EPICS Base  7.0.4.1
Installation Instructions

EPICS Base Release 7.0.3.1


Table of Contents

What is EPICS base?

The Experimental Physics and Industrial Control Systems (EPICS) is an extensible set of software components and tools with which application developers can create a control system. This control system can be used to control accelerators, detectors, telescopes, or other scientific experimental equipment. EPICS base is the set of core software, i.e. the components of EPICS without which EPICS would not function. EPICS base allows an arbitrary number of target systems, IOCs (input/output controllers), and host systems, OPIs (operator interfaces) of various types.

What is new in this release?

Please check the RELEASE_NOTES file in the distribution for description of changes and release migration details.

Copyright

Please review the LICENSE file included in the distribution for legal terms of usage.

Supported platforms

The list of platforms supported by this version of EPICS base is given in the configure/CONFIG_SITE file. If you are trying to build EPICS Base on an unlisted host or for a different target machine you must have the proper host/target cross compiler and header files, and you will have to create and add the appropriate new configure files to the base/configure/os/directory. You can start by copying existing configuration files in the configure/os directory and then make changes for your new platforms.

Supported compilers

This version of EPICS base has been built and tested using the host vendor's C and C++ compilers, as well as the GNU gcc and g++ compilers. The GNU cross-compilers work for all cross-compiled targets. You may need the C and C++ compilers to be in your search path to do EPICS builds; check the definitions of CC and CCC in base/configure/os/CONFIG.<host>.<host> if you have problems.

Software requirements

GNU make You must use GNU make, gnumake, for any EPICS builds. Set your path so that a gnumake version 3.81 or later is available.

Perl You must have Perl version 5.8.1 or later installed. The EPICS configuration files do not specify the perl full pathname, so the perl executable must be found through your normal search path.

Unzip and tar (Winzip on WIN32 systems) You must have tools available to unzip and untar the EPICS base distribution file.

Target systems EPICS supports IOCs running on embedded platforms such as VxWorks and RTEMS built using a cross-compiler, and also supports soft IOCs running as processes on the host platform.

vxWorks You must have vxWorks 6.8 or later installed if any of your target systems are vxWorks systems; the C++ compiler from older versions cannot compile recently developed code. The vxWorks installation provides the cross-compiler and header files needed to build for these targets. The absolute path to and the version number of the vxWorks installation must be set in the base/configure/os/CONFIG_SITE.Common.vxWorksCommon file or in one of its target-specific overrides.

Consult the vxWorks 6.x EPICS web pages about and the vxWorks documentation for information about configuring your vxWorks operating system for use with EPICS.

RTEMS For RTEMS targets, you need RTEMS core and toolset version 4.9.x or 4.10.x (4.11 or 5.x are not yet supported).

GNU readline or Tecla library GNU readline and Tecla libraries can be used by the IOC shell to provide command line editing and command line history recall and edit. GNU readline (or Tecla library) must be installed on your target system when COMMANDLINE_LIBRARY is set to READLINE (or TECLA) for that target. EPICS (EPICS shell) is the default specified in CONFIG_COMMON. A READLINE override is defined for linux-x86 in the EPICS distribution. Comment out COMMANDLINE_LIBRARY=READLINE in configure/os/CONFIG_SITE.Common.linux-x86 if readline is not installed on linux-x86. Command-line editing and history will then be those supplied by the os. On vxWorks the ledLib command-line input library is used instead.

Host system storage requirements

The compressed tar file is approximately 1.6 MB in size. The distribution source tree takes up approximately 12 MB. Each host target will need around 40 MB for build files, and each cross-compiled target around 20 MB.

Documentation

EPICS documentation is available through the EPICS website at Argonne.

Release specific documentation can also be found in the base/documentation directory of the distribution.

Directory Structure

Distribution directory structure:

base Root directory of the base distribution
base/configure Operating system independent build config files
base/configure/os Operating system dependent build config files
base/documentation Distribution documentation
base/src Source code in various subdirectories
base/startup Scripts for setting up path and environment

Install directories created by the build:

bin Installed scripts and executables in subdirs
cfg Installed build configuration files
db Installed data bases
dbd Installed data base definitions
doc Installed documentation files
html Installed html documentation
include Installed header files
include/os Installed os specific header files in subdirs
include/compiler Installed compiler-specific header files
lib Installed libraries in arch subdirectories
lib/perl Installed perl modules
templates Installed templates

Build related components

base/documentation directory - contains setup, build, and install documents

README.md Instructions for setup and building epics base
README.darwin.html Installation notes for Mac OS X (Darwin)
RELEASE_NOTES.html Notes on release changes
KnownProblems.html List of known problems and workarounds

base/startup directory - contains scripts to set environment and path

EpicsHostArch Shell script to set EPICS_HOST_ARCH env variable
unix.csh C shell script to set path and env variables
unix.sh Bourne shell script to set path and env variables
win32.bat Bat file example to configure win32-x86 target
windows.bat Bat file example to configure windows-x64 target

base/configure directory - contains build definitions and rules

CONFIG Includes configure files and allows variable overrides
CONFIG.CrossCommon Cross build definitions
CONFIG.gnuCommon Gnu compiler build definitions for all archs
CONFIG_ADDONS Definitions for <osclass> and DEFAULT options
CONFIG_APP_INCLUDE
CONFIG_BASE EPICS base tool and location definitions
CONFIG_BASE_VERSION Definitions for EPICS base version number
CONFIG_COMMON Definitions common to all builds
CONFIG_ENV Definitions of EPICS environment variables
CONFIG_FILE_TYPE
CONFIG_SITE Site specific make definitions
CONFIG_SITE_ENV Site defaults for EPICS environment variables
MAKEFILE Installs CONFIG* RULES* creates
RELEASE Location of external products
RULES Includes appropriate rules file
RULES.Db Rules for database and database definition files
RULES.ioc Rules for application iocBoot/ioc* directory
RULES_ARCHS Definitions and rules for building architectures
RULES_BUILD Build and install rules and definitions
RULES_DIRS Definitions and rules for building subdirectories
RULES_EXPAND
RULES_FILE_TYPE
RULES_TARGET
RULES_TOP Rules specific to a <top> dir (uninstall and tar)
Sample.Makefile Sample makefile with comments

base/configure/os directory - contains os-arch specific definitions

CONFIG.<host>.<target> Specific host-target build definitions
CONFIG.Common.<target> Specific target definitions for all hosts
CONFIG.<host>.Common Specific host definitions for all targets
CONFIG.UnixCommon.Common Definitions for Unix hosts and all targets
CONFIG.Common.UnixCommon Definitions for Unix targets and all hosts
CONFIG.Common.vxWorksCommon Specific host definitions for all vx targets
CONFIG_SITE.<host>.<target> Site specific host-target definitions
CONFIG_SITE.Common.<target> Site specific target defs for all hosts
CONFIG_SITE.<host>.Common Site specific host defs for all targets

Building EPICS base (Unix and Win32)

Unpack file

Unzip and untar the distribution file. Use WinZip on Windows systems.

Set environment variables

Files in the base/startup directory have been provided to help set required path and other environment variables.

Do site-specific build configuration

Site configuration To configure EPICS, you may want to modify the default definitions in the following files:

configure/CONFIG_SITE Build choices. Specify target archs.
configure/CONFIG_SITE_ENV Environment variable defaults
configure/RELEASE TORNADO2 full path location

Host configuration To configure each host system, you may override the default definitions by adding a new file in the configure/os directory with override definitions. The new file should have the same name as the distribution file to be overridden except with CONFIG in the name changed to CONFIG_SITE.

configure/os/CONFIG.<host>.<host> Host build settings
configure/os/CONFIG.<host>.Common Host common build settings

Target configuration To configure each target system, you may override the default definitions by adding a new file in the configure/os directory with override definitions. The new file should have the same name as the distribution file to be overridden except with CONFIG in the name replaced by CONFIG_SITE. This step is necessary even if the host system is the only target system.

configure/os/CONFIG.Common.<target> Target common settings
configure/os/CONFIG.<host>.<target> Host-target settings

Build EPICS base

After configuring the build you should be able to build EPICS base by issuing the following commands in the distribution's root directory (base):

gnumake clean uninstall
gnumake

The command "gnumake clean uninstall" will remove all files and directories generated by a previous build. The command "gnumake" will build and install everything for the configured host and targets.

It is recommended that you do a "gnumake clean uninstall" at the root directory of an EPICS directory structure before each complete rebuild to ensure that all components will be rebuilt.

Example application and extension

A perl tool, makeBaseApp.pl is included in the distribution file. This script will create a sample application that can be built and then executed to try out this release of base.

Instructions for building and executing the 3.15 example application can be found in the section "Example Application" of Chapter 2, "Getting Started", in the "IOC Application Developer's Guide" for this release. The "Example IOC Application" section briefly explains how to create and build an example application in a user created <top> directory. It also explains how to run the example application on a vxWorks ioc or as a process on the host system. By running the example application as a host-based IOC, you will be able to quickly implement a complete EPICS system and be able to run channel access clients on the host system.

A perl script, makeBaseExt.pl, is included in the distribution file. This script will create a sample extension that can be built and executed. The makeBaseApp.pl and makeBaseExt.pl scripts are installed into the install location bin/<hostarch> directory during the base build.

Multiple host platforms

You can build using a single EPICS directory structure on multiple host systems and for multiple cross target systems. The intermediate and binary files generated by the build will be created in separate subdirectories and installed into the appropriate separate host/target install directories. EPICS executables and perl scripts are installed into the /bin/<arch> directories. Libraries are installed into $(INSTALL_LOCATION)/lib/<arch>. The default definition for is ../.. which is the root directory in the distribution directory structure, base. Created object files are stored in O.<arch> source subdirectories, This allows objects for multiple cross target architectures to be maintained at the same time. To build EPICS base for a specific host/target combination you must have the proper host/target C/C++ cross compiler and target header files and the base/configure/os directory must have the appropriate configure files.