Depending on your needs, the amount and type of additional basic software (excluding m4nfo modules) will vary. This page outlines basic software needed for
To simply run m4nfo and to generate nfo code, all you need is the GNU M4 macro processor and the grf-compiling tool grfcodec, available for almost all operating systems.
M4 can be downloaded from
Precompiled versions for Windows and Macintosh are available from
In addition, to compile the resulting nfo code into a newGRF, you need grfcodec which can be downloaded from
That package also contains renum, a syntax checker for nfo code which is not needed, but might come in handy in case of bug hunting.
For larger projects, an advanced installation, providing an integrated development environment, would be very helpful. Such an installation would primarily include the GNU make utility to keep track of user files, as well as a graphics conversion utility, like irfanview, to enable usage of other graphics file formats than PCX and PNG, and a good editor, supporting syntax-highlighting as well as the ability to run external programs and manage their output.
Only in this way you will be able to master large newGRF projects. But this will be very easy then, by producing newGRFs by just one mouse click!
In addition to the software above, following programs would be needed:
Dependency-tracking build utility make
Precompiled versions for Windows and Macintosh can be downloaded from
A graphics conversion utility, e.g. irfanview
A good code editor, e.g. PSPad for Windows, or BBEdit (or TextWrangler) for OS X:
For this to work, you will need the newGRF linker program linkgrf, see the download page.