RetroShare/BUILD-cmake.md

RetroShare — CMake build (Linux / macOS / Windows)

Build commands for the whole tree from the root of the super-project. The top-level CMakeLists.txt only aggregates the independent component projects (libretroshare + GUI + service + friendserver + plugins) — each is a standalone CMake project, buildable on its own. JSON API / WebUI enabled.

Qt5 or Qt6

The build is version-agnostic: retroshare-gui/CMakeLists.txt probes Qt6 first (find_package(Qt6 QUIET COMPONENTS Core)) and falls back to Qt5, so the same tree builds against either Qt5 or Qt6. When both are installed Qt6 is preferred; force Qt5 with -DCMAKE_DISABLE_FIND_PACKAGE_Qt6=ON.

Why an explicit probe and not find_package(QT NAMES Qt6 Qt5 …): on Debian/Ubuntu multiarch (Qt5 and Qt6 both under /usr/lib/<arch>/cmake) the NAMES order is not honoured — CMake globs the sibling Qt5*/Qt6* config dirs and stops at whichever …Config.cmake it reaches first, which is filesystem-order dependent and routinely lands on Qt5 even with Qt6 listed first. The explicit Qt6 probe makes the preference deterministic, and is also what makes -DCMAKE_DISABLE_FIND_PACKAGE_Qt6=ON actually force a Qt5 build (with the versionless QT package name that switch had no effect).

Two deltas for a Qt6 build (everything else is identical):

• different Qt -dev packages (see each platform below);
• -DRS_PLUGINS=OFF — the VOIP plugin still uses the Qt5-era QtMultimedia API (QAudioInput/QAudioOutput/QCameraInfo) and isn't ported to Qt6 yet; FeedReader's CMake is also still Qt5-only.

Each configure below is prefixed with rm -rf Build-cmake, so the build dir is recreated from scratch every time. This keeps switching between Qt5 and Qt6 in the same Build-cmake clean (no stale CMakeCache.txt pinning the previous Qt version). Drop the rm -rf if you want an incremental rebuild instead.

Validated by the CMake CI: .github/workflows/{ubuntu,macos,windows}-cmake.yml (Qt5) and the matching …-cmake-qt6.yml (Qt6).

Other notes:

• RS_FORUM_DEEP_INDEX=OFF on purpose (Xapian unused; re-enabled later via the ForumContentSearchFTS5 branch).
• Ninja is used on all three platforms for consistency.
• RS_SERVICE_TERMINAL_WEBUI_PASSWORD=ON is required for retroshare-service to expose the -W/-B flags that enable and serve the WebUI. RS_WEBUI=ON alone builds the WebUI machinery, but the service then has no way to turn it on — enableWebUI defaults to false and only -W ever sets it, so the WebUI never serves. It is a cmake_dependent_option requiring RS_WEBUI=ON.

Submodules (init WITHOUT --remote)

--remote would move libretroshare off its pinned CMake commit and break the build. librnp needs --recursive for its nested src/libsexpp.

git submodule update --init libbitdht/ libretroshare/ openpgpsdk/ retroshare-webui/
git submodule update --init --recursive supportlibs/librnp
git submodule update --init supportlibs/restbed supportlibs/libsam3 \
                              supportlibs/udp-discovery-cpp supportlibs/rapidjson

rapidjson / GCC >= 13: the commit pinned by the super-project (f54b0e47) has a broken GenericStringRef::operator= that assigns to the const member length, so it fails to compile on modern toolchains (e.g. Debian 13 / GCC 14) with "assignment of read-only member 'length'". Check out the upstream fix commit (#719, on Tencent/rapidjson master):

git -C supportlibs/rapidjson fetch origin
git -C supportlibs/rapidjson checkout 9bd618f5

Version numbering

Versions are not hard-coded — CMake derives them at configure time from git describe run in each component's working tree, so what a build reports is exactly what your local checkout resolves to. Three independent strings are stamped in:

String	Source command	CMake file
RS_GUI_VERSION — the GUI's own version (shown in Help ▸ About)	git describe --tags --always --dirty in the super-project, leading v stripped	retroshare-gui/CMakeLists.txt
libRetroShare version (RS_MAJOR/RS_MINOR/RS_MINI + RS_EXTRA_VERSION)	git describe --tags --long --match 'v*.*.*' in libretroshare/, parsed into major.minor.mini + trailing extra	libretroshare/CMakeLists.txt
RS_LIB_VERSION_HASH — engine build hash	git describe --tags --always --dirty in libretroshare/, leading v stripped	libretroshare/CMakeLists.txt

The super-project's describe resolves to a v0.6.7.x tag; libretroshare's own tags are v0.6.7. So a GUI version reads like 0.6.7.3-1112-gd6047eb5a and the engine like 0.6.7-548-g25845f94, i.e. <tag>-<commits since tag>-g<short hash>.

To read the exact values a build would stamp, without building, run from the super-project root:

git describe --tags --always --dirty
git -C libretroshare describe --tags --long --match 'v*.*.*'

The first line is RS_GUI_VERSION (drop the leading v); the second is the libRetroShare version.

Notes:

• -dirty is appended whenever the working tree has tracked modifications at configure time. Modified submodule pointers count as tracked changes, so a tree that is otherwise clean apart from submodule drift still stamps -dirty on the GUI/engine version. Untracked files never trigger it.
• libretroshare uses --long, which always prints the -<N>-g<hash> suffix — even on a tagged commit you get v0.6.7-0-g…, never a bare 0.6.7.
• Merging feature branches into an integration branch (e.g. combo) only grows the -<N>- commit count and changes the -g<hash>; the v0.6.7.x / v0.6.7 tag prefix stays put. An octopus merge (one merge commit) yields a slightly lower <N> than the same branches merged one by one (one merge commit each).
• If git metadata is unavailable (tarball / distro build, or the git call fails), the GUI falls back to the default in retroshare-gui/src/rsguiversion.h ("version not available"), and libretroshare must be given the version on the CMake command line: -DRS_MAJOR_VERSION=… -DRS_MINOR_VERSION=… -DRS_MINI_VERSION=….

---

Linux (Ubuntu/Debian)

Dependencies — Qt5:

sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install -y \
  build-essential g++ cmake ninja-build pkg-config git \
  qtbase5-dev qtbase5-dev-tools qtmultimedia5-dev libqt5svg5-dev \
  libqt5x11extras5-dev qttools5-dev qttools5-dev-tools \
  libssl-dev zlib1g-dev libbz2-dev libbotan-2-dev libjson-c-dev \
  libasio-dev libsqlcipher-dev \
  libspeex-dev libspeexdsp-dev libminiupnpc-dev \
  libavcodec-dev libavutil-dev \
  libxml2-dev libxslt1-dev libcurl4-openssl-dev \
  doxygen python3

Dependencies — Qt6 (self-contained; only the qt* packages differ from the Qt5 list above):

sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install -y \
  build-essential g++ cmake ninja-build pkg-config git \
  qt6-base-dev qt6-base-dev-tools qt6-multimedia-dev \
  qt6-5compat-dev qt6-tools-dev qt6-tools-dev-tools \
  libssl-dev zlib1g-dev libbz2-dev libbotan-2-dev libjson-c-dev \
  libasio-dev libsqlcipher-dev \
  libspeex-dev libspeexdsp-dev libminiupnpc-dev \
  libavcodec-dev libavutil-dev \
  libxml2-dev libxslt1-dev libcurl4-openssl-dev \
  doxygen python3

On Ubuntu 24.04 the Core5Compat dev headers come from qt6-5compat-dev (there is no libqt6core5compat6-dev). Svg/X11Extras dev packages aren't needed on Linux for Qt6.

Build — Qt5:

rm -rf Build-cmake
cmake -G Ninja -B Build-cmake -S . \
  -DCMAKE_POLICY_VERSION_MINIMUM=3.5 -DCMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=Release \
  -DCMAKE_DISABLE_FIND_PACKAGE_Qt6=ON \
  -DRS_RNPLIB=ON -DRS_JSON_API=ON -DRS_WEBUI=ON -DRS_SERVICE_TERMINAL_WEBUI_PASSWORD=ON \
  -DRS_GUI=ON -DRS_SERVICE=ON -DRS_FRIENDSERVER=ON -DRS_PLUGINS=ON -DRS_FORUM_DEEP_INDEX=OFF \
  -DRS_USE_I2P_SAM3=ON -DRS_BITDHT=ON -DRS_MINIUPNPC=ON \
  -DRS_BRODCAST_DISCOVERY=ON -DRS_SQLCIPHER=ON
cmake --build Build-cmake -j$(nproc)

Build — Qt6 (auto-selected once the qt6 -dev packages are installed):

rm -rf Build-cmake
cmake -G Ninja -B Build-cmake -S . \
  -DCMAKE_POLICY_VERSION_MINIMUM=3.5 -DCMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=Release \
  -DRS_RNPLIB=ON -DRS_JSON_API=ON -DRS_WEBUI=ON -DRS_SERVICE_TERMINAL_WEBUI_PASSWORD=ON \
  -DRS_GUI=ON -DRS_SERVICE=ON -DRS_FRIENDSERVER=ON -DRS_PLUGINS=OFF -DRS_FORUM_DEEP_INDEX=OFF \
  -DRS_USE_I2P_SAM3=ON -DRS_BITDHT=ON -DRS_MINIUPNPC=ON \
  -DRS_BRODCAST_DISCOVERY=ON -DRS_SQLCIPHER=ON
cmake --build Build-cmake -j$(nproc)

Debug build (Linux)

The commands above build Release (-O3 -DNDEBUG): aggressive inlining, assertions stripped. Fine for daily use, wrong under a debugger — backtraces land on misattributed lines and locals read <optimized out>. To step through code or investigate a crash with gdb, build Debug instead.

Two changes to the Qt5 configure above:

• swap -DCMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=Release for -DCMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=Debug (gives -g -O0);
• pin explicit debug flags so every symbol is emitted and nothing is inlined: -DCMAKE_CXX_FLAGS_DEBUG / -DCMAKE_C_FLAGS_DEBUG = -g3 -O0 -fno-omit-frame-pointer.

-g3 emits full debug info including macro definitions; -O0 disables inlining so backtrace line numbers are exact; -fno-omit-frame-pointer keeps stack unwinding reliable.

rm -rf Build-cmake
cmake -G Ninja -B Build-cmake -S . \
  -DCMAKE_POLICY_VERSION_MINIMUM=3.5 -DCMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=Debug \
  -DCMAKE_CXX_FLAGS_DEBUG="-g3 -O0 -fno-omit-frame-pointer" \
  -DCMAKE_C_FLAGS_DEBUG="-g3 -O0 -fno-omit-frame-pointer" \
  -DCMAKE_DISABLE_FIND_PACKAGE_Qt6=ON \
  -DRS_RNPLIB=ON -DRS_JSON_API=ON -DRS_WEBUI=ON -DRS_SERVICE_TERMINAL_WEBUI_PASSWORD=ON \
  -DRS_GUI=ON -DRS_SERVICE=ON -DRS_FRIENDSERVER=ON -DRS_PLUGINS=ON -DRS_FORUM_DEEP_INDEX=OFF \
  -DRS_USE_I2P_SAM3=ON -DRS_BITDHT=ON -DRS_MINIUPNPC=ON \
  -DRS_BRODCAST_DISCOVERY=ON -DRS_SQLCIPHER=ON
cmake --build Build-cmake -j$(nproc)

For a Qt6 debug build, drop -DCMAKE_DISABLE_FIND_PACKAGE_Qt6=ON and set -DRS_PLUGINS=OFF (as in the Release Qt6 command); the debug flags are identical.

A Debug build compiles slower and produces a much larger binary — expected. RelWithDebInfo (-O2 -g) is a middle ground with usable symbols, but because it still optimizes it gives approximate backtraces; prefer Debug when chasing a crash.

Run the GUI under gdb (the binary lands at Build-cmake/retroshare-gui/retroshare):

gdb ./Build-cmake/retroshare-gui/retroshare

then run, reproduce the issue, and bt at the crash for a full symbolized stack.

AddressSanitizer (use-after-free / heap bugs)

For memory-corruption bugs (use-after-free, heap overflow, double free), an ASan build reports the fault at the moment of the bad access, with three stacks — allocation, free, and the offending access — instead of a bare SIGSEGV after the fact. Add -fsanitize=address to both the compile and the link flags:

rm -rf Build-cmake
cmake -G Ninja -B Build-cmake -S . \
  -DCMAKE_POLICY_VERSION_MINIMUM=3.5 -DCMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=Debug \
  -DCMAKE_CXX_FLAGS_DEBUG="-g3 -O1 -fno-omit-frame-pointer -fsanitize=address" \
  -DCMAKE_C_FLAGS_DEBUG="-g3 -O1 -fno-omit-frame-pointer -fsanitize=address" \
  -DCMAKE_EXE_LINKER_FLAGS="-fsanitize=address" \
  -DCMAKE_SHARED_LINKER_FLAGS="-fsanitize=address" \
  -DCMAKE_MODULE_LINKER_FLAGS="-fsanitize=address" \
  -DCMAKE_DISABLE_FIND_PACKAGE_Qt6=ON \
  -DRS_RNPLIB=ON -DRS_JSON_API=ON -DRS_WEBUI=ON -DRS_SERVICE_TERMINAL_WEBUI_PASSWORD=ON \
  -DRS_GUI=ON -DRS_SERVICE=ON -DRS_FRIENDSERVER=ON -DRS_PLUGINS=ON -DRS_FORUM_DEEP_INDEX=OFF \
  -DRS_USE_I2P_SAM3=ON -DRS_BITDHT=ON -DRS_MINIUPNPC=ON \
  -DRS_BRODCAST_DISCOVERY=ON -DRS_SQLCIPHER=ON
cmake --build Build-cmake -j$(nproc)

Needs the ASan runtime: sudo apt-get install -y libasan8. Run with leak detection off — RetroShare allocates plenty at startup that would otherwise bury the report:

ASAN_OPTIONS=abort_on_error=1:detect_leaks=0 ./Build-cmake/retroshare-gui/retroshare

-O1 (not -O0) is deliberate: ASan needs light optimization for acceptable runtime and cleaner reports, and the sanitizer preserves accurate line numbers regardless.

---

macOS (Homebrew, Apple Silicon)

Dependencies — Qt5:

brew install ninja qt@5 openssl@3 botan@2 sqlcipher miniupnpc \
  json-c asio speex speexdsp ffmpeg libxml2 libxslt bzip2 zlib rapidjson doxygen

Dependencies — Qt6 (self-contained; only the Qt package differs from the Qt5 list above). Unlike Linux's split qt6-* packages, Homebrew ships Qt6 as a single monolithic qt formula that already bundles qt5compat / svg / multimedia / tools — so installing qt is all you need:

brew install ninja qt openssl@3 botan@2 sqlcipher miniupnpc \
  json-c asio speex speexdsp ffmpeg libxml2 libxslt bzip2 zlib rapidjson doxygen

qt5compat (bundled in qt) provides Qt6::Core5Compat, required by the GUI (QRegExp / QTextCodec).

If brew install qt fails with Cannot install qtbase because conflicting formulae are installed … qt@5: because both link conflicting binaries, your qt@5 is (force-)linked. Run brew unlink qt@5 first, then re-run brew install qt:

brew unlink qt@5
brew install qt

Both Qt versions then coexist: the Qt6 build finds Qt6 via Qt6_DIR, and the Qt5 build still finds qt@5 via -DQt5_DIR="$(brew --prefix qt@5)/lib/cmake/Qt5" (the keg path works whether or not qt@5 is linked).

Botan: with several Botan versions installed (botan=v3, botan@2, botan@3), a fresh configure can mismatch — Botan 3 headers + Botan 2 lib → Undefined symbols … Botan::… linker errors in librnp. Both macOS commands below pin it with -DBOTAN_ROOT_DIR="$(brew --prefix botan@2)" so headers and lib come from the same keg ([FindBotan.cmake] searches BOTAN_ROOT_DIR only, via NO_DEFAULT_PATH). To build against Botan 3 instead, point it at $(brew --prefix botan) — RNP then detects v3 and links libbotan-3.

The harvest loop in both macOS commands skips every qt* keg on purpose: Qt is provided via Qt6_DIR / Qt5_DIR, and pulling a second Qt's headers off /opt/homebrew/opt/qt* would mix Qt5/Qt6 and break the build.

Build — Qt5 (harvest Homebrew include/lib dirs; point find_package(Qt5) at keg-only qt@5):

HB="$(brew --prefix)"; QT5="$(brew --prefix qt@5)"
IFLAGS="-I$HB/include"; LFLAGS="-L$HB/lib"; PREFIX="$QT5;$HB"
for d in "$HB"/opt/*; do
  case "${d##*/}" in qt*) continue;; esac
  [ -d "$d/include" ] && IFLAGS="$IFLAGS -I$d/include"
  [ -d "$d/lib" ]     && LFLAGS="$LFLAGS -L$d/lib"
  PREFIX="$PREFIX;$d"
done

rm -rf Build-cmake
cmake -G Ninja -B Build-cmake -S . \
  -DCMAKE_POLICY_VERSION_MINIMUM=3.5 -DCMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=Release \
  -DCMAKE_PREFIX_PATH="$PREFIX" -DQt5_DIR="$QT5/lib/cmake/Qt5" \
  -DCMAKE_DISABLE_FIND_PACKAGE_Qt6=ON \
  -DOPENSSL_ROOT_DIR="$(brew --prefix openssl@3)" \
  -DBOTAN_ROOT_DIR="$(brew --prefix botan@2)" \
  -DRS_RNPLIB=ON -DRS_JSON_API=ON -DRS_WEBUI=ON -DRS_SERVICE_TERMINAL_WEBUI_PASSWORD=ON \
  -DRS_GUI=ON -DRS_SERVICE=ON -DRS_FRIENDSERVER=ON -DRS_PLUGINS=ON -DRS_FORUM_DEEP_INDEX=OFF \
  -DRS_USE_I2P_SAM3=ON -DRS_BITDHT=ON -DRS_MINIUPNPC=ON \
  -DRS_BRODCAST_DISCOVERY=ON -DRS_SQLCIPHER=ON \
  -DCMAKE_C_FLAGS="$IFLAGS" -DCMAKE_CXX_FLAGS="$IFLAGS" \
  -DCMAKE_EXE_LINKER_FLAGS="$LFLAGS" \
  -DCMAKE_SHARED_LINKER_FLAGS="$LFLAGS" \
  -DCMAKE_MODULE_LINKER_FLAGS="$LFLAGS"
cmake --build Build-cmake -j$(sysctl -n hw.ncpu)

Build — Qt6 (use the qt prefix + Qt6_DIR; plugins OFF):

HB="$(brew --prefix)"; QT6="$(brew --prefix qt)"
IFLAGS="-I$HB/include"; LFLAGS="-L$HB/lib"; PREFIX="$QT6;$HB"
for d in "$HB"/opt/*; do
  case "${d##*/}" in qt*) continue;; esac
  [ -d "$d/include" ] && IFLAGS="$IFLAGS -I$d/include"
  [ -d "$d/lib" ]     && LFLAGS="$LFLAGS -L$d/lib"
  PREFIX="$PREFIX;$d"
done

rm -rf Build-cmake
cmake -G Ninja -B Build-cmake -S . \
  -DCMAKE_POLICY_VERSION_MINIMUM=3.5 -DCMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=Release \
  -DCMAKE_PREFIX_PATH="$PREFIX" -DQt6_DIR="$QT6/lib/cmake/Qt6" \
  -DOPENSSL_ROOT_DIR="$(brew --prefix openssl@3)" \
  -DBOTAN_ROOT_DIR="$(brew --prefix botan@2)" \
  -DRS_RNPLIB=ON -DRS_JSON_API=ON -DRS_WEBUI=ON -DRS_SERVICE_TERMINAL_WEBUI_PASSWORD=ON \
  -DRS_GUI=ON -DRS_SERVICE=ON -DRS_FRIENDSERVER=ON -DRS_PLUGINS=OFF -DRS_FORUM_DEEP_INDEX=OFF \
  -DRS_USE_I2P_SAM3=ON -DRS_BITDHT=ON -DRS_MINIUPNPC=ON \
  -DRS_BRODCAST_DISCOVERY=ON -DRS_SQLCIPHER=ON \
  -DCMAKE_C_FLAGS="$IFLAGS" -DCMAKE_CXX_FLAGS="$IFLAGS" \
  -DCMAKE_EXE_LINKER_FLAGS="$LFLAGS" \
  -DCMAKE_SHARED_LINKER_FLAGS="$LFLAGS" \
  -DCMAKE_MODULE_LINKER_FLAGS="$LFLAGS"
cmake --build Build-cmake -j$(sysctl -n hw.ncpu)

---

Windows (MSYS2 — UCRT64 shell)

The build commands use -j$(nproc) (all cores; nproc is available in MSYS2). MinGW C++ compilation is RAM-hungry (RNP/rapidjson can use ~1.5 GB per job), so on a low-memory machine lower it manually, e.g. -j4 — that's why it used to be hard-capped at -j3.

RS_USE_NATIVE_DIALOGS=ON — Qt's own (non-native) file/directory dialogs hang on Windows. Using the OS native dialogs (RS_USE_NATIVE_DIALOGS=ON) avoids the problem. On Linux/macOS the default OFF works fine.

Dependencies — common + Qt5 (use the UCRT64 doxygen, not the base MSYS one — it mishandles D:/ paths):

pacman -S --needed base-devel git perl ruby \
  mingw-w64-ucrt-x86_64-toolchain mingw-w64-ucrt-x86_64-cmake mingw-w64-ucrt-x86_64-ninja \
  mingw-w64-ucrt-x86_64-doxygen mingw-w64-ucrt-x86_64-python \
  mingw-w64-ucrt-x86_64-qt5-base mingw-w64-ucrt-x86_64-qt5-multimedia \
  mingw-w64-ucrt-x86_64-qt5-svg mingw-w64-ucrt-x86_64-qt5-tools \
  mingw-w64-ucrt-x86_64-openssl mingw-w64-ucrt-x86_64-libbotan mingw-w64-ucrt-x86_64-sqlcipher \
  mingw-w64-ucrt-x86_64-miniupnpc mingw-w64-ucrt-x86_64-json-c mingw-w64-ucrt-x86_64-rapidjson \
  mingw-w64-ucrt-x86_64-asio mingw-w64-ucrt-x86_64-libxml2 mingw-w64-ucrt-x86_64-libxslt \
  mingw-w64-ucrt-x86_64-speex mingw-w64-ucrt-x86_64-speexdsp mingw-w64-ucrt-x86_64-ffmpeg \
  mingw-w64-ucrt-x86_64-bzip2 mingw-w64-ucrt-x86_64-zlib

Dependencies — Qt6 (self-contained; only the qt* packages differ from the Qt5 list above):

pacman -S --needed base-devel git perl ruby \
  mingw-w64-ucrt-x86_64-toolchain mingw-w64-ucrt-x86_64-cmake mingw-w64-ucrt-x86_64-ninja \
  mingw-w64-ucrt-x86_64-doxygen mingw-w64-ucrt-x86_64-python \
  mingw-w64-ucrt-x86_64-qt6-base mingw-w64-ucrt-x86_64-qt6-multimedia \
  mingw-w64-ucrt-x86_64-qt6-svg mingw-w64-ucrt-x86_64-qt6-5compat mingw-w64-ucrt-x86_64-qt6-tools \
  mingw-w64-ucrt-x86_64-openssl mingw-w64-ucrt-x86_64-libbotan mingw-w64-ucrt-x86_64-sqlcipher \
  mingw-w64-ucrt-x86_64-miniupnpc mingw-w64-ucrt-x86_64-json-c mingw-w64-ucrt-x86_64-rapidjson \
  mingw-w64-ucrt-x86_64-asio mingw-w64-ucrt-x86_64-libxml2 mingw-w64-ucrt-x86_64-libxslt \
  mingw-w64-ucrt-x86_64-speex mingw-w64-ucrt-x86_64-speexdsp mingw-w64-ucrt-x86_64-ffmpeg \
  mingw-w64-ucrt-x86_64-bzip2 mingw-w64-ucrt-x86_64-zlib

Build — Qt5 (the -include / -Wno-template-body flags are only needed for GCC >= 16 — RNP/rapidjson; harmless on older GCC):

rm -rf Build-cmake
cmake -G Ninja -B Build-cmake -S . \
  -DCMAKE_POLICY_VERSION_MINIMUM=3.5 -DCMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=Release \
  -DRS_LIBRETROSHARE_STATIC=OFF -DRS_LIBRETROSHARE_SHARED=ON \
  -DCMAKE_DISABLE_FIND_PACKAGE_Qt6=ON \
  -DRS_USE_NATIVE_DIALOGS=ON \
  -DRS_RNPLIB=ON -DRS_JSON_API=ON -DRS_WEBUI=ON -DRS_SERVICE_TERMINAL_WEBUI_PASSWORD=ON \
  -DRS_GUI=ON -DRS_SERVICE=ON -DRS_FRIENDSERVER=ON -DRS_PLUGINS=ON -DRS_FORUM_DEEP_INDEX=OFF \
  -DRS_USE_I2P_SAM3=ON -DRS_BITDHT=ON -DRS_MINIUPNPC=ON \
  -DRS_BRODCAST_DISCOVERY=ON -DRS_SQLCIPHER=ON \
  -DCMAKE_C_FLAGS="-include string.h -include stdint.h" \
  -DCMAKE_CXX_FLAGS="-include cstring -include cstdint -Wno-template-body"
cmake --build Build-cmake -j$(nproc)

Build — Qt6 (auto-selected once the qt6 packages are installed; plugins OFF):

rm -rf Build-cmake
cmake -G Ninja -B Build-cmake -S . \
  -DCMAKE_POLICY_VERSION_MINIMUM=3.5 -DCMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=Release \
  -DRS_LIBRETROSHARE_STATIC=OFF -DRS_LIBRETROSHARE_SHARED=ON \
  -DRS_USE_NATIVE_DIALOGS=ON \
  -DRS_RNPLIB=ON -DRS_JSON_API=ON -DRS_WEBUI=ON -DRS_SERVICE_TERMINAL_WEBUI_PASSWORD=ON \
  -DRS_GUI=ON -DRS_SERVICE=ON -DRS_FRIENDSERVER=ON -DRS_PLUGINS=OFF -DRS_FORUM_DEEP_INDEX=OFF \
  -DRS_USE_I2P_SAM3=ON -DRS_BITDHT=ON -DRS_MINIUPNPC=ON \
  -DRS_BRODCAST_DISCOVERY=ON -DRS_SQLCIPHER=ON \
  -DCMAKE_C_FLAGS="-include string.h -include stdint.h" \
  -DCMAKE_CXX_FLAGS="-include cstring -include cstdint -Wno-template-body"
cmake --build Build-cmake -j$(nproc)

Packaging & Deployment (Portable & Setup Installer)

Once the CMake build finishes successfully, you can bundle RetroShare and all its DLL dependencies into a standalone portable folder, a compressed archive, and a Windows Setup Installer.

To do this, run the deployment script from the project root:

./build_scripts/Windows-msys2/deploy-windows.sh

By default, the script looks for your build files in Build-cmake/. You can override this by setting the BUILD_DIR environment variable:

BUILD_DIR=MyCustomBuildDir ./build_scripts/Windows-msys2/deploy-windows.sh

Portable Archives (7z / ZIP)

• The script automatically gathers all DLLs (Qt libraries, compiler runtime, and third-party dependencies) and places them alongside the executables.
• It then compresses the folder into a portable package.
• If p7zip is installed, it will compress using 7-Zip for high compression ratios. Otherwise, it falls back to standard ZIP.
• To install 7-Zip in MSYS2:

  pacman -S --needed p7zip
  

Setup Installer (NSIS)

• If makensis is found, the script will automatically compile a self-extracting Windows installer (-setup.exe) using Nullsoft Scriptable Install System (NSIS).
• To enable this, you must install the NSIS package for your active shell environment:
  • UCRT64 shell:

    pacman -S --needed mingw-w64-ucrt-x86_64-nsis
    

  • MinGW64 shell:

    pacman -S --needed mingw-w64-x86_64-nsis