• New user? Read the intro page to learn more about the project!
• You can get the latest releases from our downloads page.
• You can report bugs or suggest features on our issue tracker.

If you're using GitHub for Windows, just use the "Clone in Desktop" button.

Otherwise, make sure to use git clone --recursive to initialize submodules in the external folder:

git clone --recursive git://github.com/powertab/powertabeditor.git

If you've already cloned the repository, you can run git submodule init && git submodule update.

• CMake >= 2.8.9
• Boost 1.55 or greater
  • Earlier versions may work, but are currently untested
• Qt 5.4 or greater
• zlib
• (Linux only) - ALSA library (e.g. libasound2-dev)
• (Linux only) - MIDI sequencer (e.g. timidity)
• (Linux only) - libbfd (e.g. binutils-dev)
• A compiler with C++11 support (gcc 4.8+, Clang, VS 2013)

• Install Git - see https://help.github.com/articles/set-up-git
• Building Boost:
  • Download and extract Boost 1.56 to C:\Program Files\boost\boost_1_56_0.
  • Download and extract zlib to any directory. However, the path must not contain any spaces.
  • Open a command prompt (e.g. VS2013 x64 Native Tools Command Prompt) and navigate to the Boost directory.
  • Run bootstrap and then b2 -s ZLIB_SOURCE=/path/to/zlib link=shared address-model=64 variant=debug,release.
    • Use address-model=32 for a 32-bit build.
    • If building both 32-bit and 64-bit versions, use --stagedir=stage32 to place the 32-bit versions under a different directory (stage32/lib instead of stage/lib), and set BOOST_LIBRARYDIR accordingly when running CMake.
• Installing Qt:
  • Download the online installer from http://qt-project.org/downloads.
  • Install the msvc2013 64-bit component (or msvc2013 32-bit for a 32-bit build)
• Compiling Qt (optional):
  • You may want to do this instead if you intend on building the installer so that Qt can be built without dependencies on huge libraries such as icu.
  • Download and extract the source code.
  • If necessary, install Python 2.7.x and add it to your PATH.
  • Open a command prompt (e.g. VS2013 x64 Native Tools Command Prompt) and navigate to the Qt source directory.
  • Run configure -opensource -nomake examples -nomake tests -skip qtwebkit -skip qtwebengine -skip qtconnectivity -skip qtandroidextras -skip qtlocation -skip qtscript -opengl desktop -debug-and-release -mp -no-icu -c++11 -prefix C:\Qt\5.4.1 and accept the license agreement.
  • Run nmake and nmake install and grab a cup of coffee ...
• Install and open CMake, and browse to select the location of the root directory (e.g. $HOME/Documents/GitHub/powertabeditor).
• Set the build directory to $HOME/Documents/GitHub/powertabeditor/build.
• Use the "Add Entry" button to set the STRING CMAKE_PREFIX_PATH to the cmake directory inside Qt's installation directory (e.g. C:\Qt\5.4.1\lib\cmake)
• For Windows XP support, set CMAKE_GENERATOR_TOOLSET to v120_xp.
• Press Configure and select your compiler version (e.g. Visual Studio 12 Win64, or Visual Studio 12 for a 32-bit build) and then press Generate
• Open the resulting solution (powertabeditor.sln) and select Build Solution from the Build menu.
• Right-click on the powertabeditor project and select "Set as Startup Project" before running.

• These instructions assume a recent Ubuntu/Debian-based system, but the package names should be similar for other package managers.
  • For older Ubuntu systems (such as Ubuntu 12.04) - you may need to add some PPAs to get updated versions of the dependencies.
• Install dependencies:
  • sudo apt-get update
  • sudo apt-get install cmake qtbase5-dev libboost-dev libboost-date-time-dev libboost-filesystem-dev libboost-iostreams-dev libboost-program-options-dev libboost-regex-dev libasound2-dev libiberty-dev binutils-dev rapidjson-dev libpugixml-dev catch librtmidi-dev
  • sudo apt-get install timidity - timidity is not required for building, but is a good sequencer for MIDI playback.
  • Optionally, use Ninja instead of make (sudo apt-get install ninja-build)
• Build:
  • mkdir build && cd build
  • cmake ..
    • Add -DCMAKE_INSTALL_PREFIX=/some/path to customize the install directory.
    • Add -DCMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=Debug for a debug build instead of a Release build.
    • Add -DCMAKE_CXX_COMPILER=clang++ to compile with Clang.
    • Add -G Ninja to generate Ninja build files.
  • make -j8 or ninja
• Run:
  • ./bin/powertabeditor
  • ./bin/pte_tests to run the unit tests.
• Install:
  • make install or ninja install

• Tested with Mac OS X 10.9 and above.
• Install Xcode along with its Command Line Tools.
• Install CMake:
  • If you prefer a GUI, download the CMake installer.
  • Otherwise, run brew install cmake
• Install dependencies:
  • brew install boost qt5
• Build:
  • mkdir build && cd build
  • cmake -DCMAKE_PREFIX_PATH=/usr/local/opt/qt5/lib/cmake ..
    • If necessary, define BOOST_ROOT to point to the root directory where Boost was installed (e.g. /usr/local/opt/boost).
    • To generate an Xcode project, add -G Xcode.
  • For a Makefile build, run make -j4.
  • For Xcode, open and build build/powertabeditor.xcodeproj.
• Run:
  • ./bin/powertabeditor
  • ./bin/pte_tests or make test to run the unit tests.
  • For Xcode, select Product/Scheme/powertabeditor and then Product/Run.