Building and using mesa for development and testing

This explains how to build mesa from source, and how to use the custom built mesa to run some apps and games, without needing to replace the mesa libraries that your operating system runs on.

Let's assume that you are using an x86_64 system.

Building mesa

Step 1. Install dependencies

Use your distro package manager to install mesa dependencies. If you're on a different distro, you will need to substitute with the correct commands for your package manager. The packages are usually named similarly but maybe have a different naming convention (eg. -dev vs. -devel, etc.).

This works on Fedora 35:

dnf install git meson ninja-build gcc gcc-c++ cmake bison flex vulkan*.x86_64 vulkan*.i686 libdrm-devel.x86_64 libdrm-devel.i686 libvdpau-devel.x86_64 libvdpau-devel.i686 libva-devel.x86_64 libva-devel.i686 libomxil-bellagio-devel.x86_64 libomxil-bellagio-devel.i686 zlib-devel.x86_64 zlib-devel.i686 llvm-devel.x86_64 llvm-devel.i686 elfutils-libelf-devel.x86_64 elfutils-libelf-devel.i686 wayland*-devel.x86_64 wayland*-devel.i686 wayland-protocols-devel libX*-devel.x86_64 libX*-devel.i686 libunwind-devel.x86_64 libunwind-devel.i686 libxshmfence-devel.x86_64 libxshmfence-devel.i686 lm_sensors-devel.x86_64 lm_sensors-devel.i686 expat-devel.x86_64 expat-devel.i686 libzstd-devel.x86_64 libzstd-devel.i686

Step 2. Clone the mesa repo

mkdir -p ~/Projects
cd ~/Projects
git clone https://gitlab.freedesktop.org/mesa/mesa.git

Step 3. 64-bit build

We're assuming that your distro uses lib64 for the 64-bit libraries. If not, adjust the meson commands below. The compiled libraries will go into ~/mesa for the sake of simplicity.

This command will build both Intel and AMD drivers in release mode:

# Enter the mesa root directory
cd mesa
# Configure the build with meson
meson build64 --libdir lib64 --prefix $HOME/mesa -Ddri-drivers= -Dgallium-drivers=radeonsi,swrast,iris,zink -Dvulkan-drivers=intel,amd -Dgallium-nine=true -Dosmesa=false -Dbuildtype=release
# Compile with ninja
ninja -C build64 install

Config with AMD drivers only in release mode (recommended for performance testing):

meson build64 --libdir lib64 --prefix $HOME/mesa -Ddri-drivers= -Dgallium-drivers=radeonsi,swrast,zink -Dvulkan-drivers=amd -Dgallium-nine=true -Dosmesa=false -Dbuildtype=release
ninja -C build64 install

Config with RADV only in debug mode (recommended for bisecting crashes, etc.)

meson build64radvdebug --libdir lib64 --prefix $HOME/mesa -Ddri-drivers= -Dgallium-drivers= -Dvulkan-drivers=amd -Dbuild-aco-tests=true -Dbuildtype=debug
ninja -C build64radvdebug install

You can compile one with ninja -C build64radvdebug and the other with ninja -C build64 - they don't interfere with each other. Of course if you use the same install prefix they will overwrite each other when you install them.

Step 4. 32-bit build on an x86_64 system (skip when only testing a 64-bit game)

If you don't use Fedora (or another Red Hat family distro), replace i686-redhat-linux-gnu-pkg-config with the correct 32-bit pkg-config executable for your distro. Also verify the location of llvm-config-32 which might be different on another distro.

Create a meson cross file here: ~/.local/share/meson/cross/gcc-i686 with the following content:

[binaries]
c='gcc'
cpp='g++'
ar='ar'
strip='strip'
pkgconfig='i686-redhat-linux-gnu-pkg-config'
llvm-config='/usr/bin/llvm-config-32'

[properties]
c_args=['-m32', '-march=native']
c_link_args=['-m32']
cpp_args=['-m32', '-march=native']
cpp_link_args=['-m32']

[host_machine]
system='linux'
cpu_family='x86'
cpu='x86'
endian='little'

Now you can use it to build 32-bit mesa libs:

cd mesa
meson build32 --cross-file gcc-i686 --libdir lib --prefix $HOME/mesa -Ddri-drivers= -Dgallium-drivers=radeonsi,swrast,iris,zink -Dvulkan-drivers=intel,amd -Dgallium-nine=true -Dosmesa=false -Dbuildtype=release
ninja -C build32 install

32-bit config with AMD drivers only:

meson build32 --cross-file gcc-i686 --libdir lib --prefix $HOME/mesa -Ddri-drivers= -Dgallium-drivers=radeonsi,swrast,zink -Dvulkan-drivers=amd -Dgallium-nine=true -Dosmesa=false -Dbuildtype=release

Note that you can build both the x86_64 and the i686 libraries together and they can all go to ~/mesa, and then you can use all of that with either 32-bit or 64-bit games.

Using the compiled mesa binaries

Running through a script (recommended for testing a single game or app)

Create a script file like this, eg. nano ~/mesa-run.sh
If you used a different install prefix or a different lib dir above, you will need to adjust this script accordingly.

#!/bin/sh

MESA=$HOME/mesa \
LD_LIBRARY_PATH=$MESA/lib64:$MESA/lib:$LD_LIBRARY_PATH \
LIBGL_DRIVERS_PATH=$MESA/lib64/dri:$MESA/lib/dri \
VK_ICD_FILENAMES=$MESA/share/vulkan/icd.d/radeon_icd.x86_64.json:$MESA/share/vulkan/icd.d/radeon_icd.x86.json \
D3D_MODULE_PATH=$MESA/lib64/d3d/d3dadapter9.so.1:$MESA/lib/d3d/d3dadapter9.so.1 \
    exec "$@"

Don't forget to add executable permissions to the script:

chmod +x ~/mesa-run.sh

Now you can run your games like:

~/mesa-run.sh vkcube

Testing a Steam game with your custom built mesa:

Compile mesa as written above
Create the ~/mesa-run.sh script as above
Open Steam, go to your Library
Right-click the game, click "Properties"
In the "Launch options" type:
~/mesa-run.sh %command%

Alternative: sourcing a script method

Use this when you want all apps you launch from a terminal to use your custom built mesa.

Create a script at ~/mesa.sh with the following content.
If you used a different install prefix or a different lib dir above, you will need to adjust this script accordingly.

#!/bin/sh

MESA=$HOME/mesa

export LD_LIBRARY_PATH=$MESA/lib64:$MESA/lib:$LD_LIBRARY_PATH
export LIBGL_DRIVERS_PATH=$MESA/lib64/dri:$MESA/lib/dri
export VK_ICD_FILENAMES=$MESA/share/vulkan/icd.d/radeon_icd.x86_64.json:$MESA/share/vulkan/icd.d/radeon_icd.i686.json
export D3D_MODULE_PATH=$MESA/lib64/d3d/d3dadapter9.so.1:$MESA/lib/d3d/d3dadapter9.so.1

Now you can just source mesa.sh and then anything launched from that terminal will use the mesa libs you just built.

For example:

source ~/mesa.sh
vkcube

To verify that it uses the version of mesa you want:

source ~/mesa.sh
vulkaninfo

Using RADV with RGP

# Run RADV with pipeline tracing enabled, and specify a trigger file
RADV_THREAD_TRACE_PIPELINE=1 RADV_THREAD_TRACE_TRIGGER=/tmp/trigger ~/mesa-run.sh ./bin/triangle

# From a different terminal, touch the trigger file. This will make RADV create an RGP capture in /tmp
touch /tmp/trigger

Building LLVM and using it with mesa (skip this unless you know you specifically need it)

Sometimes you need to test the very latest LLVM and use it without messing up your system packages.

Here are some useful cmake options:

CMAKE_INSTALL_PREFIX - for simplicity, let's just use the same prefix as used by your mesa build
LLVM_LIBDIR_SUFFIX - for distros that use /usr/lib64 or a similar convention, eg. set this to 64 on Fedora

Example:

cd llvm-project/llvm
mkdir build
cd build
cmake .. -G Ninja -DCMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=Release -DCMAKE_INSTALL_PREFIX=$HOME/mesa -DLLVM_LIBDIR_SUFFIX=64 -DLLVM_TARGETS_TO_BUILD="AMDGPU" -DLLVM_OPTIMIZED_TABLEGEN=ON -DLLVM_BUILD_LLVM_DYLIB=ON -DLLVM_LINK_LLVM_DYLIB=ON -DLLVM_INCLUDE_EXAMPLES=OFF
ninja
ninja install

After this, you need to rebuild mesa. First, tell mesa's meson to use the LLVM that you just built.

Create a meson native file at $HOME/.local/share/meson/native/my-llvm-x64 with the following content. Substitute Timur with your own username.

[binaries]
llvm-config = "/home/Timur/mesa/bin/llvm-config"

Finally, specify this to meson using the --native-file=my-llvm-x64 argument, for example:

meson build64 --libdir lib64 --prefix $HOME/mesa -Ddri-drivers= -Dgallium-drivers=radeonsi,swrast -Dvulkan-drivers=amd -Dgallium-nine=true -Dosmesa=false -Dbuildtype=release --native-file=my-llvm-x64

julienbenjamin/mesa-howto.md