This article describes step by step compilation of PlexyDesk on the Windows Platform, so you can easily prepare a Windows package of PlexyDesk from sources. For sources we use the GitHub Sources of PlexyDesk, but you may use the packed sources from SourceForge project page.

This article may help you compiling other open source applications too because the process is always very similar.

Note: The links on this page may be outdated but you should find the files we are talking about easily.

1. Install the latest version of Git for Windows. At the time of this writing you can get the exe file from here. When installing, please choose the option to add Git to the system PATH (may not have this option in the next releases though).
2. Install the latest version of CMake for Windows. Just choose the latest Windows (Win32 Installer) from the list there. When installing, please choose the option to add CMake to the system PATH. NOTE: Have in mind that sometimes the CMake installer fails to add the path to cmake.exe (which is something like C:\CMake 2.8\bin for example), so you should add it manually to your PATH before proceeding to the next steps.
3. Install the latest version of NSIS for Windows. After installation you better add manually the folder where you have installed it to your system PATH. For information how to do it follow this article from Microsoft or this thread.
4. Install the latest 7z GUI for Windows. Choose to download whatever suits your needs - x86, x64, .msi or the .exe. The reason we use this is that it can support browsing and extraction of packages prepared with NSIS.
5. Now you have to decide what version of PlexyDesk you will like and what development tools you will use. A general rule of thumb is that you should use similar architecture and building tools for all that you are going to build. That means if you will build PlexyDesk x86, all the tools and libraries have to be build for x86 and build by one and the same tool like Visual Studio 9 2008 (MSVC 2008). Since PlexyDesk is a bleeding edge software, we advice you to use latest technologies and versions too, i.e. MS Visual Studio 10 (MSVC 10) and self prepared QT libraries build with the MSVC 10.
   1. For x86 platform and MSVC 2008 (this is the easiest and fastest way to compile) PlexyDesk's versions you will need:
      1. Microsoft Windows SDK. For additional information or other links you may look here. Just install the SDK.
      2. Microsoft Visual Studio 2008 Express. From there you will need only the Visual C++ 2008 Express Edition with SP1. Just download and install.
      3. QT Libraries x86, VS/VC 2008 - These are precompiled and ready to installed via installer libraries. Just download and install latest binary named Qt libraries 4.7.3 for Windows (VS 2008, 228 MB)
   2. For x86 platform and MSVC 10 (this way of compiling needs a bit more efforts and is time consuming - like 1-2-4 h depending on your PC) PlexyDesk's versions you will need:
      1. Microsoft Windows SDK. For additional information or other links you may look here. Just install the SDK.
      2. Microsoft Visual Studio 2010 Express. From there you will need only the Visual C++ 2010 Express Edition. Just download and install.
      3. QT Libraries Sources - Choose the tar.gz (202 MB) file.
         1. Unpack the sources using 7z GUI, to an easy place with short path. For example C:\QT
         2. Add the bin path of QT to your PATH (to know how to do it see 3 above), i.e. C:\QT\bin Note: If you have compiled the QT 64 bit already, please remove it from your PATH first.
         3. Open the command prompt of the MS Visual C++ 2010 (you will find it in your Start menu shortcuts after you have installed 5.B.b) and go to that folder. i.e    cd /d c:\QT
         4. Configure QT using this command (you may find the configure commands as remarks in the make_win32_installer.bat file): configure -release -opensource -qt-zlib -qt-libpng -qt-libmng -qt-libtiff -qt-libjpeg -platform win32-msvc2010
         5. After configure is done, issue a: nmake command. You will have to wait here a lot :) depending on the PC you have. On my PC with a 6 core AMD Phenom and 8GB RAM it took about 30 min to compile...
         6. Do a: nmake install command.
         7. Now you are ready to use QT x86
   3. For x64 platform and MSVC 10 (this way of compiling needs a bit more efforts and is time consuming - like 1-2-4 h depending on your PC) PlexyDesk's versions you will need:
      1. Microsoft Windows SDK. For additional information or other links you may look here. Just install the SDK.
      2. Microsoft Visual Studio 2010 Express. From there you will need only the Visual C++ 2010 Express Edition. Just download and install.
      3. QT Libraries Sources - Choose the tar.gz (202 MB) file.
         1. Unpack the sources using 7z GUI, to an easy place with short path. For example C:\QT-64. It is important that these sources and build are not in the same folder with the QT x86 build. Another solution is to put both in C:\Qt and make a C:\QT\32 folder for the x86 build and a C:\QT\64 folder for the x64 build.
         2. Add the bin path of QT to your PATH (to know how to do it see 3 above), i.e. C:\QT-64\bin Note: If you have compiled the QT 32 bit already, please remove it from your PATH first.
         3. Open the Microsoft SDK command prompt (you will find it in your Start menu shortcuts after you have installed 5.C.a). Then set the build environment to x64 and the desired Windows version. The setting is done using the SetEnv.cmd file that can be found in the BIN folder of the SDK (look at the properties of the shortcut of "Windows SDK Command Prompt" to find out the exact path). More info can be found here (go to the section named "Configuring the Windows SDK Command Prompt Window"). i.e.: SetEnv.cmd /Release /x64 /win7
         4. Go to the folder where you unpacked the QT sources. i.e    cd /d c:\QT-64
         5. Configure QT using this command (you may find the configure commands as remarks in the make_win32_installer.bat file): configure -release -opensource -qt-zlib -qt-libpng -qt-libmng -qt-libtiff -qt-libjpeg
         6. After configure is done, issue a: nmake command. You will have to wait here a lot :) depending on the PC you have. On my PC with a 6 core AMD Phenom and 8GB RAM it took about 30 min to compile...
         7. Do a: nmake install command.
         8. Now you are ready to use QT x64. Note: You better not have both QT x86 and QT x64 bin folders in your PATH. Just put the one you will use in environment, or just add it to your PATH in the command prompt just after you have opened the Command prompt. Use something like this command: SET PATH=%PATH%;C:\QT-64\bin
   4. For x86 platform and MSVC 2008 (self prepared QT) (this way of compiling needs a bit more efforts and is time consuming - like 1-2-4 h depending on your PC) PlexyDesk's versions you will need to follow basically the instructions of C, but instead you should configure the Microsoft SDK to use x86 build tools(see C.c.c) i.e. SetEnv.cmd /Release /x86 /win7 and use MSVC 2008 instead.
6. When you have prepared all your build tools and support libraries, it will be very easy to build and pack PlexyDesk. Before you proceed please read the NOTES bellow. For the example we will assume we want a x86 MSVC 10 build of PlexyDesk:
   1. Open the command prompt of the MS Visual C++ 2010 (you will find it in your Start menu shortcuts after you have installed 5.B.b) and create a folder where you will build PlexyDesk: mkdir c:\PlexyDesk
   2. Open the Git Bash command prompt (you will find it in your Start Menu shortcuts after installing Git as in 1)
   3. Go to the C:\PlexyDesk folder using this command: cd c:/PlexyDesk (the forward slash is needed 'cause it is an sh command prompt actually)
   4. Do a: git clone git://github.com/siraj/plexydesk.git
   5. Quit the Git Bash and return back to the already opened command prompt of the MS Visual C++ 2010 (see 6.A)
   6. Go to C:\PlexyDesk\plexydesk folder: cd /d C:\PlexyDesk\plexydesk
   7. Run the dist\make_dist_win.bat and follow the instructions there (the BAT file is in the folder named dist). NOTE: The build BAT file assumes by default that you are building for x86 platform. So if you need  x64 builds, you have explicitely to chose the options that are x64, i.e. have (x64) in their name.
   8. At the end you should have an installer in the C:\PlexyDesk\plexydesk\INSTALLERS folder

Here are some NOTES you should have in mind when building PlexyDesk (thanks to William for helping us with these):

1. Before proceeding with step 6 make sure:
   1. You have the CMake bin path added to your environment PATH variable. (for example C:\Cmake 2.8\bin)
   2. You have the NSIS path added to your environment PATH variable. (for example C:\Program files\NSIS)
   3. You have the QT bin path added to your environment PATH variable. (for example C:\QT\bin)
   4. You have the QT path added to your environment QTDIR variable. (for example C:\QT)
   5. If you change your environment variables through the Control Panel, please restart the Command Prompt you are using, so the changed values can work.
   6. Please make sure you do not use any quotes in your environment variables QTDIR and PATH (even if you use SET QTDIR=C:..... etc etc)
2. If for any reason cmake gives you errors, or you get some errors during compilation, delete the 'build' folder and restart the BAT script file (for example delete 'C:\PlexyDesk\plexydesk\build')
3. If for any reason you get an error in NSIS stage like: 'Can't open output file, Error - aborting creation process', please make sure you have the INSTALLERS folder created (for example 'C:\PlexyDesk\plexydesk\INSTALLERS')
4. After you have compiled QT manually, please avoid renaming the base QT folder, because all paths remain hard coded in some of the QT binaries.

That is all :)

Everything should build without a problem, but anyway if you have any questions or problems compiling and packaging PlexyDesk for Windows Platform, feel free to:

1. Join our Dev Mailing List and contact us there.
2. Leave a comment/question on this page.
3. Send us comments/questions using our website contact form.
4. See other ways of contacting us here.