How to compile Radiance using the MinGW tools and Scons

Python for Windows can be downloaded from http://www.python.org/download/.

Scons is a software building system written in Python and it is downloadable from http://www.scons.org/download.php.

MinGW is a minimalist GNU software development system, available from http://www.mingw.org/download.shtml. It is a good idea to download and install also gzip and bsdtar to extract the Radiance source code tarballs from the command line.

The next steps are to download Radiance and to build it using the Scons system.

The latest Radiance source code can be downloaded from http://www.radiance-online.org/software/. It is divided into two packages:

1. a support pakage: rad3R8supp.tar.gz
2. the actual actively developed source code: radiance-HEAD.tgz

Open the Windows Command Prompt (Start/All programs/Accessories/Command Prompt), cd to the folder where the Radiance source tarballs are and expand them using the following commands:

• bsdtar zxvf rad3R8supp.tar.gz
• bsdtar zxvf radiance-HEAD.tar.gz

Change to the ray folder:

• cd ray

and launch the build process:

• scons build

As of today (2008/04/15 22:04) the required changes to manage to compile Radiance with MinGW are summarised in the attached diff file: differences.zip