FINDLIB.CONF - reference manual online

findlib.conf(5)                        File Formats Manual                        findlib.conf(5)

NAME
       findlib.conf - [Configuration of findlib/ocamlfind]

GENERAL
       There are three possibilities to configure the findlib library:

         Build time:

              Before findlib is compiled, a "configure" script is invoked to figure  out the set‐
              tings that are most likely to work on the system. Most  settings are simply entered
              into text files and can easily be changed  after installation. The following prop‐
              erties cannot be changed later  because they are compiled into the resulting bina‐
              ries:

                  ·  The default location of the configuration file findlib.conf. However,  you
                     can set a different location by the environment variable  OCAMLFIND_CONF.

                  ·  Whether the installed O'Caml version supports autolinking or not.

         Configuration file findlib.conf:

              An initial version of this file is generated by the configure script,  but you are
              free to modify it later. Most important, this file  contains the system-wide search
              path used to look up packages, and the  default location where to install new pack‐
              ages.

              All files with the suffix ".conf" found in the directory  findlib.conf.d are also
              scanned for parameters.

         Environment variables:

              The settings of findlib.conf can be overridden by environment variables.

       Last but not least, several settings can also be passed as command-line options, or by
       invoking the function Findlib.init.

findlib.conf
       The directory containing findlib.conf is determined at build time (by running the config‐
       ure script), the fallback default is /usr/local/etc. You can set a different location by
       changing the environment variable OCAMLFIND_CONF which must contain the absolute path of
       findlib.conf.

       The file has the same syntax as META, i.e. it consists of a number of lines with the for‐
       mat

       variable = "value"

       Here is the list of allowed variables:

         path

              The search path for META files/package directories. The variable  enumerates direc‐
              tories which are separated by colons (Windows:  semicolons), and these directories
              are tried in turn to find a certain  package. More exactly, if d is such a direc‐
              tory and p the searched  package, the search algorithm will first check whether
              d/p/META  exists. In this case, this META file is taken, and d/p is the package
              directory. Second, the algorithm tries d/META.p, but the package  directory must be
              specified in this META.p file by a  directory directive.

              Note that the first found META file is taken, so the order of the  directories in
              the search path counts.

              This variable is required.

              Example:

              path = "/usr/local/lib/ocaml/site-lib:/usr/lib/ocaml/site-lib"

         destdir

              This variable determines the location where ocamlfind  install puts the packages by
              default: If d is this  directory, and p the package to install, a new subdirectory
              d/p will  be created containing all the files of the package.

              Example:

              destdir = "/usr/local/lib/ocaml/site-lib"

              This variable is required.

         metadir

              If set, the command ocamlfind install will put the  META files of packages into
              this directory (files are named META.p  where p=package name); otherwise the META
              files are put into the  package directories like any other file.

              Example:

              metadir = "/var/lib/findlib/metaregistry"

              This variable is optional. It is not used by default.

         ocamlc,  ocamlopt,  ocamlcp,  ocamlmktop,  ocamldoc,  ocamldep,  ocamlbrowser

              If you want to call other executables than "ocamlc", "ocamlopt",  "ocamlcp",
              "ocamlmktop", "ocamldoc", "ocamldep", and  "ocamlbrowser", you can  set the names
              of  the executables here. The command ocamlfind looks  into these four variables to
              determine the names of the compilers to  call.

              Example:

              ocamlc     = "ocamlc.opt"
              ocamlopt   = "ocamlopt.opt"
              ocamlcp    = "ocamlcp.opt"
              ocamlmktop = "ocamlmktop.opt"

              This variable is optional. It is not used by default.

         stdlib

              This variable determines the location of the standard library. This must  be the
              same directory for which the O'Caml compilers are configured.

              This variable is optional. It is not recommend to set this variable  unless you
              know what you are doing!

         ldconf

              This variable determines the location of the ld.conf file. This must  be the same
              file the O'Caml compilers read in; it is updated by   ocamlfind when installing and
              removing packages. You can set this  variable to the special value "ignore" to dis‐
              able  the automatic modification of the ld.conf file.

              If not set, the ld.conf file is assumed to reside in the O'Caml  standard library
              directory.

              This variable is optional. It is not recommended to set this variable  unless you
              know what you are doing!

       Toolchains: It is possible to have variants of the original configuration. These variants
       are called "toolchains" because they are intended to select different compilers, e.g.
       patched compilers. In order to set a variable for a certain toolchain, use the syntax

       variable(toolchain) = "value"
         For example:

       ocamlc(mypatch) = "ocamlc-mypatch"
         When the toolchain "mypatch" is selected, this compiler will be used instead of the
       standard one.

       In order to switch to a certain toolchain, use the -toolchain option of ocamlfind.

Environment
       A number of environment variables modifies the behaviour of findlib/ocamlfind:

         OCAMLFIND_CONF

              This variable overrides the location of the configuration file  findlib.conf. It
              must contain the absolute path name of this file.

         OCAMLFIND_TOOLCHAIN

              This variable sets the currently selected toolchain when  a -toolchain option is
              not passed  on the command line.

         OCAMLPATH

              This variable may contain an additional search path for package  directories. It is
              treated as if the directories were prepended to  the configuration variable path.

         OCAMLFIND_DESTDIR

              This variable overrides the configuration variable  destdir.

         OCAMLFIND_METADIR

              This variable overrides the configuration variable  metadir.

         OCAMLFIND_COMMANDS

              This variable overrides the configuration variables  ocamlc, ocamlopt,  ocamlcp,
              ocamlmktop,  ocamldoc, ocamldep, and/or  ocamlbrowser.    Its value must conform to
              the syntax

              ocamlc=name ocamlopt=name ocamlcp=name ocamlmktop=name ocamldoc=name ocamldep=name oca ↲
 mlbrowser=name

              Example:

              ocamlc=ocamlc-3.00 ocamlopt=ocamlopt-3.00 ocamlcp=ocamlcp-3.00 ocamlmktop=ocamlmktop-3 ↲
 .00

         CAMLLIB or OCAMLLIB

              This variable overrides the configuration variable  stdlib.

         OCAMLFIND_LDCONF

              This variable overrides the configuration variable  ldconf.

         OCAMLFIND_IGNORE_DUPS_IN

              This variable instructs findlib not to emit warnings that packages  or module occur
              several times. The variable must be set to the  directory where the packages reside
              that are to be ignored for this  warning.

User Manual                   The findlib package manager for OCaml               findlib.conf(5)