Installation

Install on Windows using binaries

Binary releases exist only for Windows users. Others will have to follow one of the other installation guides for Linux or Docker There exists a ready-to-use version of 3dfier for Windows 64-bit. Download and extract the files to any given folder and follow the instructions in the Get started guide.

Release binaries content

Description of files in the zip file

All dll files distributed with 3dfier belong to GDAL or other packages used in the GDAL drivers. Other depencencies used are statically built within the executable.

macOS

You need to install the following free libraries:

1. CMake
2. CGAL v5.0+
3. GDAL
4. yaml-cpp
5. LASlib
6. LASzip

We suggest using Homebrew for the first 4:

$ brew install cmake
$ brew install cgal
$ brew install gdal
$ brew install yaml-cpp

For LASlib/LASzip, get the source code from the LAStools repository and use the CMakeLists.txt included in the root folder:

$ git clone git@github.com:LAStools/LAStools.git
$ cmake .
$ make install

If you’re getting the clang compilation error character too large for enclosing character literal type, comment out the line causing the problem and try again.

To compile 3dfier:

$ mkdir build
$ cd build
$ cmake ..
$ make install
$ 3dfier

Ubuntu 20.04

1. Adding ubuntugis-unstable repository

To install GDAL on Ubuntu 20.04 LTS it is probably the easiest to add the ubuntugis-unstable. It contains GDAL >= 2.1 under (libgdal-dev) package.

Note: ubuntugis-stable repository doesn’t contain any Ubuntu 20.04 packages yet.

Add the ubuntugis-unstable repository by running:

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:ubuntugis/ubuntugis-unstable
sudo apt-get update

2. Install dependencies

CGAL (libcgal-dev), Boost (libboost-all-dev) and yaml-cpp (libyaml-cpp-dev) are part of the Ubuntu Universe repository.

Once you have all the repos added, you can use a package manager, e.g. apt or Synaptic to install them.

E.g. using apt-get:

sudo apt-get install libcgal-dev libboost-all-dev libyaml-cpp-dev libgdal-dev

3. Compile LAStools

LAStools contains both the LASlib and LASzip.

This step requires CMake and UnZip packages. Some Linux distributions don’t have them preinstalled:

sudo apt-get install -y unzip cmake

Download and compile LAStools with the following:

wget  http://lastools.github.io/download/LAStools.zip
unzip LAStools.zip
cd LAStools; mv LASlib/src/LASlib-config.cmake LASlib/src/laslib-config.cmake
mkdir build; cd build
cmake ..
sudo make install

4. Compile 3dfier

Download and compile 3dfier:

git clone https://github.com/tudelft3d/3dfier.git
cd 3dfier; mkdir build; cd build
cmake ..
sudo make install

Test the installation by trying out the first run.

Windows

This guide will talk you through the compilation of 3dfier on Windows 10 64-bit using Visual Studio (steps are identical for Visual Studio 2017 and 2019).

There are some steps to be taken to prepare the build environment for 3dfier. Most important is installing software to compile and downloading the libraries 3dfier is depending on.

Note 1: Versions used in this guide are the versions used at time of writing. Future versions of libraries could be supported but usage can change and the Visual Studio Solution might need changing for them to work.

Note 2: In this guide we build 3dfier in 64-bit (x64) and all dependencies must also be built in 64-bit. For project files created with CMake the -A x64 switch should explicitly be used.

Note 3: Since CGAL 5.0 the library is header only. Building the library is not needed anymore. The current Visual Studio project file in the repository is made for version 4.xx, when using verions >5.0 one should remove the library includes from the project file.

1. Running installers

First you will need to download and install in their default directorties:

1. Visual Studio Community (2017 or later). Install at least the C++ part.
2. CMake (3.15 or later), download and install Windows win64-x64 Installer. Add variable to the PATH during installation.
3. Boost precompiled binaries (1.71 or later). Pick the latest version that is built for your MSVC++ compiler version. Install boost using the installer.
4. OSGeo4W (with GDAL 2.3.0 or later), download the 64-bit installer. From this package you will need to install at least the GDAL package.
5. CGAL (4.12 or later), download CGAL-4.12-Setup.exe (or newer) and install. Select GMP and MPFR precompiled libs, Environment variables to set CGAL_DIR and Add CGAL/auxilary/gmp/lib to the PATH during setup.

2. Compilation of dependencies

Next, we need to download and compile Yaml-cpp and LAStools.

Yaml-cpp

Download yaml-cpp (0.5.3 or later) and extract to e.g. C:\dev\yaml-cpp. There are two options of getting the Visual Studio project files using CMake:

1. using CMake GUI (tutorial here).

2. using command line. Open a Command prompt (press windows button+R, type cmd and press enter) and navigate to the yaml-cpp directory:

   cd C:\dev\yaml-cpp
   

   Generate the Visual Studio build files with

   mkdir vs_build
   cd vs_build
   cmake .. -G "Visual Studio 15 2017 Win64"
   

After generation open the Visual Studio file YAML_CPP.sln. Set the solution configuration to Release in the main toolbar. From the menu bar select Build and click Build Solution.

LAStools

Download LAStools and extract to e.g. C:\dev\lastools.

Use CMake as explained previous for Yaml-cpp to generate the Visual Studio solution files.

After generation open the Visual Studio file LASlib.sln. Set the solution configuration to Release in the main toolbar. From the menu bar select Build and click Build Solution.

3. Set environment variables

Go to Control Panel > System > Advanced system settings > Environment Variables and add the following user variables. Note that the version numbers and the installation paths may be different!

• BOOST_ROOT=C:\boost_1_71_0
• BOOST_LIBRARYDIR=C:\boost_1_71_0\lib64-msvc-14.0
• CGAL_DIR=C:\dev\CGAL-4.12
• GDAL_ROOT=C:\OSGeo4W64
• LASLIB_ROOT=C:\dev\lastools\LASlib
• LASZIP_ROOT=C:\dev\lastools\LASzip
• OSGEO4W_ROOT=C:\OSGeo4W64
• YAML-CPP_DIR=C:\dev\yaml-cpp

Go to Control Panel > System > Advanced system settings > Environment Variables and add the following directory to Path.

• C:\OSGeo4W64\bin

4. Compile 3dfier

Download and extract the source code from the menu on the left or fork directly from GitHub. Browse to the vs_build folder and open the Visual Studio file 3dfier.sln.

If in any case the Visual Studio solution is not working its possible to generate them from the CMake files directly as explained previous for Yaml-cpp.

5. Run 3dfier!

If all is good you should now be able to run 3dfier! Go to the First run and start producing models.

Help, Visual Studio complains that some file can not be found!

Check whether the directories and files specified in the environment variables are correct. Also check these places in Visual Studio:

• the include folders in Project > Properties > C/C++ > General > Additional Include Directories
• the library folders in Project > Properties > Linker > General > Additional Library Directories
• the libraries files in Project > Properties > Linker > Input > Additional Dependencies

Make sure each directory or file exists on your drive. For example: you may need to change a version number somewhere.

Docker

We offer built docker images from the master, development branches and each release. You’ll find the images and instructions on using them at Docker Hub.