Help Building Blender 2.79 on Windows

I’m trying to build an old version of Blender to look at Blender Internal Renderer’s vertex-color baking code in action. I don’t care which version of Blender I can build, as long as it’s pre-2.80 and can bake to vertex colors. The latest daily build of 2.79 would work as well as any of the releases. But right now I’m trying to build 2.79b. I’ve succeeded in finding the commit tagged as 2.79b : rBf4dc9f9d68bd
And git checkout f4dc9f9d68bd seems to work OK. I’ve installed MSVS 2013 Update 5. When I run ./make.bat lite from git bash, I get:

$ ./make.bat lite
loading initial cache file D:\git-blender\blender\\build_files\cmake\config\blender_lite.cmake
loading initial cache file D:\git-blender\blender\\build_files\cmake\config\blender_lite.cmake
CMake Warning at CMakeLists.txt:767 (message):
  Addons path 'D:/git-blender/blender/release/scripts/addons' is missing,
  This is a 'git submodule', which are known not to work with bridges to
  other version control systems: * CONTINUING WITHOUT ADDONS *


-- 64 bit compiler detected.
-- Visual Studio 2013 detected.
CMake Error at build_files/cmake/platform/platform_win32_msvc.cmake:151 (message):
  Windows requires pre-compiled libs at:
  'D:/git-blender/blender/../lib/win64_vc12'
Call Stack (most recent call first):
  build_files/cmake/platform/platform_win32.cmake:29 (include)
  CMakeLists.txt:866 (include)


-- Configuring incomplete, errors occurred!
See also "D:/git-blender/build_windows_Lite_x64_vc12_Release/CMakeFiles/CMakeOutput.log".
Microsoft (R) Build Engine version 12.0.40629.0
[Microsoft .NET Framework, version 4.0.30319.42000]
Copyright (C) Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.

MSBUILD : error MSB1009: Project file does not exist.
Switch: D:\git-blender\blender\..\build_windows_Lite_x64_vc12_Release\Blender.sln
"Build Failed"


So I think this is the problem:

  Windows requires pre-compiled libs at:
  'D:/git-blender/blender/../lib/win64_vc12'

Now I have a folder called win64_vc14 How do I get the older library dependencies? I’m not familiar with SVN.

@LazyDodo can you help with this?

Thanks in advance to anyone that can help :smile:

seemingly two problems here, looks like you haven’t gotten the addons yet, on this page follow the git submodule commands to get them.

as for the libs, they are tagged for every release, in your lib folder run:

svn co https://svn.blender.org/svnroot/bf-blender/tags/blender-2.79a-release/lib/win64_vc12

to get the 2.79a libs

Thanks! Works perfectly now.

The only issue is I’m not sure how to update the addons to the right commit, but I don’t need them for what I’m doing. I did
git submodule foreach git pull --rebase origin master
and of course it probably should be a different commit. I’ll try the release branch of 2.79a next time I build.

git submodule foreach git pull --rebase origin blender-v2.79a-release fails. I can build successfully in VS but it won’t lauunch Blender (even though it will run from the console). The project that seems to give me trouble is python-numpy64.

Never mind, NUMPY has nothing to do with it. No matter what build options I use, VS says Unable to start program [directory]/ALL_BUILD Access is Denied.
I don’t use any kind of anti-virus and this occurs even if I run VS as an admin. Any idea what’s causing this? Runnning the debugger was the one thing I was hoping to do with this 2.79. I suppose it is still building correctly, though, so maybe running it from the console will be enough.

Well, whatever the deal is with VS, make.bat is working just fine. I think I can figure it out from here. Thanks.

addons are tagged as well, you should just be able to check out the right branch, running

git submodule foreach git checkout v2.79a

grabbed the right locale and addons for me, contrib crapped out but those don’t get shipped with a release build anyhow so thats ok.

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Thanks! That worked. I’ve succeeded in finding some of the old vertex-color baking code, too. Hopefully I can figure out how to bring it back into Cycles from this!

Hi, have you managed to “bring it back”?

No, I never got very far with it before I realized “this involves a lot of design decisions that I’m not qualified to make”. Now I am learning and learning, mostly the rigging side of things. I’m working on a bug fix for Spline IK. Eventually I may come back to vertex-color baking. It’s certainly an important feature, but it’s big enough that it should be done well by someone who knows what they’re doing!

Agree … you can vote for my feature request then :slight_smile:

Thanks and happy blending!

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