Building OVITO on macOS — OVITO User Manual 3.15.3-dev-HEAD-b1e9512d documentation

# Building OVITO on macOS

## Installing dependencies

See the list of requirements and install the required build tools and third-party libraries. OVITO should be compiled with Apple’s clang C++ compiler shipping with Xcode. It’s easiest to use MacPorts for installing many of the required dependencies.

After setting up MacPorts, run:

    sudo port install netcdf pzlib libssh boost cmake yasm

from the terminal to install the required dependencies of OVITO.

Next, download and install Qt 6 for Mac.

Next, download the source code and build the shared version of the ffmpeg video encoding library (optional):

    curl -O https://ffmpeg.org/releases/ffmpeg-4.2.8.tar.gz
    tar xzfv ffmpeg-4.2.8.tar.gz
    cd ffmpeg-4.2.8
    ./configure \
      --disable-network \
      --disable-programs \
      --disable-debug \
      --disable-doc \
      --disable-static \
      --enable-shared \
      --prefix=$HOME/ffmpeg
    make install

## Downloading the source code

To download OVITO’s source code into a new directory named `ovito/` run:

    git clone --recursive https://gitlab.com/stuko/ovito.git

## Compiling OVITO

Within the source directory, create a build sub-directory and let CMake generate the Makefile:

    cd ovito
    mkdir build
    cd build
    cmake -DCMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=Release \
        -DCMAKE_INSTALL_PREFIX=../install \
        -DCMAKE_PREFIX_PATH=`echo $HOME/Qt/6.*.*/clang_64/` \
        -DFFMPEG_INCLUDE_DIR=$HOME/ffmpeg/include \
        -DFFMPEG_LIBRARY_DIR=$HOME/ffmpeg/lib \
        ..

Adjust the paths in the command above as needed. If this step fails, or if you want to disable individual components of OVITO, you can now run ccmake . to open the CMake configuration program and make changes to the build settings. Once you are done, build OVITO by running

    cmake --build . --parallel

If this step succeeds, you can run cmake --install . to generate an app bundle in the `ovito/install/` directory.