Unable to run kicad after update to version 8

Software
1

I just tried to install the kicad package on my arch linux machine after the update to version 8.0.1-1:

~ $ sudo pacman -S kicad
Sync Explicit (1): kicad-8.0.1-1
resolving dependencies...
looking for conflicting packages...

Packages (1) kicad-8.0.1-1

Total Download Size:    42.93 MiB
Total Installed Size:  185.47 MiB

:: Proceed with installation? [Y/n] 
:: Retrieving packages...
 kicad-8.0.1-1-x86_64              42.9 MiB  7.33 MiB/s 00:06 [#################################] 100%
(1/1) checking keys in keyring                                [#################################] 100%
(1/1) checking package integrity                              [#################################] 100%
(1/1) loading package files                                   [#################################] 100%
(1/1) checking for file conflicts                             [#################################] 100%
(1/1) checking available disk space                           [#################################] 100%
:: Processing package changes...
(1/1) installing kicad                                        [#################################] 100%
Optional dependencies for kicad
    kicad-library: for footprints, symbols and templates
    kicad-library-3d: for 3D models of components
:: Running post-transaction hooks...
(1/4) Arming ConditionNeedsUpdate...
(2/4) Updating the MIME type database...
(3/4) Updating icon theme caches...
(4/4) Updating the desktop file MIME type cache..

Subsequently trying to run kicad yields the following error:

~ $ kicad
kicad: error while loading shared libraries: libkigal.so.8.99.0: cannot open shared object file: No such file or directory

As far as I understand, 8.99.0 is the current version of the nightly package, and I am unsure as to why
a shared library generated by the nightly package would be required by the official stable release.
Does anybody else experience this or has any ideas how to solve it?

Thanks for any help in advance!

2

Are you sure you’re running the correct executable?

3

Thanks! Manually running /usr/bin/kicad works with no errors.
Simply executing kicad, howeverm seems to attempt to run /usr/local/bin/kicad which then fails with the aforementioned error.

What exactly is the purpose of /usr/local/bin/kicad? Should it exist in the stable version of the package?

The way my PATH environment variable is set, /usr/local/bin/kicad will always have priority over /usr/bin/kicad. Is this the intended behavior?

~ $ echo $PATH
/usr/local/bin:/usr/bin:...
4

/usr/local prefix is commonly used by default when building programs yourself vs the distro-provided packages.

For example, building/installing programs with make; make install usually installs them to /usr/local.

You’ve probably build kicad yourself at some point, or used a mis-configured package manager.

1 Like
5

I had indeed tried to build from source previously. I thought I had removed any and all artifacts from the build. Apparently not.

Thank you very much for the quick response! Marking this as solved.

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