[Plplot-general] Independence of executables from build platform

[Michael E. <ms...@sa...>]

Hello,

I am working on a project that uses PLplot for 3D surface 
plotting (more info: http://endo.sandia.gov/DAKOTA) and am 
having the problem that an executable linked with
libplplotfX.a on one platform won't execute on a different 
platform of the same type due to the dependence on external 
font files.  The error manifests itself as:


Cannot open library file: plstnd5.fnt
lib
dir="/home/mseldre/export/sierra/Dakota/VendorPackages/plplot/i686-unknown-linux/lib"

*** PLPLOT ERROR ***
Unable to open font file
Program aborted


As it is not practical to build the DAKOTA application from 
scratch on every platform where we'd like to run, we'd prefer
to be able to distribute executables without this type of 
dependency.  

I have read through the FAQ and other available documentation
and the only possible solution I can find it to distribute the 
font files along with the executable and have the user set a 
$PLPLOT_LIB environment variable.  This is do-able, but I'm 
writing to see if there may be other possibilities that would
be cleaner.

I am currently using an older version of PLplot (circa Sept. 
1998, the included NEWS file says version 4.99j), so the first 
thing I tried was downloading the latest (5.2.0) to see if 
that would help.  From the distribution, it appears that this 
version is still dependent on the same external font files.

So I don't know much about font management, but the desired
solution would be something where the font support is compiled
into the executable or, alternatively, is reliant on the locally
supported fonts such that external fonts are not needed.  Is
something like this available?  I looked a little at the freetype
configure option, but couldn't find much info on what this is
about.

Thanks very much for the help,
--Mike Eldred
-- 
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Michael S. Eldred, Ph.D.
Sandia National Laboratories
P.O. Box 5800, Mail Stop 0847
Albuquerque, NM 87185-0847
(505)844-6479, FAX:(505)844-9297
ms...@sa...
http://endo.sandia.gov/~mseldre/
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^