Fails to create release when there is a non-Erlang deps (such as rebar raw dependencies)

[nivertech]

Relx fails to build a release, because I have a non-Erlang dependency without ebin folder or with empty ebin folder.
Like this one:
https://github.com/basho/node_package

There is also something called rebar raw dependencies [1] and I believe that more correct behaviour for Relx is either copy them to release or ignore them, but not to fail release creation altogether.

basho/rebar#217 (comment)

$ ./relx
Starting relx build process ...
Resolving OTP Applications from directories:
    /home/me/ws/myproject/lib
    /home/me/ws/myproject/deps
    /usr/local/lib/erlang/lib

no beam files found in directory /home/me/ws/myproject/deps/node_package/ebin

Usage: relx [-n <relname>] [-v <relvsn>] [-g <goal>] [-u <upfrom>]
            [-o <output_dir>] [-l <lib_dir>]
            [--disable-default-libs [<disable_default_libs>]]
            [-V [<log_level>]] [-a <override_app>] [-c [<config>]]
            [-r <root_dir>] [*release-specification-file*]

  -n, --relname           Specify the name for the release that will be 
                          generated
  -v, --relvsn            Specify the version for the release
  -g, --goal              Specify a target constraint on the system. These 
                          are usually the OTP
  -u, --upfrom            Only valid with relup target, specify the 
                          release to upgrade from
  -o, --output-dir        The output directory for the release. This is 
                          `./` by default.
  -l, --lib-dir           Additional dirs that should be searched for OTP 
                          Apps
  --disable-default-libs  Disable the default system added lib dirs (means 
                          you must add them all manually [default: false]
  -V, --verbose           Verbosity level, maybe between 0 and 2 [default: 
                          1]
  -a, --override_app      Provide an app name and a directory to override 
                          in the form <appname>:<app directory>
  -c, --config            The path to a config file [default: ]
  -r, --root              The project root directory

$ 

[nivertech]

In case of node_package app, it does have a ebin/node_package.app file, which specifies empty modules list.
So it implicitly indicates thata there are no .beam files to look for.

{application,node_package,
             [{description,"RPM/Debian/Solaris packaging templates for Erlang Nodes"},
              {vsn,"1.2.1"},
              {modules,[]},
              {registered,[]},
              {applications,[]}]}.

[nivertech]

Adding dummy beam file solves this problem. This is just a workaround - not perfect.

$ cd deps/node_package/ebin/
[ebin ((1.2.1))]$ touch dummy.beam
[ebin ((1.2.1))]$ cd ../../..
$ ./relx
Starting relx build process ...
Resolving OTP Applications from directories:
    /home/me/ws/myproject/lib
    /home/me/ws/myproject/deps
    /usr/local/lib/erlang/lib

Resolving available releases from directories:
    /home/me/ws/myproject/lib
    /home/me/ws/myproject/deps
    /usr/local/lib/erlang/lib

Resolved myproject-0.0.1
release successfully created!
$

[tsloughter]

Hmm, this will actually conflict with a problem someone had where they wanted it to skip "apps" that didn't have beam files. But I am blanking though, @ericbmerritt do you remember? And relcool repo issues are gone.

Maybe that was why we added the skip_apps option... You can add these which have no beam files to your relx.config file under {skip_apps, []}.

[tsloughter]

Ah, I remember a little more now, we don't want to skip apps with no beam files because that should mean the app is not compiled and something went wrong. So we added skip_apps.

[ericbmerritt]

Actually #7 should solve this problem. We just need to finish it up, the original submitter never came back.

[nivertech]

skip_apps doesn't work for me - using relx master

My relx.config file:

{
    release, {myapp, "0.0.1"},
    [myapp]
}.

{sys_config, "./bin/sys.config"}.

% skip OTP apps without .beam files
{skip_apps, [node_package]}.

Fails on:

$ ./relx 
Starting relx build process ...
Resolving OTP Applications from directories:
    /home/me/ws/myapp/lib
    /home/me/ws/myapp/deps
    /usr/local/lib/erlang/lib

no beam files found in directory /home/me/ws/myapp/deps/node_package/ebin

Usage: relx [-n <relname>] [-v <relvsn>] [-g <goal>] [-u <upfrom>]
            [-o <output_dir>] [-l <lib_dir>]
            [--disable-default-libs [<disable_default_libs>]]
            [-V [<log_level>]] [-a <override_app>] [-c [<config>]]
            [-r <root_dir>] [*release-specification-file*]

  -n, --relname           Specify the name for the release that will be 
                          generated
  -v, --relvsn            Specify the version for the release
  -g, --goal              Specify a target constraint on the system. These 
                          are usually the OTP
  -u, --upfrom            Only valid with relup target, specify the 
                          release to upgrade from
  -o, --output-dir        The output directory for the release. This is 
                          `./` by default.
  -l, --lib-dir           Additional dirs that should be searched for OTP 
                          Apps
  --disable-default-libs  Disable the default system added lib dirs (means 
                          you must add them all manually [default: false]
  -V, --verbose           Verbosity level, maybe between 0 and 2 [default: 
                          1]
  -a, --override_app      Provide an app name and a directory to override 
                          in the form <appname>:<app directory>
  -c, --config            The path to a config file [default: ]
  -r, --root              The project root directory

$

[tsloughter]

Hm, that's no good. I'll look into this. As well as I'll try to get #7 done so skip_apps isn't needed either.

[tsloughter]

@nivertech can you give master a try? We just merged a fix in #42

[nivertech]

It works now, even without {skip_apps, [...]}.
Is this OK?

[jwilberding]

@nivertech I believe that is supposed to be the correct behavior.

[tsloughter]

Oops, replied in the wrong place. '@nivertech Yup, now it checks that it has a beam file for all modules listed in the applications .app file. So if there are none listed it is still considered valid if there are no beam files.'