Building MiKTeX (macOS)

The MiKTeX source code allows you to build a Drag'n'Drop installer for macOS:

Image Text

This HOWTO describes the build procedure.

Prerequisites

  • Homebrew

    Homebrew is a package manager for macOS which you can use to install development libraries and build tools which are required for building MiKTeX on macOS. Please visit https://brew.sh for installation instructions.

  • Xcode

    Building MiKTeX requires a modern C/C++ compiler. The minimum required standard versions are C99 and C++14 which will be satisfied by installing the latest Xcode version.

  • CMake

    The MiKTeX build is driven by CMake, a tool which will create Makefiles suited for the local system. The minimum required CMake version is 3.7.0. Install it with Homebrew:

    brew install cmake

  • Various build utilities

    In addition to the compiler and the CMake build system, you will need these utilities:

    • pkg-config

    Install these utilities with Homebrew:

    brew install pkg-config

  • Libraries

    You will need development packages for a couple of development packages. Again, use Homebrew to install them:

    brew install icu4c
brew install freetype
brew install fribidi
brew install gmp
brew install graphite2
brew install hunspell
brew install jpeg
brew install libpng
brew install libtiff
brew install libzzip
brew install log4cxx
brew install mpfr
brew install openssl
brew install pixman
brew install popt
brew install potrace
brew install qt
brew install uriparser
brew install xz

Running CMake

In order to make some special libraries accessible to CMake, it is necessary to set the environment variable CMAKE_PREFIX_PATH:

brewprefix="`brew --prefix`"
export CMAKE_PREFIX_PATH="${brewprefix}/opt/icu4c:${brewprefix}/opt/openssl:${brewprefix}/opt/icu4c:${brewprefix}/opt/qt:${CMAKE_PREFIX_PATH}"

It is recommended that you build outside the source code directory:

cmake ../source

Here you have to specify the path to the MiKTeX source code directory (../source in the example above).

Building MiKTeX

Run the Make utility to build MiKTeX, for example:

make

Create installer

Run

make package

to build the Drag'n'Drop installer. This will create a .dmg file which you can use to install MiKTeX.