diff --git a/.gitignore b/.gitignore
index 6955ad75bf..ef53118a33 100644
--- a/.gitignore
+++ b/.gitignore
@@ -90,6 +90,11 @@ drupal/sites/default/project
 ## translation system
 locale/*/*.flag
 
+## dependency builds and CI cache directories
+3rdParty/linux/
+3rdParty/mac/
+3rdParty/buildCache/
+
 .libs/
 svn_version.h
 
diff --git a/.travis.yml b/.travis.yml
index e50ef70d55..597fc8b4c2 100644
--- a/.travis.yml
+++ b/.travis.yml
@@ -21,7 +21,7 @@ sudo: false
 cache:
   apt: true
   directories:
-  - build/wxWidgets-3.0.2
+  - 3rdParty/buildCache
 
 addons:
   coverity_scan:
@@ -80,5 +80,5 @@ script:
 - if [[ "${BOINC_TYPE}" == "server" ]]; then ( ./configure --disable-client --disable-manager && make ) fi
 - if [[ "${BOINC_TYPE}" == "client" ]]; then ( ./configure --disable-server --disable-manager && make ) fi
 - if [[ "${BOINC_TYPE}" == "apps" ]]; then ( ./configure --enable-apps --disable-server --disable-client --disable-manager && make ) fi
-- if [[ "${BOINC_TYPE}" == "manager" ]]; then ( ./build/getWxWidgets.sh && ./configure --disable-server --disable-client --with-wxdir=./build/wxWidgets-3.0.2/buildgtk && make ) fi
 - if [[ "${BOINC_TYPE}" == "libs-mingw" ]]; then ( cd lib && CC=/usr/bin/x86_64-w64-mingw32-gcc; CXX=/usr/bin/x86_64-w64-mingw32-g++; make -f Makefile.mingw ) fi
+- if [[ "${BOINC_TYPE}" == "manager" ]]; then ( ./3rdParty/buildLinuxDependencies.sh && ./configure --disable-server --disable-client --with-wxdir=./3rdParty/buildCache/linux && make ) fi
diff --git a/3rdParty/README.md b/3rdParty/README.md
new file mode 100644
index 0000000000..5182e86841
--- /dev/null
+++ b/3rdParty/README.md
@@ -0,0 +1,12 @@
+# Purpose of 3rdParty
+
+This directory is used to download and build dependencies for BOINC components.
+Archives should be downloaded into a platform specific subdirectory (e.g linux, mac, ...)
+to allow cross compilation of several platforms on a single host.
+
+Build products of dependencies should be installed into a corresponding subdirectory of
+3rdParty/buildCache to allow CI systems to cache this data between BOINC builds.
+
+See the existing [buildLinuxDependencies.sh](buildLinuxDependencies.sh) and
+[buildMacDependencies.sh](buildMacDependencies.sh) scripts for how this is done
+on Linux and Mac currently.
diff --git a/3rdParty/buildLinuxDependencies.sh b/3rdParty/buildLinuxDependencies.sh
new file mode 100755
index 0000000000..b71bdcd43f
--- /dev/null
+++ b/3rdParty/buildLinuxDependencies.sh
@@ -0,0 +1,123 @@
+#!/bin/bash
+
+# This file is part of BOINC.
+# http://boinc.berkeley.edu
+# Copyright (C) 2017 University of California
+#
+# BOINC is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it
+# under the terms of the GNU Lesser General Public License
+# as published by the Free Software Foundation,
+# either version 3 of the License, or (at your option) any later version.
+#
+# BOINC is distributed in the hope that it will be useful,
+# but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of
+# MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE.
+# See the GNU Lesser General Public License for more details.
+#
+# You should have received a copy of the GNU Lesser General Public License
+# along with BOINC.  If not, see <http://www.gnu.org/licenses/>.
+#
+
+## support script to build a specific wxWidgets version for linux
+## This script checks if a cached version is available and builts one if not.
+## The build is done in 3rdParty/linux and usable files are installed to 3rdParty/buildCache/linux
+## in order to keep the cache as small as possible
+## The 3rdParty/buildCache directory can be cached by CI systems for all subsequent builds
+
+# checks if a given path is canonical (absolute and does not contain relative links)
+# from http://unix.stackexchange.com/a/256437
+isPathCanonical() {
+  case "x$1" in
+    (x*/..|x*/../*|x../*|x*/.|x*/./*|x./*)
+        rc=1
+        ;;
+    (x/*)
+        rc=0
+        ;;
+    (*)
+        rc=1
+        ;;
+  esac
+  return $rc
+}
+
+# check working directory because the script needs to be called like: ./3rdParty/buildLinuxDependencies.sh
+if [ ! -d "3rdParty" ]; then
+    echo "start this script in the source root directory"
+    exit 1
+fi
+
+ROOTDIR=$(pwd)
+cache_dir=""
+doclean=""
+wxoption=""
+while [[ $# -gt 0 ]]; do
+    key="$1"
+    case $key in
+        --cache_dir)
+        cache_dir="$2"
+        shift
+        ;;
+        --clean)
+        doclean="yes"
+        ;;
+        --debug)
+        wxoption="--debug"
+        ;;
+        *)
+        echo "unrecognized option $key"
+        ;;
+    esac
+    shift # past argument or value
+done
+
+if [ "x$cache_dir" != "x" ]; then
+    if isPathCanonical "$cache_dir" && [ "$cache_dir" != "/" ]; then
+        PREFIX="$cache_dir"
+    else
+        echo "cache_dir must be an absolute path without ./ or ../ in it"
+        exit 1
+    fi
+else
+    PREFIX="$(pwd)/3rdParty/buildCache/linux"
+fi
+
+download_and_build() {
+    cd "${ROOTDIR}/3rdParty/linux" || exit 1
+    DIRNAME="${1}"
+    FILENAME="${2}"
+    DLURL="${3}"
+    BUILDSCRIPT="${4}"
+    FLAGFILE="${PREFIX}/${DIRNAME}_done"
+    if [ -e "${FLAGFILE}" ]; then
+        echo "${DIRNAME} seems already to be present in ${PREFIX}"
+        return 0
+    fi
+    if [ ! -d ${DIRNAME} ]; then
+        if [ ! -e ${FILENAME} ]; then
+            wget ${DLURL}
+        fi
+        tar -xf ${FILENAME}
+    fi
+    cd ${DIRNAME} || exit 1
+    source ${BUILDSCRIPT} --prefix ${PREFIX}
+    if [ $? -ne 0 ]; then exit 1; fi
+    cd ../.. || exit 1
+    touch ${FLAGFILE}
+}
+
+mkdir -p 3rdParty/linux
+mkdir -p ${PREFIX}
+cd "${ROOTDIR}/3rdParty/linux" || exit 1
+
+if [ "${doclean}" = "yes" ]; then
+    echo "cleaning cache"
+    rm -rf ${PREFIX}
+    mkdir -p ${PREFIX}
+fi
+
+#download_and_build $DIRNAME $FILENAME $DOWNLOADURL $BUILDSCRIPT
+download_and_build "wxWidgets-3.0.2" "wxWidgets-3.0.2.tar.bz2" "https://sourceforge.net/projects/wxwindows/files/3.0.2/wxWidgets-3.0.2.tar.bz2" "${ROOTDIR}/3rdParty/buildWxLinux.sh ${wxoption}"
+
+# change back to root directory
+cd ${ROOTDIR} || exit 1
diff --git a/3rdParty/buildWxLinux.sh b/3rdParty/buildWxLinux.sh
new file mode 100644
index 0000000000..68cabe5d36
--- /dev/null
+++ b/3rdParty/buildWxLinux.sh
@@ -0,0 +1,71 @@
+#!/bin/bash
+
+# This file is part of BOINC.
+# http://boinc.berkeley.edu
+# Copyright (C) 2017 University of California
+#
+# BOINC is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it
+# under the terms of the GNU Lesser General Public License
+# as published by the Free Software Foundation,
+# either version 3 of the License, or (at your option) any later version.
+#
+# BOINC is distributed in the hope that it will be useful,
+# but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of
+# MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE.
+# See the GNU Lesser General Public License for more details.
+#
+# You should have received a copy of the GNU Lesser General Public License
+# along with BOINC.  If not, see <http://www.gnu.org/licenses/>.
+
+# Script to build a wxWidgets GTK version for BOINC
+
+# Usage:
+#  cd [path]/wxWidgets-3.0.2/
+#  source path_to_this_script [--clean] [--debug] [--prefix PATH]
+#
+# the --clean argument will force a full rebuild.
+# the --debug argument will build the debug version of the library
+# if --prefix is given as absolute path the library is installed into there
+
+
+doclean=""
+configuration="Release"
+while [[ $# -gt 0 ]]; do
+    key="$1"
+    case $key in
+        -clean|--clean)
+        doclean="yes"
+        ;;
+        -debug|--debug)
+        configuration="Debug"
+        ;;
+        -prefix|--prefix)
+        lprefix="$2"
+        shift
+        ;;
+    esac
+    shift # past argument or value
+done
+
+debug_flag="--disable-debug_flag"
+if [ $configuration = "Debug" ]; then
+    debug_flag="--enable-debug"
+fi
+
+if [ "${doclean}" = "yes" ]; then
+    make clean
+fi
+
+mkdir buildgtk
+if [  $? -ne 0 ]; then exit 1; fi
+cd buildgtk || return 1
+
+../configure --prefix="${lprefix}" --with-gtk --disable-shared --enable-webview --disable-gtktest --disable-sdltest ${debug_flag}
+if [ $? -ne 0 ]; then cd ..; return 1; fi
+make 1>/dev/null # the wxWidgets build is very noisy so tune it down to warnings and errors only
+if [ $? -ne 0 ]; then cd ..; return 1; fi
+make install
+if [ $? -ne 0 ]; then cd ..; return 1; fi
+
+cd ..
+return 0
diff --git a/build/getWxWidgets.sh b/build/getWxWidgets.sh
deleted file mode 100755
index 273a199b2c..0000000000
--- a/build/getWxWidgets.sh
+++ /dev/null
@@ -1,26 +0,0 @@
-#!/bin/bash
-set -x
-
-## Travis-CI support script to built a specific wxWidgets version
-## This script checks if a cached version is available and builts one if not.
-## The directory is cached by Travis-CI for all subsequent runs of the VM
-
-# change to correct working directory because the script is called like: ./build/getWxWidgets.sh
-cd ./build
-
-# if the versioning changes try to delete the old directory and change .travis.yml to cache the new directory
-if [ ! -e "wxWidgets-3.0.2/build_complete" ]; then
-  wget https://sourceforge.net/projects/wxwindows/files/3.0.2/wxWidgets-3.0.2.tar.bz2
-  tar -xf wxWidgets-3.0.2.tar.bz2
-  cd wxWidgets-3.0.2
-  mkdir buildgtk
-  cd buildgtk
-  ../configure --with-gtk --disable-shared --enable-webview --disable-gtktest --disable-sdltest
-  make
-  cd ..
-  touch build_complete
-  cd ..
-fi
-
-# change back to root directory
-cd ..