# HDF and JLD have been unbuildable on macs for months... Not sure anyone is addressing

**URL:** <https://discourse.julialang.org/t/hdf-and-jld-have-been-unbuildable-on-macs-for-months-not-sure-anyone-is-addressing/13468>\
**Category:** Data\
**Created:** [August 14, 2018, 9:28pm UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/hdf-and-jld-have-been-unbuildable-on-macs-for-months-not-sure-anyone-is-addressing/13468 "2018-08-14T21:28:29Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 6\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![nickeubank](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/julialang/user_avatar/discourse.julialang.org/nickeubank/32/3878_2.png) [@nickeubank](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/nickeubank)\
**Post date:** [August 14, 2018, 9:28pm UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/hdf-and-jld-have-been-unbuildable-on-macs-for-months-not-sure-anyone-is-addressing/13468/1 "2018-08-14T21:28:29Z")

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So for several months now HDF.jl and JLD.jl are unbuildable on macs because of a problem with Homebrew.jl. It’s been brought up in a number of places by a number of people ([here](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/anyone-know-status-of-hdf5-build-problems/12575), [here](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/problems-to-install-jld-hdf5/13219/4), [here](https://github.com/JuliaPackaging/Homebrew.jl/issues/237#issuecomment-413015130), [here](https://github.com/JuliaIO/HDF5.jl/issues/483), [here](https://github.com/JuliaIO/HDF5.jl/issues/482), [here](https://github.com/JuliaIO/HDF5.jl/issues/482), and more I’m sure I haven’t seen), but I don’t think it’s getting any attention because it only affects new users who don’t have a pre-existing homebrew install of HDF5 (as many developers do).

With the release of 1.0, I feel like Julia is looking to bring in new people, and I worry about a problem with such a basic set of dependencies. Any chance anyone is working on this?

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**Author:** ![ggggggggg](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/julialang/user_avatar/discourse.julialang.org/ggggggggg/32/265_2.png) [@ggggggggg](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/ggggggggg)\
**Post date:** [August 14, 2018, 10:27pm UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/hdf-and-jld-have-been-unbuildable-on-macs-for-months-not-sure-anyone-is-addressing/13468/2 "2018-08-14T22:27:16Z")

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I agree it seems like a problem, and it seems to have lasted for a long time for such an important package. Part of the problem is that HDF5 won’t cross compile, so the new `BinaryBuilder` toolchain doesn’t work. But maybe we could just build a `BinaryProvider` script ([like this example](https://github.com/JuliaPackaging/BinaryProvider.jl/blob/master/test/LibFoo.jl/deps/build.jl)) that points to new github repo that just caches copies of the HDF5 binaries? The HDF5 site provides linux and windows binaries, and someone could upload a mac binary, maybe just copy the ones homebrew builds?. It not as maintainable as having `BinaryBuilder` cross compile, but it shouldn’t be too much work to get it going.

But in answer to your final question, no, I’m not working on this.

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**Author:** ![stevengj](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/julialang/user_avatar/discourse.julialang.org/stevengj/32/71_2.png) [@stevengj](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/stevengj)\
**Post date:** [August 15, 2018, 12:04am UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/hdf-and-jld-have-been-unbuildable-on-macs-for-months-not-sure-anyone-is-addressing/13468/3 "2018-08-15T00:04:46Z")

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In the long run, I think it should be possible to cross compile HDF5. I’m working on a fork for this.

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**Author:** ![nickeubank](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/julialang/user_avatar/discourse.julialang.org/nickeubank/32/3878_2.png) [@nickeubank](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/nickeubank)\
**Post date:** [August 15, 2018, 1:42am UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/hdf-and-jld-have-been-unbuildable-on-macs-for-months-not-sure-anyone-is-addressing/13468/4 "2018-08-15T01:42:59Z")

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Thanks @stevengj! Also, sorry to raise a problem without offering a solution (poor form in open source I know), but this is well outside my areas of experties.

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**Author:** ![tobias.knopp](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/julialang/user_avatar/discourse.julialang.org/tobias.knopp/32/7551_2.png) [@tobias.knopp](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/tobias.knopp)\
**Post date:** [August 16, 2018, 10:25am UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/hdf-and-jld-have-been-unbuildable-on-macs-for-months-not-sure-anyone-is-addressing/13468/5 "2018-08-16T10:25:54Z")

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I have opened [https://github.com/staticfloat/homebrew-juliadeps/issues/132](https://github.com/staticfloat/homebrew-juliadeps/issues/132) since I think what should be done is to make a custom formula for gcc allowing relocation. I hope of course that Steven will solve this in the long run with the fork of HDF5 that allows cross-compilation.

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**Author:** ![nickeubank](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/julialang/user_avatar/discourse.julialang.org/nickeubank/32/3878_2.png) [@nickeubank](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/nickeubank)\
**Post date:** [September 20, 2018, 2:29pm UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/hdf-and-jld-have-been-unbuildable-on-macs-for-months-not-sure-anyone-is-addressing/13468/7 "2018-09-20T14:29:21Z")

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Just a note that HDF and JLD are still, as far as I can tell, unbuildable for new users… (sorry, last post was reply to wrong portion of post)