Step-by-Step: Building MIOpen and hipDNN with Ninja

 

Step-by-Step: Building MIOpen and hipDNN with Ninja

Step 1: Navigate to the monorepo

git clone https://github.com/ROCm/rocm-libraries.git

>cd rocm-libraries

Step 2: Create a build directory

mkdir -p build_miopen_hipdnn

cd build_miopen_hipdnn

Step 3: Configure with CMake using Ninja

cmake -GNinja -B . -S .. \

  -DCMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=Release \

  -DCMAKE_INSTALL_PREFIX=/opt/rocm \

  -DCMAKE_PREFIX_PATH=/opt/rocm \

  -DROCM_LIBS_ENABLE_COMPONENTS="miopen;hipdnn"

What this does:

• -GNinja - Use Ninja build system (faster than Make)

• -DCMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=Release - Optimized build

• -DCMAKE_INSTALL_PREFIX=/opt/rocm - Install location

• -DCMAKE_PREFIX_PATH=/opt/rocm - Where to find ROCm dependencies

• -DROCM_LIBS_ENABLE_COMPONENTS="miopen;hipdnn" - Build only these two projects + their dependencies

Step 4: Build both projects

ninja -j$(nproc)

Or if you want to limit parallel jobs (e.g., for memory constraints):

ninja -j8

Step 5: Run tests (optional)

# Test everything

ninja check

# Or test specific components

ninja test

Step 6: Install (optional)

sudo ninja install

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Alternative: Build with specific options

If you need more control, you can add these flags:

cmake -GNinja -B . -S .. \

  -DCMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=Release \

  -DCMAKE_INSTALL_PREFIX=/opt/rocm \

  -DCMAKE_PREFIX_PATH=/opt/rocm \

  -DROCM_LIBS_ENABLE_COMPONENTS="miopen;hipdnn" \

  -DBUILD_DEV=ON \

  -DCMAKE_CXX_COMPILER=/opt/rocm/bin/hipcc \

  -DMIOPEN_BACKEND=HIP

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Useful Ninja Commands

# Build only MIOpen

ninja miopen

# Build only hipDNN

ninja hipdnn

# Clean build

ninja clean

# Verbose output (see actual commands)

ninja -v

# Dry run (show what would be built)

ninja -n

# Build specific target

ninja MIOpenDriver

---

Expected Build Time

• Configuration (CMake): ~30 seconds to 2 minutes

• MIOpen build: ~20-40 minutes (first time)

• hipDNN build: ~5-10 minutes

• Total: ~30-50 minutes on MI250X system

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What Gets Built

After successful build, you'll have:

build_miopen_hipdnn/

├── projects/

│   ├── miopen/

│   │   ├── lib/libMIOpen.so

│   │   ├── bin/MIOpenDriver

│   │   └── test/

│   └── hipdnn/

│       ├── backend/src/libhipdnn.so

│       ├── frontend/

│       ├── plugins/

│       └── tests/

---

If You Encounter Issues

1. Missing dependencies error:
      # The superbuild should handle this, but if needed:

      cmake -DROCM_LIBS_ENABLE_COMPONENTS="rocblas;hipblas;composablekernel;miopen;hipdnn" ...

2. Out of memory during build:
      ninja -j4  # Reduce parallel jobs

3. See what would be built:
      ninja -n | grep -E "(miopen|hipdnn)"