如何用VC++编译器编译MEX文件

This document describes how to setup to compile C-language mex les with the free Microsoft Visual C/C++ 2005 Express Edition compiler. You will compile your mex le using the Matlab command line tool mex, rather than creating projects and compiling within the Visual Studio IDE. The steps are as streamlined as possible and require no hacking on any of the mex setup les.
1 History
version 1.1 8 Dec 2006. Initial Revision. Covered mex + MSVC for Matlab R2006b. version 1.2 1 Aug 2007. Revised to encompass Matlab R2007a. URL to get VC Express has been updated. Added reference to Mathworks website.
2 Introduction
Microsoft now distributes \Visual Studio 2005 Express Edition" for free, which includes the \Express Edition Visual C/C++" compiler (hereafter \VC Express"). This document grew out of an attempt to make VC Express work with Matlab 7.3 (R2006b). This required some trickery, because the Express Edition was not an ocially supported compiler; only the Professional Edition ($$) was. With the release of Matlab 7.4, (R2007a), the Express Edition is now an ocially supported compiler for mex. As a result of its new-found status,
the install procedure is slightly dierent, so this document contains separate instructions based on your version of Matlab.
Why do we need a howto? The hitch is that, out of the box, VC Express can only generate .NET-based programs, not Win32|\regular" Windows|programs, and it does not come packaged with all of the standard windows library (.lib) les (kernel32.lib, user32.lib,
etc). Now, even if you don't need to make Win32 calls from within your mex le, mex by default asks the linker to link against several of these standard Win32 libraries, and will fail if it cannot nd them. Thus, mex will not work with VC Express straight out of the box. Since we'd prefer to do zero hacking on the mex setup, we want those libraries.
Fortunately, Microsoft also distributes a \Windows Platform SDK," which contains the necessary library and header les as a free download. Once you have these les, and mex can nd them, mex will be perfectly happy to compile using VC Express.
A nal note: Matlab already comes bundled with a compiler (at least on Windows), called lcc. Try to use lcc rst; it should work out of the box for many (most?) normal mex applications. (In our case, we were writing mex routines to control hardware, and for arcane reasons lcc could not compile the code. If there are other reasons to prefer VC, please let me know.) Also, the lcc distribution that comes with Matlab has the Win32
library and header les, but I was not successful in getting VC Express to use those. Ergo: you have to use the Platform SDK.
3 Instructions for Matlab 7.3 (R2006a, R2006b)
To get VC Express to work with R2006, we will download VC Express and the Platform SDK. The crucial step is installing the Platform SDK in the correct directory so that the whole thing looks to Matlab like a VC Professional install.
1. Obtain and install Visual C++ 2005 Express Edition. Browse to: http://msdn.microsoft.com/vstudio/express/downloads
and choose to download \Visual C++ 2005" under Step 2. This will start the download of the le vcsetup.exe. Run this to start the web installer. I installed to the to the default directory (C:nProgram FilesnMicrosoft Visual Studio 8) During my install, I chose not to install any optional features, including the IDE. mex needs only the command line tools.
2. Obtain and install the Windows Platform SDK.
The download is called \Microsoft Platform SDK for Windows Server 2003 R2." Browse to: http://msdn.microsoft.com/vstudio/express/visualc/usingpsdk/ This page is also linked from the bottom of the VC Express homepage. Follow the link on step 2. Get the le PSDK-x86.exe, which is the SDK web installer. Run it and choose to do a Custom install. This is necessary to install the SDK to the correct directory and to choose only a subset of the components to install.
CRITICAL: choose the install directory as C:nProgram FilesnMicrosoft Visual Studio 8nVCnPlatformSDK (Mind the lack-of-space in  \PlatformSDK.") This is a directory where mex wants to look for both header les and linking, so installing it here will allow everything else
to work out of the box. Next, choose which components to install. For simplicity, you can include everything. See the end of this document for the minimum set of components to get mex to work.
3. mex setup Finally, we're home free. Within Matlab, run
>> mex -setup
If you let the routine search for compilers itself, it should nd [2] Microsoft Visual C/C++ version 8.0 in C:nProgram Filesn Microsoft Visual Studio 8 (The number in brackets may vary.) Choose that one; mex is now set up to use VC Express.
4 Instructions for Matlab 7.4 (R2007a, and later?)
VC Express is now an ocially supported compiler in R2007. As before, we start by downloading VC Express and the Platform SDK.
Note mex now knows about both the Professional Edition and the Express Edition. In its list of compilers, it calls the former Microsoft Visual C++ 2005, and the latter Microsoft Visual C++ 2005 Express Edition. I have made VC Express work in two ways. One is to follow the directions exactly as for R2006, dropping the Platform SDK in the right place to mimic a Professional install. If you do so, be sure to specify during mex -setup that you have Microsoft Visual C++ 2005 (i.e. the Professional Edition|in this case, we truly are fooling mex into thinking we have
installed VC Professional.)
The preferred way to install, however, is to place the Platform SDK in its default directory, and dene the environment variable MSSDK to point to that directory. Then, you tell mex -setup that you have installed Microsoft Visual C++ 2005 Express Edition. The instructions for this method follow.
1. Obtain and install Visual C++ 2005 Express Edition. Browse to:
http://msdn.microsoft.com/vstudio/express/downloads
and choose to download \Visual C++ 2005 Express Edition" under Step 2. This will start the download of the le vcsetup.exe. Run this to start the web installer. I installed to the to the default directory
C:nProgram FilesnMicrosoft Visual Studio 8n During my install, I chose not to install any optional features, including the IDE.
mex needs only the command line tools.
2. Obtain and install the Windows Platform SDK.
The download is called \Microsoft Platform SDK for Windows Server 2003 R2." Browse to:
http://msdn.microsoft.com/vstudio/express/visualc/usingpsdk/
This page is also linked from the bottom of the VC Express homepage. Follow the link on step 2 to get the le PSDK-x86.exe, which is the SDK web installer. Run it and choose to do a Custom install. Unlike for R2006, in R2007a it is not critical where the SDK is installed. For simplicity, choose the default directory. This should be:
C:nProgram FilesnMicrosoft Platform SDK for Windows
Server 2003 R2n
Next, choose which components to install. For simplicity, you can include everything. However, the full download is large. See the end of this document for the minimum
set of components to get mex to work.
3. Set the MSSDK environment variable
Set the environment variable by going to Start ! Control Panel ! System ! Advanced (tab) ! Environment (button)
and then create a New System Variable, with name MSSDK, and value C:nProgram FilesnMicrosoft Platform SDK for Windows
Server 2003 R2n
(or whichever directory you installed the Platform SDK to).
4. mex setup
First, restart Matlab. It is necessary to do so whenever you change Windows environment variables. To conrm that the environment variable stuck, run:
>> !set
and check to see that MSSDK is on the list with the correct value. If so, you're home free. To setup mex, run:
>> mex -setup
Note, in R2007a, there seems to be a bug in mex -setup: it has trouble nding theExpress Edition when automatically searching for compilers (at least for me, it misidentied the install as the Professional Edition). The solution is to ask mex -setup not to search for installed compilers. Then, in the long list choose:
[14] Microsoft Visual C++ 2005 Express Edition
(The bracketed number may vary.) mex -setup may complain that it cannot nd the Express Edition; no matter: mex is now set up to use VC Express.
A Appendix: Minimum Platform SDK components for a functional mex For a smaller download (and thus faster install), during the custom Platform SDK install include only the following top-level components:
p Conguration Options
p Microsoft Windows Core SDK
p Microsoft Data Access Services SDK
(This was a surprise, but this is how you get odbc32.lib and odbcbcp.lib)
p Debugging Tools for Windows
(No key libraries, but we should have these, right?)
All other items (e.g. Microsoft Web Workshop (IE) SDK) got an X at the highest level. Now, drilling down on the chosen components, X out the following sub-components
to choose not to install
Conguration Options
Register Environment Variables. (This is the default, in fact.)
MS Windows Core SDK:
Tools ! AMD 64-bit
Tools ! Intel 64-bit
Build Environment ! AMD 64-bit
Build Environment ! Intel 64-bit
Documentation
Sample Code
Source Code
Microsoft Data Access Services:
Tools ! AMD 64-bit
Tools ! Intel 64-bit
Build Environment ! AMD 64-bit
Build Environment ! Intel 64-bit
Documentation
Sample Code
This will give you the minimum set of libraries to run mex. Further, within the libraries, you are keeping only code for 32-bit Intels.
References
[1] Mathworks Tech-Notes: Matlab Supported Compilers. http://www.mathworks.com/ support/tech-notes/1600/1601.htm.