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Building from Source

Binaries

Users are recommended to use the pre-built xemu binaries. If you would like to build from source however, follow the instructions for your platform below.

Windows

Windows builds are cross-compiled from Ubuntu. If you would like to build on Windows, you can use WSL2 and Docker. See official Docker documentation for how to get WSL2 and Docker set up.

# Clone and build
git clone --recurse-submodules https://github.com/xemu-project/xemu.git
docker run -u $(id -u):$(id -g) --rm -v $PWD/xemu:/xemu -w /xemu \
    -e CCACHE_DIR=/xemu/ccache \
    ghcr.io/xemu-project/xemu-win64-toolchain:latest \
    ./build.sh -p win64-cross

# Run
./xemu/dist/xemu.exe

Tips

  • The docker run command must be done from the directory containing the xemu clone, not from inside the clone. If running ls -d xemu does not print "xemu" you will need to change directories.

  • When building on Windows via WSL2, doing the git clone from inside WSL2 may substantially increase the build speed.

macOS

First install the Homebrew package manager.

# Install dependencies
brew update
brew install coreutils pkg-config dylibbundler ninja
python3 -m pip install pyyaml

# Clone and build
git clone --recurse-submodules https://github.com/xemu-project/xemu.git
cd xemu
./build.sh

# Run
open ./dist/xemu.app

Linux

# Install dependencies
sudo apt update
sudo apt install git build-essential libsdl2-dev libepoxy-dev libpixman-1-dev libgtk-3-dev libssl-dev libsamplerate0-dev libpcap-dev ninja-build python3-yaml libslirp-dev

# Clone and build
git clone --recurse-submodules https://github.com/xemu-project/xemu.git
cd xemu
./build.sh

# Run
./dist/xemu

# Install dependencies
sudo pacman -S --noconfirm git base-devel sdl2 libepoxy pixman gtk3 openssl libsamplerate libpcap ninja glu python-yaml libslirp

# Clone and build
git clone --recurse-submodules https://github.com/xemu-project/xemu.git
cd xemu
./build.sh

# Run
./dist/xemu

# Install dependencies
sudo dnf install libdrm-devel libslirp-devel mesa-libGLU-devel gtk3-devel libpcap-devel libsamplerate-devel libaio-devel SDL2-devel libepoxy-devel pixman-devel gcc-c++ ninja-build openssl-devel python3-pyyaml

# Clone and build
git clone --recurse-submodules https://github.com/xemu-project/xemu.git
cd xemu
./build.sh

# Run
./dist/xemu

# Install DistroBox
curl -s https://raw.githubusercontent.com/89luca89/distrobox/main/install | sh -s -- --prefix ~/.local && curl -s https://raw.githubusercontent.com/89luca89/distrobox/main/extras/install-podman | sh -s -- --prefix ~/.local

# Go to home/deck/ and create a file named .distroboxrc and in kate add whats below.
export PATH=$PATH:/home/deck/.local/bin/
export PATH=$PATH:/home/deck/.local/podman/bin/
xhost +si:localuser:$USER

# Installing Container 
distrobox-create -i docker.io/library/archlinux:latest --name arch

# Launch arch container.
distrobox-enter arch

# Install dependencies
sudo pacman -S --needed --noconfirm git base-devel sdl2 libepoxy pixman gtk3 openssl libsamplerate libpcap ninja glu python-yaml libslirp && git clone https://aur.archlinux.org/yay.git && cd yay && makepkg -si && sudo pacman -S pipewire-pulse

# !During pulse audio install Select wireplumber

# Install an IDE/code editor (vscode)
yay -S visual-studio-code-bin --noconfirm

# export Code editor if it has a .desktop
distrobox-export --app code

# Clone and build
git clone --recurse-submodules https://github.com/xemu-project/xemu.git
cd xemu
./build.sh

# Run
./dist/xemu

Tip: Building with Clang, or another specific compiler

If you have multiple toolchains and would like to build with specific one, such as clang, you can specify the compiler and linker through environment variables when invoking build.sh as follows:

CC=clang CXX=clang++ CC_LD=lld CXX_LD=lld AR=llvm-ar ./build.sh

Tip: Passing build flags to the C/C++ compiler

Extra build flags can be passed to the C/C++ compiler by using environment variables in a similar manner to changing toolchains. The CFLAGS variable sets C compiler flags and the CXXFLAGS variable sets C++ compiler flags. Multiple flags can be set by separating them with a space, just be sure to surround it in quotations. For example, if you wanted to build xemu with extra optimizations for your specific CPU then you would invoke build.sh as follows:

CFLAGS="-march=native" CXXFLAGS="-march=native" ./build.sh