Compiling PHP Source on Ubuntu 14.04: Common Errors and Solutions

This article documents the process of compiling PHP from source on an Ubuntu 14.04 server that already has a LAMP development environment installed. It starts by ensuring required tools are present, then clones the PHP repository, configures a minimal build, and runs the compilation.

Prerequisites

Install Git:

<code>sudo apt-get install git -y</code>

Clone the source and install build tools:

<code>git clone https://github.com/php/php-src.git
cd php-src
sudo apt-get install build-essential
./buildconf
./configure --disable-all   # minimal PHP for testing
make
./sapi/cli/php -v   # -v shows version if build succeeded</code>

Common compilation errors and their solutions

Missing libxml2

<code>configure: error: xml2-config not found. Please check your libxml2 installation.</code>

Solution:

<code>apt-get install libxml2-dev</code>

Missing MySQL client libraries

<code>/usr/bin/mysql_config: No such file or directory</code>

Solution:

<code>apt-get install mysql-server mysql-client libmysqlclient-dev</code>

PEAR compatibility warnings

<code>Warning: Declaration of PEAR_Installer::download() should be compatible with &amp; PEAR_Downloader::download($params) ...</code>

These are warnings; they can be ignored or resolved by updating PEAR packages.

Missing OpenSSL headers

<code>configure: error: Cannot find OpenSSL's</code>

Solution:

<code>apt-get install libssl-dev</code>

Missing BZip2

<code>checking for BZip2 in default path… not found
configure: error: Please reinstall the BZip2 distribution</code>

Solution:

<code>apt-get install libbz2-dev</code>

Missing libcurl headers

<code>configure: error: Please reinstall the libcurl distribution – easy.h should be in /include/curl/</code>

Solution:

<code>apt-get install libcurl4-openssl-dev</code>

Missing JPEG library

<code>configure: error: jpeglib.h not found.</code>

Solution:

<code>apt-get install libjpeg-dev</code>

Missing PNG library

<code>configure: error: png.h not found.</code>

Solution:

<code>apt-get install libpng12-dev</code>

Missing FreeType

<code>configure: error: freetype-config not found.</code>

Solution:

<code>apt-get install libfreetype6-dev</code>

Missing mcrypt

<code>configure: error: mcrypt.h not found. Please reinstall libmcrypt.</code>

Solution:

<code>apt-get install libmcrypt-dev</code>

Missing pspell

<code>configure: error: Cannot find pspell</code>

Solution:

<code>apt-get install libpspell-dev</code>

Missing PEAR PHP_Archive

<code>PEAR package PHP_Archive not installed: generated phar will require PHP's phar extension be enabled.</code>

Solution:

<code>pear install pear/PHP_Archive</code>

Missing recode.h

<code>configure: error: Can not find recode.h anywhere under /usr /usr/local /usr /opt.</code>

Solution:

<code>apt-get install librecode-dev</code>

After addressing each missing dependency, re‑run ./configure and make until the build completes successfully.