Subsurface uses quite a few open source libraries and frameworks to do its job. The most important ones include libdivecomputer, Qt, libxml2, libxslt, libsqlite3, libzip, and libgit2.
Below are instructions for building Subsurface
- on some popular Linux distributions,
- MacOSX,
- Windows (cross-building)
- Android (cross-building)
- iOS (cross-building)
You can get the sources to the latest development version from our git repository:
git clone http://github.com/Subsurface/subsurface.git
cd subsurface
git submodule init # this will give you our flavor of libdivecomputer
You keep it updated by doing:
git checkout master
git pull -r
git submodule update
Subsurface requires its own flavor of libdivecomputer which is inclduded above as git submodule
The branches won't have a pretty history and will include ugly merges,
but they should always allow a fast forward pull that tracks what we
believe developers should build against. All our patches are contained
in the Subsurface-DS9 branch.
This should allow distros to see which patches we have applied on top of upstream. They will receive force pushes as we rebase to newer versions of upstream so they are not ideal for ongoing development (but they are of course easy to use for distributions as they always build "from scratch", anyway).
The rationale for this is that we have no intention of forking the project. We simply are adding a few patches on top of their latest version and want to do so in a manner that is both easy for our developers who try to keep them updated frequently, and anyone packaging Subsurface or trying to understand what we have done relative to their respective upstreams.
We use Qt5 in order to only maintain one UI across platforms.
Qt5.9.1 is the oldest version supported if ONLY building Subsurface Qt5.12 is the oldest version supported if also building Subsurface-mobile
Most Linux distributions include a new enough version of Qt (and if you are on a distro that still ships with an older Qt, likely your C compiler is also not new enough to build Subsurface).
If you need Qt (likely on macOS) or want a newer version than provided by your Linux distro, you can install a separate version that Subsurface will use. As of Qt5.15 it has become a lot harder to download and install Qt - you now need a Qt account and the installer tool has a new space age look and significantly reduced flexibility.
As of this writing, there is thankfully a thirdparty offline installer still available:
pip3 install aqtinstall
aqt install -O <Qt Location> 5.15.2 mac desktop
(or whatever version / OS you need). This installer is surprisingly fast and seems well maintained - note that we don't use this for Windows as that is completely built from source using MXE.
In order to use this Qt installation, simply add it to your PATH:
PATH=<Qt Location>/<version>/<type>/bin:$PATH
QtWebKit is needed, if you want to print, but no longer part of Qt5, so you need to download it and compile. In case you just want to test without print possibility omit this step.
git clone -b 5.212 https://github.com/qt/qtwebkit
mkdir -p qtwebkit/WebKitBuild/Release
cd qtwebkit/WebKitBuild/Release
cmake -DPORT=Qt -DCMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=Release -DQt5_DIR=/<Qt Location>/<version>/<type>/lib/cmake/Qt5 ../..
make install
In order for our cloud storage to be fully functional you need libgit2 0.26 or newer.
Our main build system is based on cmake. But qmake is needed for the googlemaps plugin and the iOS build.
Download from https://cmake.org/download and follow the instructions to install it or alternatively follow the instruction specific to a distribution (see build instructions).
The following options are recognised when passed to cmake:
-DCMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=Release create a release build
-DCMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=Debug create a debug build
The Makefile that was created using cmake can be forced into a much more verbose mode by calling
make VERBOSE=1
Many more variables are supported, the easiest way to interact with them is to call
ccmake .
in your build directory.
On Fedora you need
sudo dnf install autoconf automake bluez-libs-devel cmake gcc-c++ git \
libcurl-devel libsqlite3x-devel libssh2-devel libtool libudev-devel \
libusbx-devel libxml2-devel libxslt-devel make \
qt5-qtbase-devel qt5-qtconnectivity-devel qt5-qtdeclarative-devel \
qt5-qtlocation-devel qt5-qtscript-devel qt5-qtsvg-devel \
qt5-qttools-devel qt5-qtwebkit-devel redhat-rpm-config \
bluez-libs-devel libgit2-devel libzip-devel libmtp-devel
Package names are sadly different on OpenSUSE
sudo zypper install git gcc-c++ make autoconf automake libtool cmake libzip-devel \
libxml2-devel libxslt-devel sqlite3-devel libusb-1_0-devel \
libqt5-linguist-devel libqt5-qttools-devel libQt5WebKitWidgets-devel \
libqt5-qtbase-devel libQt5WebKit5-devel libqt5-qtsvg-devel \
libqt5-qtscript-devel libqt5-qtdeclarative-devel \
libqt5-qtconnectivity-devel libqt5-qtlocation-devel libcurl-devel \
bluez-devel libgit2-devel libmtp-devel
On Debian Bookworm this seems to work
sudo apt install \
autoconf automake cmake g++ git libbluetooth-dev libcrypto++-dev \
libcurl4-openssl-dev libgit2-dev libqt5qml5 libqt5quick5 libqt5svg5-dev \
libqt5webkit5-dev libsqlite3-dev libssh2-1-dev libssl-dev libtool \
libusb-1.0-0-dev libxml2-dev libxslt1-dev libzip-dev make pkg-config \
qml-module-qtlocation qml-module-qtpositioning qml-module-qtquick2 \
qt5-qmake qtchooser qtconnectivity5-dev qtdeclarative5-dev \
qtdeclarative5-private-dev qtlocation5-dev qtpositioning5-dev \
qtscript5-dev qttools5-dev qttools5-dev-tools libmtp-dev
In order to build and run mobile-on-desktop, you also need
sudo apt install \
qtquickcontrols2-5-dev qml-module-qtquick-window2 qml-module-qtquick-dialogs \
qml-module-qtquick-layouts qml-module-qtquick-controls2 qml-module-qtquick-templates2 \
qml-module-qtgraphicaleffects qml-module-qtqml-models2 qml-module-qtquick-controls
Package names for Ubuntu 21.04
sudo apt install \
autoconf automake cmake g++ git libbluetooth-dev libcrypto++-dev \
libcurl4-gnutls-dev libgit2-dev libqt5qml5 libqt5quick5 libqt5svg5-dev \
libqt5webkit5-dev libsqlite3-dev libssh2-1-dev libssl-dev libtool \
libusb-1.0-0-dev libxml2-dev libxslt1-dev libzip-dev make pkg-config \
qml-module-qtlocation qml-module-qtpositioning qml-module-qtquick2 \
qt5-qmake qtchooser qtconnectivity5-dev qtdeclarative5-dev \
qtdeclarative5-private-dev qtlocation5-dev qtpositioning5-dev \
qtscript5-dev qttools5-dev qttools5-dev-tools libmtp-dev
In order to build and run mobile-on-desktop, you also need
sudo apt install \
qtquickcontrols2-5-dev qml-module-qtquick-window2 qml-module-qtquick-dialogs \
qml-module-qtquick-layouts qml-module-qtquick-controls2 qml-module-qtquick-templates2 \
qml-module-qtgraphicaleffects qml-module-qtqml-models2 qml-module-qtquick-controls
On Raspberry Pi (Raspian Buster and Ubuntu Mate 20.04.1) this seems to work
sudo apt install \
autoconf automake cmake g++ git libbluetooth-dev libcrypto++-dev \
libcurl4-gnutls-dev libgit2-dev libqt5qml5 libqt5quick5 libqt5svg5-dev \
libqt5webkit5-dev libsqlite3-dev libssh2-1-dev libssl-dev libtool \
libusb-1.0-0-dev libxml2-dev libxslt1-dev libzip-dev make pkg-config \
qml-module-qtlocation qml-module-qtpositioning qml-module-qtquick2 \
qt5-qmake qtchooser qtconnectivity5-dev qtdeclarative5-dev \
qtdeclarative5-private-dev qtlocation5-dev qtpositioning5-dev \
qtscript5-dev qttools5-dev qttools5-dev-tools libmtp-dev
In order to build and run mobile-on-desktop, you also need
sudo apt install \
qtquickcontrols2-5-dev qml-module-qtquick-window2 qml-module-qtquick-dialogs \
qml-module-qtquick-layouts qml-module-qtquick-controls2 qml-module-qtquick-templates2 \
qml-module-qtgraphicaleffects qml-module-qtqml-models2 qml-module-qtquick-controls
Note that on Ubuntu Mate on the Raspberry Pi, you may need to configure some swap space in order for the build to complete successfully. There is no swap space configured by default. See the dphys-swapfile package.
On Raspberry Pi OS with Desktop (64-bit) Released April 4th, 2022, this seems to work
sudo apt install \
autoconf automake cmake g++ git libbluetooth-dev libcrypto++-dev \
libcurl4-gnutls-dev libgit2-dev libqt5qml5 libqt5quick5 libqt5svg5-dev \
libqt5webkit5-dev libsqlite3-dev libssh2-1-dev libssl-dev libtool \
libusb-1.0-0-dev libxml2-dev libxslt1-dev libzip-dev make pkg-config \
qml-module-qtlocation qml-module-qtpositioning qml-module-qtquick2 \
qt5-qmake qtchooser qtconnectivity5-dev qtdeclarative5-dev \
qtdeclarative5-private-dev qtlocation5-dev qtpositioning5-dev \
qtscript5-dev qttools5-dev qttools5-dev-tools libmtp-dev
Note that you'll need to increase the swap space as the default of 100MB doesn't seem to be enough. 1024MB worked on a 3B+.
If maps aren't working, copy the googlemaps plugin
from <build_dir>/subsurface/googlemaps/build/libqtgeoservices_googlemaps.so
to /usr/lib/aarch64-linux-gnu/qt5/plugins/geoservices/.
If Subsurface can't seem to see your dive computer on /dev/ttyUSB0, even after
adjusting your account's group settings (see note below about usermod), it
might be that the FTDI driver doesn't recognize the VendorID/ProductID of your
computer. Follow the instructions here:
If you're unsure of the VID/PID of your device, plug your dive computer in to
your host and run dmesg. That should show the codes that are needed to
follow TN_101.
On PCLinuxOS you appear to need the following packages
su -c "apt-get install -y autoconf automake cmake gcc-c++ git libtool \
lib64bluez-devel lib64qt5bluetooth-devel lib64qt5concurrent-devel \
lib64qt5help-devel lib64qt5location-devel lib64qt5quicktest-devel \
lib64qt5quickwidgets-devel lib64qt5script-devel lib64qt5svg-devel \
lib64qt5test-devel lib64qt5webkitwidgets-devel lib64qt5xml-devel \
lib64ssh2-devel lib64usb1.0-devel lib64zip-devel qttools5 qttranslations5"
In order to build Subsurface, use the supplied build script. This should work on most systems that have all the prerequisite packages installed.
You should have Subsurface sources checked out in a sane place, something like this:
mkdir -p ~/src
cd ~/src
git clone https://github.com/Subsurface/subsurface.git
./subsurface/scripts/build.sh # <- this step will take quite a while as it
# compiles a handful of libraries before
# building Subsurface
Now you can run Subsurface like this:
cd ~/src/subsurface/build
./subsurface
Note: on many Linux versions (for example on Kubuntu 15.04) the user must
belong to the dialout group.
You may need to run something like
sudo usermod -a -G dialout $USER
with your correct username and log out and log in again for that to take effect.
If you get errors like:
./subsurface: error while loading shared libraries: libGrantlee_Templates.so.5: cannot open shared object file: No such file or directory
You can run the following command:
sudo ldconfig ~/src/install-root/lib
While it is possible to build all required components completely from source, at this point the preferred way to build Subsurface is to set up the build infrastructure via Homebrew and then build the dependencies from source.
- You need to have XCode installed. The first time (and possibly after updating OSX)
xcode-select --install
- install Homebrew (see https://brew.sh) and then the required build infrastructure:
brew install autoconf automake libtool pkg-config gettext
- install Qt
download the macOS installer from https://download.qt.io/official_releases/online_installers and use it to install the desired Qt version. At this point the latest Qt5 version is still preferred over Qt6.
If you plan to deploy your build to an Apple Silicon Mac, you may have better results with Bluetooth connections if you install Qt5.15.13. If Qt5.15.13 is not available via the installer, you can download from https://download.qt.io/official_releases/qt/5.15/5.15.13 and build using the usual configure, make, and make install.
- now build Subsurface
cd ~/src; bash subsurface/scripts/build.sh -build-deps
if you are building against Qt6 (still experimental) you can create a universal binary with
cd ~/src; bash subsurface/scripts/build.sh -build-with-qt6 -build-deps -fat-build
After the above is done, Subsurface.app will be available in the subsurface/build directory. You can run Subsurface with the command
A. open subsurface/build/Subsurface.app
this will however not show diagnostic output
B. subsurface/build/Subsurface.app/Contents/MacOS/Subsurface
the [Tab] key is your friend :-)
Debugging can be done with either Xcode or QtCreator.
To install the app for all users, move subsurface/build/Subsurface.app to /Applications.
-
build SubSurface under MacOSX and iOS
-
cd <repo>/..; bash <repo>/scripts/build.sh -build-deps -bothnote: this is mainly done to ensure all external dependencies are downloaded and set to the correct versions -
follow these instructions
Subsurface for Windows builds on linux by using the MXE (M cross environment). The easiest way to do this is to use a Docker container with a pre-built MXE for Subsurface by following these instructions.
This is NOT RECOMMENDED. To the best of our knowledge there is one single person who regularly does this. The Subsurface team does not provide support for Windows binary build from sources natively under Windows...
The lack of a working package management system for Windows makes it really painful to build Subsurface natively under Windows, so we don't support that at all.
But if you want to build Subsurface on a Windows system, the docker based cross-build for Windows works just fine in WSL2 on Windows.
Follow these instructions.