# Continued development of GSL.jl

**URL:** <https://discourse.julialang.org/t/continued-development-of-gsl-jl/16131>\
**Category:** Numerics\
**Tags:** package\
**Created:** [October 10, 2018, 7:48pm UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/continued-development-of-gsl-jl/16131 "2018-10-10T19:48:53Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 11\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![ludvigak](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/julialang/user_avatar/discourse.julialang.org/ludvigak/32/5689_2.png) [@ludvigak](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/ludvigak)\
**Post date:** [October 10, 2018, 7:48pm UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/continued-development-of-gsl-jl/16131/1 "2018-10-10T19:48:53Z")

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I would like to check if anybody knows what the status is of the GSL package, and what the community interest is for continued development.

Currently there has not been any development in a while, things are not working at all on Julia 1.0, and a number of pull requests ([#69](https://github.com/JuliaMath/GSL.jl/pull/69), [#71](https://github.com/JuliaMath/GSL.jl/pull/71), [#74](https://github.com/JuliaMath/GSL.jl/pull/74)) trying to move things forward have been left hanging.

I find GSL.jl very useful in my work, and would hate to see it abandoned. I would be more than happy to help contribute, if we can get a dialogue going with the maintainers about what needs to be done, and how it should be done.

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**Author:** ![Tamas\_Papp](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/julialang/user_avatar/discourse.julialang.org/tamas_papp/32/25949_2.png) [@Tamas\_Papp](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/Tamas_Papp)\
**Post date:** [October 11, 2018, 7:57am UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/continued-development-of-gsl-jl/16131/2 "2018-10-11T07:57:16Z")

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> [@ludvigak](#):
>
> would hate to see it abandoned. I would be more than happy to help contribute

If you don’t get a response, you can always fork the package.

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**Author:** ![jiahao](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/julialang/user_avatar/discourse.julialang.org/jiahao/32/5767_2.png) [@jiahao](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/jiahao)\
**Post date:** [October 11, 2018, 2:36pm UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/continued-development-of-gsl-jl/16131/3 "2018-10-11T14:36:48Z")

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I’m happy to have @ludvigak help maintain! I’m the original author of GSL.jl and sadly don’t have the time to work on it anymore. It’s one of the few packages that has been developed and maintained since Julia v0.0, and I would hate to see it lose relevance.

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**Author:** ![giordano](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/julialang/user_avatar/discourse.julialang.org/giordano/32/2166_2.png) [@giordano](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/giordano)\
**Post date:** [October 11, 2018, 5:00pm UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/continued-development-of-gsl-jl/16131/4 "2018-10-11T17:00:47Z")

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I’ve created a builder using BinaryBuilder: [https://github.com/giordano/GSLBuilder.jl](https://github.com/giordano/GSLBuilder.jl) However, there are a couple of issues to be fixed for this to completely work, in particular MacOS support:

[https://github.com/giordano/GSLBuilder.jl/issues/1](https://github.com/giordano/GSLBuilder.jl/issues/1)

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**Author:** ![ludvigak](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/julialang/user_avatar/discourse.julialang.org/ludvigak/32/5689_2.png) [@ludvigak](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/ludvigak)\
**Post date:** [October 12, 2018, 10:50pm UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/continued-development-of-gsl-jl/16131/5 "2018-10-12T22:50:45Z")

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That’s great @jiahao and @giordano !

In order to get GSL back online again quickly, I would suggest we first get out a release using the existing build script, that just fixes the syntax to be compatible with Julia 1.0. That does not seem to be too far off, if we start from one of the existing pull requests. We could even temporarily disable features that currently use `pointer_from_objref`, to get things running as soon as possible.

As a second step, switching to BinaryBuilder absolutely makes sense.

Going forward, I think it would make sense to restructure the package, and base it on wrappers generated from the GSL headers, perhaps using Clang.jl. Then we could add a second wrapping layer on those, that does some input checking and adds convenience, and that doesn’t get overwritten if the wrappers are regenerated.

For now though, I’ll look at the pull requests and try to put something together that has the correct syntax, and builds and runs on Julia 1.0 with most of the features intact.

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**Author:** ![giordano](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/julialang/user_avatar/discourse.julialang.org/giordano/32/2166_2.png) [@giordano](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/giordano)\
**Post date:** [October 13, 2018, 12:05am UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/continued-development-of-gsl-jl/16131/6 "2018-10-13T00:05:57Z")

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The PR to switch to BinaryProvider is ready: [Switch to BinaryProvider by giordano · Pull Request #77 · JuliaMath/GSL.jl · GitHub](https://github.com/JuliaMath/GSL.jl/pull/77)

Note that GSL.jl is currently based on GSL 1.16, which is some 5 year-old. It may be nice to upgrade to a newer version of the library at some point, after development of the package restarts.

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**Author:** ![JeffreySarnoff](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/julialang/user_avatar/discourse.julialang.org/jeffreysarnoff/32/1980_2.png) [@JeffreySarnoff](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/JeffreySarnoff)\
**Post date:** [October 13, 2018, 3:12am UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/continued-development-of-gsl-jl/16131/7 "2018-10-13T03:12:07Z")

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I recommend that you make the upgrade now. There is no need to delay that because `GSL.jl` is not available to the current release, v1.0.

```julia
(v1.0) pkg> add GSL
  Updating registry at `~/.julia/registries/General`
  Updating git-repo `https://github.com/JuliaRegistries/General.git`
 Resolving package versions...
ERROR: Unsatisfiable requirements detected for package GSL [92c85e6c]:
 GSL [92c85e6c] log:
 ├─possible versions are: [0.0.1, 0.1.0-0.1.2, 0.2.0, 0.3.0-0.3.6] or uninstalled
 ├─restricted to versions * by an explicit requirement, leaving only versions [0.0.1, 0.1.0-0.1.2, 0.2.0, 0.3.0-0.3.6]
 └─restricted by julia compatibility requirements to versions: uninstalled — no versions left

```

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**Author:** ![giordano](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/julialang/user_avatar/discourse.julialang.org/giordano/32/2166_2.png) [@giordano](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/giordano)\
**Post date:** [October 13, 2018, 10:26am UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/continued-development-of-gsl-jl/16131/8 "2018-10-13T10:26:57Z")

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I’ve already prepared a build for GSL 2.5: [https://github.com/giordano/GSLBuilder.jl/releases/tag/v2.5](https://github.com/giordano/GSLBuilder.jl/releases/tag/v2.5) but I’m not sure it’s a good idea to upgrade it now. I think the priority should be to get `GSL.jl` to work as it is now, then upgrade to a newer version. I didn’t check, but APIs may have been changed since version 1.16

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**Author:** ![Tamas\_Papp](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/julialang/user_avatar/discourse.julialang.org/tamas_papp/32/25949_2.png) [@Tamas\_Papp](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/Tamas_Papp)\
**Post date:** [October 13, 2018, 3:35pm UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/continued-development-of-gsl-jl/16131/9 "2018-10-13T15:35:38Z")

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> [@giordano](#):
>
> I think the priority should be to get `GSL.jl` to work as it is now, then upgrade to a newer version.

Purely from a code organization point of view, I think it is better to make upgrades to 1.0 separate from other changes. Makes it easier to bisect etc later on.

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**Author:** ![ludvigak](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/julialang/user_avatar/discourse.julialang.org/ludvigak/32/5689_2.png) [@ludvigak](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/ludvigak)\
**Post date:** [October 19, 2018, 4:13pm UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/continued-development-of-gsl-jl/16131/10 "2018-10-19T16:13:50Z")

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I’ve created a pull request merging @giordano’s work on BinaryBuilder with previous pull requests that have syntax updates for Julia 1.0: [Support for Julia 0.6-1.0, use BinaryProvider by ludvigak · Pull Request #78 · JuliaMath/GSL.jl · GitHub](https://github.com/JuliaMath/GSL.jl/pull/78)

What’s the best way of moving forward? Is there someone in JuliaMath who can merge pull requests and create releases on GSL, or can someone new be added as maintainer?

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![ludvigak](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/julialang/user_avatar/discourse.julialang.org/ludvigak/32/5689_2.png) [@ludvigak](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/ludvigak)\
**Post date:** [October 19, 2018, 4:47pm UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/continued-development-of-gsl-jl/16131/11 "2018-10-19T16:47:48Z")

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Apparently @simonbyrne was around to keep things running, so all is good!