Unable to find ncurses library

[ghost]

I'm trying to compile conky from source. But when I enter cmake ../ I get:

CMake Error at cmake/ConkyPlatformChecks.cmake:125 (message): Unable to find ncurses library Call Stack (most recent call first): CMakeLists.txt:37 (include)

I know that I don't have the ncurses library and I did a search about installing ncurses so I did:

sudo apt-get install libncurses5-dev libncursesw5-dev

But it still did not work. Can anyone help me? I'm not very experienced at compiling from source. I am running an ubuntu 32-bit computer.

[MattSturgeon]

You can try ncurses-dev instead of libncurses5-dev.

However, if I recall correctly, when I first built on my fedora machine, I'd run ccmake then installed ncurses after recieving the error and it kept giving the error until I cleaned my build directory.

You can try running this from your git checkout directory (you will have to reconfigure any options you entered):

rm -rf build/*

[ghost]

It doesn't work I tried:

'sudo apt-get install ncurses-dev'

it said:

'Note, selecting 'libncurses5-dev' instead of 'ncurses-dev' libncurses5-dev is already the newest version.`

It seems that my system only recognises libncurses5-dev

[MattSturgeon]

Did you try deleting build/* and starting ccmake from scratch?

[ghost]

It works now! I successfully built and installed it. Thanks very much! Just a quick question did I have to build the lua modules? Because currently my conky is just a black window on the left side of my desktop and when I click on my desktop it disappears. Is that normal?

[MattSturgeon]

Do you have a conkyrc file? What do you have the window mode set to?

[ghost]

Where do I find the conkyrc file? How do I check what window mode I set it to?

[MattSturgeon]

By default you create a file called ~/.conkyrc, but you can use any file with conky -c /path/to/any/conkyrc

I'm on my phone at the moment so I can't really help. If you just read the docs (man conky) or google "conky config file" it should be fairly clear.

All the settings, variables for use within the printed text.

[MattSturgeon]

Heres an example conkyrc:

conky.config = {
    -- output settings
    own_window = true,
    own_window_type = 'normal', 
        -- options are 'normal', 'desktop', 'dock',
        -- 'panel' or 'override'
    own_window_hints = 'above, skip_taskbar, skip_pager',
        -- options are 'undecorated', 'below', 'above',
        -- 'sticky', 'skip_taskbar', 'skip_pager'
    own_window_title = 'my awesome conky window',

    -- min and max sizes
    maximum_width = 200,
    minimum_width = 100,
    minimum_height = 20,

    -- position (or padding in 'normal' window mode)
    alignment = 'top_left',
    gap_x = 10,
    gap_y = 10,

    -- background and colours
    own_window_argb_visual = true, -- ARGB transparency; wont work well with 'override' mode
    own_window_argb_value = 230, -- opacity value (0-255)
    own_window_colour = '0000ff',
    default_color = '0c0c0c',

    -- where to print conky's output
    out_to_console = false,
    out_to_ncurses = false,
    out_to_x = true
}

conky.text = [[
CPU: ${cpubar}

RAM: ${membar}

Put other cool variables here
# you can write text section comments using '#' or options section comments with '--'
\
# You can escape newlines (and some other characters) with '\'
]]

[ghost]

I googled conky config file and found a wikihow page on how to configure conky, http://www.wikihow.com/Configure-Conky, it said to install lm-sensors. Should I do that?

[MattSturgeon]

It is a good way of configuring your sensors if you want to display things like HDD temps, CPU temps, fan speeds, voltages, etc.

Some of those things may already work correctly on your system.

There's a guide on how to setup lm-sensors here (you can skip step 2) if you want it

[Stolas]

Same issue on OpenSuse.

-- checking for module 'ncurses'
--   package 'ncurses' not found
CMake Error at cmake/ConkyPlatformChecks.cmake:124 (message):
  Unable to find ncurses library
Call Stack (most recent call first):
  CMakeLists.txt:37 (include)

-- Configuring incomplete, errors occurred!
See also "/home/stolas/code/conky/build/CMakeFiles/CMakeOutput.log".
See also "/home/stolas/code/conky/build/CMakeFiles/CMakeError.log".
stolas@wasp-prime:~/code/conky/build% zypper se ncurses                                                        3s
Loading repository data...
Reading installed packages...

S | Name                     | Summary                                                   | Type
--+--------------------------+-----------------------------------------------------------+--------
i | libncurses5              | The New curses Libraries                                  | package
i | libncurses5-32bit        | The New curses Libraries                                  | package
i | libncurses6              | The New curses Libraries                                  | package
i | libncurses6-32bit        | The New curses Libraries                                  | package
  | libyui-ncurses-devel     | Libyui-ncurses header files                               | package
  | libyui-ncurses-doc       | Libyui-ncurses documentation                              | package
  | libyui-ncurses-pkg-devel | Libyui-ncurses-pkg header files                           | package
  | libyui-ncurses-pkg-doc   | Libyui-ncurses-pkg documentation                          | package
i | libyui-ncurses-pkg7      | Libyui - yast2 package selector widget for the ncurses UI | package
i | libyui-ncurses7          | Libyui - Character Based User Interface                   | package
i | ncurses-devel            | Include Files and Libraries mandatory for Development     | package
  | ncurses-devel-32bit      | Include Files and Libraries mandatory for Development     | package
i | ncurses-utils            | Tools using the new curses libraries                      | package

Fix:

`diff --git a/cmake/ConkyPlatformChecks.cmake b/cmake/ConkyPlatformChecks.cmake
index ca0498b..7a87130 100644
--- a/cmake/ConkyPlatformChecks.cmake
+++ b/cmake/ConkyPlatformChecks.cmake
@@ -119,10 +119,11 @@ if(BUILD_HTTP)
 endif(BUILD_HTTP)

 if(BUILD_NCURSES)
-       pkg_check_modules(NCURSES ncurses)
-       if(NOT NCURSES_FOUND)
+       # pkg_check_modules(NCURSES ncurses)
+       check_include_files(ncurses/ncurses.h NCURSES_H_)
+       if(NOT NCURSES_H_)
                message(FATAL_ERROR "Unable to find ncurses library")
-       endif(NOT NCURSES_FOUND)
+       endif(NOT NCURSES_H_)
        set(conky_libs ${conky_libs} ${NCURSES_LIBRARIES})
        set(conky_includes ${conky_includes} ${NCURSES_INCLUDE_DIRS})
 endif(BUILD_NCURSES)
`

As this is on a headless server it now crashes on xorg. But I'll get into this myself, can someone with Buntu, Fedora, Debian check if their os can use this as well. Cheers

[MattSturgeon]

@Stolas could you submit a pull request so that @brndnmtthws can test and review your patch?

[Stolas]

I'll setup a decent development system (a non-headless one) and start submitting my Patches (I've got multiple)

[Vistaus]

Same issue on Solus. ncurses-devel is installed but Conky says it can't find it. Note that I've had ncurses-devel installed prior to cloning the Conky git master repo.

[arpitjindal97]

Same issue in Arch Linux

[plikhari]

@arpitjindal97 try using conky-cairo in the AUR

By the way - this is geared to work with lua 5.3

[arpitjindal97]

CMake Error at cmake/ConkyPlatformChecks.cmake:124 (message):
  Unable to find ncurses library
Call Stack (most recent call first):
  CMakeLists.txt:37 (include)

-- Configuring incomplete, errors occurred!
See also "/tmp/yaourt-tmp-arpit/aur-conky-cairo/src/conky-1.10.6/CMakeFiles/CMakeOutput.log".
See also "/tmp/yaourt-tmp-arpit/aur-conky-cairo/src/conky-1.10.6/CMakeFiles/CMakeError.log".
==> ERROR: A failure occurred in build().
    Aborting...
==> ERROR: Makepkg was unable to build .

[xsoft]

Ive tried this at Ubuntu 17.04 (64b), 16.10 (32b and 64b) but all ends with this: (VMbox images)

Note, selecting 'libncurses5-dev' instead of 'ncurses-dev'
E: Unable to locate package libqt4-core
E: Unable to locate package libqt4-gui

use: apt-get install libncurses5-dev ncurses-dev will NOT help

Using Ubuntu 12.04 worked (whoa)

Install OK!
make[1]: Leaving directory `/tmp/OpenBLAS'
WARNING: Your ipython version is too old.  Type "ipython --version" to see this.  Should be at least version 2
==> Torch7's dependencies have been installed

Ive used images from: http://www.osboxes.org/ubuntu/ Note that smallest Amazon Ubuntu image worked also.