Wx is a pain to install on Windows using ActivePerl 5.10.1 and a MS compiler. This post details one way of installing it.

I got in touch with the maintainer of Wx after writing this post. Save for the incompatibility with VS6, all the issues listed in this post have been resolved. See Re: Installation instructions for Wx (wxWidgets fomerly wxWindows) using ActivePerl (update) for details.

It crashes Visual Studio 6's compiler, so start by upgrading your compiler:

Download "Visual C++ 2008 Express edition". Install it under C:\Progs (Adjust at will, but I didn't try a path with a space in it)

Now we need the library. If you let Alien::wxWidgets download and build it, it won't patch it to have it embed the manifest files into the DLL files, causing DLL errors and malfunctions when you try to some aspects of Wx. I could patch Alien::wxWidgets to patch wxWidget's makefile, but I decide to just patch wxWidget's makefile. That means the patches Alien::wxWidgets wants to apply [1] [2] won't get applied.

Download wxWidgets-2.8.10 Install it in C:\Progs\wxWidgets-2.8.10 (Adjust at will, but I didn't try a path with a space in it)

It might be a good idea to upgrade your Perl tool chain. You want at least:

I had the following installed:

Then, open up a console and execute the following commands in turn. As is, it's not suitable to be copy and pasted in its entirety or put in a batch file.

Note that the process takes a while. The longest step, building "msw", takes an hour or more on my aging machine.

"C:\Progs\Microsoft Visual Studio 9.0\VC\vcvarsall" C: cd \Progs\wxWidgets-2.8.10 cd build\msw nmake -f makefile.vc SHARED=1 BUILD=release cd ..\.. cd contrib\build\stc nmake -f makefile.vc SHARED=1 BUILD=release cd ..\..\.. cd lib\vc_dll for %q in (*.manifest) do ( mt -nologo -manifest %q -outputresource:%~nq;2 del %q ) cd ..\.. set WXDIR=C:\Progs\wxWidgets-2.8.10 set WXWIN=C:\Progs\wxWidgets-2.8.10 C: cd \ md stager cd stager lwp-request http://search.cpan.org/CPAN/authors/id/M/MB/MBARBON/Alien- + wxWidgets-0.47.tar.gz > Alien-wxWidgets-0.47.tar.gz perl -MArchive::Tar -e"Archive::Tar->new->read($ARGV[0],1,{extract=>1} + )" Alien-wxWidgets-0.47.tar.gz cd Alien-wxWidgets-0.47 perl -i.bak -pe"s/config => \{ cc => \$cc, ld => \K(?=\$cc })/\$cc eq + 'cl' ? 'link' : /" lib\Alien\wxWidgets\Utility.pm perl Makefile.PL INSTALLDIRS=site -> Should ask "Do you want to fetch and build wxWidgets from source + s?". Use default "no". nmake nmake test nmake install cd .. rd /s/q Alien-wxWidgets-0.47 del Alien-wxWidgets-0.47.tar.gz lwp-request http://search.cpan.org/CPAN/authors/id/M/MB/MBARBON/Wx-0.9 + 4.tar.gz > Wx-0.94.tar.gz perl -MArchive::Tar -e"Archive::Tar->new->read($ARGV[0],1,{extract=>1} + )" Wx-0.94.tar.gz cd Wx-0.94 perl -i.bak -pe"s/^sub \K(?=dynamic_lib \{$)/DELETED_/" build\Wx\build + \MakeMaker\Win32_MSVC.pm perl -i.bak -pe"s/new wxCursor\( name, \K(?=type, hsx, hsy \))/(long)/ + " xs\Cursor.xs perl Makefile.PL INSTALLDIRS=site --extra-cflags="/FIstdlib.h" nmake nmake test nmake install cd .. rd /s/q Wx-0.94 del Wx-0.94.tar.gz cd .. rd stager [download]

Finally, you may uninstall wxWidgets-2.8.10 since Alien::wxWidgets made a copy of the files Wx needs into Perl's lib. To uninstall wxWidgets-2.8.10,

Run the uninstaller found via Start | Programs, then Delete the directory C:\Progs\wxWidgets-2.8.10

Doing so will free up 500MB.

I recommend that you get Wx::Demo.

"C:\Progs\Microsoft Visual Studio 9.0\VC\vcvarsall" cpan Wx::Demo [download]

You can launch the demo using

It warns that it's "skipping module 'Wx::DemoModules::wxHVScrolledWindow'". I think it's a problem with the demo, not a problem with Wx.

Update: Many small tweaks to the text parts. Last one on Dec 22, 2009 at 10:21 EST

Update: Modified the paragraph starting with "Now we need the library". Dec 30, 2009 at 10:06 EST