yasm/Mkfiles/vc10

Building YASM with Microsoft Visual Studio 2010 (C/C++ v10)

-----------------------------------------------------------



This note describes how to build YASM using Microsoft Visual

Studio 2010 (C/C++ v10 - currently releasxed as beta 2).  



1. The Compiler

---------------



If you want to build the 64-bit version of YASM you will need 

to install the Visual Studio 2010 64-bit tools, which may not 

be installed by default.  If using Visual C++ Express 2010, 

you will need to install the Windows SDK to obtain the 64-bit

build tools. 



2. YASM Download

----------------



First YASM needs to be downloaded and the files placed within 

a suitable directory, which will be called <yasm> here but can 

be named and located as you wish.



3. Building YASM with Microsoft 2010 (VC10)

-------------------------------------------



Now locate and double click on the yasm.sln solution file in 

the 'Mkfiles/vc10' subdirectory to open the build project in 

the Visual Studio 2010 IDE and then select:



    win32 or x64 build

    release or debug build



as appropriate to build the YASM binaries that you need.



4. Using YASM with Visual Sudio 2010 and VC++ version 10

--------------------------------------------------------



1. Firstly you need to locate the directory (or directories) 

where the VC++ compiler binaries are located and put copies 

of the appropriate yasm.exe binary in these directories. A

typical location is:



C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft Visual Studio 10.0\VC\bin



Depending on your system you can use either the win32 or the

x64 version of YASM.  It must be named yasm.exe.



2. To use the new custom tools facility in Visual Studio 2010,

you need to place a copy of three files - yasm.props, yasm.targets 

and yasm.xml - into the MSBUILD customisation directory, which is

typically at:



C:\Program Files (x86)\MSBuild\Microsoft.Cpp\v4.0\BuildCustomizations



This allows you to configure YASM as an assembler within the VC++

IDE. To use YASM in a project, right click on the project in the

Solution Explorer and select 'Build Customisations..'. This will 

give you a dialog box that allows you to select YASM as an 

assembler (note that your assembler files need to have the 

extension '.asm').



To assemble a file with YASM, select the Property Page for the 

file and the select 'Yasm Assembler' in the Tool dialog entry. 

Then click 'Apply' and an additional property page entry will 

appear and enable YASM settings to be established.



As alternative to placing the yasm.rules files as described 

above is to set the rules file path in the Visual Studio 2010

settings dialogue.



5. A Linker Issue

-----------------



There appears to be a linker bug in the VC++ linker that 

prevents symbols with absolute addresses being linked in DLL 

builds.  This means, for example, that LEA instructions of 

the general form:



   lea, rax,[rax+symbol]



cannot be used for DLL builds.  The following general form 

has to be used instead:



   lea rcx,[symbol wrt rip]

   lea rax,[rax+rcx]



This limitation may also cause problems with other instruction 

that use absolute addresses.



6. Acknowledgements

-------------------



I am most grateful for the fantastic support that Peter Johnson,

YASM's creator, has given me in tracking down issues in using

YASM for the production of Windows x64 code.



  Brian Gladman, 10th November 2009