brief list of prerequisite packages, along with the URL where each can be found. In most cases, the specific version is not critical, but these are the versions I use. Cygwin Mingw32-2.0.0 readline-4.2-20010727.zip bzip2-1.0.2-bin.zip zlib-1.1.4-bin.zip bzip2-1.0.2-lib.zip zlib-1.1.4-lib.zip The above table lists the packages required. It is convenient to install them in the above order. Many of these packages are also collected into the directory: Incidentally, besides Mingw32, none of these packages are needed after installation of Icarus Verilog is complete. These are only needed to build the compiler. The Mingw32 package can be used to compile VPI modules if you choose. * Install Cygwin So, step 1 is "Download and Install Cygwin." See the web page http://www.cygwin.com for instructions and the files to do this. Cygwin *is* a kool package, and is worth having anyhow. There is a convenient setup program that you download first. You execute the setup program, and that prompts you to select the package you want. You need in particular the Cygwin base, bison (see notes) flex, make and gperf. If you are compiling from CVS, you also need cvs, rcs and automake packages. You will also need tar and gunzip, but these are hard to not install. I recommend installing the "which" package as well. Beyond the basics, be sure to install these Cygwin packages: bison (*not* 1.875. See Notes.) flex ghostscript (makes the documentation) gperf gzip make strip tar (tar and gunzip for unpacking the source) unzip (For unpacking zip compressed packages.) which NOTES: bison-1.875 is broken, it generates invalid C/C++ code. You don't want that version for anything you do. If you have that version (use "bison -V" to check the version) then use the Cygwin setup program to get a different version. I've downgraded to 1.75 and couldn't be happier. In fact, a whole host of insane bison bugs can be avoided that way. There is a mingw32 runtime package included in the Cygwin distribution. You do *not* need that, as you will be getting everything from the mingw32 distribution itself. Other then the install of mingw32, most of the remaining steps are best done in a Cygwin window. When you installed Cygwin, a start menu entry was created to allow you to start up the Cygwin window. I'll use the string "$ " to represent a command prompt in this window, because that is the usual bash prompt. * Install Mingw32 The obvious step 2, then, is install the mingw compilers. These can be found at the web page . The Mingw-2.x.x version comes prepackaged in a convenient, Windows style, installer. I recommend you download this package instead of picking and choosing bits. When I install Mingw32 (using the installer) I typically set a destination directory of d:\mingw-2.0.0 or the like. You will be using that path later. NOTES: If you intend to compile VPI modules for Icarus Verilog, you need Mingw32, even if you are using a precompiled binary. VPI modules only require Mingw32, and none of the other libraries. * Install Mingw32 Packages There is a collection of precompiled libraries and add-on packages that are intended for use with the Mingw32 compiler. These do not come with simplified Windows installers, but they are pretty easy to install by hand. Icarus Verilog uses the readline-4.2 package from that collection. Since I installed Mingw32 in d:\mingw-2.0.0, I also created a Mingw-packages directory called d:\mingw-packages. The install, then, is as easy as this: $ cd d:/mingw-packages $ unzip readline-4.2-20010727.zip [lots of inflating...] Done. On to the next packages. * Install GnuWin32 Packages The GnuWin32 project is a collections of open source programs and libraries ported to Windows. These also work well with the Mingw compiler, and in fact Icarus Verilog uses a few libraries from this collection. You will need these gnuwin32 packages to compile Icarus Verilog: bzip2-1.0.2-lib.zip bzip2-1.0.2-bin.zip zlib-1.1.4-lib.zip zlib-1.1.4-bin.zip I suggest creating a common directory for holding all your gnuwin32 packages. I use D:\gnuwin32. After downloading these packages, put the .zip files in your gnuwin32 directory and install them like so: $ cd d:/gnuwin32 $ unzip bzip2-1.0.2-bin.zip [lots of inflating...] $ unzip bzip2-1.0.2-lib.zip [lots of inflating...] $ unzip zlib-1.1.4-bin.zip [lots of inflating...] $ unzip zlib-1.1.4-lib.zip [lots of inflating...] Done. * Unpack Icarus Verilog source Unpack the compressed tar file (.tar.gz) of the source with a command like this: $ gunzip -d verilog-20030303.tar.gz | tar xvf - This will create a directory "verilog-20030303" that contains all the source for Icarus Verilog. Descend into that directory, as that is where we will work from now on. $ cd verilog-20030303 NOTE: The exact name of the file will vary according to the snapshot. The 20030303 name is only an example. * Select the mingw compilers In your cygwin window, if you type "which c++" you might get the response path "/usr/bin/c++" which is the cygwin compiler. This is not the one we want to use, however. Tell the shell where the mingw compilers are by setting the search path like so: $ PATH=/cygdrive/d/mingw-2.0.0/bin:$PATH This assumes that you installed mingw in D:\mingw-2.0.0. The actual programs are in the bin directory under the root. After this command, check that you are now getting the right compilers with this "which" command: $ which c++ /cygdrive/d/mingw-2.0.0/bin/c++ Good! * Configure Icarus Verilog Now we are all set to configure and compile Icarus Verilog. Choose a destination path where you will want to install the binaries. I chose on my system the directory "D:\iverilog". This choice is not permanent, so don't get too much angst over it. Just choose a name without white space. Now, configure the source to make the makefiles and configuration details. Run these commands: $ CPPFLAGS="-Id:/gnuwin32/include -Id:/mingw-packages/include" $ LDFLAGS="-Ld:/gnuwin32/lib -Ld:/mingw-packages/include" $ export CPPFLAGS LDFLAGS $ ./configure --prefix=d:/iverilog NOTES: The CPPFLAGS and LDFLAGS variables tell configure where the gnuwin32 packages are. The configure program will write these values into the Makefiles, so you only need to keep these variables long enough for the configure program to work. Your PATH variable was set in the previous step. Use forward slashes as directory charactors. All the various tools prefer the forward slash. Substitute your chosen directory for the prefix. This will cause the makefiles to build and the source code to configure. The configure program will detect that this is a mingw environment and set things up to build properly. (For a prefix, use the drive letter notation; the mingw compiled parts require it, and the Cygwin tools should be able to handle it. You may need to check or upgrade your Cygwin installation if this causes problems for you.) * Compile Icarus Verilog This, believe it or not, should be the easy part: $ make It could take a while. Now is a good time to go get some coffee or take a tea break. * Install Icarus Verilog If the compile ran OK, then next you install Icarus Verilog in the directory you have chosen. When you are ready, install like this: $ make install This is part of what the configure program did for you. The Makefiles now know to put the files under the D:\iverilog directory (or whatever directory you chose) and away you go. You may find that you need to put some of the prerequisite DLLS into the d:\iverilog\bin directory. These include: d:\mingw-2.0.0\bin\mingw10.dll d:\mingw-packages\bin\libreadline.dll d:\gnuwin32\bin\bzip2.dll d:\gnuwin32\bin\zlib.dll If you already have these in your Windows path (i.e. your system32 directory) then you do not need to copy them into the iverilog directory. However, prepackaged Icarus Verilog binaries include these files. * Running Icarus Verilog Finally, put the D:\iverilog\bin directory in your Windows path, and you should be able to run the iverilog and vvp commands to your heart's content. Currently, the iverilog.exe uses the path to itself to locate the libraries and modules associated with itself. In other words, if you execute the D:\iverilog\bin\iverilog.exe program, it will locate its subparts in the D:\iverilog directory and subdirectories below that. This means you can move the Icarus Verilog installation by simply moving the root directory and all its contents. The vvp.pdf and iverilog.pdf files document the main commands. View these with Acrobat reader, or any other viewer capable of displaying PDF format files.