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It is STRONGLY advised to read through this entire doc page before getting started.

Build tools

Compiler

SOFA requires a C++17 compatible compiler.
On MacOS, we officially support MacOS >= 10.13.2 (High Sierra) and AppleClang >= 9.1.0.

Check your MacOS version with system_profiler SPSoftwareDataType
Check your AppleClang version with clang --version

If your MacOS version is too low, update your Mac from the App Store.

If your AppleClang version is too low:

  1. Download and install the highest possible Xcode compatible with your MacOS.
    Compatibility list (taken from Wikipedia):

    MacOS >= 11.3    : Xcode 13.2.1 (with AppleClang 13.0.0)
MacOS >= 11.0    : Xcode 12.5.1 (with AppleClang 12.0.5)
MacOS >= 10.15.4 : Xcode 12.4   (with AppleClang 12.0.0)   
MacOS >= 10.15.2 : Xcode 11.7   (with AppleClang 11.0.3)
MacOS >= 10.14.4 : Xcode 11.3.1 (with AppleClang 11.0.0)
MacOS >= 10.14.3 : Xcode 10.3   (with AppleClang 10.0.1)
MacOS >= 10.13.6 : Xcode 10.1   (with AppleClang 10.0.0)
MacOS >= 10.13.2 : Xcode 9.4.1  (with AppleClang  9.1.0)
    To download any version, go to https://developer.apple.com/download/more/ and search for "Xcode".

  2. Open Xcode to automatically finalize installation

  3. In Xcode, navigate to "Xcode > Preferences > Locations" and set Command Line Tools to your Xcode version

  4. Verify Command Line Tools path: xcode-select -p
    If it is not pointing to your Xcode, change it: xcode-select --switch /Applications/Xcode.app

  5. Reboot

CMake: Makefile generator

SOFA requires at least CMake 3.22.

brew install --cask cmake

[optional] Ninja: build system

Ninja is an alternative to Make. It has a better handling of incremental builds.

brew install ninja

[optional] CCache: caching system

We advise you to use ccache. It is by no means mandatory, but it will dramatically improve the compilation time if you make changes to SOFA.

brew install ccache

Dependencies

Core (required)

SOFA requires some libraries: - tinyXML2 

brew install tinyxml2

  • Qt (>= 5.12.0) with Charts and WebEngine
    We recommend to install Qt in your user directory with the unified installer.
    Make sure to enable Charts and WebEngine components.

  • Boost (>= 1.65.1)

    brew install boost

  • Python 3.10 + pip + numpy + scipy 

    brew install python@3.10
brew link --force python@3.10
python3 -m pip install --upgrade pip
python3 -m pip install numpy scipy
brew install pybind11

  • Additional libraries: libPNG, libJPEG, libTIFF, Glew 

    brew install libpng libjpeg libtiff glew

  • SOFA v20.06 and newer also need Eigen (>= 3.2.10)

    brew install eigen

Plugins (optional)

SOFA plugins depend on libraries that are available in the official repositories.
You probably don't need them all, but you might find it convenient to install them all and not worry about it later.
This list does not cover all available SOFA plugins, only the ones that are built by our continuous integration platform.

  • CGALPlugin
    brew install cgal
  • MeshSTEPLoader
    brew install opencascade
  • SofaAssimp
    brew install assimp
  • SofaCUDA
    brew install homebrew/cask-drivers/nvidia-cuda
  • SofaPardisoSolver
    brew install lapack

Building SOFA

Setup your source and build directories

To set up clean repositories, we recommend to arrange the SOFA directories as follows:

sofa/
├── build/
│   ├── master/
│   └── v24.06/
└── src/
    └── < SOFA sources here >

First, checkout the sources from Git repository:

Get the current stable version on the v24.06 branch: 

git clone -b v24.06 https://github.com/sofa-framework/sofa.git sofa/src

OR get the development unstable version on the master branch: 

git clone -b master https://github.com/sofa-framework/sofa.git sofa/src

Generate a Makefile with CMake

  1. Create build directories respecting the arrangement above.

  2. Run CMake.app and set source folder and build folder.

  3. Run Configure. A popup will ask you to specify the generator for the project.

  4. If you installed Ninja (recommended), select "CodeBlocks - Ninja".

  5. Otherwise, select "CodeBlocks - Unix Makefile".

  6. Keep "Use default native compilers" and press "Done".

  7. Fix eventual dependency errors by following CMake messages (see Troubleshooting section below). Do not worry about warnings.

  8. Customize SOFA via CMake variables

  9. choose the build type by setting CMAKE_BUILD_TYPE to "Release" or "RelWithDebInfo" (recommended) or "Debug"

  10. if your Mac has a M1 processor: set CMAKE_OSX_ARCHITECTURES to "arm64"
  11. activate or deactivate plugins: see PLUGIN_XXX variables
  12. activate or deactivate functionalities: see SOFA_XXX variables

Do not forget to Configure again to check if your changes are valid.

  1. When you are ready, run Generate.

Compile

To compile, open a terminal in your build directory and run make or ninja depending on the generator you chose during CMake configuration.
Do not forget the -j option to use all your CPU cores.

Time for a coffee!

Troubleshooting CMake errors

Qt detection error

To solve Qt detection errors, click on Add Entry and add CMAKE_PREFIX_PATH with path /home/YOUR_USERNAME/Qt/QT_VERSION/COMPILER matching your Qt architecture.
Example: CMAKE_PREFIX_PATH=/home/bob/Qt/5.7/gcc_64
Configure again.

A further dev warning may appear:

CMake Warning (dev) at YOUR_QT_PATH/lib/cmake/Qt5Core/Qt5CoreMacros.cmake:224 (configure_file):
configure_file called with unknown argument(s):

COPY_ONLY

Call Stack (most recent call first):
applications/projects/Modeler/exec/CMakeLists.txt:14 (qt5_add_resources)

This is just a typo with Qt5CoreMacros.cmake file. It uses COPY_ONLY instead of COPYONLY. Simply edit your Qt5CoreMacros.cmake, replace COPY_ONLY with COPYONLY and Configure again.