How to fetch external dependencies in bazel

Question

I want bazel to fetch an external dependency from a URL. The file is an rpm file. I added this in the WORKSPACE file in root dir:

http_archive(
    name = "mylib",
    url = "someURL/somefile.rpm",
    build_file = "example.BUILD"
)

When I try:

bazel fetch @mylib//...

It says:

"com.google.devtools.build.lib.syntax.EvalException: Expected a file with a .zip, .jar, .war, .tar, .tar.gz, .tgz, .tar.xz, .txz, or .tar.bz2 suffix"

Basically it is not allowing to download rpm deps. How can I achieve this ? How to download external dependency of type rpm.

score 0 · Answer 1 · answered May 09 '19 at 16:59

0

You're trying to fetch an .rpm file, but it seems that bazel only accepts archive files with the suffixes .zip, .jar, .war, .tar, .tar.gz, .tgz, .tar.xz, .txz, or .tar.bz2.

answered May 09 '19 at 16:59

vincent

1,370
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1

Such information, much wow :P ! That's obvious. I was asking how to achieve it. – Shayan Anwar May 10 '19 at 09:44
@ShayanAnwar: you could try using `http_file` and unpack it yourself – Sebastian Nowak Mar 28 '20 at 22:44

score 0 · Answer 2 · answered May 13 '20 at 13:03

You certainly figured it out by now. Like @sebastian-nowak commented, you can do something like:

load("@bazel_tools//tools/build_defs/repo:http.bzl", "http_file")

http_file(
    name = "mylib",
    url = "someURL/somefile.rpm"
)

and in your example.BUILD, reference it with @mylib//file

(Source: https://docs.bazel.build/versions/master/repo/http.html#http_file)

How to fetch external dependencies in bazel

2 Answers2