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A Brief Introduction to our Source Repository Layout

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  • src all files that have to be built
    • add-ons everything you'll find in /boot/system/add-ons/ including all kernel drivers, media codecs, and Translators etc.
    • apps the GUI applications that are not preferences apps
    • bin command line applications such as the GNU tools
    • build files to allow using the Haiku build-tools on non-BeOS compatible platforms
    • data data files of any kind like the MIME type database or keymap files
    • kits the public API of Haiku that is organized in kits - except the "kernel kit" which is part of libroot.so
    • libs static and shared libraries that are used by Haiku applications
    • preferences the preferences applications
    • servers
    • system most of the files you'll find in the /boot/system directory - they make up the core of Haiku without the public userlevel API besides everything what is in libroot.so
      • boot The boot loader with all supported platforms
      • glue The glue code that makes shared libraries execute their global constructors/destructors, and executables call main().
      • kernel The kernel and all of its core services and supported architectures
      • ldscripts linker scripts for building various parts of Haiku
      • libroot Everything that is exported by libroot.so which is the POSIX API and the kernel kit
      • runtime_loader the userland ELF loader that loads and starts executables
    • tests this more or less mirrors the tree itself, and contains test applications for the various subsystems (like an app_server that runs as a window under BeOS), some of them are to be used in a C++ unit test suite.
    • tools Tools that are either needed to build Haiku or are in other ways useful even when not running under Haiku
  • headers all shared private and public headers
    • build
    • compatibility header files that increase the compatibility of Haiku to other systems; currently, you'll find some headers that allow compilation of some BSD tools (for libbsd.so).
    • cpp
    • glibc
    • gnu
    • legacy non-POSIX headers that are still needed by some ancient or not so well maintained tools
    • libs
    • os the public headers that define the Haiku API
    • posix the POSIX API as supported by Haiku
    • private private headers that are shared throughout Haiku components
    • tools

Now that the basic idea should be clear, let me point out some inconsistencies in the current layout that haven't been resolved yet:

  • Top-level "docs" contains doxygen source files that will have to be built; the whole directory layout there is a bit untidy, anyway.
  • Some of the tools in "src/tools" will also be part of a Haiku installation, and also, some of the binaries in "src/bin" are needed to build Haiku (such as mimeset)
  • "src/system/ldscripts" don't really belong where they are; they should be in "build".