Building MySQL from Source  /  Installing MySQL from Source on Windows

Chapter 6 Installing MySQL from Source on Windows

These instructions describe how to build binaries from source for MySQL 5.1 on Windows. Instructions are provided for building binaries from a standard source distribution or from the Bazaar tree that contains the latest development source.


The instructions here are strictly for users who want to test MySQL on Microsoft Windows from the latest source distribution or from the Bazaar tree. For production use, we do not advise using a MySQL server built by yourself from source. Normally, it is best to use precompiled binary distributions of MySQL that are built specifically for optimal performance on Windows by Oracle Corporation. Instructions for installing binary distributions are available in Installing MySQL on Microsoft Windows.

To build MySQL on Windows from source, you must satisfy the following system, compiler, and resource requirements:

You also need a MySQL source distribution for Windows, which can be obtained two ways:

If you find something not working as expected, or you have suggestions about ways to improve the current build process on Windows, please send a message to the win32 mailing list. See MySQL Mailing Lists.


To compile from the source code on Windows you must use the standard source distribution (for example, or mysql-5.1.73.tar.gz). You build from the same distribution as used to build MySQL on Unix, Linux and other platforms. Do not use the Windows Source distributions as they do not contain the necessary configuration script and other files.

Follow this procedure to build MySQL:

  1. If you are installing from a packaged source distribution, create a work directory (for example, C:\workdir), and unpack the source distribution there using WinZip or another Windows tool that can read .zip files. This directory is the work directory in the following instructions.


    Commands that are located in the win directory should be executed from the top-level source directory. Do not change location into the win directory, as the commands will not execute correctly.

  2. Start a command shell. If you have not configured the PATH and other environment variables for all command shells, you may be able to start a command shell from the Start Menu within the Windows Visual Studio menu that contains the necessary environment changes.

  3. Within the command shell, navigate to the work directory and run the following command:

    C:\workdir>win\configure.js options

    If you have associated the .js file extension with an application such as a text editor, then you may need to use the following command to force configure.js to be executed as a script:

    C:\workdir>cscript win\configure.js options

    These options are available for configure.js:

    • WITH_INNOBASE_STORAGE_ENGINE: Enable the InnoDB storage engine.

    • WITH_PARTITION_STORAGE_ENGINE: Enable user-defined partitioning.

    • WITH_ARCHIVE_STORAGE_ENGINE: Enable the ARCHIVE storage engine.

    • WITH_BLACKHOLE_STORAGE_ENGINE: Enable the BLACKHOLE storage engine.

    • WITH_EXAMPLE_STORAGE_ENGINE: Enable the EXAMPLE storage engine.

    • WITH_FEDERATED_STORAGE_ENGINE: Enable the FEDERATED storage engine.

    • WITH_NDBCLUSTER_STORAGE_ENGINE: Enable the NDBCLUSTER storage engine in the MySQL server; cause binaries for the MySQL Cluster management and data node, management client, and other programs to be built.

      This option is supported only in MySQL Cluster NDB 7.0 and later (NDBCLUSTER storage engine versions 6.4.0 and later) using the MySQL Cluster sources. It cannot be used to enable clustering support in other MySQL source trees or distributions.

    • MYSQL_SERVER_SUFFIX=suffix: Server suffix, default none.

    • COMPILATION_COMMENT=comment: Server comment, default "Source distribution".

    • MYSQL_TCP_PORT=port: Server port, default 3306.

    • DISABLE_GRANT_OPTIONS: Disables the --bootstrap, --skip-grant-tables, and --init-file options for mysqld. This option is available as of MySQL 5.1.15.

    For example (type the command on one line):

    C:\workdir>win\configure.js WITH_INNOBASE_STORAGE_ENGINE
  4. From the work directory, execute the win\build-vs9.bat (Windows Visual Studio 2008), win\build-vs8.bat (Windows Visual Studio 2005), or win\build-vs71.bat (Windows Visual Studio 2003) script, depending on the version of Visual Studio you have installed. The script invokes CMake, which generates the mysql.sln solution file.

    You can also use the corresponding 64-bit file (for example win\build-vs8_x64.bat or win\build-vs9_x64.bat) to build the 64-bit version of MySQL. However, you cannot build the 64-bit version with Visual Studio Express Edition. You must use Visual Studio 2005 (8.0) or higher.

  5. From the work directory, open the generated mysql.sln file with Visual Studio and select the proper configuration using the Configuration menu. The menu provides Debug, Release, RelwithDebInfo, MinRelInfo options. Then select Solution > Build to build the solution.

    Remember the configuration that you use in this step. It is important later when you run the test script because that script needs to know which configuration you used.

  6. Test the server. The server built using the preceding instructions expects that the MySQL base directory and data directory are C:\mysql and C:\mysql\data by default. If you want to test your server using the source tree root directory and its data directory as the base directory and data directory, you need to tell the server their path names. You can either do this on the command line with the --basedir and --datadir options, or by placing appropriate options in an option file. (See Using Option Files.) If you have an existing data directory elsewhere that you want to use, you can specify its path name instead.

    When the server is running in standalone fashion or as a service based on your configuration, try to connect to it from the mysql interactive command-line utility.

    You can also run the standard test script, This script is written in Perl, so you'll need either Cygwin or ActiveState Perl to run it. You may also need to install the modules required by the script. To run the test script, change location into the mysql-test directory under the work directory, set the MTR_VS_CONFIG environment variable to the configuration you selected earlier (or use the --vs-config option), and invoke For example (using Cygwin and the bash shell):

    shell> cd mysql-test
    shell> export MTR_VS_CONFIG=debug
    shell> ./ --force --timer
    shell> ./ --force --timer --ps-protocol

When you are satisfied that the programs you have built are working correctly, stop the server. Now you can install the distribution. One way to do this is to use the make_win_bin_dist script in the scripts directory of the MySQL source distribution (see make_win_bin_dist — Package MySQL Distribution as Zip Archive). This is a shell script, so you must have Cygwin installed if you want to use it. It creates a Zip archive of the built executables and support files that you can unpack in the location at which you want to install MySQL.

It is also possible to install MySQL by copying directories and files directly:

  1. Create the directories where you want to install MySQL. For example, to install into C:\mysql, use these commands:

    C:\> mkdir C:\mysql
    C:\> mkdir C:\mysql\bin
    C:\> mkdir C:\mysql\data
    C:\> mkdir C:\mysql\share
    C:\> mkdir C:\mysql\scripts

    If you want to compile other clients and link them to MySQL, you should also create several additional directories:

    C:\> mkdir C:\mysql\include
    C:\> mkdir C:\mysql\lib
    C:\> mkdir C:\mysql\lib\debug
    C:\> mkdir C:\mysql\lib\opt

    If you want to benchmark MySQL, create this directory:

    C:\> mkdir C:\mysql\sql-bench

    Benchmarking requires Perl support for MySQL. See Perl Installation Notes.

  2. From the work directory, copy into the C:\mysql directory the following files and directories:

    C:\> cd \workdir
    C:\workdir> mkdir C:\mysql
    C:\workdir> mkdir C:\mysql\bin
    C:\workdir> copy client\Release\*.exe C:\mysql\bin
    C:\workdir> copy sql\Release\mysqld.exe C:\mysql\bin\mysqld.exe
    C:\workdir> xcopy scripts\*.* C:\mysql\scripts /E
    C:\workdir> xcopy share\*.* C:\mysql\share /E

    If you want to compile other clients and link them to MySQL, you should also copy several libraries and header files:

    C:\workdir> copy lib\Release\mysqlclient.lib C:\mysql\lib\debug
    C:\workdir> copy lib\Release\libmysql.* C:\mysql\lib\debug
    C:\workdir> copy lib\Release\zlib.* C:\mysql\lib\debug
    C:\workdir> copy include\*.h C:\mysql\include
    C:\workdir> copy libmysql\libmysql.def C:\mysql\include

    If you have compiled a Debug solution, rather than a Release solution, install it by replacing Release with Debug in the source file names just shown.

    If you want to benchmark MySQL, you should also do this:

    C:\workdir> xcopy sql-bench\*.* C:\mysql\bench /E

After installation, set up and start the server in the same way as for binary Windows distributions. This includes creating the system tables by running mysql_install_db. For more information, see Installing MySQL on Microsoft Windows.