Last Updated: Sept 28, 2012

This file outlines what it takes to build Autopsy from source.

Note that it currently only works out of the box on Windows.  We
are working on getting the process working under non-Windows systems.
It generally works, but needs some custom mangling to find the
correct C libraries.


STEPS:
1) Get Java Setup

1a) Download and install 32-bit version of JDK (32-bit is currently
needed even if you have a 64-bit system).

1b) Ensure that JDK_HOME is set to the root JDK directory. 

1c) (optional) Download and install Netbeans IDE (http://netbeans.org/)
Note: Netbeans IDE is not required to build and run Autopsy,
but it is a recommended IDE to use for development of Autopsy modules.


2) Get Sleuth Kit Setup
2a) Download and build the release version of Libewf2 (20120304 or
later).  All you need is the dll file.  Note that you will get a
launching error if you use libewf 1.
- http://sourceforge.net/projects/libewf/

2b) Set LIBEWF_HOME environment variable to root directory of LIBEWF

2c) Download and build a Release version of Sleuth Kit (TSK) 4.0.  You
need to build the tsk_jni project.  You can use a released version or
download the latest from github:
- git://github.com/sleuthkit/sleuthkit.git

2d) Build the TSK JAR file by typing 'ant' in bindings/java in the
TSK source code folder from a command line.  You can also add the
code to a NetBeans project and build it from there.

2e) Set TSK_HOME environment variable to the root directory of TSK

2f) On Non-Windows systems, you will need to do a 'make install'
from the TSK root directory to install the libraries and such in
the needed places (i.e. '/usr/local').


3) Get gstreamer Setup.  gstreamer is used to view video files. You
can either download it and install it or manually by unziping the
version that is included in the 'thirdparty/gstreamer' folder.  You
will need the 'bin' and 'lib/gstreamer-1.0' folders to be in your
Windows PATH environment variable.

NOTE: This has not been fully tested in non-Windows environments
yet, so we don't have instructions for that yet.


4) Compile Autopsy
4a) using Netbeans IDE:
- Start NetBeans IDE and open the Autopsy project.
- Choose to build the Autopsy project / module.  It is the highest
level project that will then cause the other modules to be compiled.

4b) without Netbeans IDE (requires JDK and ant >= 1.7.1):
- from root directory of Autopsy source execute:
ant build
(to build Autopsy)
ant run
(to run Autopsy)


BACKGROUND:
Here are some notes to shed some light on what is going on during
the build process.

- NetBeans uses ant to build Autopsy.  The build target locates TSK
(and LIBEWF) based on the environment variables and copies the
needed JAR and library files into the DataModel module in the Autopsy
project (see build-unix.xml and build-windows.xml in the root
directory for details).   If you want to use the debug version of
the TSK dll, then edit the copy line in the build-windows.xml file
to copy from the Debug folder.

- On a Windows system, the ant target copies all needed libraries
to the autopsy folder.  On a Unix system, the ant taget copies only
the JNI library and then relies on the other libraries (libtsk,
libewf, zilb, etc.) to be installed on the system in their standard
locations (i.e. /usr/local).

- Everytime that you do a source code update of TSK, make sure you
rebuild both the dll and the JAR file.


---------------
Brian Carrier
carrier <at> sleuthkit <dot> org