Build Vim with lua on Debian 7.8

Question

I'm trying to build it myself since the version in debian apt-get is too old for a plugin I need, and this plugin needs lua.

I did apt-get install libtolua-dev

And am runnning the command

./configure --with-features=huge \
        --enable-rubyinterp \
        --enable-pythoninterp \
        --with-python-config-dir=/usr/lib/python2.7/config \
        --enable-perlinterp \
        --enable-gui=gtk2 --enable-cscope --prefix=/usr \
        --enable-luainterp \

When I run this command, at some point the program will say checking Lua version... (cached) 5.0.3 when I actually have version 5.2 installed. When I run the configure I get:

checking for lua... (cached) /usr/bin/lua
checking if lua.h can be found in /usr/include... no
checking if lua.h can be found in /usr/include/lua5.0.3... no

So I tried to copy all the files from /usr/include/lua5.2 to a new directory /usr/include/lua5.0.3 Then I'll get

checking if lua.h can be found in /usr/include... no
checking if lua.h can be found in /usr/include/lua5.0.3... yes
checking if link with -L/usr/lib -llua5.0.3 is sane... no

I don't understand how to make it use lua 5.2.

That copying was a mistake. You should never mess around in /usr like that. You will only succeed in confusing and/or breaking your system. — Etan Reisner
What version of vim does the plugin need? What version of vim is available from packages? Does vim support lua 5.2? — Etan Reisner
The plugin needs 7.3.885 or later with lua support (it's neocomplete) With apt get I get version 7.3.547-7 I don't know how to find if Vim supports lua 5.2 — Percee

S0bek S0bek · Accepted Answer · 2016-10-09T14:33:33

For those who are interested by a manner that worked for me to build vim with lua support and a solid basis to setup spf13 with full Neocomplete support here are the steps followed to do it:

Download the vim sources from git:

git clone https://github.com/vim/vim.git

Setup dependancies (on ArchLinux, adapt according to your distribution):
```
pacman -Suy ruby perl python2 python lua luajit
```

Link luajit headers for the compilation:

cd /usr/local/include
sudo ln -sv /usr/include/luajit-2.0/lua.h
sudo ln -sv /usr/include/luajit-2.0/luaconf.h
sudo ln -sv /usr/include/luajit-2.0/lualib.h
sudo ln -sv /usr/include/luajit-2.0/lauxlib.h

Run the following commands to build vim (include lua support as desired):

./configure --with-features=huge --enable-multibyte --enable-rubyinterp --enable-pythoninterp --with-python-config-dir=/usr/lib/python2.7/config --enable-gui=no --without-x enable-cscope --enable-multibyte --enable-fontset --enable-largefile --enable-cscope --enable-perlinterp --enable-luainterp --enable-fail-if-missing --with-lua-prefix=/usr/local/  --with-luajit --prefix=/usr

Compile:

make VIMRUNTIMEDIR=/usr/share/vim/vim80

Install Vim:
```
sudo make install
```
Use vim --version command to verify lua support (+lua):
```
vim --version
```

And that's it!

Build Vim with lua on Debian 7.8

2 Answers