| NOTE SeqAn3 is out and hosted in a different repository |
|---|
| We recommend using SeqAn3 for new applications. |
SeqAn is an open source C++ library of efficient algorithms and data structures for the analysis of sequences with the focus on biological data. Our library applies a unique generic design that guarantees high performance, generality, extensibility, and integration with other libraries. SeqAn is easy to use and simplifies the development of new software tools with a minimal loss of performance.
The SeqAn library itself, the tests and demos are licensed under the very permissive 3-clause BSD License. The licenses for the applications themselves can be found in the LICENSE files.
Older compiler versions might work but are neither supported nor tested.
- GCC ≥ 13
- Clang/LLVM ≥ 18
- Intel oneAPI C++ Compiler 2025.0 (IntelLLVM)
- Visual C++ ≥ 17.0 / Visual Studio ≥ 2022
- Intel/AMD platforms, including optimisations for modern instruction sets (
POPCNT,SSE4,AVX2,AVX512) - All Debian release architectures supported, including most ARM and all PowerPC platforms.
- To build tests, demos, and official SeqAn applications you also need CMake ≥ 3.12.
Some official applications might have additional requirements or only work on a subset of platforms.
To build an application from the apps directory, you can pass -DSEQAN_BUILD_SYSTEM=APP:<APPNAME> to CMake.
<APPNAME> is the name of one of the subdirectories in the apps directory.
In the examples below, we build the mason2 application.
# To clone a specific release, replace `main` with the desired tag, e.g., `seqan-v2.5.1`.
git clone --depth 1 --branch main https://github.com/seqan/seqan.git
cd seqan
mkdir -p build
cmake -S . -B build -DCMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=Release -DSEQAN_BUILD_SYSTEM=APP:mason2
cmake --build build --parallel
ls build/bin # Binaries are available in the `build/bin` directory.