Compile

mruby uses Rake to compile and cross-compile all libraries and binaries.

Prerequisites

To compile mruby out of the source code you need the following tools:

C Compiler (e.g. gcc or clang)
Linker (e.g. gcc or clang)
Archive utility (e.g. ar)
Ruby 2.5 or later (e.g. ruby or jruby)

Optional:

Git (to update mruby source and integrate mrbgems easier)
C++ compiler (to use mrbgems which include *.cpp, *.cxx, *.cc)
Bison (to compile mrbgems/mruby-compiler/core/parse.y)
gperf (to compile mrbgems/mruby-compiler/core/keywords)

Note that bison bundled with macOS is too old to compile mruby. Try brew install bison and follow the instruction shown to update the $PATH to compile mruby. We also encourage you to upgrade ruby on macOS in similar manner.

Build

To compile mruby with the default build configuration, just invoke rake inside of the mruby source root. To generate and execute the test tools call rake test. To clean all build files call rake clean. To see full command line on build, call rake -v.

You can specify your own configuration file by the MRUBY_CONFIG environment variable (you can use CONFIG for shorthand for MRUBY_CONFIG). If the path doesn't exist, build_config/${MRUBY_CONFIG}.rb is used. The default configuration is defined in the build_config/default.rb file.

Those build configuration files contain the build configuration of mruby, for example:

MRuby::Build.new do |conf|
  conf.toolchain :gcc
end

All tools necessary to compile mruby can be set or modified here.

Build Configuration

We wish you submit a pull-request to build_config/PLATFORM.rb, once you created a new configuration for a new platform.

Inside the configuration file, the following options can be configured based on your environment.

Toolchains

The mruby build system already contains a set of toolchain templates which configure the build environment for specific compiler infrastructures.

GCC

Toolchain configuration for the GNU C Compiler.

conf.toolchain :gcc

clang

Toolchain configuration for the LLVM C Compiler clang. Mainly equal to the GCC toolchain.

conf.toolchain :clang

Visual Studio 2010, 2012 and 2013

Toolchain configuration for Visual Studio on Windows. If you use the Visual Studio Command Prompt, you normally do not have to specify this manually, since it gets automatically detected by our build process.

conf.toolchain :visualcpp

Android

Toolchain configuration for Android.

conf.toolchain :android

Requires the custom standalone Android NDK and the toolchain path in ANDROID_STANDALONE_TOOLCHAIN.

Binaries

It is possible to select which tools should be compiled during the compilation process. For example,

mruby
mirb

The configuration are done via mrbgems. See Mrbgems section.

File Separator

Some environments require a different file separator character. It is possible to set the character via conf.file_separator.

conf.file_separator = '/'

C Compiler

Configuration of the C compiler binary, flags and include paths.

conf.cc do |cc|
  cc.command = ...
  cc.flags = ...
  cc.include_paths = ...
  cc.defines = ...
  cc.option_include_path = ...
  cc.option_define = ...
  cc.compile_options = ...
end

C Compiler has header searcher to detect installed library.

If you need an include path of header file use search_header_path:

# Searches ```iconv.h```.
# If found it will return include path of the header file.
# Otherwise it will return nil .
fail 'iconv.h not found' unless conf.cc.search_header_path 'iconv.h'

If you need a full file name of header file use search_header:

# Searches ```iconv.h```.
# If found it will return full path of the header file.
# Otherwise it will return nil .
iconv_h = conf.cc.search_header 'iconv.h'
print "iconv.h found: #{iconv_h}\n"

Header searcher uses compiler's include_paths by default. When you are using GCC toolchain (including clang toolchain since its base is gcc toolchain) it will use compiler specific include paths too. (For example /usr/local/include, /usr/include)

If you need a special header search paths define a singleton method header_search_paths to C compiler:

def conf.cc.header_search_paths
  ['/opt/local/include'] + include_paths
end

Linker

Configuration of the Linker binary, flags and library paths.

conf.linker do |linker|
  linker.command = ...
  linker.flags = ...
  linker.flags_before_libraries = ...
  linker.libraries = ...
  linker.flags_after_libraries = ...
  linker.library_paths = ....
  linker.option_library = ...
  linker.option_library_path = ...
  linker.link_options = ...
end

Archiver

Configuration of the Archiver binary and flags.

conf.archiver do |archiver|
  archiver.command = ...
  archiver.archive_options = ...
end

Parser Generator

Configuration of the Parser Generator binary and flags.

conf.yacc do |yacc|
  yacc.command = ...
  yacc.compile_options = ...
end

GPerf

Configuration of the GPerf binary and flags.

conf.gperf do |gperf|
  gperf.command = ...
  gperf.compile_options = ...
end

File Extensions

conf.exts do |exts|
  exts.object = ...
  exts.executable = ...
  exts.library = ...
end

Preallocated Symbols

By far, preallocated symbols are highly compatible with the previous versions, so we expect you won't see any problem with them. But just in case you face any issue, you can disable preallocated symbols by specifying conf.disable_presym.

In the build process, mrbc under cross compiling environment will be compiled with this configuration.

Mrbgems

mruby comes with the (sort of) packaging system named mrbgems. To specify gem, you can use conf.gem in the configuration file.

# Integrate a bundled Gem you see in `mrbgems` directory
conf.gem :core => 'mruby-something'

# Integrate a Gem from GitHub
conf.gem :github => 'someone/mruby-another'

# Integrate a mruby binary Gem
conf.gem :core => 'mruby-bin-mruby'

# Integrate a interactive mruby binary Gem
conf.gem :core => 'mruby-bin-mirb'

# Integrate GemBox (set of Gems)
conf.gembox "default"

A GemBox is a set of Gems defined in mrbgems/default.gembox for example. It's just a set of mrbgem configurations.

There is a RubyGem (gem for CRuby) named mgem that help you to manage mrbgems. Try gem install mgem. mgem can show you the list of registered mrbgems.

See doc/mrbgems/README.md for more option about mrbgems.

Mrbtest

Configuration Mrbtest build process.

If you want mrbtest.a only, You should set conf.build_mrbtest_lib_only

conf.build_mrbtest_lib_only

Bintest

Tests for mrbgem tools using CRuby. To have bintests place *.rb scripts to bintest/ directory of mrbgems. See mruby-bin-*/bintest/*.rb if you need examples. If you want a temporary files use tempfile module of CRuby instead of /tmp/.

You can enable it with following:

conf.enable_bintest

C++ ABI

By default, mruby uses setjmp/longjmp to implement its exceptions. But it doesn't release C++ stack object correctly. To support mrbgems written in C++, mruby can be configured to use C++ exception.

There are two levels of C++ exception handling. The one is enable_cxx_exception that enables C++ exception, but uses C ABI. The other is enable_cxx_abi where all files are compiled by C++ compiler.

When you mix C++ code, C++ exception would be enabled automatically. If you need to enable C++ exception explicitly add the following:

conf.enable_cxx_exception

C++ exception disabling

If your compiler does not support C++, and you want to ensure you don't use mrbgem written in C++, you can explicitly disable C++ exception, add following:

conf.disable_cxx_exception

and you will get an error when you try to use C++ gem. Note that it must be called before enable_cxx_exception or gem method.

Debugging mode

To enable debugging mode add the following:

conf.enable_debug

When debugging mode is enabled

Macro MRB_DEBUG would be defined.
- Which means mrb_assert() macro is enabled.
Debug information of irep would be generated by mrbc.
- Because -g flag would be added to mrbc runner.
  - You can have better backtrace of mruby scripts with this.

Cross-Compilation

mruby can also be cross-compiled from one platform to another. To achieve cross-compilation, the build configuration needs to contain an instance of MRuby::CrossBuild. This instance defines the compilation tools and flags for the target platform. An example could look like this:

MRuby::CrossBuild.new('32bit') do |conf|
  conf.toolchain :gcc

  conf.cc.flags << "-m32"
  conf.linker.flags << "-m32"
end

All configuration options of MRuby::Build can also be used in MRuby::CrossBuild. You can find examples under the build_config directory.

Mrbtest in Cross-Compilation

In cross compilation, you can run mrbtest on an emulator if you have it by changing configuration of test runner.

conf.test_runner do |t|
  t.command = ... # set emulator. this value must be non nil or false
  t.flags = ... # set flags of emulator

  def t.run(bin) # override `run` if you need to change the behavior of it
    ... # `bin` is the full path of mrbtest
  end
end

Build process

During the build process the directory build will be created in the root directory. The structure of this directory will look like this:

+- build
    |
    +- host
        |
        +- LEGAL        <- License description
        |
        +- bin          <- Binaries (mirb, mrbc and mruby)
        |
        +- lib          <- Libraries (libmruby.a and libmruby_core.a)
        |
        +- mrbc         <- Minimal mrbc place
        |
        +- mrbgems      <- Compilation result from mrbgems
        |
        +- mrblib       <- Compilation result from mrblib
        |
        +- src          <- Compilation result from C sources

The compilation workflow will look like this:

compile minimal mrbc from src and mrblib sources
- compile all files under src (object files will be stored in build/host/mrbc/src)
- compile mruby-compiler gem
- create build/host/mrbc/lib/libmruby_core.a out of all object files (C only)
- create build/host/mrbc/bin/mrbc via mruby-bin-mrbc gem
compile all files under src and store result in build/host/src
create build/host/mrblib/mrblib.c by compiling all *.rb files under mrblib with build/host/mrbc/bin/mrbc
compile build/host/mrblib/mrblib.c to build/host/mrblib/mrblib.o
create build/host/lib/libmruby.a out of all object files (C and Ruby)
compile (normal) mrbgems specified in the configuration file
create build/host/lib/libmruby.a from object files from gems and libmruby_core.a
create binary commands according to binary gems (e.g. mirb and mruby)
copy binaries under build/host/bin to bin directory

 _____    _____    ______    ____    ____    _____    _____    ____
| CC  |->|GEN  |->|AR    |->|CC  |->|CC  |->|AR   |->|CC   |->|CC  |
| *.c |  |y.tab|  |core.a|  |mrbc|  |*.rb|  |lib.a|  |mruby|  |mirb|
 -----    -----    ------    ----    ----    -----    -----    ----

Cross-Compilation

In case of a cross-compilation to i386 the build directory structure looks like this:

+- build
    |
    +- host
    |   |
    |   +- bin           <- Native Binaries
    |   |
    |   +- lib           <- Native Libraries
    |   |
    |   +- mrbgems
    |   |
    |   +- src
    |
    +- i386
        |
        +- bin            <- Cross-compiled Binaries
        |
        +- include        <- Header Directory
        |
        +- lib            <- Cross-compiled Libraries
        |
        +- mrbgems
        |
        +- mrblib
        |
        +- src

An extra directory is created for the target platform. In case you compile for i386 a directory called i386 is created under the build directory.

The cross compilation workflow starts in the same way as the normal compilation by compiling all native libraries and binaries, except for we don't have host/mrbc directory (host directory itself works as placeholder for mrbc). Afterwards the cross compilation process proceeds like this:

cross-compile all files under src and store result in build/i386/src
create build/i386/lib/libmruby_core.a out of C object files
create build/i386/mrblib/mrblib.c by compiling all *.rb files under mrblib with native build/host/bin/mrbc
cross-compile build/i386/mrblib/mrblib.c to build/i386/mrblib/mrblib.o
create build/i386/lib/libmruby.a from object files from gems and libmruby_core.a
create binary commands according to binary gems (e.g. mirb and mruby)
copy binaries under build/host/bin to bin directory

 _______________________________________________________________
|              Native Compilation for Host System               |
|  _____      ______      _____      ____      ____      _____  |
| | CC  | -> |AR    | -> |GEN  | -> |CC  | -> |CC  | -> |AR   | |
| | *.c |    |core.a|    |y.tab|    |mrbc|    |*.rb|    |lib.a| |
|  -----      ------      -----      ----      ----      -----  |
 ---------------------------------------------------------------
                                ||
                               \||/
                                \/
 ________________________________________________________________
|             Cross Compilation for Target System                |
|  _____      _____      _____      ____      ______      _____  |
| | CC  | -> |AR   | -> |CC   | -> |CC  | -> |AR    | -> |CC   | |
| | *.c |    |lib.a|    |mruby|    |mirb|    |core.a|    |mrbc | |
|  -----      -----      -----      ----      ------      -----  |
 ----------------------------------------------------------------

Build Configuration Examples

Minimal Library

To build a minimal mruby library you need to use the Cross Compiling feature due to the reason that there are functions (e.g. stdio) which can't be disabled for the main build.

MRuby::CrossBuild.new('minimal') do |conf|
  conf.toolchain :gcc
  conf.cc.defines << 'MRB_NO_STDIO'
end

This configuration defines a cross compile build called 'minimal' which is using the GCC and compiles for the host machine. It also disables all usages of stdio and doesn't compile any binaries (e.g. mrbc).

Test Environment

mruby's build process includes a test environment. In case you start the testing of mruby, a native binary called mrbtest will be generated and executed. This binary contains all test cases which are defined under test/t. In case of a cross-compilation an additional cross-compiled mrbtest binary is generated. You can copy this binary and run on your target system.

Embedding `mruby` in Your Application

After the build, you will get libmruby.a. You can link it to your application.

For compiler options and library path, you can use mruby-config command for convenience. mruby-config command prints the configuration used for libmruby.a.

$ mruby-config --help
Usage: mruby-config [switches]
  switches:
  --cc                        print compiler name
  --cflags                    print flags passed to compiler
  --ld                        print linker name
  --ldflags                   print flags passed to linker
  --ldflags-before-libs       print flags passed to linker before linked libraries
  --libs                      print linked libraries
  --libmruby-path             print libmruby path
  --help                      print this help

For example, when you have a C source file (c.c) and try to compile and link it with libmruby.a, you can run the following command,

gcc `mruby-config --cflags` c.c `mruby-config --ldflags` `mruby-config --libs`

When you use make, add following lines in Makefile

MRB_CONFIG = <path-to-mruby-config>
CFLAGS = `$(MRB_CONFIG) --cflags`
LDFLAGS = `$(MRB_CONFIG) --ldflags`
LIBS = `$(MRB_CONFIG) --libs`

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Compile

Prerequisites

Build

Build Configuration

Toolchains

GCC

clang

Visual Studio 2010, 2012 and 2013

Android

Binaries

File Separator

C Compiler

Linker

Archiver

Parser Generator

GPerf

File Extensions

Preallocated Symbols

Mrbgems

Mrbtest

Bintest

C++ ABI

C++ exception disabling

Debugging mode

Cross-Compilation

Mrbtest in Cross-Compilation

Build process

Cross-Compilation

Build Configuration Examples

Minimal Library

Test Environment

Embedding `mruby` in Your Application

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Compile

Prerequisites

Build

Build Configuration

Toolchains

GCC

clang

Visual Studio 2010, 2012 and 2013

Android

Binaries

File Separator

C Compiler

Linker

Archiver

Parser Generator

GPerf

File Extensions

Preallocated Symbols

Mrbgems

Mrbtest

Bintest

C++ ABI

C++ exception disabling

Debugging mode

Cross-Compilation

Mrbtest in Cross-Compilation

Build process

Cross-Compilation

Build Configuration Examples

Minimal Library

Test Environment

Embedding mruby in Your Application

Embedding `mruby` in Your Application