Does not work on NixOS due to non standard FHS

[devins2518]

build.zig

const std = @import("std");
const Sdk = @import("sdl/Sdk.zig");

pub fn build(b: *std.build.Builder) void {
    const target = b.standardTargetOptions(.{});

    const sdk = Sdk.init(b);

    const mode = b.standardReleaseOptions();

    const exe = b.addExecutable("ziggyboy", "src/main.zig");
    exe.setTarget(target);
    exe.setBuildMode(mode);
    sdk.link(exe, .static);
    exe.addPackage(sdk.getNativePackage("sdl2"));
    // exe.linkSystemLibrary("SDL2");
    // exe.linkSystemLibrary("c");
    exe.install();

    const run_cmd = exe.run();
    run_cmd.step.dependOn(b.getInstallStep());
    if (b.args) |args| {
        run_cmd.addArgs(args);
    }

    const run_step = b.step("run", "Run the app");
    run_step.dependOn(&run_cmd.step);

    const tests = b.addTest("src/main.zig");
    tests.setBuildMode(mode);

    const test_step = b.step("test", "Run all the tests");
    test_step.dependOn(&tests.step);
}

Error from LLD

ld.lld: error: unable to find library -lsdl2
error: LLDReportedFailure
ziggyboy...The following command exited with error code 1:
/nix/store/rfpl182slqas5nq68xbla2901jc6f6c6-zig-master-unstable-2021-06-27/bin/zig build-exe /home/devin/Repos/ziggyboy/src/main.zig -lc -lsdl2 --cache-dir /home/devin/Repos/ziggyboy/zig-cache --global-cache-dir /home/devin/.cache/zig --name ziggyboy --enable-cache
error: the following build command failed with exit code 1:
/home/devin/Repos/ziggyboy/zig-cache/o/fd09d5499e7e1e5f701e4b7c647cdf96/build /nix/store/rfpl182slqas5nq68xbla2901jc6f6c6-zig-master-unstable-2021-06-27/bin/zig /home/devin/Repos/ziggyboy /home/devin/Repos/ziggyboy/zig-cache /home/devin/.cache/zig

My shell.nix

{ pkgs ? import <nixpkgs> { } }:
pkgs.mkShell {
  nativeBuildInputs = with pkgs; [ SDL2 pkgconf ];
  NIX_LD_LIBRARY_PATH =
    pkgs.lib.makeLibraryPath [ pkgs.pkgconf pkgs.SDL2 pkgs.lld ];
  NIX_LD = builtins.readFile "${pkgs.stdenv.cc}/nix-support/dynamic-linker";
}

Using Andrew's build.zig as an example, linking them as system libraries does compile using the shell.nix.

    exe.linkSystemLibrary("SDL2");
    exe.linkSystemLibrary("c");

Might be related to NixOS/nixpkgs#24744

[devins2518]

Actually it seems that just changing line 229 fixes it, but I'm not sure if this is portable to other distros.

-            exe.linkSystemLibrary("sdl2");
+            exe.linkSystemLibrary("SDL2");

[ikskuh]

Afaik the official pkg-config name is SDL2, not sdl2. This means that NixOS isn't compatible here to other linux distributions having pkg-config.

It would be a good idea to verify this and maybe file a bug report to NixOS