Copyright 2008 Google Inc.
To compile or install protobuf from source using CMake, see cmake/README.md.
To build protobuf from source, the following tools are needed:
On Ubuntu/Debian, for example, you can install them with:
sudo apt-get install g++ git bazel
On other platforms, use the corresponding package managing tool to install them before proceeding. See https://bazel.build/install for further instructions on installing Bazel, or to build from source using CMake, see cmake/README.md. See https://github.com/abseil/abseil-cpp for instructions on installing Abseil.
To get the source, download the release .tar.gz or .zip package in the release page:
https://github.com/protocolbuffers/protobuf/releases/latest
You can also get the source by “git clone” our git repository. Make sure you have also cloned the submodules and generated the configure script (skip this if you are using a release .tar.gz or .zip package):
git clone https://github.com/protocolbuffers/protobuf.git cd protobuf git submodule update --init --recursive
To build the C++ Protocol Buffer runtime and the Protocol Buffer compiler (protoc) execute the following:
bazel build :protoc :protobuf
You can then install the compiler, for example on Linux:
cp bazel-bin/protoc /usr/local/bin
For more usage information on Bazel, see http://bazel.build.
Compiling dependent packages
To compile a package that uses Protocol Buffers, you need to setup a Bazel WORKSPACE that's hooked up to the protobuf repository and loads its dependencies. For an example, see WORKSPACE.
Note for Mac users
For a Mac system, Unix tools are not available by default. You will first need to install Xcode from the Mac AppStore and then run the following command from a terminal:
sudo xcode-select --install
To install Unix tools, you can install “port” following the instructions at https://www.macports.org . This will reside in /opt/local/bin/port for most Mac installations.
sudo /opt/local/bin/port install bazel
Alternative for Homebrew users:
brew install bazel
Then follow the Unix instructions above.
If you only need the protoc binary, you can download it from the release page:
https://github.com/protocolbuffers/protobuf/releases/latest
In the downloads section, download the zip file protoc-$VERSION-win32.zip. It contains the protoc binary as well as public proto files of protobuf library. The protoc binary and the gencode version must match.
You can install protobuf and its dependencies directly by using vcpkg:
>vcpkg install protobuf protobuf:x64-windows
If you want to use zlib, you'll also need to install the zlib feature:
>vcpkg install protobuf[zlib] protobuf[zlib]:x64-windows
See https://github.com/Microsoft/vcpkg for more information.
To build from source using Microsoft Visual C++, see cmake/README.md.
To build from source using Cygwin or MinGW, follow the Unix installation instructions, above.
Due to the nature of C++, it is unlikely that any two versions of the Protocol Buffers C++ runtime libraries will have compatible ABIs. That is, if you linked an executable against an older version of libprotobuf, it is unlikely to work with a newer version without re-compiling. This problem, when it occurs, will normally be detected immediately on startup of your app. Still, you may want to consider using static linkage. You can configure this in your cc_binary Bazel rules by specifying:
linkstatic=True
The complete documentation for Protocol Buffers is available at: