Compiling the CGAL Plugin on windows

[Goophi13]

Hello everyone,
i have compiled SOFA v23.12.00 with cmake on windows 10 and tried to follow this instruction SOFA - CGAL Library for windows. After re-building and running a python scene, i get a error message that the plugin was not found. Here a terminal output:

[INFO]    [PluginManager] Loaded plugin: C:/Users/Marc Notebook/Desktop/sofacmake/2312/bin/Release/Sofa.Component.AnimationLoop.dll
[INFO]    [PluginManager] Loaded plugin: C:/Users/Marc Notebook/Desktop/sofacmake/2312/bin/Release/SoftRobots.dll
[INFO]    [PluginManager] Loaded plugin: C:/Users/Marc Notebook/Desktop/sofacmake/2312/bin/Release/Sofa.Component.IO.Mesh.dll
[INFO]    [PluginManager] Loaded plugin: C:/Users/Marc Notebook/Desktop/sofacmake/2312/bin/Release/Sofa.Component.LinearSolver.Iterative.dll
[INFO]    [PluginManager] Loaded plugin: C:/Users/Marc Notebook/Desktop/sofacmake/2312/bin/Release/Sofa.Component.Mass.dll
[INFO]    [PluginManager] Loaded plugin: C:/Users/Marc Notebook/Desktop/sofacmake/2312/bin/Release/Sofa.Component.ODESolver.Backward.dll
[INFO]    [PluginManager] Loaded plugin: C:/Users/Marc Notebook/Desktop/sofacmake/2312/bin/Release/Sofa.Component.Topology.Container.Constant.dll
[INFO]    [PluginManager] Loaded plugin: C:/Users/Marc Notebook/Desktop/sofacmake/2312/bin/Release/Sofa.Component.Visual.dll
[INFO]    [PluginManager] Loaded plugin: C:/Users/Marc Notebook/Desktop/sofacmake/2312/bin/Release/Sofa.GL.Component.Rendering3D.dll
[INFO]    [PluginManager] Loaded plugin: C:/Users/Marc Notebook/Desktop/sofacmake/2312/bin/Release/Sofa.Component.SolidMechanics.FEM.Elastic.dll
[INFO]    [PluginManager] Loaded plugin: C:/Users/Marc Notebook/Desktop/sofacmake/2312/bin/Release/Sofa.Component.Engine.Select.dll
[INFO]    [PluginManager] Loaded plugin: C:/Users/Marc Notebook/Desktop/sofacmake/2312/bin/Release/Sofa.Component.LinearSolver.Direct.dll
[INFO]    [PluginManager] Loaded plugin: C:/Users/Marc Notebook/Desktop/sofacmake/2312/bin/Release/Sofa.Component.Constraint.Lagrangian.Correction.dll
[ERROR]   [PluginManager] Plugin loading failed (C:/Users/Marc Notebook/Desktop/sofacmake/2312/bin/Release/CGALPlugin.dll): Modul was not found.

[ERROR]   [RequiredPlugin(CGALPlugin)] Plugin loading failed (C:/Users/Marc Notebook/Desktop/sofacmake/2312/bin/Release/CGALPlugin.dll

The CGALPlugin.dll does exist in the directory C:/Users/Marc Notebook/Desktop/sofacmake/2312/bin/Release/CGALPlugin.dll

For my other attempt at installing the CGAL plugin, i tried this instruction Out-of-tree build with the following CMakeLists.txt

cmake_minimum_required(VERSION 2.8.12)

find_package(SofaFramework)

sofa_add_subdirectory(plugin C:\Users\phi\Desktop\CGAL\CGAL-5.6.1  CGALPlugin)

And the following output in Microsoft Visual Studio:

`Build started at 21:13...
1>------ Build started: Project: ZERO_CHECK, Configuration: Release x64 ------
1>1>Checking Build System
2>------ Skipped Build: Project: install_FindCGAL, Configuration: Release x64 ------
2>Project not selected to build for this solution configuration 
3>------ Build started: Project: examples, Configuration: Release x64 ------
4>------ Build started: Project: demos, Configuration: Release x64 ------
5>------ Build started: Project: ALL_BUILD, Configuration: Release x64 ------
3>Building Custom Rule C:/Users/phi/Desktop/CGAL/CGAL-5.6.1/CMakeLists.txt
4>Building Custom Rule C:/Users/phi/Desktop/CGAL/CGAL-5.6.1/CMakeLists.txt
6>------ Skipped Build: Project: ALL_CGAL_TARGETS, Configuration: Release x64 ------
6>Project not selected to build for this solution configuration 
5>Building Custom Rule C:/Users/phi/Desktop/CGAL/CGAL-5.6.1/CMakeLists.txt
7>------ Skipped Build: Project: INSTALL, Configuration: Release x64 ------
7>Project not selected to build for this solution configuration 
========== Build: 4 succeeded, 0 failed, 0 up-to-date, 3 skipped ==========
========== Build completed at 21:13 and took 01,095 seconds ==========

I'm clueless why builds are skipped here.

I tried using CGAL version 5.6.1 on windows 10 64bit
CGAL releases

Any help is very much appreciated, thank you!

[bakpaul]

Hello !

I'll have three remarks that might help you :

1. You are not compiling the latest SOFA version. The release has been patched and the error you are having might be solved by this patch. The version is 23.12.01.
2. The 'Modul not found' is really misleading. When you get this message it doesn't mean that the CGALPlugin is not found, but that one of its dependency is not found. The SOFA project and all of the plugins have dependencies, which are external libraries upon which we 'link' meaning we use some of their methods or classes. These dependencies mean that you need to get access to those methods when you are trying to execute the plugin code. There exists two main ways of resolving that, either by copying the external methods and embedding them inside of the plugin (which is called static linking) or relying on the OS to provide the required library upon which we have linked when we try to launch it (this is called dynamic linking and it is what is used in SOFA). Here, the library is not launched because one of its dependency cannot be found. You can use https://www.dependencywalker.com/ to find-out which library is missing and to fix it.
3. For the compilation, given the path you are using in sofa_add_subdirectory, it seems like you are confusing the CGALPlugin and CGAL itself. CGAL is an external library that you need to install on your computer to be able to compile the CGALPlugin which is a bridge between CGAL and SOFA. The CGALPlugin source code can be found here : https://github.com/sofa-framework/CGALPlugin

[Goophi13]

Hello @bakpaul,
thank you for your quick and detailed response! I did confuse CGAL and the CGALPlugin, sorry.
I will try 1. and 2. but i still have some questions about the installation process:

1. Do i understand it correctly that this and this are two different ways to get the CGALPlugin working?
2. As described in Windows Installation. I download and compile CGAL with its dependencies which are provided as zip and i only need to extract then into the source directory of CGAL. Then i building CGAL with CMake. Afterwards i start CMake set "source" and "where to build" to sofa sources and sofa build directory respectively and set the SOFA_FETCH_CGAL variable, configure and set PLUGIN_CGALPLUGIN. Do i have to do something here with the source code from the CGALPlugin provided by your link?
   I will let you know if the first two suggestion solved my problem, thank you!

[bakpaul]

Hello !

1. The first link explains how to install the dependencies needed to compile the CGALPlugin. The second link is a generic tutorial on how to compile such plugin, either in-tree or out-of-tree. If you don't want to compile all the SOFA project, you have to go with the out-of-tree using the binaries. Otherwise, if you want to compile SOFA yourself, you can go with the in-tree.
2. HEre you are performing a in-tree compilation. From what you are telling me and regarding the compilation, no, it looks good. If the cmake stage finishes successfully then you are ready to go. You'll be able to use the CGALPlugin after the compilation. If during the CMake configuration there are errors regarding CGAL being not found, you'll need to go back in the build directory of CGAL itself, then perform the install step. Afterwards you'll need to add the path to the bin directory of the CGAL installation to your PATH environment variable.

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