# XMLSec Library: Windows port

This directory contains the files required to build this software on the
native Windows platform.

## Building the library

Building from command line is the only supported method.

In order to build from the command-line you need to make sure that
your compiler works from the command line. This is not always the
case, often the required environment variables are missing. If you are
not sure, test if this works first. If it doesn't, you will first have
to configure your compiler suite to run from the command-line - please
refer to your compiler's documentation regarding that.

The first thing you want to do is configure the source. You can have
the configuration script do this automatically for you. The
configuration script is written in JScript, a Microsoft's
implementation of the ECMA scripting language. Almost every Windows
machine can execute this through the Windows Scripting Host. If your
system lacks the ability to execute JScript for some reason, you must
perform the configuration manually.

The second step is compiling the source and, optionally, installing it
to the location of your choosing.

### Configuring the source automatically

The configuration script accepts numerous options. Some of these
affect features which will be available in the compiled software,
others affect the way the software is built and installed. To see a
full list of options supported by the configuration script, run

```
cscript configure.js help
```

from the `win32` subdirectory. The configuration script will present you
the options it accepts and give a biref explanation of these. In every
case you will have two sets of options. The first set is specific to
the software you are building and the second one is specific to the
Windows port.

Once you have decided which options suit you, run the script with that
options. Here is an example:

```
cscript configure.js prefix=c:\opt include=c:\opt\include lib=c:\opt\lib debug=yes
```

The previous example will configure the process to install the library
in `c:\opt`, use `c:\opt\include` and `c:\opt\lib` as additional search
paths for the compiler and the linker and build executables with debug
symbols.

Note: Please do not use path names which contain spaces. This will
fail.

### Configuring the source manually

The manual configuration is pretty straightforward, but I would
suggest rather to get a JScript engine and let the configure script do
it for you. This process involves editing the apropriate Makefile to
suit your needs, as well as manually generating certain *.h files from
their *.h.in sources.

### Compiling

After the configuration stage has been completed, you want to build
the software. To do that, type

```
nmake
```

in the `win32` subdirectory.When the building completes, you will find
the executable files in `win32\binaries` directory.

You can install the software into the directory you specified to the
configure script during the configure stage by typing

```
nmake install
```

## Building your appliation

On Windows there is no easy way to automatically configure compilation
options or paths. You have to do everything manualy. Start up your
favorite IDE or text editor and read on.

### Global Defines

If you want to use automatic crypto library configuration (`xmlsec/crypto.h` file)
you need to add one of the following global defines:

```
    #define XMLSEC_CRYPTO_OPENSSL
    #define XMLSEC_CRYPTO_GNUTLS
    #define XMLSEC_CRYPTO_NSS
```

Also you'll need to define all configuration parameters used during XML Security
Library compilation (`XMLSEC_NO_AES`, `XMLSEC_NO_X509`,...).

### Setting include and library paths.

As usual, you need to have correct include and library paths to xmlsec, libxml,
libxslt, iconv, openssl or any other library used in your application.

### Selecting correct Windows runtime libraries.

Windows basically has 6 different C runtimes. The first one is called libc.lib
and can only be linked to statically and used only in single-threaded mode.
The second one is also can only be linked staticaly and used in multi-threaded
mode. The third one is called msvcrt.dll and can only be linked to dynamically.
These three then live in their debug and release incarnations, which results in
six C runtimes. The rule is simple: exactly the same runtime must be used
throughout the application. Client code *MUST* use the same runtime as XMLSec,
LibXML, LibXSLT, OpenSSL or any other library used.

If you downloaded XMLSec, LibXML, LibXSLT and OpenSSL binaries from Igor's
page then all libraries are all linked to msvcrt.dll ("Multithreaded DLL"
(NOT DEBUG!); /MD compiler switch). The click-next click-finish wizardry
from Visual Studio chooses the single-threaded libc.lib as the default
when you create a new project. And this causes great problems because
you program crashes on first IO operation, first malloc/free from different
runtimes or something even more trivial.

Do not forget that if you need a different runtime for some reason, then
you MUST recompile not only XMLSec, but LibXML, LibXSLT and OpenSSL as well.

## Authors
- March 2002, Igor Zlatkovic <igor@stud.fh-frankfurt.de>
- July, 2022, Aleksey Sanin <aleksey@aleksey.com>
