Libxc

Libxc is a library of exchange-correlation functionals for density-functional theory. The aim is to provide a portable, well tested and reliable set of exchange and correlation functionals that can be used by a variety of programs.

For more information, please check the manual at http://www.tddft.org/programs/Libxc

INSTALLATION

Autotools

The recommended way to install the library is by using GNU Autotools.

To install the library, just use the standard procedure:

./configure --prefix=PATH/TO/LIBXC
make
make check
make install

If you're not using a stable release tarball, you'll first need to generate configure with autoreconf -i.

CMake

Support for CMake has also been recently contributed by Lori Burns.

The CMake file has the following caveats

• tested on Linux and Mac, static and shared lib, namespaced and non-namespaced headers, but really only to the extent that it works for Psi4
• all the fancy libtool options and Fortran interface not tested
• test suite executed after build via ctest. But it has always totally passed or totally failed, which doesn't inspire confidence
• The generated libxc_docs.txt is large, and the generation step sometimes balks on it, leading to xc_funcs.h not found errors. Just execute again.

Building with CMake

Use the following procedure:

cmake -H. -Bobjdir
cd objdir && make
make test
make install

The build is also responsive to

• static/shared toggle BUILD_SHARED_LIBS
• install location CMAKE_INSTALL_PREFIX
• namespacing of headers NAMESPACE_INSTALL_INCLUDEDIR
• of course, CMAKE_C_COMPILER, BUILD_TESTING, and CMAKE_C_FLAGS

See CMakeLists.txt for options details. All these build options should be passed as cmake -DOPTION.

Detecting with CMake

CMake builds install with LibxcConfig.cmake, LibxcConfigVersion.cmake, and LibxcTargets.cmake files suitable for use with CMake find_package() in CONFIG mode.

• find_package(Libxc) - find any xc libraries and headers
• find_package(Libxc 3.0.0 EXACT CONFIG REQUIRED COMPONENTS static) - find Libxc exactly version 3.0.0 built with static libraries or die trying

See cmake/LibxcConfig.cmake.in for details of how to detect the Config file and what CMake variables and targets are exported to your project.

Use with CMake

After find_package(Libxc ...),

• test if package found with if(${Libxc_FOUND}) or if(TARGET Libxc::xc)
• link to library (establishes dependency), including header and definitions configuration with target_link_libraries(mytarget Libxc::xc)
• include header files using target_include_directories(mytarget PRIVATE $<TARGET_PROPERTY:Libxc::xc,INTERFACE_INCLUDE_DIRECTORIES>)
• compile target applying -DUSING_Libxc definition using target_compile_definitions(mytarget PRIVATE $<TARGET_PROPERTY:Libxc::xc,INTERFACE_COMPILE_DEFINITIONS>)

FILE ORGANIZATION

The distribution is organized as follows

./cmake	CMake helper files
./build	pkgconfig and Fedora spec files
./m4	m4 scripts used by configure.ac, and libxc.m4 used by other projects linking to libxc
./maple	the Maple source code for the functionals
./scripts	various scripts for libxc development
./src	source files
./testsuite	regression tests

The most important contents of the src directory for users are

xc.h	main header file with all external definitions
xc_funcs.h	automatically generated file with the list of functionals

In addition, developers will be interested in the following

util.h	header file with internal definitions
*.f90 *.F90 xc_f.c string_f.h	Fortran 90 interface
*.f03 *.F03	Fortran 2003 interface
funcs_*.c	automatically generated files with the functional definitions
functionals.c	generic interface to simplify access to the different families
lda.c gga.c mgga.c	interface to the different families of functionals
special_functions.c	implementation of a series of special functions
hyb_gga_*.c	definition of the different hybrid GGA functionals
hyb_mgga_*.c	definition of the different hybrid meta-GGA functionals
lda_*.c	definition of the different LDA functionals
gga_*.c	definition of the different GGA functionals
mgga_*.c	definition of the different meta-GGA functionals
work_lda.c	code that simplifies the implementation of LDAs
work_gga_x.c	code that simplifies the implementation of exchange GGAs
work_gga_c.c	code that simplifies the implementation of some correlation GGAs
work_mgga_x.c	code that simplifies the implementation of exchange meta-GGAs
work_mgga_c.c	code that simplifies the implementation of some correlation meta-GGAs

Notes:

• Most functionals use the framework contained in a work_*.c file. This simplifies tremendously the implementation of the different functionals. The work_*.c are #include'd in the functional implementations through a preprocessor directive.
• Some files contain more than one functional, as similar functionals are usually grouped together. Therefore, the best way to find where a functional is implemented is by looking at its keyword in xc_funcs.h and using grep to find the correct file.
• The files where the functionals are defined are named as family_type_name.c, where: family - functional family (lda, gga, hyb_gga, or mgga) type - type of functional (x, c, xc, or k) name - name of the functional or class of functionals