Why does installing Nokogiri on Mac OS fail with l

Question

I've been trying to install Nokogiri on Mac OS 10.9.3 and whatever I try, the install fails in the end with the following error message:

$ sudo gem install nokogiri -- --with-xml2-include=/usr/local/Cellar/libxml2/2.9.1/include/libxml2 --with-xml2-lib=/usr/local/Cellar/libxml2/2.9.1/lib --with-xslt-dir=/usr/local/Cellar/libxslt/1.1.28 --with-iconv-include=/usr/local/Cellar/libiconv/1.14/include --with-iconv-lib=/usr/local/Cellar/libiconv/1.14/lib
Building native extensions with: '--with-xml2-include=/usr/local/Cellar/libxml2/2.9.1/include/libxml2 --with-xml2-lib=/usr/local/Cellar/libxml2/2.9.1/lib --with-xslt-dir=/usr/local/Cellar/libxslt/1.1.28 --with-iconv-include=/usr/local/Cellar/libiconv/1.14/include --with-iconv-lib=/usr/local/Cellar/libiconv/1.14/lib'
This could take a while...
Building nokogiri using packaged libraries.
ERROR:  Error installing nokogiri:
    ERROR: Failed to build gem native extension.

    /System/Library/Frameworks/Ruby.framework/Versions/2.0/usr/bin/ruby extconf.rb --with-xml2-include=/usr/local/Cellar/libxml2/2.9.1/include/libxml2 --with-xml2-lib=/usr/local/Cellar/libxml2/2.9.1/lib --with-xslt-dir=/usr/local/Cellar/libxslt/1.1.28 --with-iconv-include=/usr/local/Cellar/libiconv/1.14/include --with-iconv-lib=/usr/local/Cellar/libiconv/1.14/lib
Building nokogiri using packaged libraries.
checking for iconv.h... yes
checking for iconv_open() in iconv.h... no
checking for iconv_open() in -liconv... no
checking for libiconv_open() in iconv.h... no
checking for libiconv_open() in -liconv... no
-----
libiconv is missing.  please visit http://nokogiri.org/tutorials/installing_nokogiri.html for help with installing dependencies.
-----
*** extconf.rb failed ***
Could not create Makefile due to some reason, probably lack of necessary
libraries and/or headers.  Check the mkmf.log file for more details.  You may
need configuration options.

Provided configuration options:
    --with-opt-dir
    --without-opt-dir
    --with-opt-include
    --without-opt-include=${opt-dir}/include
    --with-opt-lib
    --without-opt-lib=${opt-dir}/lib
    --with-make-prog
    --without-make-prog
    --srcdir=.
    --curdir
    --ruby=/System/Library/Frameworks/Ruby.framework/Versions/2.0/usr/bin/ruby
    --help
    --clean
    --use-system-libraries
    --enable-static
    --disable-static
    --with-zlib-dir
    --without-zlib-dir
    --with-zlib-include
    --without-zlib-include=${zlib-dir}/include
    --with-zlib-lib
    --without-zlib-lib=${zlib-dir}/lib
    --enable-cross-build
    --disable-cross-build


Gem files will remain installed in /Library/Ruby/Gems/2.0.0/gems/nokogiri-1.6.2.1 for inspection.
Results logged to /Library/Ruby/Gems/2.0.0/gems/nokogiri-1.6.2.1/ext/nokogiri/gem_make.out

After following a lot of help found around the web including building and installing libxml2 and libxslt using brew and building libiconv from the sources (as described in "Installing Nokogiri"), the error remains the same.

When trying to run the installation for Nokogiri, libxml2 and libxslt seem to be found fine, but not libiconv.

Anyone with a better knowledge of these things know how to get Nokogiri installed?

Answer 1

In my case, (as with scotchi) the build failed because of an incompatible iconv library in /opt/local/lib. By default, theNokogiri build process looks at /opt/local first. To force it to use a different install directory, /usr/local for example, do:

gem install nokogiri -- --with-xml2-lib=/usr/local/lib --with-xml2-include=/usr/local/include/libxml2 --with-xslt-lib=/usr/local/lib --with-xslt-include=/usr/local/include

Answer 2

Just adding my voice to the crowd, but mkmf.log said something about not being able to find symbols for x86_64 architecture. I stumbled across this solution:

sudo env ARCHFLAGS="-arch x86_64" gem install nokogiri -- --use-system-libraries

May not solve anything for the original asker, but this may help someone.

Side Note: nokogiri has been my highest barrier to using ruby applications. Every time someone depends on a different version I have to figure out how to build it. And my problem is different every time.

Answer 3

I solved this on Yosemite running Ruby 2.1.4 by

1. ensure you have xCode 6.1 installed, then
2. xcode-select --install, then
3. In the AppStore click on updates and install the most recent version of the command-line tools (which apparently xcode-select --install does't do - sigh)
4. then bundle install worked as normal.

I also did a brew install libiconv too but I am not convinced that step was needed.

Answer 4

$ gem install nokogiri -- --with-xslt-dir=/usr/local/Cellar/libxslt/1.1.26 --with-xml2-dir=/usr/local/Cellar/libxml2/2.7.8/

same as above, this is the solution for homebrew and using gem install (apply changes depends on your version)

however, if you use Gemfile and bundle install, you should apply the bundle config before you install, here the code

$ bundle config build.nokogiri --with-xslt-dir=/usr/local/Cellar/libxslt/1.1.26 --with-xml2-dir=/usr/local/Cellar/libxml2/2.7.8/ --with-iconv-dir=/usr/local/Cellar/libiconv/1.14

again, apply changes depends on your version

hope this will help you.

credit: https://gist.github.com/1344331

Answer 5

This one worked for me

sudo env ARCHFLAGS="-arch x86_64" gem install nokogiri:1.6.6.2 -- --use-system-libraries --with-xml=/usr/local/Cellar/libxml2/2.9.3/ --with-iconv-dir=/usr/local/Cellar/libiconv/1.14

Answer 6

Look in the mkmf.log file in the gem's build directory (e.g. /Library/Ruby/Gems/1.8/gems/nokogiri-1.4.4/ext/nokogiri/mkmf.log). That has a lot more info. In my case when I hit this it was that Nokogiri specifically adds /opt/local/lib to the library search path and GNU Backgammon had installed an incompatible libiconv there.