# NSPR

```{warning}
NSPR is a legacy library. We do not recommend using it in new projects.
It is maintained primarily for existing Mozilla code that still depends
on it; modern platform and standard-library facilities should be
preferred instead.
```

**Netscape Portable Runtime (NSPR)** provides a platform-neutral API for
system level and libc-like functions. The API is used in the Mozilla
clients, many of Red Hat's and Oracle's server applications, and other
software offerings.

## Documentation

{ref}`About NSPR`

: This topic describes, in general terms, the goals of NSPR and a bit
  about how it does it.

{ref}`NSPR API Reference`

: The reference describes each API public macro, structure and function
  in the NSPR API.

{ref}`NSPR build instructions`

: How to checkout and build from source.

{ref}`NSPR release procedure`

: How to cut a new NSPR release: bumping the version and producing the
  distributions.

{ref}`NSPR listing`

: All NSPR pages

(getting-nspr)=

## Getting NSPR

NSPR is available in various source and binary packages, depending on
your platform:

- **Windows:** Build the source package, using the {ref}`NSPR build
  instructions`.

- **Mac:** Install the [MacPorts](http://www.macports.org/) *nspr*
  package, or the [Homebrew](http://brew.sh) *nspr* package.

- **Ubuntu:** Install the *libnspr4-dev* package via `apt-get.`

- **Debian:** Install the *libnspr4-dev* package via `apt-get`.

- **openSUSE Linux:** Install one or more of the following via `yast`
  or `zypper` :

  - *mozilla-nspr* : Binary libraries for your platform
  - *mozilla-nspr-32bit* : Binary libraries needed to run 32-bit
    programs on a 64-bit OS
  - *mozilla-nspr-devel* : Files needed (in addition to the above
    libraries) to compile programs using NSPR
  - *mozilla-nspr-debuginfo* : Debug information (including build
    symbols) for package *mozilla-nspr*
  - *mozilla-nspr-debuginfo-32bit* : Debug information (including
    build symbols) for package *mozilla-nspr-32bit*
  - *mozilla-nspr-debugsource* : Debug sources for all of the above

## Community

View Mozilla forums:

- [Mailing list](https://lists.mozilla.org/listinfo/dev-tech-nspr)
- [Newsgroup](http://groups.google.com/group/mozilla.dev.tech.nspr)
- [RSS
  feed](http://groups.google.com/group/mozilla.dev.tech.nspr/feeds)

(related-topics)=

## Related Topics

- {ref}`Networking`, {ref}`Network Security Services (NSS)`