Building on Windows (VS2015 Win64) - Linker Errors

[herzig]

I have problems building TetWild on Windows. CGAL 4.12 is installed and working (examples work).
cmake can generate build files (VS Projects & sln)
geogram.lib seems to be compiling fine (using VS2015)

then building lib_tetwild fails with the following linker error:

1>------ Build started: Project: lib_tetwild, Configuration: Release x64 ------
1>MeshRefinement.obj : error LNK2019: unresolved external symbol "struct GEO::CellDescriptor * * GEO::MeshCellDescriptors::cell_type_to_cell_descriptor" (?cell_type_to_cell_descriptor@MeshCellDescriptors@GEO@@3PAPEAUCellDescriptor@2@A) referenced in function "public: unsigned int __cdecl GEO::MeshCells::create_cells(unsigned int,enum GEO::MeshCellType)" (?create_cells@MeshCells@GEO@@QEAAIIW4MeshCellType@2@@Z)
1>D:\proj\TetWild\build\Release\TetWild.dll : fatal error LNK1120: 1 unresolved externals
2>------ Build started: Project: TetWild, Configuration: Release x64 ------
2>LINK : fatal error LNK1181: cannot open input file 'Release\TetWild.lib'
========== Build: 0 succeeded, 2 failed, 5 up-to-date, 0 skipped ==========

geogram.lib seems to be fine, and is found by the linker as only this single symbol is causing a problem.

Thanks for you help!

[Yixin-Hu]

Could you try this cmakelists?

https://github.com/Yixin-Hu/TetWild/blob/cbd8713cb5ee37c8fe475a87f5c61c4829b89dd1/CMakeLists.txt

[herzig]

Just did, still the same result
Here's the cmake output:

Selecting Windows SDK version  to target Windows 10.0.17134.
No build type selected, default to Release
Using local options file: D:/proj/TetWild/extern/geogram/CMakeOptions.txt
Configuring build for standalone Geogram (without Vorpaline)
Configuring 64 bits build
Doxygen >= 1.7.0 not found, cannot generate documentation
Boost version: 1.67.0
Boost include dirs: C:/dev/boost_1_67_0
Boost libraries:    
Found CGAL: C:/dev/CGAL-4.12/build
Boost version: 1.67.0
Found the following Boost libraries:
  thread
  system
  chrono
  date_time
  atomic
Could NOT find Matlab (missing: Matlab_INCLUDE_DIRS Matlab_MEX_LIBRARY Matlab_MEX_EXTENSION MEX_COMPILER MX_LIBRARY ENG_LIBRARY) (found version "unknown")
Could NOT find MOSEK (missing: MOSEK_LIBRARIES MOSEK_INCLUDE_DIR) 
Creating target: igl::core
Found CGAL: C:/dev/CGAL-4.12/build
Creating target: igl::cgal
Boost version: 1.67.0
Found the following Boost libraries:
  thread
  system
  chrono
  date_time
  atomic
Configuring done
Generating done

Also the complete build output:
tetwild_vs14win64.txt

[Yixin-Hu]

Could you try using older version of geogram, like version ~1.5.5?

[herzig]

Tried with 1.5.5 and 1.5.2, unfortuneately, exactly the same result for both version.

Maybe I am using the wrong, cmake generator/VS version, which did you use to test it under Windows?

[trelau]

@herzig you may have a look here https://github.com/trelau/TetWild/commits/reorg

For Windows, nothing was being exported to the shared library so it didn't generate TetWild.lib. I made some changes as outlined in the commit history that includes:

• Build a static lib when building an executable

• Build a shared lib only when NOT building an executable (this will be nice if using tetwild in a different program)

Still some things that need cleaned up but I think I'm on the right track...

[herzig]

@trelau Could you get it working with your version?

I have the same issue as before. geogram.lib is created fine, but then linking tetwild_lib fails.

I tried to use the dumpbin utility to list all symbols defined in geogram.lib, and the supposedly missing symbol
?cell_type_to_cell_descriptor@MeshCellDescriptors@GEO@@3PAPEAUCellDescriptor@2@A (struct GEO::CellDescriptor * * GEO::MeshCellDescriptors::cell_type_to_cell_descriptor)
is listed in the output. Why the linker can not find the symbol is beyond me, any ideas?

Full output of dumpbin /exports geogram.lib :
geogram_lib_exports.txt

[trelau]

@herzig in my branch, when i turn BUILD_WITH_DEBUG to OFF the TetWild.exe will build and link to the static libTetWild.lib (I renamed some stuff). All this switch does is not compile things that use PyMesh to write out stuff (I plan to change this). But, this tells us something, although it's strange that an unresolved external to what seems like geogram shows up in the code that is being left out with BUILD_WITH_DEBUG...?

[herzig]

@trelau Sorry I mixed up my working copies, embarassing... I can build your branch fine (with BUILD_WITH_DEBUG OFF). i generates an exe, and I just successfully meshed a geometry that all other simple meshing tools failed to mesh. Awesome project!

[trelau]

@herzig Great! I just took a step back and pushed a branch that builds the basic exe https://github.com/trelau/TetWild/commit/78aa7fc42750e6dce1278890c97c5428af46b47c I had to comment out some code to resolve the external, so looking for the root cause now. This should now represent the initial state of @Yixin-Hu 's code. I'm thinking about refactoring the API a little in the tetwild.h file (use a single class to define parameters and load/retrieve mesh) to make it easier to optionally build as a shared lib. If you're looking to contribute the next step will be to optimize for speed!

[herzig]

I could resolve the linker issue by moving the definition for the static function MeshCellsStore::cell_type_to_cell_descriptor in geogram mesh.h to the mesh.cpp file.

mesh.h now looks like this:

		static const CellDescriptor& cell_type_to_cell_descriptor(
			MeshCellType t
		);

and this added to mesh.cpp

	const CellDescriptor& MeshCellsStore::cell_type_to_cell_descriptor(
		MeshCellType t
	) {
		geo_debug_assert(t < GEO::MESH_NB_CELL_TYPES);
		return *(MeshCellDescriptors::cell_type_to_cell_descriptor[t]);
	}
    

I can build tetwild.exe now without any problems and using background meshes (the part that was causing linker problems) now works as well.

[jdumas]

Just FYI, the linking issue with Geogram should be fixed with the latest version (1.6.6).