cannot compile with hdf5

[Petr Mikulik]

> On Mon, Feb 2, 2009 at 2:41 PM, Petr Mikulik <mikulik at physics.muni.cz> wrote:
> >> On Mon, Feb 2, 2009 at 8:54 AM, Petr Mikulik <mikulik at physics.muni.cz> wrote:
> >> > I have tried to compile octave 3.0.4 rc3 tarball, configured with HDF5.
> >> > Octave fails to compile, see below. The same happens also for 3.0.3.
> >> > There are the following libraries under OpenSUSE 11.1:
> >> >        libhdf5_hl0-1.8.2-1.1
> >> >        hdf5-devel-1.8.2-1.1
> >> >        libhdf5-0-1.8.2-1.1
> >> >        hdf5-1.8.2-1.1
> >> >
> >> This is a known problem, caused by the incompatible API changes
> >> between HDF5 1.5 and 1.8. I think there's no need to support both the
> >> APIs, but someone needs to modify the relevant code to adapt to the
> >> 1.8 API. So far, there has been no volunteer. Apparently hdf5 is not
> >> much used amongst Octave developers/users.
> >
> > Could the ./configure test the API and disable building against HDF5 <1.8?
> 
> Not a bad suggestion. I think we were sort of hoping that somebody who
> cares about hdf5 will do the update, but maybe nobody cares enough. If
> you would like to write a test program that detects the version, I
> could include it in configure.

Here is the test:

/* hdf5test.c */
#include <stdio.h>
#include <hdf5.h>
int main()
{
    printf("%s\n", H5_VERS_INFO);
    return 0;
}

$ gcc -o h hdf5test.c -lhdf5
$ ./h
HDF5 library version: 1.6.6

> > I don't use HDF5 but Octave autodetects it during ./configure and then fails
> > during make which is annoying.
> 
> Use --without-hdf5. Maybe, given the state of HDF5 support (only
> obsolete version is supported), we should make this the default and
> not warn about it. What do you think? That would mean much less work.

I propose to put a test into configure. Once that somebody updates the API, 
he can easily change the test condition towards newer version.


> > BTW, recently I have sent a small testing program QhullCrashTest.c to
> > detect crashing Qhull library. Is there an autoconf guru who would add it to
> > the configure script?
> 
> Please a start a fresh thread or revive the old one, I'll take a look.

Here is the latest mail of the thread:
  http://www-old.cae.wisc.edu/pipermail/bug-octave/2009-January/007737.html
The QhullCrashTest.c is enclosed there; you can use for configure just 
the commands therein, i.e. without the description&comments.

---
Petr Mikulik