Instructions how to build native sed.exe with Microsoft Visual Studio (or Build Tools for Visual Studio) from CYGWIN shell.

While building, it is possible to save build log and create a patch - for compiling sed.exe using only Microsoft Visual Studio tools, without need for CYGWIN.

This is how sed-4.9-build-VS22-x64.patch and sed-4.9-build-VS22-x86.patch were created.

(sed-4.9-build-VS9-x86.patch was created analogously in Microsoft Visual Studio 2008 environment)


From CYGWIN shell:

1) get archive:
  wget https://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/sed/sed-4.9.tar.xz

2) unpack archive:
  tar xf sed-4.9.tar.xz

3) go to sed sources:
  cd sed-4.9

4) patch the sources:
  patch -Np1 -i sed-4.9-src.patch
  (patch location: https://raw.githubusercontent.com/mbuilov/sed-windows/master/sed-4.9-src.patch)

5) now start dos prompt:
  cmd /c "start cmd.exe"

6) setup compiler:
  "C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft Visual Studio\2022\BuildTools\VC\Auxiliary\Build\vcvarsall.bat" amd64
  (if Microsoft Build Tools for Visual Studio 2022 is installed in "C:\Program Files (x86)")

  --tip: to build 32-bit version of the Gnu Sed utility, specify "x86" instead of "amd64"

  --tip: for Visual Studio 2008:
  "C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft Visual Studio 9.0\VC\vcvarsall.bat" x86

7) run bash from dos prompt (with environment prepared for compiling with Microsoft Build Tools for Visual Studio 2022):
  bash

8) check that Gnu Make is installed in CYGWIN and it is working (Gnu Make is required for the build):
  make --version

9) configure sed:
  - for 64-bit build:
  CFLAGS= \
  CC="cl /Dssize_t=__int64" \
  CPP="cl /Dssize_t=__int64 /E" \
  LD=lib ARFLAGS="/OUT:" ./configure --enable-threads=windows --disable-dependency-tracking --disable-silent-rules --disable-nls gl_cv_sys_struct_lconv_ok=yes gt_cv_ssize_t=yes

  - for 32-bit build:
  CFLAGS= CC=cl CPP="cl /E" LD=lib ARFLAGS="/OUT:" ./configure --enable-threads=windows --disable-dependency-tracking --disable-silent-rules --disable-nls gl_cv_sys_struct_lconv_ok=yes

  --tip: for Visual Studio 2008, add "/D_WIN32_WINNT=0x501 /D__bool_true_false_are_defined /Dbool=int /Dtrue=1 /Dfalse=0" compiler switches:
  CFLAGS= \
  CC="cl /D_WIN32_WINNT=0x501 /D__bool_true_false_are_defined /Dbool=int /Dtrue=1 /Dfalse=0" \
  CPP="cl /D_WIN32_WINNT=0x501 /D__bool_true_false_are_defined /Dbool=int /Dtrue=1 /Dfalse=0 /E" \
  LD=lib ARFLAGS="/OUT:" ./configure --enable-threads=windows --disable-dependency-tracking --disable-silent-rules --disable-nls gl_cv_sys_struct_lconv_ok=yes

10) configure script is not fully functional to create correct Makefiles - they are need to be fixed manually:
  sed -i '/^SUBDIRS/s/=.*/= ./'                              Makefile
  sed -i '/^NEXT/s/=.*/=""/'                                 Makefile
  sed -i '/lib_libsed_a_AR/s/ lib/lib/'                      Makefile
  sed -i '/sed_libver_a_AR/s/ sed/sed/'                      Makefile
  sed -i 's@^AR = .*@AR = lib /nologo@'                      Makefile
  sed -i 's/-c -o /-c -nologo -Fo/'                          Makefile
  sed -i '/RANLIB/d'                                         Makefile
  sed -i '/^sed_sed_LINK/{s/.*/sed_sed_LINK = $(LINK)/;n;d}' Makefile

11) fix linker command, add support for wildcards in program arguments:
  sed -i 's%^LINK = .*%LINK = link /nologo /SUBSYSTEM:CONSOLE /OUT:$@ /DEFAULTLIB:Advapi32.lib /DEFAULTLIB:LIBCPMT.lib wsetargv.obj%'      ./Makefile

  --tip: for Visual Studio 2008, specify "/SUBSYSTEM:CONSOLE,5.01" linker switch:
  sed -i 's%^LINK = .*%LINK = link /nologo /SUBSYSTEM:CONSOLE,5.01 /OUT:$@ /DEFAULTLIB:Advapi32.lib /DEFAULTLIB:LIBCPMT.lib wsetargv.obj%' ./Makefile

12) add gen target:
  echo 'gen: $(BUILT_SOURCES)' >> Makefile

13) execute Makefile to generate sed headers:
  make gen

14) some references to system header files are missing in generated headers - they need to be fixed manually.

 a) set paths to locations of Build Tools for Visual Studio 2022 and WDK10 in sed-4.9-win-headers.patch (assume it was copied to the current directory):

  sed -i '/Visual Studio/s@.:.*include@'"$(env | sed -n 's@\\@\\\\@g;/^INCLUDE/s@.*[=;]\([^=;]*\\\\VC\\\\[^=;]*[0-9]\\\\include\).*$@\1@p')"'@' ./sed-4.9-win-headers.patch
  sed -i '/Windows Kits/s@.:.*ucrt@'"$(env | sed -n 's@\\@\\\\@g;/^INCLUDE/s@.*[=;]\([^=;]*\\\\ucrt\).*$@\1@p')"'@'                             ./sed-4.9-win-headers.patch

  (patch location: https://raw.githubusercontent.com/mbuilov/sed-windows/master/sed-4.9-win-headers.patch)

  note: sub-command
    env | sed -n 's@\\@\\\\@g;/^INCLUDE/s@.*[=;]\([^=;]*\\\\VC\\\\[^=;]*[0-9]\\\\include\).*$@\1@p'
    should extract path to MSVC headers, like:
    C:\\Program Files (x86)\\Microsoft Visual Studio\\2022\\BuildTools\\VC\\Tools\\MSVC\\14.30.30705\\include

  and sub-command
    env | sed -n 's@\\@\\\\@g;/^INCLUDE/s@.*[=;]\([^=;]*\\\\ucrt\).*$@\1@p'
    should extract path to WDK headers, like:
    C:\\Program Files (x86)\\Windows Kits\\10\\include\\10.0.22000.0\\ucrt

  --tip: for Visual Studio 2008:
  sed -i '/Visual Studio/s@.:.*include@'"$(env | sed -n 's@\\@\\\\@g;/^INCLUDE/s@.*[=;]\([^=;]*\\\\VC\\\\[iI][nN][cC][lL][uU][dD][eE]\).*$@\1@p')"'@' ./sed-4.9-win-headers.patch
  sed -i '/Windows Kits/s@.:.*ucrt@'"$(env | sed -n 's@\\@\\\\@g;/^INCLUDE/s@.*[=;]\([^=;]*\\\\VC\\\\[iI][nN][cC][lL][uU][dD][eE]\).*$@\1@p')"'@' ./sed-4.9-win-headers.patch

  note: sub-command
    env | sed -n 's@\\@\\\\@g;/^INCLUDE/s@.*[=;]\([^=;]*\\\\VC\\\\[iI][nN][cC][lL][uU][dD][eE]\).*$@\1@p'
    should extract path to MSVC headers, like:
    C:\\Program Files (x86)\\Microsoft Visual Studio 9.0\\VC\\INCLUDE

 b) lib/assert.h header file may not be generated if system has builtin static_assert support, fix the patch to avoid patching missing lib/assert.h
  test -f ./lib/assert.h || sed -i -n '\@diff -Naur .*/assert.h@{:b;n;/diff -Naur/!b b};p' ./sed-4.9-win-headers.patch

 c) now patch the previously generated headers with updated patch-file:
  patch -Np1 -i ./sed-4.9-win-headers.patch

15) add missing getopt sources:
  patch -Np1 -i sed-4.9-getopt.patch
  (patch location: https://raw.githubusercontent.com/mbuilov/sed-windows/master/sed-4.9-getopt.patch)

16) add rules to make getopt objects:

  sed -i 's@^gl_LIBOBJS =.*@& lib/getopt.obj lib/getopt1.obj@' Makefile
  sed -i '$s@.*@&\nlib/libsed_a-getopt.obj: lib/getopt.c\n\t\$(AM_V_CC)$(CC) $(DEFS) $(DEFAULT_INCLUDES) $(INCLUDES) $(AM_CPPFLAGS) $(CPPFLAGS) $(lib_libsed_a_CFLAGS) $(CFLAGS) -c -nologo -Folib/libsed_a-getopt.obj `if test -f '"'"'lib/getopt.c'"'"'; then $(CYGPATH_W) '"'"'lib/getopt.c'"'"'; else $(CYGPATH_W) '"'"'$(srcdir)/lib/getopt.c'"'"'; fi`@' Makefile
  sed -i '$s@.*@&\nlib/libsed_a-getopt1.obj: lib/getopt1.c\n\t\$(AM_V_CC)$(CC) $(DEFS) $(DEFAULT_INCLUDES) $(INCLUDES) $(AM_CPPFLAGS) $(CPPFLAGS) $(lib_libsed_a_CFLAGS) $(CFLAGS) -c -nologo -Folib/libsed_a-getopt.obj `if test -f '"'"'lib/getopt1.c'"'"'; then $(CYGPATH_W) '"'"'lib/getopt1.c'"'"'; else $(CYGPATH_W) '"'"'$(srcdir)/lib/getopt1.c'"'"'; fi`@' Makefile

17) when building with Visual Studio 2008:

 a) fix sources for compilation with non-c99 compiler:
  patch -Np1 -i sed-4.9-src-non-c99.patch
  (patch location: https://raw.githubusercontent.com/mbuilov/sed-windows/master/sed-4.9-src-non-c99.patch)

 b) stdbool.h header file is missing, add it:
  echo > stdbool.h

 c) fix lib/string.h:
  sed -i 's@\*restrict @*@g' lib/string.h

 d) fix lib/ctype.h:
  sed -i -e '/undef isblank/{:r;n;/^#endif/!b r' -e 's@@&\nstatic __inline int isblank(int c) {return '"'"' '"'"' == c || '"'"'\\t'"'"' == c;}@}' lib/ctype.h

18) do compile sed:
  make > make.bat

19) check build result:
  ./sed/sed.exe --version --locale=C

  (should print sed version, e.g.: (GNU sed) 4.9)

compilation should be ok, native (unoptimized) ./sed/sed.exe should be created.


Now it is possible to create a patch file - for compiling optimized sed.exe using only Microsoft Visual Studio tools, without need for CYGWIN.

1) create directory for unpatched sed:
  mkdir ../orig

2) unpack sed:
  tar xf ../sed-4.9.tar.xz -C ../orig/

3) diff current directory with original just unpacked sed-4.9.tar.xz in the '../orig' directory
  diff -rql . ../orig/sed-4.9

4) remove unneeded built files in the current directory (object files, libs, etc...)

  rm -rv \
    ./Makefile \
    ./stamp-h1 \
    ./sed-4.9-win-headers.patch \
    ./lib/*.obj \
    ./lib/.dirstamp \
    ./lib/.deps \
    ./lib/glthread/*.obj \
    ./lib/glthread/.dirstamp \
    ./lib/glthread/.deps \
    ./lib/libsed.a \
    ./sed/*.obj \
    ./sed/.dirstamp \
    ./sed/.deps \
    ./lib/malloc/*.obj \
    ./lib/malloc/.dirstamp \
    ./lib/malloc/.deps \
    ./sed/sed.exe \
    ./sed/libver.a \
    ./po/Makefile \
    ./po/Makefile.in \
    ./po/POTFILES \
    ./config.log \
    ./config.status \
    ./gnulib-tests/Makefile \
    ./sed/sed.exp \
    ./sed/sed.lib

  cp -fv \
    ../orig/sed-4.9/doc/sed.1 ./doc/sed.1

5) after this, diff should print:

  diff -rql . ../orig/sed-4.9
  Only in .: config.h
  Only in ./lib: alloca.h
# Only in ./lib: assert.h
* Files ./lib/calloc.c and ../orig/sed-4.9/lib/calloc.c differ
* Files ./lib/canonicalize-lgpl.c and ../orig/sed-4.9/lib/canonicalize-lgpl.c differ
  Only in ./lib: ctype.h
* Files ./lib/dfa.c and ../orig/sed-4.9/lib/dfa.c differ
  Only in ./lib: errno.h
  Only in ./lib: fcntl.h
  Only in ./lib: getopt-cdefs.h
  Only in ./lib: getopt-core.h
  Only in ./lib: getopt-ext.h
  Only in ./lib: getopt-pfx-core.h
  Only in ./lib: getopt-pfx-ext.h
  Only in ./lib: getopt.c
  Only in ./lib: getopt.h
  Only in ./lib: getopt1.c
  Only in ./lib: getopt_int.h
  Only in ./lib: inttypes.h
  Only in ./lib: langinfo.h
  Only in ./lib: limits.h
  Files ./lib/localcharset.c and ../orig/sed-4.9/lib/localcharset.c differ
  Only in ./lib: locale.h
* Files ./lib/localeinfo.c and ../orig/sed-4.9/lib/localeinfo.c differ
  Only in ./lib/malloc: dynarray-skeleton.gl.h
  Only in ./lib/malloc: dynarray.gl.h
* Files ./lib/malloc/dynarray_emplace_enlarge.c and ../orig/sed-4.9/lib/malloc/dynarray_emplace_enlarge.c differ
* Files ./lib/malloc/dynarray_finalize.c and ../orig/sed-4.9/lib/malloc/dynarray_finalize.c differ
* Files ./lib/malloc/dynarray_resize.c and ../orig/sed-4.9/lib/malloc/dynarray_resize.c differ
* Files ./lib/malloc/dynarray_resize_clear.c and ../orig/sed-4.9/lib/malloc/dynarray_resize_clear.c differ
  Only in ./lib/malloc: scratch_buffer.gl.h
* Files ./lib/malloc/scratch_buffer_set_array_size.c and ../orig/sed-4.9/lib/malloc/scratch_buffer_set_array_size.c differ
* Files ./lib/malloc.c and ../orig/sed-4.9/lib/malloc.c differ
* Files ./lib/malloca.c and ../orig/sed-4.9/lib/malloca.c differ
  Files ./lib/mbtowc-lock.h and ../orig/sed-4.9/lib/mbtowc-lock.h differ
  Files ./lib/nl_langinfo.c and ../orig/sed-4.9/lib/nl_langinfo.c differ
* Files ./lib/rawmemchr.c and ../orig/sed-4.9/lib/rawmemchr.c differ
* Files ./lib/realloc.c and ../orig/sed-4.9/lib/realloc.c differ
* Files ./lib/regcomp.c and ../orig/sed-4.9/lib/regcomp.c differ
* Files ./lib/regexec.c and ../orig/sed-4.9/lib/regexec.c differ
  Only in ./lib: selinux
  Only in ./lib: stdalign.h
  Only in ./lib: stdckdint.h
  Only in ./lib: stddef.h
  Only in ./lib: stdint.h
  Only in ./lib: stdio.h
  Only in ./lib: stdlib.h
  Only in ./lib: string.h
* Files ./lib/strverscmp.c and ../orig/sed-4.9/lib/strverscmp.c differ
  Only in ./lib: sys
* Files ./lib/tempname.c and ../orig/sed-4.9/lib/tempname.c differ
  Only in ./lib: time.h
  Only in ./lib: unistd.h
  Only in ./lib: wchar.h
  Only in ./lib: wctype.h
* Files ./lib/xmalloc.c and ../orig/sed-4.9/lib/xmalloc.c differ
  Only in .: make.bat
* Files ./sed/debug.c and ../orig/sed-4.9/sed/debug.c differ
  Files ./sed/execute.c and ../orig/sed-4.9/sed/execute.c differ
* Files ./sed/regexp.c and ../orig/sed-4.9/sed/regexp.c differ
  Files ./sed/sed.c and ../orig/sed-4.9/sed/sed.c differ
  Files ./sed/utils.c and ../orig/sed-4.9/sed/utils.c differ
  Only in ./sed: version.c
  Only in ./sed: version.h
* Only in .: stdbool.h

# -- if ./lib/assert.h was generated
* -- if sed-4.9-src-non-c99.patch was applied

6) edit make.bat

  cp make.bat make.bat.old
  sed -i -n 's/.*cl /cl /p;/^lib /p;/^link /p' make.bat
  sed -i 's@-DLOCALEDIR=."/usr/local/share/locale.".*-c -nologo -F@/DLOCALEDIR="" /c /nologo /F@' make.bat
  sed -i 's@   -c -nologo -F@/c /nologo /F@' make.bat
  sed -i '/lc-charset-dispatch.c/s@ /nologo @&/DGNULIB_WCHAR_SINGLE_LOCALE=1 @' make.bat
  sed -i 's@lib/glthread/@lib\\glthread\\@g' make.bat
  sed -i 's@/Fosed/@/Fosed\\@;s@/Folib/@/Folib\\@' make.bat
  sed -i 's@`if test -f .@@;s@.; then.*@@' make.bat
  sed -i 's@`cygpath -w .@@;s@.`@@' make.bat
  sed -i 's@ lib/@ lib\\@g;s@ sed/@ sed\\@g' make.bat
  sed -i 's@\\malloc/@\\malloc\\@g' make.bat
  sed -i 's@-DHAVE_CONFIG_H -I.  -I. -I./lib -I./lib -I./sed@/Ox /GF /Gy /GS- /GL /EHsc /DHAVE_CONFIG_H /I. /I.\\lib /I.\\sed@' make.bat
  sed -i 's@lib /nologo@lib /LTCG /nologo@' make.bat
  sed -i 's@/OUT:lib/@/OUT:lib\\@;s@/OUT:sed/@/OUT:sed\\@' make.bat
  sed -i 's@link /nologo@& /LTCG@' make.bat
  sed -i 's@$@ || exit /b 1@' make.bat
  rm make.bat.old

7) finally, create a patch:
  diff -Naur ../orig/sed-4.9 . > ../sed-4.9-build-VS22-x64.patch

 --tip: for the 32-bit build, use different patch name:
  diff -Naur ../orig/sed-4.9 . > ../sed-4.9-build-VS22-x86.patch

 --tip: for Visual Studio 2008:
  diff -Naur ../orig/sed-4.9 . > ../sed-4.9-build-VS9-x86.patch