From BlenderWiki

Building Blender

Deciding which platform to build on

If you are an experienced developer, you probably already have your preferred compiler, build system, and development environment, and can likely skim most of this section. This page is geared towards the more novice developer with very little experience setting up a complicated project for building.

Many of the tools used in Blender are cross platform, meaning they will work equally well on Linux, Mac, or Windows. Some of your choices will be limited based on your operating system. And even more of your choices will be made on personal experience.

Build Systems

A "build system" is simply a way to take a large, complex project such as Blender, and set it up in a way to ensure that all of the dependencies are met. It may also organize the source code in such a way as to make it easier for a developer to navigate through the multiple projects.

Blender is set up to use either CMake or Scons. The decision on which to use will largely be based on personal preference, as there are a lot of developers using both systems and finding support for your specific issues should not be difficult.

Integrated Development Environment

There are some choices here that are limited by the operating system you use. For example, XCode is only available for Macintosh computers. Likewise, Microsoft Visual Studio will only work on Windows platforms. Here again, if you have experience with a particular IDE, or are trying to become familiar with a particular development environment, your choice will like be driven by that. If you are not sure about which environment to use, it is recommended to use a more popular IDE so that you'll be able to find help for any issues you have with your particular environment.

Currently, the most popular are Microsoft Visual Studio, XCode, and QTCreator. Microsoft Visual Studio Express is free with registration, whereas Microsoft Visual Studio Professional costs money. XCode, Eclipse, KDevelop, QTCreator, and many, many others are all free as well.

	College Students developing on Windows
	If you are currently a student at a participating university, you can download MSVS Professional, as well as many other Microsoft applications, for free through Microsoft DreamSpark.