================

Kallithea README

================

About

-----

**Kallithea** is a fast and powerful management tool for Mercurial_ and Git_

with a built-in push/pull server, full text search and code-review. It works on

HTTP/HTTPS and SSH, has a built-in permission/authentication system with the ability

to authenticate via LDAP or ActiveDirectory. Kallithea also provides simple API

so it's easy to integrate with existing external systems.

Kallithea is similar in some respects to GitHub_ or Bitbucket_, however

Kallithea can be run as standalone hosted application on your own server. It is

open-source and focuses more on providing a customised,

self-administered interface for Mercurial_ and Git_ repositories. Kallithea

works on Unix-like systems and Windows.

Kallithea was forked from RhodeCode in July 2014 and has been heavily modified.

Installation

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

virtualenv. Official releases of Kallithea can be installed with::

    pip install kallithea

The development repository is kept very stable and used in production by the

developers -- you can do the same.

Please visit https://docs.kallithea-scm.org/en/latest/installation.html for

more details.

There is also an experimental `Puppet module`_ for installing and setting up

Kallithea. Currently, only basic functionality is provided, but it is still

enough to get up and running quickly, especially for people without Python

background. See

https://docs.kallithea-scm.org/en/latest/installation_puppet.html for further

information.

Source code

-----------

The latest sources can be obtained from

https://kallithea-scm.org/repos/kallithea.

The issue tracker and a repository mirror can be found at Bitbucket_ on

https://bitbucket.org/conservancy/kallithea.

Kallithea features

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

- Has its own middleware to handle Mercurial_ and Git_ protocol requests. Each

  request is authenticated and logged together with IP address.

- Built for speed and performance. You can make multiple pulls/pushes

  simultaneously. Proven to work with thousands of repositories and users.

- Supports HTTP/HTTPS with LDAP, AD, or proxy-pass authentication.

- Supports SSH access with server-side public key management.

- Full permissions (private/read/write/admin) together with IP restrictions for

  each repository, additional explicit forking, repositories group and

  repository creation permissions.

- User groups for easier permission management.

- Repository groups let you group repos and manage them easier. They come with

  permission delegation features, so you can delegate groups management.

- Users can fork other users repos, and compare them at any time.

- Built-in versioned paste functionality (Gist) for sharing code snippets.

- Integrates easily with other systems, with custom created mappers you can

  connect it to almost any issue tracker, and with a JSON-RPC API you can make

  much more.

Connection Security : required

    Defines the connection to LDAP server

    PLAIN

        Plain unencrypted LDAP connection.

        This will by default use `Port`_ 389.

    LDAPS

        Use secure LDAPS connections according to `Certificate

        Checks`_ configuration.

        This will by default use `Port`_ 636.

    START_TLS

        Use START TLS according to `Certificate Checks`_ configuration on an

        apparently "plain" LDAP connection.

        This will by default use `Port`_ 389.

.. _Certificate Checks:

Certificate Checks : optional

    How SSL certificates verification is handled -- this is only useful when

    `Enable LDAPS`_ is enabled.  Only DEMAND or HARD offer full SSL security

    with mandatory certificate validation, while the other options are

    susceptible to man-in-the-middle attacks.

    NEVER

        A serve certificate will never be requested or checked.

    ALLOW

        A server certificate is requested.  Failure to provide a

        certificate or providing a bad certificate will not terminate the

        session.

    TRY

        A server certificate is requested.  Failure to provide a

        certificate does not halt the session; providing a bad certificate

        halts the session.

    DEMAND

        A server certificate is requested and must be provided and

        authenticated for the session to proceed.

    HARD

        The same as DEMAND.

.. _Custom CA Certificates:

Custom CA Certificates : optional

    It can be set to something like `/etc/openldap/cacerts` on older systems or

    if using self-signed certificates.

.. _Base DN:

Base DN : required

    The Distinguished Name (DN) where searches for users will be performed.

    Searches can be controlled by `LDAP Filter`_ and `LDAP Search Scope`_.

.. _LDAP Filter:

LDAP Filter : optional

    A LDAP filter defined by RFC 2254.  This is more useful when `LDAP

    Search Scope`_ is set to SUBTREE.  The filter is useful for limiting

    which LDAP objects are identified as representing Users for

    authentication.  The filter is augmented by `Login Attribute`_ below.

    This can commonly be left blank.

.. _LDAP Search Scope:

LDAP Search Scope : required

    This limits how far LDAP will search for a matching object.

    BASE

        Only allows searching of `Base DN`_ and is usually not what you

        want.

    ONELEVEL

        Searches all entries under `Base DN`_, but not Base DN itself.

    SUBTREE

        Searches all entries below `Base DN`_, but not Base DN itself.

        When using SUBTREE `LDAP Filter`_ is useful to limit object

        location.

.. _Login Attribute:

Login Attribute : required

    The LDAP record attribute that will be matched as the USERNAME or

    ACCOUNT used to connect to Kallithea.  This will be added to `LDAP

    Filter`_ for locating the User object.  If `LDAP Filter`_ is specified as

    "LDAPFILTER", `Login Attribute`_ is specified as "uid" and the user has

    connected as "jsmith" then the `LDAP Filter`_ will be augmented as below

    ::

        (&(LDAPFILTER)(uid=jsmith))

.. _ldap_attr_firstname:

then replace the clone step above by a clone of your fork. In this case, please

see :ref:`contributing-guidelines` below for configuring your fork correctly.

Contribution flow

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

Starting from an existing Kallithea clone, make sure it is up to date with the

latest upstream changes::

        hg pull

        hg update

Review the :ref:`contributing-guidelines` and :ref:`coding-guidelines`.

If you are new to Mercurial, refer to Mercurial `Quick Start`_ and `Beginners

Guide`_ on the Mercurial wiki.

Now, make some changes and test them (see :ref:`contributing-tests`). Don't

forget to add new tests to cover new functionality or bug fixes.

For documentation changes, run ``make html`` from the ``docs`` directory to

generate the HTML result, then review them in your browser.

Before submitting any changes, run the cleanup script::

        ./scripts/run-all-cleanup

When you are completely ready, you can send your changes to the community for

review and inclusion. Most commonly used methods are sending patches to the

mailing list (via ``hg email``) or by creating a pull request on Bitbucket_.

.. _contributing-tests:

Running tests

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

After finishing your changes make sure all tests pass cleanly. Run the testsuite

by invoking ``py.test`` from the project root::

    py.test

Note that on unix systems, the temporary directory (``/tmp`` or where

``$TMPDIR`` points) must allow executable files; Git hooks must be executable,

and the test suite creates repositories in the temporary directory. Linux

systems with /tmp mounted noexec will thus fail.

When running tests, Kallithea generates a `test.ini` based on template values

in `kallithea/tests/conftest.py` and populates the SQLite database specified

there.

It is possible to avoid recreating the full test database on each invocation of

the tests, thus eliminating the initial delay. To achieve this, run the tests as::

    gearbox serve -c /tmp/kallithea-test-XXX/test.ini --pid-file=test.pid --daemon

    KALLITHEA_WHOOSH_TEST_DISABLE=1 KALLITHEA_NO_TMP_PATH=1 py.test

    kill -9 $(cat test.pid)

In these commands, the following variables are used::

    KALLITHEA_WHOOSH_TEST_DISABLE=1 - skip whoosh index building and tests

    KALLITHEA_NO_TMP_PATH=1 - disable new temp path for tests, used mostly for testing_vcs_operations

You can run individual tests by specifying their path as argument to py.test.

py.test also has many more options, see `py.test -h`. Some useful options

are::

    -k EXPRESSION         only run tests which match the given substring

                          expression. An expression is a python evaluable

                          expression where all names are substring-matched

                          against test names and their parent classes. Example:

    -x, --exitfirst       exit instantly on first error or failed test.

    --lf                  rerun only the tests that failed at the last run (or

                          all if none failed)

    --ff                  run all tests but run the last failures first. This

                          may re-order tests and thus lead to repeated fixture

                          setup/teardown

    --pdb                 start the interactive Python debugger on errors.

    -s, --capture=no      don't capture stdout (any stdout output will be

                          printed immediately)

Performance tests

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

A number of performance tests are present in the test suite, but they are

not run in a standard test run. These tests are useful to

evaluate the impact of certain code changes with respect to performance.

To run these tests::

    env TEST_PERFORMANCE=1 py.test kallithea/tests/performance

To analyze performance, you could install pytest-profiling_, which enables the

--profile and --profile-svg options to py.test.

Kallithea is GPLv3 and we assume all contributions are made by the

committer/contributor and under GPLv3 unless explicitly stated. We do care a

lot about preservation of copyright and license information for existing code

that is brought into the project.

Contributions will be accepted in most formats -- such as pull requests on

Bitbucket, something hosted on your own Kallithea instance, or patches sent by

email to the `kallithea-general`_ mailing list.

When contributing via Bitbucket, please make your fork of

https://bitbucket.org/conservancy/kallithea/ `non-publishing`_ -- it is one of

the settings on "Repository details" page. This ensures your commits are in

"draft" phase and makes it easier for you to address feedback and for project

maintainers to integrate your changes.

.. _non-publishing: https://www.mercurial-scm.org/wiki/Phases#Publishing_Repository

Make sure to test your changes both manually and with the automatic tests

before posting.

We care about quality and review and keeping a clean repository history. We

might give feedback that requests polishing contributions until they are

"perfect". We might also rebase and collapse and make minor adjustments to your

changes when we apply them.

We try to make sure we have consensus on the direction the project is taking.

Everything non-sensitive should be discussed in public -- preferably on the

mailing list.  We aim at having all non-trivial changes reviewed by at least

one other core developer before pushing. Obvious non-controversial changes will

be handled more casually.

There is a main development branch ("default") which is generally stable so that

it can be (and is) used in production. There is also a "stable" branch that is

almost exclusively reserved for bug fixes or trivial changes. Experimental

changes should live elsewhere (for example in a pull request) until they are

ready.

.. _coding-guidelines:

Coding guidelines

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

We don't have a formal coding/formatting standard. We are currently using a mix

of Mercurial's (https://www.mercurial-scm.org/wiki/CodingStyle), pep8, and

consistency with existing code. Run ``scripts/run-all-cleanup`` before

committing to ensure some basic code formatting consistency.

We try to support the most common modern web browsers. IE9 is still supported

to the extent it is feasible, IE8 is not.

We primarily support Linux and OS X on the server side but Windows should also work.

HTML templates should use 2 spaces for indentation ... but be pragmatic. We

should use templates cleverly and avoid duplication. We should use reasonable

semantic markup with element classes and IDs that can be used for styling and testing.

We should only use inline styles in places where it really is semantic (such as

``display: none``).

JavaScript must use ``;`` between/after statements. Indentation 4 spaces. Inline

multiline functions should be indented two levels -- one for the ``()`` and one for

``{}``.

Variables holding jQuery objects should be named with a leading ``$``.

Commit messages should have a leading short line summarizing the changes. For

bug fixes, put ``(Issue #123)`` at the end of this line.

Use American English grammar and spelling overall. Use `English title case`_ for

page titles, button labels, headers, and 'labels' for fields in forms.

.. _English title case: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capitalization#Title_case

Template helpers (that is, everything in ``kallithea.lib.helpers``)

should only be referenced from templates. If you need to call a

helper from the Python code, consider moving the function somewhere

else (e.g. to the model).

Notes on the SQLAlchemy session

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

Each HTTP request runs inside an independent SQLAlchemy session (as well

as in an independent database transaction). ``Session`` is the session manager

and factory. ``Session()`` will create a new session on-demand or return the

current session for the active thread. Many database operations are methods on

such session instances - only ``Session.remove()`` should be called directly on

the manager.

Database model objects

(almost) always belong to a particular SQLAlchemy session, which means

that SQLAlchemy will ensure that they're kept in sync with the database

(but also means that they cannot be shared across requests).

Objects can be added to the session using ``Session().add``, but this is

rarely needed:

.. _installation:

==========================

Installation on Unix/Linux

==========================

The following describes three different ways of installing Kallithea:

- :ref:`installation-source`: The simplest way to keep the installation

  up-to-date and track any local customizations is to run directly from

  source in a Kallithea repository clone, preferably inside a virtualenv

  virtual Python environment.

- :ref:`installation-virtualenv`: If you prefer to only use released versions

  of Kallithea, the recommended method is to install Kallithea in a virtual

  Python environment using `virtualenv`. The advantages of this method over

  direct installation is that Kallithea and its dependencies are completely

  contained inside the virtualenv (which also means you can have multiple

  installations side by side or remove it entirely by just removing the

  virtualenv directory) and does not require root privileges.

- :ref:`installation-without-virtualenv`: The alternative method of installing

  a Kallithea release is using standard pip. The package will be installed in

  the same location as all other Python packages you have ever installed. As a

  result, removing it is not as straightforward as with a virtualenv, as you'd

  have to remove its dependencies manually and make sure that they are not

  needed by other packages.

Regardless of the installation method you may need to make sure you have

appropriate development packages installed, as installation of some of the

Kallithea dependencies requires a working C compiler and libffi library

headers. Depending on your configuration, you may also need to install

Git and development packages for the database of your choice.

For Debian and Ubuntu, the following command will ensure that a reasonable

set of dependencies is installed::

For Fedora and RHEL-derivatives, the following command will ensure that a

reasonable set of dependencies is installed::

.. _installation-source:

Installation from repository source

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

To install Kallithea in a virtualenv using the stable branch of the development

repository, follow the instructions below::

        hg clone https://kallithea-scm.org/repos/kallithea -u stable

        cd kallithea

        python3 -m venv ../kallithea-venv

        . ../kallithea-venv/bin/activate

        pip install --upgrade pip setuptools

        pip install --upgrade -e .

You can now proceed to :ref:`setup`.

.. _installation-virtualenv:

Installing a released version in a virtualenv

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

It is highly recommended to use a separate virtualenv for installing Kallithea.

This way, all libraries required by Kallithea will be installed separately from your

main Python installation and other applications and things will be less

problematic when upgrading the system or Kallithea.

An additional benefit of virtualenv is that it doesn't require root privileges.

- Assuming you have installed virtualenv, create a new virtual environment

  for example, in `/srv/kallithea/venv`, using the venv command::

    python3 -m venv /srv/kallithea/venv

- Activate the virtualenv in your current shell session and make sure the

  basic requirements are up-to-date by running::

    . /srv/kallithea/venv/bin/activate

    pip install --upgrade pip setuptools

.. note:: You can't use UNIX ``sudo`` to source the ``virtualenv`` script; it

   will "activate" a shell that terminates immediately. It is also perfectly

   acceptable (and desirable) to create a virtualenv as a normal user.

- Make a folder for Kallithea data files, and configuration somewhere on the

  filesystem. For example::

    mkdir /srv/kallithea

- Go into the created directory and run this command to install Kallithea::

    pip install --upgrade kallithea

.. note:: Some dependencies are optional. If you need them, install them in

   the virtualenv too::

     pip install --upgrade kallithea python-ldap python-pam psycopg2

   This might require installation of development packages using your

   distribution's package manager.

  Alternatively, download a .tar.gz from http://pypi.python.org/pypi/Kallithea,

.. _installation_iis:

=====================================================================

Installing Kallithea on Microsoft Internet Information Services (IIS)

=====================================================================

The following is documented using IIS 7/8 terminology. There should be nothing

preventing you from applying this on IIS 6 well.

.. note::

    Installing Kallithea under IIS can enable Single Sign-On to the Kallithea

    web interface from web browsers that can authenticate to the web server.

    (As an alternative to IIS, SSO is also possible with for example Apache and

    mod_sspi.)

    Mercurial and Git do however by default not support SSO on the client side

    and will still require some other kind of authentication.

    (An extension like hgssoauthentication_ might solve that.)

.. note::

    For the best security, it is strongly recommended to only host the site over

    a secure connection, e.g. using TLS.

Prerequisites

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

Apart from the normal requirements for Kallithea, it is also necessary to get an

ISAPI-WSGI bridge module, e.g. isapi-wsgi.

Installation

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

The following assumes that your Kallithea is at ``c:\inetpub\kallithea``, and

will be served from the root of its own website. The changes to serve it in its

own virtual folder will be noted where appropriate.

Application pool

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

Make sure that there is a unique application pool for the Kallithea application

with an identity that has read access to the Kallithea distribution.

The application pool does not need to be able to run any managed code. If you

are using a 32-bit Python installation, then you must enable 32-bit program in

the advanced settings for the application pool; otherwise Python will not be able

to run on the website and neither will Kallithea.

.. note::

    The application pool can be the same as an existing application pool,

    as long as the Kallithea requirements are met by the existing pool.

ISAPI handler

^^^^^^^^^^^^^

The ISAPI handler can be generated using::

    kallithea-cli iis-install -c my.ini --virtualdir=/

This will generate a ``dispatch.py`` file in the current directory that contains

the necessary components to finalize an installation into IIS. Once this file

has been generated, it is necessary to run the following command due to the way

that ISAPI-WSGI is made::

This accomplishes two things: generating an ISAPI compliant DLL file,

``_dispatch.dll``, and installing a script map handler into IIS for the

``--virtualdir`` specified above pointing to ``_dispatch.dll``.

The ISAPI handler is registered to all file extensions, so it will automatically

be the one handling all requests to the specified virtual directory. When the website starts

the ISAPI handler, it will start a thread pool managed wrapper around the

middleware WSGI handler that Kallithea runs within and each HTTP request to the

site will be processed through this logic henceforth.

Authentication with Kallithea using IIS authentication modules

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

The recommended way to handle authentication with Kallithea using IIS is to let

IIS handle all the authentication and just pass it to Kallithea.

.. note::

    As an alternative without SSO, you can also use LDAP authentication with

    Active Directory, see :ref:`ldap-setup`.

To move responsibility into IIS from Kallithea, we need to configure Kallithea

to let external systems handle authentication and then let Kallithea create the

user automatically. To do this, access the administration's authentication page

and enable the ``kallithea.lib.auth_modules.auth_container`` plugin. Once it is

added, enable it with the ``REMOTE_USER`` header and check *Clean username*.

Finally, save the changes on this page.

Switch to the administration's permissions page and disable anonymous access,

otherwise Kallithea will not attempt to use the authenticated user name. By

default, Kallithea will populate the list of users lazily as they log in. Either

disable external auth account activation and ensure that you pre-populate the

user database with an external tool, or set it to *Automatic activation of

external account*. Finally, save the changes.

The last necessary step is to enable the relevant authentication in IIS, e.g.

Windows authentication.

Troubleshooting

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

Typically, any issues in this setup will either be entirely in IIS or entirely

in Kallithea (or Kallithea's WSGI middleware). Consequently, two

different options for finding issues exist: IIS' failed request tracking which

is great at finding issues until they exist inside Kallithea, at which point the

ISAPI-WSGI wrapper above uses ``win32traceutil``, which is part of ``pywin32``.

In order to dump output from WSGI using ``win32traceutil`` it is sufficient to

type the following in a console window::

and any exceptions occurring in the WSGI layer and below (i.e. in the Kallithea

application itself) that are uncaught, will be printed here complete with stack

traces, making it a lot easier to identify issues.

.. _hgssoauthentication: https://bitbucket.org/domruf/hgssoauthentication

.. _installation_win:

====================================================

Installation on Windows (7/Server 2008 R2 and newer)

====================================================

First time install

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

Target OS: Windows 7 and newer or Windows Server 2008 R2 and newer

Tested on Windows 8.1, Windows Server 2008 R2 and Windows Server 2012

To install on an older version of Windows, see `<installation_win_old.html>`_

Step 1 -- Install Python

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

- Choose and click on the version

- Click on "Windows X86-64 Installer" for x64 or "Windows x86 MSI installer" for Win32.

- Disable UAC or run the installer with admin privileges. If you chose to disable UAC, do not forget to reboot afterwards.

Remember the specific major and minor versions installed, because they will

Step 2 -- Python BIN

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

Add Python BIN folder to the path. This can be done manually (editing

"PATH" environment variable) or by using Windows Support Tools that

come pre-installed in Windows Vista/7 and later.

Open a CMD and type::

  SETX PATH "%PATH%;[your-python-path]" /M

Please substitute [your-python-path] with your Python installation

Step 3 -- Install pywin32 extensions

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

Download pywin32 from:

http://sourceforge.net/projects/pywin32/files/

- Click on "pywin32" folder

- Click on the first folder (in this case, Build 219, maybe newer when you try)

  for Win32) where x is the minor version of Python you installed.

  When writing this guide, the file was:

  (x64)

  (Win32)

Step 5 -- Kallithea folder structure

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

Create a Kallithea folder structure.

This is only an example to install Kallithea. Of course, you can

change it. However, this guide will follow the proposed structure, so

please later adapt the paths if you change them. Folders without

spaces are recommended.

Create the following folder structure::

  C:\Kallithea

  C:\Kallithea\Bin

  C:\Kallithea\Env

  C:\Kallithea\Repos

Step 6 -- Install virtualenv

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

.. note::

   A python virtual environment will allow for isolation between the Python packages of your system and those used for Kallithea.

   It is strongly recommended to use it to ensure that Kallithea does not change a dependency that other software uses or vice versa.

To create a virtual environment, run::

  python3 -m venv C:\Kallithea\Env

Step 7 -- Install Kallithea

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

In order to install Kallithea, you need to be able to run "pip install kallithea". It will use pip to install the Kallithea Python package and its dependencies.

Some Python packages use managed code and need to be compiled.

.. note::

  You can also install the dependencies using already compiled Windows binaries packages. A good source of compiled Python packages is http://www.lfd.uci.edu/~gohlke/pythonlibs/. However, not all of the necessary packages for Kallithea are on this site and some are hard to find, so we will stick with using the compiler.

In a command prompt type (adapting paths if necessary)::

  cd C:\Kallithea\Env\Scripts

  activate

  pip install --upgrade pip setuptools

The prompt will change into "(Env) C:\\Kallithea\\Env\\Scripts" or similar

(depending of your folder structure). Then type::

  pip install kallithea

.. note:: This will take some time. Please wait patiently until it is fully

          complete. Some warnings will appear. Don't worry, they are

          normal.

Step 8 -- Install Git (optional)

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

Mercurial being a python package, was installed automatically when doing ``pip install kallithea``.

You need to install Git manually if you want Kallithea to be able to host Git repositories.

See http://git-scm.com/book/en/v2/Getting-Started-Installing-Git#Installing-on-Windows for instructions.

The location of the Git binaries (like ``c:\path\to\git\bin``) must be

added to the ``PATH`` environment variable so ``git.exe`` and other tools like

``gzip.exe`` are available.

Step 9 -- Configuring Kallithea

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

Steps taken from `<setup.html>`_

You have to use the same command prompt as in Step 7, so if you closed

it, reopen it following the same commands (including the "activate"

one). When ready, type::

  cd C:\Kallithea\Bin

  kallithea-cli config-create my.ini

Then you must edit my.ini to fit your needs (IP address, IP

port, mail settings, database, etc.). `NotePad++`__ or a similar text

editor is recommended to properly handle the newline character

differences between Unix and Windows.

__ http://notepad-plus-plus.org/

.. _installation_win_old:

==========================================================

Installation on Windows (XP/Vista/Server 2003/Server 2008)

==========================================================

First-time install

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

Target OS: Windows XP SP3 32-bit English (Clean installation)

+ All Windows Updates until 24-may-2012

.. note::

   This installation is for 32-bit systems, for 64-bit Windows you might need

   to download proper 64-bit versions of the different packages (Windows Installer, Win32py extensions)

   plus some extra tweaks.

   These extra steps haven been marked as "64-bit".

   Tested on Windows Server 2008 R2 SP1, 9-feb-2013.

   If you run into any 64-bit related problems, please check these pages:

   - http://blog.victorjabur.com/2011/06/05/compiling-python-2-7-modules-on-windows-32-and-64-using-msvc-2008-express/

   - http://bugs.python.org/issue7511

Step 1 -- Install Visual Studio 2008 Express

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

Optional: You can also install MinGW, but VS2008 installation is easier.

Download "Visual C++ 2008 Express Edition with SP1" from:

http://download.microsoft.com/download/E/8/E/E8EEB394-7F42-4963-A2D8-29559B738298/VS2008ExpressWithSP1ENUX1504728.iso

(if not found or relocated, google for "visual studio 2008 express" for updated link. This link was taken from http://stackoverflow.com/questions/15318560/visual-c-2008-express-download-link-dead)