Package Creation Tutorial

This tutorial walks you through the steps for creating and debugging a simple Spack package. We will develop and debug a package using an iterative approach to gain more experience with additional Spack commands. For consistency, we will create a package for mpileaks (https://github.com/LLNL/mpileaks), an MPI debugging tool.

What is a Spack Package?

Spack packages are installation scripts, which are essentially recipes for building (and testing) software.

They define properties and behavior of the build, such as:

where to find and how to retrieve the software;
its dependencies;
options for building from source; and
build commands.

They can also define checks of the installed software that can be performed after the installation.

Once we've specified a package's recipe, users can ask Spack to build the software with different features on any of the supported systems.

Getting Started

In order to avoid modifying your Spack installation with the package we are creating, add a package repository just for this tutorial by entering the following command:

.. literalinclude:: outputs/packaging/repo-add.out
   :language: console

Doing this ensures changes we make here do not adversely affect other parts of the tutorial. You can find out more about repositories at Package Repositories.

Creating the Package File

Note

Before proceeding, make sure your EDITOR environment variable is set to the name or path of your preferred text editor.

Suppose you want to install software that depends on mpileaks but found Spack did not already have a built-in package for it. This means you are going to have to create one.

Spack's create command builds a new package from a template by taking the location of the package's source code and using it to:

fetch the code;
create a package skeleton; and
open the file in your editor of choice.

The mpileaks source code is available in a tarball in the software's repository (https://github.com/LLNL/mpileaks). Spack will look at the contents of the tarball and generate a package when we run spack create with the URL:

.. literalinclude:: outputs/packaging/create.out
   :language: console

You should now be in your text editor of choice, with the package.py file open for editing.

Your package.py file should reside in the tutorial-mpileaks subdirectory of your tutorial repository's packages directory, i.e., $SPACK_ROOT/var/spack/repos/tutorial/packages/tutorial-mpileaks/package.py

Take a moment to look over the file.

As we can see from the skeleton contents, the Spack template:

provides instructions for how to contribute your package to the Spack repository;
indicates that the software is built with Autotools;
provides a docstring template;
provides an example homepage URL;
shows how to specify a list of package maintainers;
specifies the version directive, with checksum, for the software;
shows a dependency directive example; and
provides a skeleton configure_args method.

.. literalinclude:: tutorial/examples/packaging/0.package.py
   :caption: tutorial-mpileaks/package.py (from tutorial/examples/packaging/0.package.py)
   :language: python
   :emphasize-lines: 26,27,29-30,33-35,37-40,53-54,61-62

Note

The maintainers field is a comma-separated list of GitHub user names for those people who are willing to be notified when a change is made to the package. This information is useful for developers who maintain a Spack package for their own software and/or rely on software maintained by others.

Since we are providing a url, we can confirm the checksum, or sha256 calculation. Exit your editor to return to the command line and use the spack checksum command:

.. literalinclude:: outputs/packaging/checksum-mpileaks-1.out
   :language: console

Note the entire version directive is provided for your convenience.

We will now fill in the provided placeholders as we:

document some information about this package;
add dependencies; and
add the configuration arguments needed to build the package.

For the moment, though, let's see what Spack does with the skeleton by trying to install the package using the spack install command:

.. literalinclude:: outputs/packaging/install-mpileaks-1.out
   :language: console

The build was unsuccessful. The error indicates configure is unable to find the installation location of a dependency.

Let's start to customize the package for our software.

Adding Package Documentation

First, let's fill in the documentation.

Bring mpileaks' package.py file back into your $EDITOR with the spack edit command:

$ spack edit tutorial-mpileaks

Let's make the following changes:

remove the instructions between dashed lines at the top;
replace the first FIXME comment with a description of mpileaks in the docstring;
replace the homepage property with the correct link; and
uncomment the maintainers directive and add your GitHub user name.
add the license of the project and your GitHub user name.

Note

We will exclude the Copyright clause and license identifier in the remainder of the package snippets here to reduce the length of the tutorial documentation; however, the copyright is required for published packages.

Now make the changes and additions to your package.py file.

The resulting package should contain the following information:

.. literalinclude:: tutorial/examples/packaging/1.package.py
   :caption: mpileaks/package.py (from tutorial/examples/packaging/1.package.py)
   :lines: 6-
   :language: python
   :emphasize-lines: 5,7,10,12

At this point we've only updated key documentation within the package. It won't help us build the software; however, the information is now available for review.

Let's enter the spack info command for the package:

.. literalinclude:: outputs/packaging/info-mpileaks.out
   :language: console

Take a moment to look over the output. You should see the following information derived from the package:

it is an Autotools package;
it has the description, homepage, and maintainer(s) we provided;
it has the URL we gave the spack create command;
the preferred version was derived from the code;
the default Autotools package installation phases are listed;
the gnuconfig build dependency is inherited from AutotoolsPackage;
both the link and run dependencies are None at this point; and
it uses the 3-clause BSD license.

As we fill in more information about the package, the spack info command will become more informative.

Note

More information on using Autotools packages is provided in AutotoolsPackage.

The full list of build systems known to Spack can be found at Build Systems.

More information on the build-time tests can be found at https://spack.readthedocs.io/en/latest/packaging_guide_testing.html#build-time-tests.

Refer to the links at the end of this section for more information.

Now we're ready to start filling in the build recipe.

Adding Dependencies

First we'll add the dependencies determined by reviewing documentation in the software's repository (https://github.com/LLNL/mpileaks). The mpileaks software relies on three third-party libraries:

mpi,
adept-utils, and
callpath.

Note

Fortunately, all of these dependencies are built-in packages in Spack; otherwise, we would have to create packages for them as well.

Bring mpileaks' package.py file back up in your $EDITOR with the spack edit command:

$ spack edit tutorial-mpileaks

and add the dependencies by specifying them using the depends_on directive as shown below:

.. literalinclude:: tutorial/examples/packaging/2.package.py
   :caption: tutorial-mpileaks/package.py (from tutorial/examples/packaging/2.package.py)
   :lines: 6-
   :language: python
   :emphasize-lines: 25-27

Adding dependencies tells Spack that it must ensure these packages are installed before it can build our package.

Note

The mpi dependency is different from the other two in that it is a virtual dependency. That means Spack must satisfy the dependency with a package that provides the mpi interface, such as openmpi or mvapich2.

We call such packages providers. More information on virtual dependencies can be found in the Packaging Guide linked at the bottom of this tutorial.

Let's check that dependencies are effectively built when we try to install tutorial-mpileaks:

.. literalinclude:: outputs/packaging/install-mpileaks-2.out
   :language: console

Note

This command may take a while to run and may produce more output if you don't already have an MPI installed or configured in Spack.

We see that Spack has now identified and built all of our dependencies. It found that:

the openmpi package will satisfy our mpi dependency;
adept-utils is a concrete dependency; and
callpath is a concrete dependency.

We are still not able to build the package.

Debugging Package Builds

Our tutorial-mpileaks package is still not building due to the adept-utils package's configure error. Experienced Autotools developers will likely already see the problem and its solution. Let's take this opportunity to use Spack features to investigate the problem. Our options for proceeding are:

review the build log; and
build the package manually.

Reviewing the Build Log

The build log might yield some clues so let's look at the contents of the spack-build-out.txt file at the path recommended above by our failed installation:

.. literalinclude:: outputs/packaging/build-output.out
   :language: console

In this case the error conveniently appears on the last line of the log and the output from spack install.

Here we also see a number of checks performed by the configure command. Most importantly, the last line is very clear: the installation path of the adept-utils dependency cannot be found.

Note

Spack automatically adds standard include and library directories to the compiler's search path but it is not uncommon for this information to not get picked up. Some software, like mpileaks, requires the paths to be explicitly provided on the command line.

Let's investigate further from the staged build directory.

Building Manually

First let's try to build the package manually to see if we can figure out how to solve the problem.

Let's move to the build directory using the spack cd command:

$ spack cd tutorial-mpileaks

You should now be in the appropriate stage directory since this command moves us into the working directory of the last attempted build. If not, you can cd into the directory above that contained the spack-build-out.txt file then into its spack-src subdirectory.

Now let's ensure the environment is properly set up using the spack build-env command:

$ spack build-env tutorial-mpileaks bash

This command spawned a new shell containing the same environment that Spack used to build the tutorial-mpileaks package. (Feel free to substitute your favorite shell for bash.)

Note

If you are running using an AWS instance, you'll want to substitute your home directory for /home/spack below.

From here we can manually re-run the build using the configure command:

.. literalinclude:: outputs/packaging/build-env-configure.out
   :language: console

And we get the same results as before. Unfortunately, the output does not provide any additional information that can help us with the build.

Given that this is a simple package built with configure and we know that installation directories need to be specified, we can use its help to see what command line options are available for the software.

.. literalinclude:: outputs/packaging/configure-help.out
   :language: console
   :emphasize-lines: 80-81

Note that you can specify the paths for the two concrete dependencies with the following options:

--with-adept-utils=PATH
--with-callpath=PATH

Let's leave the spawned shell and return to the Spack repository directory:

$ exit
$ cd $SPACK_ROOT

Now that we know what arguments to provide, we can update the recipe.

Specifying Configure Arguments

We now know which options we need to pass to configure, but how do we know where to find the installation paths for the package's dependencies from within the package.py file?

Fortunately, we can query the package's concrete Spec instance. The self.spec property holds the package's directed acyclic graph (DAG) of its dependencies. Each dependency's Spec, accessed by name, has a prefix property containing its installation path.

So let's add the configuration arguments for specifying the paths to the two concrete dependencies in the configure_args method of our package.

Bring mpileaks' package.py file back up in your $EDITOR with the spack edit command:

$ spack edit tutorial-mpileaks

and add the --with-adept-utils and --with-callpath arguments in the configure_args method as follows:

.. literalinclude:: tutorial/examples/packaging/3.package.py
   :caption: tutorial-mpileaks/package.py (from tutorial/examples/packaging/3.package.py)
   :lines: 6-
   :language: python
   :emphasize-lines: 32-36

Since this is an AutotoolsPackage, the arguments returned from the method will automatically get passed to configure during the build.

Now let's try the build again:

.. literalinclude:: outputs/packaging/install-mpileaks-3.out
   :language: console

Success!

All we needed to do was add the path arguments for the two concrete packages for configure to perform a simple, simple build.

Is that all we can do to help other users build our software?

Adding Variants

What if we want to expose the software's optional features in the package? We can do this by adding build-time options using package variants.

Recall from configure's help output for tutorial-mpileaks that the software has several optional features and packages that we could support in Spack. Two stand out for tutorial purposes because they both take integers, as opposed to allowing them to be enabled or disabled.

.. literalinclude:: outputs/packaging/configure-build-options.out
   :language: console
   :emphasize-lines: 18-23

According to the software's documentation (https://github.com/LLNL/mpileaks), the integer values for the --with-stack-start-* options represent the numbers of calls to shave off of the top of the stack traces for each language, effectively reducing the noise of internal mpileaks library function calls in generated traces.

For simplicity, we'll use one variant to supply the value for both arguments.

Supporting this optional feature will require two changes to the package:

add a variant directive; and
change the configure options to use the value.

Let's add the variant to expect an int value with a default of 0. Setting the default to 0 effectively disables the option. Change configure_args to retrieve the value and add the corresponding configure arguments when a non-zero value is provided by the user.

Bring mpileaks' package.py file back up in your $EDITOR with the spack edit command:

$ spack edit tutorial-mpileaks

and add the variant directive and associated arguments as follows:

.. literalinclude:: tutorial/examples/packaging/4.package.py
   :caption: tutorial-mpileaks/package.py (from tutorial/examples/packaging/4.package.py)
   :lines: 6-
   :language: python
   :emphasize-lines: 16-21,45-52

Notice that the variant directive is translated into a variants dictionary in self.spec. Also note that the value provided by the user is accessed by the entry's value property.

Now run the installation again with the --verbose install option -- to get more output during the build -- and the new stackstart package option:

.. literalinclude:: outputs/packaging/install-mpileaks-4.out
   :language: console

Notice the addition of the two stack start arguments in the configure command that appears at the end of the highlighted line after mpileaks' Executing phase: 'configure'.

Adding Tests

The simplest tests we can add are sanity checks, which can be used to ensure the directories and files we expect to be installed for all versions of the package actually exist. If we look at a successful installation, we can see that the following directories will be installed:

So let's add a simple sanity check to ensure they are present, but let's enter a typo to see what happens:

.. literalinclude:: tutorial/examples/packaging/5.package.py
   :caption: tutorial-mpileaks/package.py (from tutorial/examples/packaging/5.package.py)
   :lines: 6-
   :language: python
   :emphasize-lines: 14

We'll need to uninstall the package so we can re-run it with tests enabled:

.. literalinclude:: outputs/packaging/install-mpileaks-5.out
   :language: console

Notice the installation fails due to the missing directory.

Now let's fix the error and try again:

.. literalinclude:: tutorial/examples/packaging/6.package.py
   :caption: tutorial-mpileaks/package.py (from tutorial/examples/packaging/6.package.py)
   :lines: 6-
   :language: python
   :emphasize-lines: 14

Installing again we can see we've fixed the problem.

.. literalinclude:: outputs/packaging/install-mpileaks-6.out
   :language: console

This only scratches the surface of testing an installation. We could leverage the examples from this package to add post-install phase tests and/or stand-alone tests. Refer to the links at the bottom for more information on checking an installation.

Querying the Spec Object

As packages evolve and are ported to different systems, build recipes often need to change as well. This is where the package's Spec comes in.

Previously, we've looked at getting the paths for dependencies and values of variants from the Spec; however, there is more to consider. The package's self.spec, property allows you to query information about the package build, such as:

how a package's dependencies were built;
what compiler was being used;
what version of a package is being installed; and
what variants were specified (implicitly or explicitly).

Examples of common queries are provided below.

Querying Spec Versions

You can customize the build based on the version of the package, compiler, and dependencies. Examples of each are:

Am I building my package with version 1.1 or greater?

if self.spec.satisfies("@1.1:"):
    # Do things needed for version 1.1 or newer

Am I building with a gcc version up to 5.0?

if self.spec.satisfies("%gcc@:5.0"):
    # Add arguments specific to gcc's up to 5.0

Is my dyninst dependency at least version 8.0?

if self.spec["dyninst"].satisfies("@8.0:"):
    # Use newest dyninst options

Querying Spec Names

If the build has to be customized to the concrete version of an abstract Spec you can use its name property. For example:

Is openmpi the MPI I'm building with?

if self.spec["mpi"].name == "openmpi":
    # Do openmpi things

Querying Variants

Adjusting build options based on enabled variants can be done by querying the Spec itself, such as:

Am I building with the debug variant?

if "+debug" in self.spec:
    # Add -g option to configure flags

These are just a few examples of Spec queries. Spack has thousands of built-in packages that can serve as examples to guide the development of your package. You can find these packages in $SPACK_ROOT/var/spack/repos/builtin/packages.

Multiple Build Systems

There are cases where software actively supports two build systems, or changes build systems as it evolves, or needs different build systems on different platforms. Spack also allows you to write a single, concise recipe for these cases. It will require only a slight change in the recipe's structure compared to what we have seen so far.

Let's take uncrustify, a source code beautifier, as an example. This software used to build with Autotools until version 0.63, and then switched build systems to CMake at version 0.64.

Compared to previous recipes in this tutorial, in this case we need Uncrustify to inherit from both CMakePackage and AutotoolsPackage. We also need to explicitly specify the build_system directive, and add conditional dependencies based on build system:

class Uncrustify(CMakePackage, AutotoolsPackage):
    """Source Code Beautifier for C, C++, C#, ObjectiveC, Java, and others."""

    homepage = "http://uncrustify.sourceforge.net/"
    git = "https://github.com/uncrustify/uncrustify"

    version("0.64", commit="1d7d97")
    version("0.63", commit="44ce0f")

    build_system(
        conditional("cmake", when="@0.64:"),
        conditional("autotools", when="@:0.63"),
        default="cmake",
    )

    with when("build_system=cmake"):
        depends_on("cmake@3.18:", type="build")

We haven't mentioned previously, but each spec has a build_system variant that specifies the build system it uses. In most cases that variant has a single allowed value, inherited from the corresponding base package - so, usually, you don't have to think about it.

When your package supports more than one build system though, you have to explicitly declare which ones are allowed and under which conditions. In the example above it's cmake for version 0.64 and higher and autotools for version 0.63 and lower.

The build_system variant can also be used to declare other properties which are conditional on the build system being selected. For instance, above we declare that when using cmake, CMake 3.18+ is required.

The other relevant difference, compared to the previous recipes we have seen so far, is that the code prescribing the installation procedure will live into two separate classes:

class CMakeBuilder(spack.build_systems.cmake.CMakeBuilder):
   def cmake_args(self):
       pass

class AutotoolsBuilder(spack.build_systems.autotools.AutotoolsBuilder):
   def configure_args(self):
       pass

Depending on the spec, and more specifically on the value of the build_system directive, a Builder object will be instantiated from one of the two classes when an installation is requested from a user.

Cleaning Up

Before leaving this tutorial, let's ensure that our work does not interfere with your Spack instance or future sections of the tutorial. Undo the work we've done here by entering the following commands:

.. literalinclude:: outputs/packaging/cleanup.out
   :language: console

More information

This tutorial module only scratches the surface of defining Spack package recipes. The Packaging Guide covers packaging topics more thoroughly.

Additional information on key topics can be found at the links below.

Customizing package-related environments

Retrieving Library Information: for supporting unique configuration options needed to locate libraries.
Modifying a Package's Build Environment: for customizing package and dependency build and run environments.

Testing an installation

Checking an installation: for more information on adding tests that run at build-time and against an installation.

Using other build systems

Build Systems: for the full list of built-in build systems.
Spack Package Build Systems tutorial: for tutorials on common build systems.
Multiple Build Systems: for a reference on writing packages with multiple build systems.
Package Class Architecture: for more insight on the inner workings of Package and Builder classes.
The GDAL Package: for an example of a complex package which extends Python and supports two build systems.

Making a package externally detectable

Making a package externally discoverable: for making a package discoverable using the spack external find command.

Provide feedback

Saved searches

Use saved searches to filter your results more quickly

Package Creation Tutorial

What is a Spack Package?

Getting Started

Creating the Package File

Adding Package Documentation

Adding Dependencies

Debugging Package Builds

Reviewing the Build Log

Building Manually

Specifying Configure Arguments

Adding Variants

Adding Tests

Querying the Spec Object

Querying Spec Versions

Querying Spec Names

Querying Variants

Multiple Build Systems

Cleaning Up

More information

Customizing package-related environments

Testing an installation

Using other build systems

Making a package externally detectable

FilesExpand file tree

tutorial_packaging.rst

Latest commit

History

tutorial_packaging.rst

File metadata and controls

Package Creation Tutorial

What is a Spack Package?

Getting Started

Creating the Package File

Adding Package Documentation

Adding Dependencies

Debugging Package Builds

Reviewing the Build Log

Building Manually

Specifying Configure Arguments

Adding Variants

Adding Tests

Querying the Spec Object

Querying Spec Versions

Querying Spec Names

Querying Variants

Multiple Build Systems

Cleaning Up

More information

Customizing package-related environments

Testing an installation

Using other build systems

Making a package externally detectable