This morning, I updated Endeavour OS with yay -Syu. One of the updated packages was extra/graphviz, which got a minor update.
yay -Syu output contained the following lines.
Warning: Could not load “/usr/lib/graphviz/libgvplugin_gs.so.6” - It was found, so perhaps one of its dependents was not. Try ldd.
Warning: Could not load “/usr/lib/graphviz/libgvplugin_gs.so.6” - It was found, so perhaps one of its dependents was not. Try ldd.
How do I check with ldd which dependencies of /usr/lib/graphviz/libgvplugin_gs.so.6 haven’t been loaded?
After I understand which dependencies caused those warnings, what should I do?
I thought ldd was the linker and wondered in which way a linker would show which shared libraries weren’t loaded.
In my defense, I can say that ldd --help doesn’t even say what that command is.
Usage: ldd [OPTION]... FILE...
--help print this help and exit
--version print version information and exit
-d, --data-relocs process data relocations
-r, --function-relocs process data and function relocations
-u, --unused print unused direct dependencies
-v, --verbose print all information
On the bright side, the output of ldd /usr/lib/graphviz/libgvplugin_gs.so.6 shows every dependencies is loaded. At least, that is what I guess, since the command output are lines like the following, where the part in parentheses should be the address where the shared library is loaded.
I learned a lesson: Instead of checking what the command help says, check what the output of man for that command is. Chances are it gives more useful information.
NAME
ldd - print shared object dependencies
SYNOPSIS
ldd [option]... file...
DESCRIPTION
ldd prints the shared objects (shared libraries) required by each program or shared object specified on the command line.
An example of its use and output is the following:
$ ldd /bin/ls
linux-vdso.so.1 (0x00007ffcc3563000)
libselinux.so.1 => /lib64/libselinux.so.1 (0x00007f87e5459000)
libcap.so.2 => /lib64/libcap.so.2 (0x00007f87e5254000)
libc.so.6 => /lib64/libc.so.6 (0x00007f87e4e92000)
libpcre.so.1 => /lib64/libpcre.so.1 (0x00007f87e4c22000)
libdl.so.2 => /lib64/libdl.so.2 (0x00007f87e4a1e000)
/lib64/ld-linux-x86-64.so.2 (0x00005574bf12e000)
libattr.so.1 => /lib64/libattr.so.1 (0x00007f87e4817000)
libpthread.so.0 => /lib64/libpthread.so.0 (0x00007f87e45fa000)
print shared object dependencies should make clear ldd is not the linker but the command that shows the information I was looking for.
I am not at the machine where I had this issue updating but when I ran the ldd command at the very top was a library without => to point to any path where it should be found. That would be the “missing link”.
Edit:
Ah, I see your edit now, so there you have it:
It’s the first entry shown. I guess I didn’t pay attention to that also because I thought that number was a memory address.
What I shown in the previous comment is the output of man ldd, though. I find interesting it shows the same line I get with ldd /usr/lib/graphviz/libgvplugin_gs.so.6 but for ldd /bin/ls.
Although Graphviz is required by Gimp, it’s only for the visualisation of data in graph form or similar. I’ve just been using Gimp without any issues. I guess it’s not much of an issue for many folk. It doesn’t seem to be a major component. Hope fully upstream will resolve it.
It seems that is the virtual ELF dynamic shared object the kernel automatically maps into the address space of all user-space applications. If I understand correctly, it cannot be a missing shared library.
Apparently, that warning doesn’t mean Graphviz won’t work as expected. It seems more a false positive given from the installation or a temporary glitch.
I correct myself: There is an issue that needs to be fixed, but it’s not a missing dependency like the warning suggests.
It seems the issue isn’t a missing dependency, as the warning suggests, but libgvplugin_gs.so that tries to access a symbol that isn’t exposed anymore from libgs.so (/usr/lib/libgs.so). Effectively, there is an issue that needs to be fixed.
I just got the exact same message when updating my system today, what is the impact of this? I restart the laptop and now have no issues using it (at least for now…).
It’s one of the Graphviz plugins that isn’t loadable. Graphviz itself is used by GIMP to create diagrams.
If you don’t use that functionality, you won’t notice any change. GIMP opens as usual and it works as always.
We can just wait for a fix. GIMP requires Graphviz; it’s not possible to remove the latter without removing the first.
for future use, the command that shows the error in question is
$ ldd -d filename
(long list of correct files, most of which are links, and then at the bottom:)
undefined symbol: gs_error_names (/usr/lib/graphviz/libgvplugin_gs.so.6)
Now that you helped me in understanding what man ldd was saying about the -d option, I can say that ldd -r reports every missing functions and objects.
