Building PoDoFo library using CMake and MinGW

I am trying to build PoDoFo Library on my Windows Platform (for use as an API). It is done using CMake. The ReadMe file says the following. Unfortunately I am new to CMake and I can't make out much from it.

Building PoDoFo on Windows

CMake 2.6.x is required for Windows. You can download it from cmake.org .

On Windows, PoDoFo may be built as either a shared or static library. Building both is not supported. By default only the shared library will be built. If you want a static library, just disable generation of the shared library with the extra argument to cmake:

    -DPODOFO_BUILD_SHARED=FALSE

Handling library naming on win32

Especially on Windows it is also common for custom built libraries to have different names to those you might download as pre-built copies. CMake won't be able to find them if they're called something else unless you tell it. Use these variables to tell CMake what names to look for a library under:

•FREETYPE_LIBRARY_NAMES_DEBUG, FREETYPE_LIBRARY_NAMES_RELEASE and FREETYPE_LIBRARY_NAMES
•TIFF_LIBRARY_NAMES_DEBUG, TIFF_LIBRARY_NAMES_RELEASE and TIFF_LIBRARY_NAMES 
•LIBJPEG_LIBRARY_NAMES_DEBUG, LIBJPEG_LIBRARY_NAMES_RELEASE and LIBJPEG_LIBRARY_NAMES
•ZLIB_LIBRARY_NAMES_DEBUG, ZLIB_LIBRARY_NAMES_RELEASE,ZLIB_LIBRARY_NAMES

CMake builds on Windows with MinGW

Once MinGW is set up, make sure that the MinGW "bin" directory is on your PATH, and be sure to set CMAKE_INCLUDE_PATH and CMAKE_LIBRARY_PATH such that CMake can find the headers and .lib files for the libraries PoDoFo requires. The GnuWin32 library packages from http://gnuwin32.sf.net/ are known to work with PoDoFo, so installing zlib, freetype, and libjpeg from there should do the trick.

To configure and build PoDoFo with a default GnuWin32 install and with MinGW already on your PATH:

md ..\podofo-debug 
cd ..\podofo-debug
cmake -G "MinGW Makefiles" ..\podofo-src -DCMAKE_INCLUDE_PATH=c:\progra~1\gnuwin32\include -DCMAKE_LIBRARY_PATH=c:\progra~1\gnuwin32\lib -DPODOFO_BUILD_SHARED:BOOL=FALSE mingw32-make

I have installed CMake and downloaded the other libraries mentioned like freetype, zlib, libjpeg. Their header and binary files are in their respective folders.

Now what should DCMAKE_INCLUDE_PATH and DCMAKE_LIBRARY_PATH be? Also what is "MinGW Makefiles"? Do I have to supply any extra parameters?

I'll be grateful if someone can explain in simple steps how I can go about it.

EDIT: error while executing CMAKE:

-- Ensure you cppunit installed version is at least 1.12.0
Cppunit not found. No unit tests will be built.
CMake Error at C:/Program Files (x86)/CMake 2.8/share/cmake-2.8/Modules/FindPack
ageHandleStandardArgs.cmake:97 (message):
  Could NOT find FREETYPE (missing: FREETYPE_LIBRARY FREETYPE_INCLUDE_DIR)
Call Stack (most recent call first):
  C:/Program Files (x86)/CMake 2.8/share/cmake-2.8/Modules/FindPackageHandleStan
dardArgs.cmake:291 (_FPHSA_FAILURE_MESSAGE)
  cmake/modules/FindFREETYPE.cmake:75 (FIND_PACKAGE_HANDLE_STANDARD_ARGS)
  CMakeLists.txt:372 (FIND_PACKAGE)

Solution

If you followed all the instructions, to compile it should normally be enough to do:

cd <podofo root directory (where CMakeLists.txt is)>
mkdir build 
cd build
cmake -G "MinGW Makefiles" -DCMAKE_INCLUDE_PATH=<path to headers> -DCMAKE_LIBRARY_PATH=<path to libraries> -DPODOFO_BUILD_SHARED:BOOL=FALSE ..
mingw32-make

Step by step: First, go to the directory where your podofo sources are. You should see a CMakeLists.txt file lying around.

Second (and third), create (and go into) a directory where the compilation will be done. I call it build but it can be any name. This is a best practice since you can simply delete the build directory and come back to a clean state.

Fourth, ask cmake to create the makefile(s) for mingw:

Specify the PODOFO_BUILD_SHARED like advertised in the manual: build shared or static version.
CMAKE_INCLUDE_PATH and CMAKE_LIBRAY_PATH are used to reference to the packages needed to build podofo. If you downloaded the precompiled packages like you did since you have de headers and the binaries, then you need to give to cmake the path to those headers and binaries. You can specify the variables multiple times if needed, e.g.:
```
cmake -G "MinGW Makefiles" -DCMAKE_INCLUDE_PATH=/path/to/freetype/include -DCMAKE_LIBRARY_PATH=/path/to/freetype/lib  -DCMAKE_INCLUDE_PATH=/path/to/zlib/include -DCMAKE_LIBRARY_PATH=/path/to/zlib/lib -DPODOFO_BUILD_SHARED:BOOL=FALSE ..
```
The "MinGW Makefiles" tells cmake to create makefiles specific to mingw. Else, by default on windows, it creates makefiles specific to Microsoft Visual Studio.
Finaly reference the CMakeLists.txt in the parent directory with .. at the end.

Last, but not least, compile with the mingw version of make.