Compiling MTASA

In order to successfully build Multi Theft Auto from source, it is necessary to perform a number of steps, which we will explain below.

Prerequisites

Before you can build Multi Theft Auto, make sure you have the following software and SDKs installed:

• Microsoft Visual Studio 2008 (SP1 required)
• Microsoft DirectX SDK (only the Direct3D related components are required)
• Microsoft Platform SDK (not required on Windows 7, only the DirectShow components are required)

If you haven't already done so, install a client such as TortoiseSVN which can be used to download and manage the code.

Getting the latest source code

To get the latest code, you will have to Checkout our SVN repository with your SVN Client (i.e. TortoiseSVN) by using Checkout function, with the URL of http://mtasa-blue.googlecode.com/svn/trunk/.

Building the software

In order to build the source, you will need Microsoft Visual Studio. Open the project file in Shared/Core 2008.sln and build using one of the project configurations Debug or Release. Note that everything will run significantly slower in Debug mode.

Target directory and permissions

By default, the current version compiles the binaries into 'C:\Program Files\MTA San Andreas 1.2\'. To ensure the correct permissions, registry entries and support files are present, you should install the latest nightly and the latest data files into that directory.

Getting the latest network module

Since the net.dll network modules for the client are covered by a different license, you will have to get these from our project Downloads section.

Alternatively, you can take the DLL from an unstable nightly build and use that. If you want to run a debug version of MTA, MTA expects a debug version of the net dll. As we don't provide this, you can append '_d' to the filename of a release dll.

Make sure you get the latest revision of the multitheftauto_net-rXXX.zip file and extract it into your MTA San Andreas 1.1\MTA program files directory (not your GTA directory!).

Running the software

You are almost ready to run your build of the Multi Theft Auto software.

Running the game client

If you want to run the Multi Theft Auto game client, you will need to extract the data files that the project uses when it is launched. These are packed in a separate archive that can be downloaded from our Downloads page on Google Code.

Make sure you download the latest revision of the multitheftauto_data-rXXX.exe file and extract it into your MTA San Andreas 1.1 program files directory (not your GTA directory!).

Running the dedicated server

If you want to run the Multi Theft Auto dedicated server, you will have to install the required resources. These are required because they implement the most basic functionality (e.g. spawning players) in order to play.

Our official resources repository is hosted on Google Code: [1]. It's recommended that you check out the latest resources from here or download a zipped revision from the Downloads tab on the resources project. Make sure that you are not using any of our resources from any previous versions of Multi Theft Auto, as this will cause issues.

If you have any problems with missing DLL files (e.g. libcurl.dll), simply copy these over from the client's data archive described above.

Getting involved

Please see our Coding guidelines for information on coding practice.

Additional information

If you need more information, try our bug tracker, IRC channel.