Install from source in a venv environmentΒΆ

  • Install base packages on your system:

sudo apt install \
cmake \
libltdl-dev \
libboost-filesystem-dev \
libboost-regex-dev \
libboost-wave-dev \
libboost-python-dev \
libboost-program-options-dev \
libboost-test-dev \
openmpi-bin \
libopenmpi-dev \
libgsl0-dev \
pandoc

  • Optional packages

# for SONATA compatiblity
libhdf5-dev
# for MUSIC compatibility
libmusic-dev \
music-bin

  • Create and activate a venv environment:

python -m venv venv
source venv/bin/activate

pip install -r requirements.txt # installs all dependencies for PyNEST, testing, docs, and nest-server

  • Create a build directory:

mkdir build_dir # Build directory should be placed outside of source repository

  • Change to the build directory:

cd build_dir

  • Build NEST:

    You may need additional cmake options (see CMake Options for NEST). Note that you should not give CMAKE_INSTALL_PREFIX to have NEST installed into the venv correctly.

cmake </path/to/NEST/src>

  • Compile and install NEST:

make
make install
make installcheck

Note

To build the developer or user documentation see Documentation workflows