This guide has been tested with FreeBSD 12.1 x86_64. Please read it in full before you proceed to familiarize yourself with the build procedure.
Several other distributions have specific build guides and a general Linux build guide is also available.
- Document conventions
- Get the source code
- Install the required packages
3.1. Build missing dependencies - Build Kodi
4.1. Configure build
4.2. Build - Build binary add-ons
- Run Kodi
- Uninstall Kodi
- Test suite
This guide assumes you are using terminal
, also known as console
, command-line
or simply cli
. Commands need to be run at the terminal, one at a time and in the provided order.
This is a comment that provides context:
this is a command
this is another command
and yet another one
Example: Clone Kodi's current master branch:
git clone https://github.com/xbmc/xbmc kodi
Commands that contain strings enclosed in angle brackets denote something you need to change to suit your needs.
git clone -b <branch-name> https://github.com/xbmc/xbmc kodi
Example: Clone Kodi's current Krypton branch:
git clone -b Krypton https://github.com/xbmc/xbmc kodi
Several different strategies are used to draw your attention to certain pieces of information. In order of how critical the information is, these items are marked as a note, tip, or warning. For example:
NOTE: Linux is user friendly... It's just very particular about who its friends are.
TIP: Algorithm is what developers call code they do not want to explain.
WARNING: Developers don't change light bulbs. It's a hardware problem.
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Make sure git
is installed:
sudo pkg install git
Change to your home
directory:
cd $HOME
Clone Kodi's current master branch:
git clone https://github.com/xbmc/xbmc kodi
If you get a package not found
type of message with the below command, remove the offending package(s) from the install list and reissue the command. Take a note of the missing dependencies and, after a successful step completion, build the missing dependencies manually.
NOTE: Kodi requires a compiler with C++17 support, i.e. gcc >= 7 or clang >= 5
Install build dependencies:
sudo pkg install autoconf automake avahi-app binutils cmake curl dbus doxygen e2fsprogs-libuuid enca encodings flac flatbuffers font-util fontconfig freetype2 fribidi fstrcmp gawk gettext-tools giflib git glew gmake gmp gnutls googletest gperf gstreamer1-vaapi hal jpeg-turbo libaacs libass libbdplus libbluray libcapn libcdio libcec libedit libfmt libgcrypt libgpg-error libidn libinotify libmicrohttpd libnfs libogg libplist librtmp libtool libudev-devd libva libvdpau libvorbis libxslt lirc lzo2 m4 mesa-libs mysql57-client nasm openjdk8 p8-platform pkgconf python3 rapidjson shairplay sndio sqlite3 swig30 taglib tiff tinyxml xf86-input-keyboard xf86-input-mouse xorg-server xrandr zip
WARNING: Make sure you copy paste the entire line or you might receive an error or miss a few dependencies.
NOTE: For developers and anyone else who builds frequently it is recommended to install ccache
to expedite subsequent builds of Kodi.
You can install it with:
sudo pkg install ccache
TIP: If you have multiple computers at home, distcc
will distribute build workloads of C and C++ code across several machines on a network. Team Kodi may not be willing to give support if problems arise using such a build configuration.
You can install it with:
sudo pkg install distcc
See the general Linux build guide for reference.
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If you get a Could NOT find...
error message during CMake configuration step, take a note of the missing dependencies and either install them from repositories (if available) or build the missing dependencies manually.
Create an out-of-source build directory:
mkdir $HOME/kodi-build
Change to build directory:
cd $HOME/kodi-build
Configure build:
cmake ../kodi -DCMAKE_INSTALL_PREFIX=/usr/local
cmake --build . -- VERBOSE=1 -j$(sysctl hw.ncpu | awk '{print $2}')
TIP: By adding -j<number>
to the make command, you can choose how many concurrent jobs will be used and expedite the build process. It is recommended to use -j$(sysctl hw.ncpu | awk '{print $2}')
to compile on all available processor cores.
After the build process completes successfully you can test your shiny new Kodi build while in the build directory:
./kodi-x11
If everything was OK during your test you can now install the binaries to their place, in this example /usr/local.
sudo gmake install
NOTE: gmake
stands for GNU Make. BSD's own make does not work here.
This will install Kodi in the prefix provided in section 4.1.
TIP: To override Kodi's install location, use DESTDIR=<path>
. For example:
sudo gmake install DESTDIR=$HOME/kodi
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You can find a complete list of available binary add-ons here.
Change to Kodi's source code directory:
cd $HOME/kodi
Build all add-ons:
sudo gmake -j$(sysctl hw.ncpu | awk '{print $2}') -C tools/depends/target/binary-addons PREFIX=/usr/local
Build specific add-ons:
sudo gmake -j$(sysctl hw.ncpu | awk '{print $2}') -C tools/depends/target/binary-addons PREFIX=/usr/local ADDONS="audioencoder.flac pvr.vdr.vnsi audiodecoder.snesapu"
Build a specific group of add-ons:
sudo gmake -j$(sysctl hw.ncpu | awk '{print $2}') -C tools/depends/target/binary-addons PREFIX=/usr/local ADDONS="pvr.*"
Clean-up binary add-ons:
sudo gmake -C tools/depends/target/binary-addons clean
For additional information on regular expression usage for ADDONS_TO_BUILD, view ADDONS_TO_BUILD section located at Kodi add-ons CMake based buildsystem
NOTE: PREFIX=/usr/local
should match Kodi's -DCMAKE_INSTALL_PREFIX=
prefix used in section 4.1.
If you chose to install Kodi using /usr
or /usr/local
as the -DCMAKE_INSTALL_PREFIX=
, you can just issue kodi in a terminal session.
If you changed -DCMAKE_INSTALL_PREFIX=
to install Kodi into some non-standard location, you will have to run Kodi directly:
<CMAKE_INSTALL_PREFIX>/bin/kodi
To run Kodi in portable mode (useful for testing):
<CMAKE_INSTALL_PREFIX>/bin/kodi -p
sudo gmake uninstall
WARNING:: If you reran CMakes' configure step with a different -DCMAKE_INSTALL_PREFIX=
, you will need to rerun configure with the correct path for this step to work correctly.
If you would like to also remove any settings and third-party addons (skins, scripts, etc.) and Kodi configuration files, you should also run:
rm -rf ~/.kodi
Kodi has a test suite which uses the Google C++ Testing Framework. This framework is provided directly in Kodi's source tree.
Build and run Kodi's test suite:
gmake check
Build Kodi's test suite without running it:
gmake kodi-test
Run Kodi's test suite manually:
./kodi-test
Show Kodi's test suite help notes:
./kodi-test --gtest_help
Useful options:
--gtest_list_tests
List the names of all tests instead of running them.
The name of TEST(Foo, Bar) is "Foo.Bar".
--gtest_filter=POSITIVE_PATTERNS[-NEGATIVE_PATTERNS]
Run only the tests whose name matches one of the positive patterns but
none of the negative patterns. '?' matches any single character; '*'
matches any substring; ':' separates two patterns.