How do I compile and test a c program with vala code in it?

Question

I am working on a specialized version of the Gnome Cheese app for a photo-booth. At the moment though I am simply trying to get rid of unnecessary code and simply the app before I add the features I want. This has the added benefit of letting me get comfy with vala which I have never used before, as well as a project like this which I have also never worked on.

The problem I am running into is I see no easy way to go about testing it, and despite having cheese already installed on my computer (so I know all required apps are installed), I am still getting errors in there.

  /usr/bin/gnome-autogen.sh
checking for autoconf >= 2.53...
  testing autoconf2.50... not found.
  testing autoconf... found 2.69
checking for automake >= 1.9...
  testing automake-1.12... not found.
  testing automake-1.11... found 1.11.6
checking for libtool >= 1.5...
  testing libtoolize... found 2.4.2
checking for intltool >= 0.30...
  testing intltoolize... found 0.50.2
checking for pkg-config >= 0.14.0...
  testing pkg-config... found 0.26
checking for gtk-doc >= 1.0...
  testing gtkdocize... found 1.18
Checking for required M4 macros...
Checking for forbidden M4 macros...
**Warning**: I am going to run `configure' with no arguments.
If you wish to pass any to it, please specify them on the
`./autogen.sh' command line.

Processing ./configure.ac
Running libtoolize...
libtoolize: putting auxiliary files in AC_CONFIG_AUX_DIR, `build-aux'.
libtoolize: copying file `build-aux/ltmain.sh'
libtoolize: putting macros in AC_CONFIG_MACRO_DIR, `m4'.
libtoolize: copying file `m4/libtool.m4'
libtoolize: copying file `m4/ltoptions.m4'
libtoolize: copying file `m4/ltsugar.m4'
libtoolize: copying file `m4/ltversion.m4'
libtoolize: copying file `m4/lt~obsolete.m4'
Running intltoolize...
Running gtkdocize...
Running aclocal-1.11...
Running autoconf...
Running autoheader...
Running automake-1.11...
Running ./configure --enable-maintainer-mode ...
checking for a BSD-compatible install... /usr/bin/install -c
checking whether build environment is sane... yes
checking for a thread-safe mkdir -p... /bin/mkdir -p
checking for gawk... no
checking for mawk... mawk
checking whether make sets $(MAKE)... yes
checking whether to enable maintainer-specific portions of Makefiles... yes
checking whether make supports nested variables... yes
checking for gcc... gcc
checking whether the C compiler works... yes
checking for C compiler default output file name... a.out
checking for suffix of executables... 
checking whether we are cross compiling... no
checking for suffix of object files... o
checking whether we are using the GNU C compiler... yes
checking whether gcc accepts -g... yes
checking for gcc option to accept ISO C89... none needed
checking for style of include used by make... GNU
checking dependency style of gcc... gcc3
checking whether gcc and cc understand -c and -o together... yes
checking for valac... /usr/bin/valac
checking /usr/bin/valac is at least version 0.18.0... yes
checking build system type... x86_64-unknown-linux-gnu
checking host system type... x86_64-unknown-linux-gnu
checking how to print strings... printf
checking for a sed that does not truncate output... /bin/sed
checking for grep that handles long lines and -e... /bin/grep
checking for egrep... /bin/grep -E
checking for fgrep... /bin/grep -F
checking for ld used by gcc... /usr/bin/ld
checking if the linker (/usr/bin/ld) is GNU ld... yes
checking for BSD- or MS-compatible name lister (nm)... /usr/bin/nm -B
checking the name lister (/usr/bin/nm -B) interface... BSD nm
checking whether ln -s works... yes
checking the maximum length of command line arguments... 1572864
checking whether the shell understands some XSI constructs... yes
checking whether the shell understands "+="... yes
checking how to convert x86_64-unknown-linux-gnu file names to x86_64-unknown-linux-gnu format... func_convert_file_noop
checking how to convert x86_64-unknown-linux-gnu file names to toolchain format... func_convert_file_noop
checking for /usr/bin/ld option to reload object files... -r
checking for objdump... objdump
checking how to recognize dependent libraries... pass_all
checking for dlltool... no
checking how to associate runtime and link libraries... printf %s\n
checking for ar... ar
checking for archiver @FILE support... @
checking for strip... strip
checking for ranlib... ranlib
checking command to parse /usr/bin/nm -B output from gcc object... ok
checking for sysroot... no
checking for mt... mt
checking if mt is a manifest tool... no
checking how to run the C preprocessor... gcc -E
checking for ANSI C header files... yes
checking for sys/types.h... yes
checking for sys/stat.h... yes
checking for stdlib.h... yes
checking for string.h... yes
checking for memory.h... yes
checking for strings.h... yes
checking for inttypes.h... yes
checking for stdint.h... yes
checking for unistd.h... yes
checking for dlfcn.h... yes
checking for objdir... .libs
checking if gcc supports -fno-rtti -fno-exceptions... no
checking for gcc option to produce PIC... -fPIC -DPIC
checking if gcc PIC flag -fPIC -DPIC works... yes
checking if gcc static flag -static works... yes
checking if gcc supports -c -o file.o... yes
checking if gcc supports -c -o file.o... (cached) yes
checking whether the gcc linker (/usr/bin/ld -m elf_x86_64) supports shared libraries... yes
checking whether -lc should be explicitly linked in... no
checking dynamic linker characteristics... GNU/Linux ld.so
checking how to hardcode library paths into programs... immediate
checking whether stripping libraries is possible... yes
checking if libtool supports shared libraries... yes
checking whether to build shared libraries... yes
checking whether to build static libraries... no
checking for pkg-config... /usr/bin/pkg-config
checking pkg-config is at least version 0.24... yes
checking whether gcc understands -Wno-sign-compare... yes
checking what warning flags to pass to the C compiler... -Wall -Wmissing-prototypes -Wnested-externs -Wpointer-arith -Wno-sign-compare
checking what language compliance flags to pass to the C compiler... 
checking whether NLS is requested... yes
checking for intltool >= 0.50.0... 0.50.2 found
checking for intltool-update... /usr/bin/intltool-update
checking for intltool-merge... /usr/bin/intltool-merge
checking for intltool-extract... /usr/bin/intltool-extract
checking for xgettext... /usr/bin/xgettext
checking for msgmerge... /usr/bin/msgmerge
checking for msgfmt... /usr/bin/msgfmt
checking for gmsgfmt... /usr/bin/msgfmt
checking for perl... /usr/bin/perl
checking for perl >= 5.8.1... 5.14.2
checking for XML::Parser... ok
checking host operating system... Linux
checking for gudev-1.0... found
checking sys/videoio.h usability... no
checking sys/videoio.h presence... no
checking for sys/videoio.h... no
checking X11/extensions/XTest.h usability... no
checking X11/extensions/XTest.h presence... no
checking for X11/extensions/XTest.h... no
checking for CHEESE... no
configure: error: Package requirements (glib-2.0 >= 2.28.0
  gio-2.0 >= 2.32.0
  x11
  gobject-2.0 >= 2.28.0
  gdk-pixbuf-2.0
  gstreamer-plugins-base-1.0 >= 0.11.0 gstreamer-1.0 >= 0.11.0 gstreamer-pbutils-1.0 >= 0.11.0
  gstreamer-plugins-bad-1.0 >= 0.11.0
  gnome-desktop-3.0 >= 2.91.6
  cairo >= 1.10.0
  pangocairo >= 1.28.0
  clutter-1.0 >= 1.12.0
  clutter-gst-2.0 >= 1.9.0
  gudev-1.0) were not met:

No package 'gstreamer-plugins-base-1.0' found
No package 'gstreamer-1.0' found
No package 'gstreamer-pbutils-1.0' found
No package 'gstreamer-plugins-bad-1.0' found
No package 'gnome-desktop-3.0' found
No package 'clutter-1.0' found
No package 'clutter-gst-2.0' found

Consider adjusting the PKG_CONFIG_PATH environment variable if you
installed software in a non-standard prefix.

Alternatively, you may set the environment variables CHEESE_CFLAGS
and CHEESE_LIBS to avoid the need to call pkg-config.
See the pkg-config man page for more details.

That is what I get when I do sh autogen.sh. I feel there has got to be a better way and I was wondering if anyone had any ideas or solutions to make this work.

Thanks, my code can be found: here

Answer 1

having cheese already installed on my computer (so I know all required apps are installed)

You might have all the required libs installed as binaries, but apparently you do not have the corresponding headers installed.

To run a dynamically linked application, you need to have the .so files of the dependencies installed. To compile an application, you also need to have the dependencies' header (and, in case of libraries that work with pkg-config , .pc ) files installed, which, according to the error message, you don't.

Most package management systems are set up, so that a libraries' header and .pc files (and generally all files that are only relevant when compiling an application that uses the library - not when running it) are contained in -dev packages. So you need to install clutter-dev and so on.