Cygwin and "failed to run aclocal: No such file or directory"

Question

I'm trying to test our Autotools stuff on Cygwin. When I open a prompt:

$ autoreconf --install --force
Can't exec "aclocal": No such file or directory at /usr/share/autoconf/Autom4te/FileUtils.pm line 326.
autoreconf-2.69: failed to run aclocal: No such file or directory

I re-ran the Cygwin package manager and verified autoconf, automake and libtool were installed. There is no package aclocal to install.

Searching is not returning useful hits in the context of Cygwin.

What is the problem, and how do I fix it?

Alary

brew install automake,libtool – Mandimandible

I had this error for a different package manager and the solution was to install automake. – Let

Answer 1

So it looks like it is not enough to install Autoconf 2.69, Automake 1.15 and Libtool. There are other packages that need to be installed, but Cygwin does not install them.

First, I needed the package called automake: wrapper for multiple versions of Automake. Second, I needed the package called libtool: generic library support script.

The package called autoconf: wrapper for multiple versions of Autoconf was already installed, so it did not need to be installed.

If the Autools package needs them, then it should probably install them when users select packages like Autoconf 2.69 and Automake 1.15.

Alary

Thanks for the help! Anyone reading this. Pay attention to the difference between Auotmake 1.15 and "automake: wrapper for multiple versions of Automake" – Knepper

Is it then recommended to just install the generic Automake rather than the versioned one? Does it pull out all versions? I haven't tried the various permutations – Kristeenkristel

What a mess. To compile anything takes way too long. – Dinsmore

Answer 2

It just cannot find aclocal

• Find the aclocal

$ which aclocal-1.15
/usr/bin/aclocal-1.15

• Then create the soft link, then it works

$ ln -s /usr/bin/aclocal-1.15 /usr/bin/aclocal

Genevieve

If the error " error: automake failed with exit status: 1" , just "ln -s /usr/bin/automake-1.15 /usr/bin/automake" as well – Ardath