# Prerequisites

ISO C++
Prerequisites

Because libstdc++ is part of GCC, the primary source for installation instructions is the GCC install page. In particular, list of prerequisite software needed to build the library starts with those requirements. The same pages also list the tools you will need if you wish to modify the source.

Additional data is given here only where it applies to libstdc++.

As of GCC 4.0.1 the minimum version of binutils required to build libstdc++ is `2.15.90.0.1.1`. You can get snapshots (as well as releases) of binutils from ftp://sources.redhat.com/pub/binutils. Older releases of libstdc++ do not require such a recent version, but to take full advantage of useful space-saving features and bug-fixes you should use a recent binutils whenever possible. The configure process will automatically detect and use these features if the underlying support is present.

To generate the API documentation from the sources you will need Doxygen, see Documentation Style in the appendix for full details.

Finally, a few system-specific requirements:

linux

  If gcc 3.1.0 or later on is being used on linux, an attempt will be made to use "C" library functionality necessary for C++ named locale support. For gcc 4.6.0 and later, this means that glibc 2.3 or later is required.

  If the 'gnu' locale model is being used, the following locales are used and tested in the libstdc++ testsuites. The first column is the name of the locale, the second is the character set it is expected to use.

      de_DE               ISO-8859-1
      de_DE@euro          ISO-8859-15
      en_GB               ISO-8859-1
      en_HK               ISO-8859-1
      en_PH               ISO-8859-1
      en_US               ISO-8859-1
      en_US.ISO-8859-1    ISO-8859-1
      en_US.ISO-8859-15   ISO-8859-15
      en_US.UTF-8         UTF-8
      es_ES               ISO-8859-1
      es_MX               ISO-8859-1
      fr_FR               ISO-8859-1
      fr_FR@euro          ISO-8859-15
      is_IS               UTF-8
      it_IT               ISO-8859-1
      ja_JP.eucjp         EUC-JP
      ru_RU.ISO-8859-5    ISO-8859-5
      ru_RU.UTF-8         UTF-8
      se_NO.UTF-8         UTF-8
      ta_IN               UTF-8
      zh_TW               BIG5

  Failure to have the underlying "C" library locale information installed will mean that C++ named locales for the above regions will not work: because of this, the libstdc++ testsuite will skip the named locale tests. If this isn't an issue, don't worry about it. If named locales are needed, the underlying locale information must be installed. Note that rebuilding libstdc++ after the "C" locales are installed is not necessary.

  To install support for locales, do only one of the following:

  - install all locales

    - with RedHat Linux:

      `export LC_ALL=C`

      `rpm -e glibc-common --nodeps`

      `rpm -i --define "_install_langs all" glibc-common-2.2.5-34.i386.rpm`

    - Instructions for other operating systems solicited.

  - install just the necessary locales

    - with Debian Linux:

      Add the above list, as shown, to the file `/etc/locale.gen`

      run `/usr/sbin/locale-gen`

    - on most Unix-like operating systems:

      `localedef -i de_DE -f ISO-8859-1 de_DE`

      (repeat for each entry in the above list)

    - Instructions for other operating systems solicited.