Build issue in trunk with pcl_visualization

[julienr]

When linking an application that uses master PCL, I get an error due to pcl_visualization not finding pcl_geometry-1.7 :

Package pcl_geometry-1.7 was not found in the pkg-config search path.
Perhaps you should add the directory containing `pcl_geometry-1.7.pc'
to the PKG_CONFIG_PATH environment variable
Package 'pcl_geometry-1.7', required by 'pcl_visualization', not found

I think this is due to commit 10d42e9 which disable the generation of the pcl_geometry-1.7.pc pkgconfig file.

Since pcl_visualization still depends on pcl_geometry, the pcl_visualization-1.7.pc file contain a reference to the non-existing pcl_geometry-1.7.pc

[rbrusu]

Can you tell us how we could replicate this please?

[nizar-sallem]

This is probably due to the fact that geometry is a header only module that doesn't produce a binary library file.
Checking...

[nizar-sallem]

So apparently we don't handle the case where library is headers only for the generated pc files though we do it for the cmake.
Working on a fix.

[nizar-sallem]

@rbrusu I found a solution but I am not sure we want it pulled right now on PCL.
You can find it in my fork for now https://github.com/nizar-sallem/pcl.git then switch to "pkgconfig_fix" branch.

[jspricke]

@nizar-sallem The branch is not on Github anymore, do you have some fix lying around?

[martyvona]

For now the workaround we are using to get our pkg-config based build going is we manually create the file pcl_geometry-1.7.pc with these contents:

missing pkg-config file for pcl_geometry

prefix=/usr/local
exec_prefix=${prefix}
libdir=${prefix}/lib
includedir=${prefix}/include/pcl-1.7
Name: pcl_geometry
Description: Point cloud geometry library
Version: 1.7.0
Requires:
Libs:
Cflags: -I${includedir}

You can then put that somewhere in the pkg-config search path, like /usr/local/lib/pkgconfig/. Though to avoid hacking up your system you can just keep the file local to your project build directory and use this command in place of the vanilla pkg-config call in your makefiles:

PKG_CONFIG_PATH=$PKG_CONFIG_PATH:. pkg-config

[jdt141]

I ran into the same issue and fixed it this way so that the proper pkg-config file will always be built when you build from source:

I create a new macro in pcl_targets.cmake:

macro(PCL_MAKE_PKGCONFIG_HEADER_ONLY _name _component _desc _pcl_deps _ext_deps _int_deps _cflags)
set(PKG_NAME ${_name})
set(PKG_DESC ${_desc})
set(PKG_CFLAGS ${_cflags})
#set(PKG_LIBFLAGS ${_lib_flags})
LIST_TO_STRING(_ext_deps_str "${_ext_deps}")
set(PKG_EXTERNAL_DEPS ${_ext_deps_str})
foreach(_dep ${_pcl_deps})
set(PKG_EXTERNAL_DEPS "${PKG_EXTERNAL_DEPS} pcl_${_dep}-${PCL_MAJOR_VERSION}.${PCL_MINOR_VERSION}")
endforeach(_dep)
set(PKG_INTERNAL_DEPS "")
foreach(_dep ${_int_deps})
set(PKG_INTERNAL_DEPS "${PKG_INTERNAL_DEPS} -l${_dep}")
endforeach(_dep)
set(_pc_file ${CMAKE_CURRENT_BINARY_DIR}/${_name}-${PCL_MAJOR_VERSION}.${PCL_MINOR_VERSION}.pc)
configure_file(${PROJECT_SOURCE_DIR}/cmake/pkgconfig-headeronly.cmake.in ${_pc_file} @ONLY)
install(FILES ${_pc_file} DESTINATION ${PKGCFG_INSTALL_DIR}
COMPONENT pcl_${_component})
endmacro(PCL_MAKE_PKGCONFIG_HEADER_ONLY)

I also added a file: pkgconfig-headeronly.cmake.in to the same directory. It looks like this:

# This file was generated by CMake for @PROJECT_NAME@ library @PKG_NAME@
prefix=@CMAKE_INSTALL_PREFIX@
exec_prefix=${prefix}
libdir=${prefix}/@LIB_INSTALL_DIR@
#includedir=${prefix}/@INCLUDE_INSTALL_DIR@
includedir=${prefix}/include/@PROJECT_NAME_LOWER@-@PCL_MAJOR_VERSION@.@PCL_MINOR_VERSION@
Name: @PKG_NAME@
Description: @PKG_DESC@
Version: @PCL_VERSION@
Requires: @PKG_EXTERNAL_DEPS@
Libs: 
Cflags: -I${includedir} @PKG_CFLAGS@

Then I called PCL_MAKE_PKGCONFIG_HEADER_ONLY from geometry/CMakeLists.txt. Works like a charm!

[martyvona]

Great, that sounds like a fix that could be included in pcl to resolve this issue, not just a workaround. Thanks!

[jspricke]

@jdt141 looking good, can you send it as a pull request, so we can merge it? Thanks!

[rbrusu]

+1 for a pull request.

[jdt141]

Just submitted the request. HTH!

[jspricke]

merged, thanks!