Xfce Forum

timeshift

Member

Registered: 2022-08-21

Posts: 42

Trouble compiling xfce4-notes-plugin 1.12.0 on Debian 12

Hello,

I'm trying to compile the latest release of xfce4-notes-plugin (1.12.0) on Debian 12. I downloaded the tarball from the official XFCE archive here:
https://archive.xfce.org/src/panel-plug … es-plugin/

I was able to run:

sudo meson setup build --prefix=/usr

without any errors, but when I run:

sudo meson compile -C build

I get the following Vala compilation errors:

error: Package `libxfconf-0' not found in specified Vala API directories or GObject-Introspection GIR directories
error: Package `libxfce4util-1.0' not found in specified Vala API directories or GObject-Introspection GIR directories
error: Package `libxfce4ui-2' not found in specified Vala API directories or GObject-Introspection GIR directories
error: Package `libxfce4panel-2.0' not found in specified Vala API directories or GObject-Introspection GIR directories

I have already installed these development packages:

sudo apt install libxfce4ui-2-dev libxfce4util-dev libxfconf-0-dev libxfce4panel-2.0-dev gir1.2-gtk-3.0

I also installed valac (version 0.56.3), and the meson setup step completes successfully.

Has anyone else managed to compile this version on Debian 12?
Are the Vala bindings for XFCE libraries maintained somewhere else or need to be generated manually?

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks in advance!

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Debian GNU/Linux 12 (bookworm)
xfce version 4.18

eriefisher

Wanderer

From: ON, Canada

Registered: 2008-10-25

Posts: 746

Re: Trouble compiling xfce4-notes-plugin 1.12.0 on Debian 12

Since you have the dev packages installed I would try to build/compile without sudo. You should only need sudo to install the package and it may cause $PATH problems.

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I AM CANADIAN!
Siduction
Debian Sid
Xfce 4.20 with Wayland/Labwc

timeshift

Member

Registered: 2022-08-21

Posts: 42

Re: Trouble compiling xfce4-notes-plugin 1.12.0 on Debian 12

Since you have the dev packages installed I would try to build/compile without sudo. You should only need sudo to install the package and it may cause $PATH problems.

I had tried to do what you suggest but since it won't let me compile I added sudo, although here is the output of the command without sudo

INFO: autodetecting backend as ninja
INFO: calculating backend command to run: /usr/bin/ninja -C /home/User/Downloads/xfce4-notes-plugin-1.12.0/build
ninja: Entering directory `/home/User/Downloads/xfce4-notes-plugin-1.12.0/build'
[0/40] Generating po/nb/LC_MESSAGES/xfce4-notes-plugin-nb.mo with a custom commandninja: error: mkdir(po/nb): Permission denied

ninja: build stopped:

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Debian GNU/Linux 12 (bookworm)
xfce version 4.18

eriefisher

Wanderer

From: ON, Canada

Registered: 2008-10-25

Posts: 746

Re: Trouble compiling xfce4-notes-plugin 1.12.0 on Debian 12

Mkdir permission denied

Do you have write permission to that directory?

---

I AM CANADIAN!
Siduction
Debian Sid
Xfce 4.20 with Wayland/Labwc

timeshift

Member

Registered: 2022-08-21

Posts: 42

Re: Trouble compiling xfce4-notes-plugin 1.12.0 on Debian 12

I am the user who owns the directory:

drwxr-xr-x 7 userxf userxf  4096 may 20 03:07 xfce4-notes-plugin-1.12.0

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Debian GNU/Linux 12 (bookworm)
xfce version 4.18

eriefisher

Wanderer

From: ON, Canada

Registered: 2008-10-25

Posts: 746

Re: Trouble compiling xfce4-notes-plugin 1.12.0 on Debian 12

Well I just tried to build it myself and after installing all the *-dev packages and build requirements I still get a build failure. A lot of deprecation errors and unable to locate errors. I'm running sid which is up to date and current so nothing is "deprecated" and paths are standard.

I'm not going to try any further as I hate building from source.

I did notice that in your signature you state version 4.18. I don't know if the latest package will even work on 4.18. There were a lot of changes when 4.20 was released.

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I AM CANADIAN!
Siduction
Debian Sid
Xfce 4.20 with Wayland/Labwc

timeshift

Member

Registered: 2022-08-21

Posts: 42

Re: Trouble compiling xfce4-notes-plugin 1.12.0 on Debian 12

Ok, thanks for your help anyway, it would be nice if @ Tamaranch could give a solution to this problem, since I think he is the maintainer of this plugin or maybe not, I guess.

On the other hand I know that if this plugin was ready to use I would just install it and that's it. I also compiled thunar-shares-plugin and xfce-clipman-plugin and was able to do it successfully, xfce-notes-plugin has been problematic.

As I say, I have compiled these plugins because they are not available for installation, clipman is in the repository but has a rather annoying bug that I reported at some point in this very forum, here Xfce Forums

Last edited by timeshift (2025-06-13 17:28:08)

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Debian GNU/Linux 12 (bookworm)
xfce version 4.18

huberto

Member

Registered: 2025-07-07

Posts: 1

Re: Trouble compiling xfce4-notes-plugin 1.12.0 on Debian 12

....

without any errors, but when I run:

sudo meson compile -C build

I get the following Vala compilation errors:

error: Package `libxfconf-0' not found in specified Vala API directories or GObject-Introspection GIR directories
error: Package `libxfce4util-1.0' not found in specified Vala API directories or GObject-Introspection GIR directories
error: Package `libxfce4ui-2' not found in specified Vala API directories or GObject-Introspection GIR directories
error: Package `libxfce4panel-2.0' not found in specified Vala API directories or GObject-Introspection GIR directories

...

The problem is those libraries were compiled/installed without VALA API bindings!

In FreeBSD (/usr/ports), you can disable option VAPI for x11/xfce4-conf (resp. x11/libxfce4util, x11/wm_xfce4-panel, x11/libxfce4menu), which causes exactly this compile error.

No idea about how to proceed with debian, sorry.  Have a look for VALA API binding options.