Building Ogre with boost 1.50 upwards and MinGW This is a step-by-step guide for building Ogre, its dependencies and boost from sources, using your favourite Windows compiler, MinGW 😊 It covers every single step and will be the only tutorial you need to read for building Ogre if this is your desired setup. Tested on Windows 7 x64 with Ogre 1.10.0

Introduction

This guide covers how to do a static Ogre build with a certain plugin setup, but on the important places, a note will be added that tells what to do differently for a dynamic build or other plugins.

We will assume a lot of different folders in the course of this tutorial. You may of course derive from them if you want.

1. Download the Ogre sources

Download the latest Ogre sources, using Mercurial, from the Ogre repository:

http://bitbucket.org/sinbad/ogre/

For the purpose of this tutorial, let's assume you downloaded them to the following folder: C:\Ogre\sources\v1-8

Now make sure you switch your local repository to the branch of Ogre you actually want to use (like v1-8 or v1-9).
For example, with TortoiseHG, you have to "Update" your repo, selecting the branch you need.

2. Download the Ogre dependencies

The same as above, but download them from the following repository:

https://bitbucket.org/cabalistic/ogredeps/downloads

https://bitbucket.org/ali1234/ogredeps/downloads

This time, let's assume the following folder: C:\Ogre\sources\dependencies

If you want DirectX support, you will also have to download and install the DirectX SDK:
Download and install DirectX 9 SDK

3. Download and install CMake

Download and install CMake
Be sure to use the latest version.

4. Download and install MinGW

Download the latest MinGW version from here, and install it.
It is advised to install it to the default directory: C:\MinGW
Make sure to use "Download latest repository catalogue". The current pre-packaged is GCC 4.6 only (may change in the future).
Also be sure to add C:\MinGW\bin and C:\MinGW\msys\1.0\bin to your PATH.

Or you can choose to use the TDM version of MinGW, which provides many bug fixes aside from just the MinGW project, from http://tdm-gcc.tdragon.net/download (current version is GCC 4.8.1).
Generally it will automatically add your installation directory to the PATH, but just in case you should check.

5. Download boost

Download boost from here. This tutorial was written with version 1.50 in mind, but should work for any newer version as well.
Let's assume C:\boost as the path.

6. Building boost

Now we come to the fun part - building!

1. Navigate to C:\boost
2. Open index.html and go to "Getting Started" -> "Getting Started on Microsoft Windows"
3. Follow the steps to build boost from sources. You will most likely want to read section 5.3 "Build Binaries from source". Mind the following:
   1. Whenever you're supposed to run "bootstrap.bat", run "bootstrap.bat gcc" instead.
   2. As you are using MinGW, specify gcc as toolset when actually building boost.
   3. Building boost takes much time. Get a cup of tea.
   4. If you use the following line to build boost...
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      b2 --build-dir=C:\boost\build toolset=gcc --build-type=complete stage

      ... you will end up with a stage folder in C:\boost. Move the lib folder inside the stage folder to C:\boost so that you end up having a C:\boost\lib folder.
   5. If you get a "Duplicate name of actual target" error when building boost, use "minimal" build-type instead of "complete".
4. Add C:\boost to PATH and create new environment variables named BOOST_ROOT and Boost_DIR also pointing to C:\boost.

7. Building the Ogre dependencies

1. Open the CMake GUI.
2. Set "Where is the source code" to C:\Ogre\sources\dependencies.
3. Set "Where to build the binaries" to C:\Ogre\building\dep-release. THIS IS NOT the final dependencies folder. It is merely the folder we will use to build the SDK.
4. Click "Configure" to init CMake. Select "MinGW Makefiles".
5. Based on your setup, CMake may or may not output some errors. Make sure to resolve them before continuing. CMake is usually pretty verbose about what to do. If you are having trouble, you can always ask in our forums, of course 😊. Click "Configure" again until no more errors appear.
6. Change CMAKE_INSTALL_PREFIX to C:\Ogre\built\dependencies. Click "Generate".
7. Repeat 3) – 6), this time changing CMAKE_BUILD_TYPE to "Debug". Also change the "Where to build the binaries" folder to C:\Ogre\building\dep-debug.
8. Open a command line in C:\Ogre\building\dep-release and type in "mingw32-make install". This will take a minute or two. Do this also for the debug folder.
9. Navigate to C:\Ogre\built\dependencies. Navigate to lib/Release within that folder and copy the cg.lib to lib/Debug. Somehow, the install make misses this.
10. Create a new folder in C:\Ogre\sources\v1-8, call it Dependencies and copy all the contents from C:\Ogre\built\dependencies there.

// Warning: tif_fd is declared as 'int' currently (see libTIFF), 
    // may result in incorrect file pointers inside libTIFF on 
    // 64bit machines (sizeof(int) != sizeof(long)). 
    // Needs to be fixed within libTIFF.
   if (tif) {
      tif->tif_fd = (long)handle;
   }

   return tif;

tif->tif_fd = (intptr_t)handle;

8. Building OIS statically (OPTIONAL)

1. To build static OIS you will need to build it separately from the other ogredeps. First get the source from
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   http://sourceforge.net/projects/wgois/

   . Let's assume you use the original name of the folder which is ois-v-1-3.
2. Navigate to ois-v-1-3/Win32/ and open ois.cbp with Code::Blocks.
3. Set the project compiler search path to your DirectX SDK directory, so it can find all the headers needed.
4. Make some changes in the code, as it will not compile out of the box:

In Win32Joystick.cpp line 587:
hr = CoCreateInstance(uuidof(WbemLocator), NULL, CLSCTX_INPROC_SERVER, uuidof(IWbemLocator), (LPVOID*)&pIWbemLocator);
uses the VC keyword __uuidof, which MingW doesn't have. Change this line to:
hr = CoCreateInstance(CLSID_WbemLocator, NULL, CLSCTX_INPROC_SERVER, IID_IWbemLocator, (LPVOID*)&pIWbemLocator);

Also the two instances of swscanf_s (Microsoft specific) were changed to swscanf.

1. The libraries that have the Microsoft COM functions that are used in W32Joystick setup need to be linked in. These libraries are ole32 and oleaut32.
2. OIS static libs (the build targets are Release and Debug) should be successfully, but the .dlls still need more libs to link against, those are: wbemuuid.lib, dinput8 and dxguid.
3. When you have succesfully compiled all build targets, copy libs from ois-v-1-3/lib into your dependencies folder. Change their names to "libOIS.a" and "libOIS_d.a" for each one respectively and replace the old libs.
4. Replace the old .dlls with new ones from ois-v-1-3/dll just like you did with the libs.
5. You have successfully replaced dynamic OIS from ogredeps with static OIS you just compiled.

9. Building the Ogre SDK

C:\Ogre\sources\v1-8

1. Open the CMake GUI.
2. Set "Where is the source code" to .
3. Set "Where to build the binaries" to C:\Ogre\building\ogre-release. THIS IS NOT the final SDK folder. It is merely the folder we will use to build the SDK.
4. Click "Configure" to init CMake. Select "MinGW Makefiles".
5. CMake should find the dependencies but if it does not, set the OGRE_DEPENDENCIES_DIR to C:\Ogre\sources\v1-8\Dependencies manually.
6. You can ignore the "Boost_DIR-NOTFOUND" if everything else worked well. If you have a look at the vars in "Advanced" CMake mode, you will see that all boost related vars except that one are correct.
7. Set the CMAKE_INSTALL_PREFIX to C:\Ogre\built\ogre-sdk. Click "Configure" again.
8. If everything worked out, you will get a load of new configurations. Make sure to select OGRE_STATIC, OGRE_INSTALL_SAMPLES and OGRE_INSTALL_DOCS.
   1. If you want a dynamic build, do not select OGRE_STATIC 😊
   2. You can of course select other plugins as you desire, but this tutorial does only "guarantee" to work for the stated ones.
9. Click "Configure" again, resolving all problems that might appear, until everything goes well. Click "Generate".
10. Repeat 3) – 9), this time changing CMAKE_BUILD_TYPE to "Debug". Also change the "Where to build the binaries" folder to C:\Ogre\building\ogre-debug.
11. Open a command line in C:\Ogre\building\ogre-release and type in "mingw32-make install". This will take some time, so get another cup of tea. Do this also for the debug folder (and get your third cup of tea).

if (!GetMonitorInfo(hMonitor, &monitorInfoEx))
            {
                DWORD le = GetLastError();
                LogManager::getSingleton().logMessage(LML_CRITICAL, 
                    ::Ogre::String("Win32Window::create(): Call to GetMonitorInfo() failed.")
                    + ::Ogre::String(" GetLastError() returns: ")
                    + ::Ogre::StringConverter::toString(le)
                    );
                OGRE_EXCEPT(Exception::ERR_RENDERINGAPI_ERROR, "Call to GetMonitorInfo() failed", "Win32Window::create()");
            }

+ ::Ogre::StringConverter::toString(size_t(le))

10. Done

That's it!
You'll have a ready-to-use-with-MinGW Ogre SDK sitting in C:\Ogre\built\ogre-sdk, both in release and debug version.
Try out the samples, they rock! 😀
Also, you'll probably want to go to the toilet with all that tea you just drank.

If you should encounter any problems while reading, please post in the forum thread for this article.