This post is written for someone who is not a coin developer or comfortable in a
linux environment to show you how to prepare your windows computer to be able to
compile 'almost' any coin wallet yourself. If you follow the directions you should
be able to compile windows qt wallets from source on a windows computer in about
7 minutes or less after you prepare your system the first time. Before we get to
the details and instructions a few things you should know first.
This guide is broken into 4 parts. Preparing the build system. Compiling a basic wallet.
Extra features to compile wallets and Possible errors and how to correct them.
1) I did not invent this process. I learned many things from many people including
Shak3zulas original coin making guide and a person known only as Nitrogenetics.
2) These instructions are just a basic guide and should work well on versions of
windows 8 and windows 7 although with 7 you may have trouble in secion 3 (extras).
3) When someone launches a coin without wallet you can make your own and start mining!
4) Do be careful: Even someone with experience can read the thousands of lines of code in
a coins source and not spot a 'payload' or virus. Just because you compiled it yourself
does not mean you are safe from malware. Use virus scanners, websites like virustotal.com
and run unknown sources on separate machines or best in virtual machines for safety.
5) Don't be discouraged if it does not work on the first try. Some people with a lot of
coding experience are unable to get this to work with directions while some other people
with no or little experience can pull it on in a few tries !
Ok since this is geared toward a novice we will be using windows only except for a few
sections described below that I have detailed exactly what commands to use so you can
copy and paste them. Set aside up to an hour of time to do this properly.
Section i - Preparing your build systemI will list all the tools first and how to install them. Depending on your internet connection
it may take a while to download some of them. If you have a 64 bit system install 64 bit versions
If 32 go with those unless stated differently. Use the most current version unless stated differently.
When installing some programs it will ask if you want to 'add to path' always answer yes.
1)Install 7z for windows from the homepage here
http://www.7-zip.org/2)Install Perl for windows from the homepage
http://www.activestate.com/activeperl/downloads3)Install Python from the homepage here
https://www.python.org/downloads/windows/4)Install MinGW 4.6.2 This is more difficult. Their homepage is here
http://www.mingw.org/wiki/msysWhat we need is the msys 4.6.2 package but the last time I used the installer the version
was 4.9. I will tell you now that I cannot get most coins to compile with 4.9 although
it is used to build the 9.x codebase of bitcoin and anything cloned from that. Almost all alt coins
are based on earlier/older codebases. So you have 3 choices. You can go to this page
and follow the directions to install 4.6.2 from source. (may be difficult/on your own here)
http://sourceforge.net/projects/mingw/files/MinGW/Base/gcc/Version4/gcc-4.6.2-1/Choice two is to search the web for the self installing version of this program.
Choice three is to download the version you need from this mirror here:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B-eDDHZG3n6dMV9mVU9FLTRLbmM/edit?usp=sharingIf you went with choice three double click on it and it will install the necessary packages
for you in a few minutes. Check the option to use preloaded repository catalogs and
when it gets to the components page you can select all and next click install.
It will create a folder on your c: (root) windows drive called Mingw.
5)Install Mingw gcc. Some people use version 4.8.2 with success which is here
http://sourceforge.net/projects/mingw-w64/files/Toolchains%20targetting%20Win32/Personal%20Builds/mingw-builds/The page of the project is here with directions for those so inclined
http://www.mingw.org/wiki/InstallationHOWTOforMinGWPersonally I have the best results and
STRONGLY recommend you use version 4.6.2 of this and
get it mirrored here.
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B-eDDHZG3n6dZ2szUHJrd2VlSDg/edit?usp=sharingUnzip that using 7z someplace and rename the folder from mingw to mingw32 and place it inside
the mingw folder I mentioned earlier in step 4.
5) Open or access the folder C:\mingw\Msys\1.0 and double click on msys.bat
(go to my computer, drive c, find the mingw folder, open it, find the Msys folder open it,
inside there is the 1.0 folder open it and you will see msys.bat there)
This opens up a 'shell' of what is basically a linux prompt you can use in windows.
Don't get nervous I have all the commands here for you to copy and paste.
When it opens up right click on the top by the MINGW32~ select properties and check\
the box that says 'quick edit mode' to make it easier to copy and paste inside.
6) Open my computer and open your c (root) drive and right click and create a new folder
called 'deps'. (without the quotes all lower case) In the next few steps we will now
download more things to this deps folder and prepare our build system !
7) Download OpenSSL from here
http://www.openssl.org/source/You want the one named openssl-1.0.1j.tar.gz and place it in the deps folder.
8) In the shell you opened in step 5 above copy and paste the following commands
and hit enter after each. Wait until it stops before you go to the next step.
cd /c/deps/
tar xvfz openssl-1.0.1j.tar.gz
cd openssl-1.0.1j
Configure no-shared no-dso mingw
make
(I know you saw a lot of 'things' scrolling on your screen you will get to see more soon.)
9) Download Berkley DB 4.8 from here
http://download.oracle.com/berkeley-db/db-4.8.30.NC.tar.gzagain to your deps folder.
Back to our shell and copy and paste one at a time the following commands and hit enter.
cd /c/deps/
tar xvfz db-4.8.30.NC.tar.gz
cd db-4.8.30.NC/build_unix
../dist/configure --enable-mingw --enable-cxx --disable-shared --disable-replication
make
10) Download boost 1_55_0 to your deps folder from here
http://sourceforge.net/projects/boost/files/boost/1.55.0/boost_1_55_0.7z/downloadNote we are geting a 7z file here that you will unzip to the deps directory in a folder called
boost_1_55_0 (create that folder inside deps and unzip boost placing it in there)
Now that you unzipped this to the proper location c:\deps\boost_1_55_0
Open a Windows command line. (In windows 8 hold x and the windows key click on command prompt.
For windows 7 click on the start button, click run, type cmd and hit enter.
(Note you also enable quick edit mode here to make it easier to copy and paste like above)
Copy and paste these commands one at a time
cd C:\deps\boost_1_55_0\
bootstrap.bat mingw
b2 --build-type=complete --with-chrono --with-filesystem --with-program_options --with-system --with-thread toolset=gcc variant=release link=static threading=multi runtime-link=static stage
Some people may have problems with this step on some versions of windows 7 if you do see part iv
11) Install Miniupnpc ; Download it from here
http://miniupnp.free.fr/files/download.php?file=miniupnpc-1.9.tar.gzand place it in your deps folder, next from the msys shell unpack it like this.
cd /c/deps/
tar xvfz miniupnpc-1.9.tar.gz
Next rename that folder from miniupnpc-1.9 to miniupnpc
Back to our windows command prompt and complete the following.
cd C:\deps\miniupnpc
mingw32-make -f Makefile.mingw init upnpc-static
12) Install Qt-MinGW32 4.8.5 from here
http://download.qt-project.org/archive/qt/4.8/4.8.5/It should be the third one down called qt-win-opensource-4.8.5-mingw.exe
Download it anywhere and run it , when it asks where your mingw folder is tell it c:\mingw
After this is installed you can click on the start button and run the qt 4.8.5 command prompt.
13)Before we make the wallet we have one last thing to do and that is to compile leveldb.
Note: some older versions of coins or clones may not have leveldb and you can skip this step.
If there is a file inside your coin / src folder called 'leveldb' you cannot skip the step.
If that file is not there skip it.
Go back to our msys linux shell and copy and paste the following
cd /C/photon/src/leveldb
TARGET_OS=NATIVE_WINDOWS make libleveldb.a libmemenv.a
(Now the fun begins your build system is ready !! See section iv if you had problems
Everything above only has to be done once (normally) NOT every time you build a wallet !)
Secion ii - Basic CompileYour build system is ready now. We need to get our coins source code.
For this guide I am going to use a coin I developed called Photon as the default coin.
I suggest for your first try you also use Photon since I have the source code 'prepared for a windows compile'
Go to the source code on github
https://github.com/photonproject/photonKeeping you on windows as much as possible as I promised click on the 'download zip'
button this will download a file called photon-master.zip place it on your c drive.
Using 7z open it and extract the folder inside called photon-master to our c drive.
Lets rename it from photon-master (right click on folder rename) to photon.
From the qt command line prompt you opened in step 12
Type the following commands (you can right click on the top and enable quick edit mode here too if you want)
cd c:\photon
qmake "USE_UPNP=1" photon-qt.pro
make -f Makefile.Release
After it is finished which can take several minutes the wallet will be in the Release folder inside the Photon folder.
You will need several dynamic link library files to use it which you probably own allready if you
have many coin wallets on your computer but if neeed they are available here
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B-eDDHZG3n6dNnlVeXNZdXkxUEE/edit?usp=sharingCongratulations on compiling your first coin wallet. If you had problems or got stuck see section iv.
If your answer or issue is not covered there post in the forum below and I will try to help you out.
If you are getting an error please be specific on what error and where in the process you get it.
Also let me know what coin you are trying to compile and provide a link to the coin source on github.
There are a 'few' coins that require 'extras' which are discussed later in the post.
section iii extrasYou can skip this part of the guide but here I will cover a few ways to do a little bit more.
First let's discuss making a 'static' wallet , one that does not need those dll files in it's folder to run.
For this we need to download a good text editor I use notepad++ but you may use anything really that at least
gives line numbers on the left side so we can reference specific items in the source code easily.
Get my suggestion here
http://notepad-plus-plus.org/In my example above where we compiled Photon to make a static wallet edit the file called Photon-qt.pro
in the photon folder on your c drive.
On line 10 which is blank now add this
CONFIG += static
Change line 67 from this
win32:QMAKE_LFLAGS *= -Wl,--large-address-aware
to this:
win32:QMAKE_LFLAGS *= -Wl,--large-address-aware -static
Save it/
Next we will need some additional things installed on our build system.
On this page download qt-everywhere-opensource-src-4.8.5.zip
http://download.qt-project.org/archive/qt/4.8/4.8.5Use 7z to unpack it to the directory qt on your c drive in a folder called 485
Open a Windows command prompt and type the following
cd C:\Qt\485
configure -release -opensource -confirm-license -static -no-sql-sqlite -no-qt3support -no-opengl -qt-zlib -no-gif -qt-libpng -qt-libmng -no-libtiff -qt-libjpeg -no-dsp -no-vcproj -no-openssl -no-dbus -no-phonon -no-phonon-backend -no-multimedia -no-audio-backend -no-webkit -no-script -no-scripttools -no-declarative -no-declarative-debug -no-style-plastique -no-style-cleanlooks -no-style-motif -no-style-cde -nomake demos -nomake examples
mingw32-make
(fyi, this one may take a while !!)
Delete everything in your folder called 'build' inside 'Photon'
Delete the following 5 files if they exist from the Photon folder
Makefile
Makefile.Debug
Makefile.Release
object_script.photon-qt.Debug
object_script.photon.qt.Release
From a Windows command prompt type the following:
set PATH=%PATH%;C:\Qt\485\bin
cd C:\photon\
qmake "USE_UPNP=1" Photon-qt.pro
mingw32-make -f Makefile.Release
Your 'static' wallet will show up once again in the release file.
It will be larger than the wallet built in step ii.
Now lets cover compiling a wallet with qr code support.
Note: Most coins based on the 8.x codebase have qr support built into them.
Not many coins built on 'earlier' codebased have it built in.
To prepare we need to install some additional items in our deps folder
Download qrencode here
http://prdownloads.sourceforge.net/libpng/libpng-1.6.12.tar.gz?downloadand here
http://fukuchi.org/works/qrencode/qrencode-3.4.3.tar.gzPlace both in your deps folder. From the msys shell copy and paste these commands
tar xvfz libpng-1.6.12.tar.gz
tar xvfz qrencode-3.4.3.tar.gz
cd /c/deps/libpng-1.6.12
configure --disable-shared
make
cp .libs/libpng16.a .libs/libpng.a
cd /c/deps/qrencode-3.4.3
LIBS="../libpng-1.6.12/.libs/libpng.a ../../mingw32/i686-w64-mingw32/lib/libz.a" \
png_CFLAGS="-I../libpng-1.6.12" \
png_LIBS="-L../libpng-1.6.12/.libs" \
configure --enable-static --disable-shared --without-tools
make
(note if you get an error here try adding
PKG_CONFIG_PATH=/c/deps/libpng-1.6.12
before the make command)
Now to build the wallet with qr code support:
Delete everything inside the folder called 'build' inside 'Photon'
Delete the following 5 files if they exist from the Photon folder
Makefile
Makefile.Debug
Makefile.Release
object_script.photon-qt.Debug
object_script.photon.qt.Release
From the qt command prompt type the following !
qmake "USE_QRCODE=1" "USE_UPNP=1" Photon-qt.pro
make -f Makefile.Release
And there it is in your release file !
Section iv If you had errors or problems some of these tips may help:If you tried to build a wallet before and used a different version of
msys /mingw you may need to build boost to match the version of mingw.
I am working here with version 4.6 so in your boost file is a file called
stage and inside that lib look here and make sure you see
files that look like libboost_chrono-mgw46-d-1_55.dll
if they have a different number just follow the directions in section i #10
to rebuild boost with the proper version of mingw.
If you have problems getting boost to compile in section 10 part i
you may want to try boost_1_53_1
Download it here
http://sourceforge.net/projects/boost/files/boost/1.53.0/and put it in the deps file name it boost_1_53_0
build it, change everything in your Photon.pro file that says boost_1_55_0
to boost_1_53_0
For photon this is on line 25,26,and 27 change the 55 to 53
If you got errors at any point and did not install things in the folders like
I named them make sure no folders have a space. For example in windows if you
install these programs into a folder like Program Files it can cause issues.
Mingw does not like empty spaces one of the reasons you have folders with the underscore.
If you got errors that say MUTEX in them when you try to compile your wallet try changing
line 7 of the Photon-qt.pro file to this
DEFINES += QT_GUI BOOST_THREAD_USE_LIB BOOST_SPIRIT_THREADSAFE BOOST_THREAD_PROVIDES_GENERIC_SHARED_MUTEX_ON_WIN __NO_SYSTEM_INCLUDES
The extra commands may help.
If you are building a different coin other than Photon as this guide can help
you build almost any coins wallet remember you need to change the names of folders to fit that coin !!
If you get errors that files are not found check your paths
go to my computer, right click properties, advanced system settings, look under environment variables
You should see things like this
C:\MinGW\mingw32\bin;
in this case for mingw , if it is not there add it, same for perl and python.
I have built over 100 different coin wallets so the directions are good but cannot make up for trying to
compile source code of a coin that is missing files.
i.e. you go to compile the wallet and it says yourcoin\src\qt\res\icons bitcoin.ico does not exist
You may be trying to compile source code that is missing things - many coins are.
This is often seen when a new coin is launched. If it is something simple like an icon use an icon from another coin and
place it where the missing icon or splash screen file is supossed to be.
On windows 7 I often have problems building static wallets and wallets with qr code support.
You may have better results on win 8.1
If you have previously tried to compile a coin and had problems or got stuck I recommend not using
qt 5.2 or 5.3 , stick with 4.8.4 , 4.8.5 or 4.8.3
Note: A few coins like the latest 9.2 version of bitcoin cannot be built with these directions and
require qt 5.3. In the future I may expand this guide to cover how to compile those coins.
As of now very few (I know of 2) coins other than bitcoin use the 9.x codebase.
A few coins like maxcoin need additional items installed.
(thanks to Tranz and Bluedragon747 for this tip)
If you see -crypto in the .pro file install it
http://www.cryptopp.com/#downloadand using 7z extract it to your deps folder.
Add these lines to the .pro file
CRYPTO_LIB_PATH=C:/deps/cryptopp562
$$join(CRYPTO_LIB_PATH,,-L,)
where you see the similar commands at the top.
Only a few coins use this but they are out there.
Most coins that use this will have at least the $$join (CRYPTO_LIB_PATH,,-L)
and you may just need to add the path of where your files are in your deps folder.
In most coins .pro file you have to 'uncomment' some commands for them to compile on windows
by removing the # in front of the line.
Take a look at line 129 in the Photon-qt.pro file
#genleveldb.commands = cd $$PWD/src/leveldb && CC=$$QMAKE_CC CXX=$$QMAKE_CXX TARGET_OS=OS_WINDOWS_CROSSCOMPILE $(MAKE) OPT=\"$$QMAKE_CXXFLAGS $$QMAKE_CXXFLAGS_RELEASE\" libleveldb.a libmemenv.a && $$QMAKE_RANLIB $$PWD/src/leveldb/libleveldb.a && $$QMAKE_RANLIB $$PWD/src/leveldb/libmemenv.a
Note, i have this line commented out with the #
You need it uncommented to build on linux & osx so almost every coin source you download before you compile the windows wallet
as I described above you have to comment this out or you will get a 'cross compile error' real fast.
Also remember that just because that command is line 129 in the Photon source code it may be a different number in
another coin (almost certainly will be a different line in most coins)
Another thing to remember is while I included these lines in the Photon-qt.pro file to make it easy to build
BOOST_LIB_SUFFIX=-mgw46-mt-sd-1_55
BOOST_INCLUDE_PATH=C:\deps\boost_1_55_0
BOOST_LIB_PATH=C:\deps\boost_1_55_0\stage\lib
BDB_INCLUDE_PATH=C:\deps\db-4.8.30.NC\build_unix
BDB_LIB_PATH=C:\deps\db-4.8.30.NC\build_unix
OPENSSL_INCLUDE_PATH=C:\deps\openssl-1.0.1j\include
OPENSSL_LIB_PATH=C:\deps\openssl-1.0.1j
MINIUPNPC_LIB_SUFFIX=-miniupnpc
MINIUPNPC_INCLUDE_PATH=C:\deps\miniupnpc
MINIUPNPC_LIB_PATH=C:\deps\miniupnpc
most coin source codes do not have them and you may need to insert them.
Finally some developers launch a coin and don't want it to compile for people easily.
While I would never do this I have seen it happen. If you get runtime errors it is
usually related to problems with qt. I would certainly master building regular (non static) wallets
before you try to compile a static wallet.
I hope you were successful in compiling your wallet, if you have problems not covered in part iv
please post them to the thread below with the error log, the name of he coin you are building and
a link to it's source on github. Also let me know if you are using boost 1_53_0 or any differnt
essentials or paths that are different from what I have here.
If you want to help keep me motivated to keep this guide updated and expanded to cover other things
or if this helped you please consider tossing a few coins at me.
(update May 1, 2015 Since posting this months ago and tens of thousands of hits or more (who knows how many really) , countless questions answered, lots of thank you's not one person EVER sent me one satoshi, even a litoshi, or anything else.
Zero --- A thankless community that wants everything handed to them on english bone china !!
SO AS A RESULT ENJOY THE GUIDE --- DUE TO THESE CIRCUMSTANCES I CANNOT GUARANTEE ANY FUTURE SUPPORT OR QUESTIONS --- MY BEST TO YOU ALL ----- (thanks also to Jimmy for pinning the thread which you can unpin if you like)
