Maverick - R2014a - LoadLibrary Error - loaddefinedlibrary

Does anyone have any insight on how to resolve this problem?

I'm trying to build a thunk.dylib for use in calling a .dylib in matlab. This method works in windows 7, so its an operating system specific problem. Debugger won't step in to the function loaddefinedlibrary for further investigation. The symbolic link /opt/refprop/librefprop/librefprop.dylib does in fact exist. See below the matlab error output for info from terminal showing the links exists:

fyi thunk.m line 4 is the only command in the file.

 Error using loadlibrary (line 422)
  There was an error loading the library "/opt/refprop/librefprop.dylib"
  dlopen(/opt/refprop/librefprop.dylib, 6): Symbol not found:
  __gfortran_transfer_character_write
    Referenced from: /opt/refprop/librefprop.dylib
    Expected in: /Applications/MATLAB_R2014a.app/sys/os/maci64/libgfortran.3.dylib
   in /opt/refprop/librefprop.dylib

Error in thunk (line 4)
loadlibrary('librefprop','header.h','mfilename','rp_proto64')

Caused by:
    Error using loaddefinedlibrary
    dlopen(/opt/refprop/librefprop.dylib, 6): Symbol not found:
    __gfortran_transfer_character_write
      Referenced from: /opt/refprop/librefprop.dylib
      Expected in: /Applications/MATLAB_R2014a.app/sys/os/maci64/libgfortran.3.dylib
     in /opt/refprop/librefprop.dylib

Terminal output:

XXXXXXXX $ ls -all
total 200
drwxr-xr-x    9 nkampy  wheel    306 Apr 10 10:02 .
drwxr-xr-x@   5 nkampy  wheel    170 Apr 10 09:08 ..
drwxr-xr-x  129 nkampy  wheel   4386 Apr 10 09:08 fluids
-rwxr-xr-x    1 nkampy  wheel  12655 Apr 10 09:59 header.h
lrwxr-xr-x    1 root    wheel     31 Apr 10 09:10 librefprop.dylib -> /usr/local/lib/librefprop.dylib
-rwxr-xr-x    1 nkampy  wheel  25008 Apr 10 10:02 librefprop_thunk_maci64.dylib
drwxr-xr-x   81 nkampy  wheel   2754 Apr 10 09:08 mixtures
-rw-r--r--    1 nkampy  wheel  48385 Apr 10 10:02 rp_proto64.m
-rwxr-xr-x@   1 nkampy  wheel    310 Apr 10 10:02 thunk.m
XXXXXXX $ pwd
/opt/refprop

XXXXXXXXXXXXX $ ls -all
total 7216
drwxr-xr-x  24 root  wheel      816 Apr 10 09:10 .
drwxr-xr-x  10 root  wheel      340 Apr  9 21:42 ..
drwxr-xr-x   3 root  wheel      102 Apr  4  2011 ImageMagick-6.6.9
drwxr-xr-x   4 root  wheel      136 May 12  2012 ImageMagick-6.7.6
drwxr-xr-x   9 root  wheel      306 Mar 29  2013 itcl4.0.0
-rw-r--r--   1 root  wheel   992256 Apr 10 09:10 librefprop.9.1.dylib
lrwxr-xr-x   1 root  wheel       35 Apr 10 09:10 librefprop.dylib -> /usr/local/lib/librefprop.9.1.dylib
-r-xr-xr-x   1 root  wheel  1419604 Mar 29  2013 libtcl8.6.dylib
-rwxr-xr-x   1 root  wheel     4824 Mar 29  2013 libtclstub8.6.a
-r-xr-xr-x   1 root  wheel  1239868 Mar 29  2013 libtk8.6.dylib
-rwxr-xr-x   1 root  wheel     3464 Mar 29  2013 libtkstub8.6.a
drwxr-xr-x   4 root  wheel      136 Mar 30  2013 pkgconfig
drwxr-xr-x   4 root  wheel      136 Mar 29  2013 sqlite3.7.15.1
drwxr-xr-x   5 root  wheel      170 Mar 29  2013 tcl8
drwxr-xr-x  19 root  wheel      646 Mar 31  2013 tcl8.6
-rw-r--r--   1 root  wheel     7977 Mar 29  2013 tclConfig.sh
-rw-r--r--   1 root  wheel      771 Mar 29  2013 tclooConfig.sh
drwxr-xr-x   7 root  wheel      238 Mar 29  2013 tdbc1.0.0
drwxr-xr-x   5 root  wheel      170 Mar 29  2013 tdbcmysql1.0.0
drwxr-xr-x   5 root  wheel      170 Mar 29  2013 tdbcodbc1.0.0
drwxr-xr-x   5 root  wheel      170 Mar 29  2013 tdbcpostgres1.0.0
drwxr-xr-x   5 root  wheel      170 Mar 29  2013 thread2.7.0
drwxr-xr-x  40 root  wheel     1360 Mar 29  2013 tk8.6
-rw-r--r--   1 root  wheel     4334 Mar 29  2013 tkConfig.sh
XXXXXXXX $ pwd
/usr/local/lib

Answer 1

[Nathan]

It is likely that a function in the libgfortran runtime library is not found in the MATLAB application directory, where it is expected. A possible workaround would be to use a soft (symbolic) link for the libgfortran.3.dylib.

1. If gfortran is installed on your machine, this DYLIB is located at /usr/local/lib/libgfortran.3.dylib

2. Rename the DYLIB file in the MATLAB application directory

3. Create a soft link for the DYLIB: ln -s /usr/local/lib/libgfortran.3.dylib /Applications/MATLAB_R2013b.app/sys/os/maci64/libgfortran.3.dylib

Restart MATLAB and try using the loadlibrary command to create the prototype file again. Do you still encounter the error message? If not, then the this is likely caused by a corrupt gfortran dynamic library in the MATLAB application directory.

in the case of using fink to install the gnu package on a mac its in the /sw folder. Otherwise the directions are the same.

A second way to resolve this is to add to the matlab search path in the startup file the location of the library.

Answer 2

[Luis Pizarro]

I did try Nathan's suggestion, but didn't work. I' using MATLAB2013a, Xcode 5.1, and gfortran-4.8.

I had the same/similar problem because MATLAB only supports gfortran-4.3. I found this installer for Mac but it didn't work on my 64-bit version.

I solved the issue by using an earlier version (4.2.3) which you can download here gfortran-4.2.3.dmg or from this list. MATLAB gave me a compilation warning though, but I could execute my gfortran program with no further issues.

[Theo Olsthoorn]

I had this problem when I ran fortran compiled stand alone programs from Matlab, i.e. MODFLOW and related programs, which I compiled on OSX some time ago. With R21014 I got an error message

"/Users/Theo/GRWMODELS/mflab/bin/mf2005.mac" mf2005.nam

dyld: lazy symbol binding failed: Symbol not found: __gfortran_transfer_character_write Referenced from: /Users/Theo/GRWMODELS/mflab/bin/mf2005.mac Expected in: /Applications/MATLAB_R2014a.app/sys/os/maci64/libgfortran.3.dylib

dyld: Symbol not found: __gfortran_transfer_character_write Referenced from: /Users/Theo/GRWMODELS/mflab/bin/mf2005.mac Expected in: /Applications/MATLAB_R2014a.app/sys/os/maci64/libgfortran.3.dylib

From this it is clear that the dylib that comes along with Matlab and is used by Matlab as default does not hold the desired function and so is not compatible. I, however, have the correct dylib at some other location on my OSX. So I renamed the version in the search dir used by Matlab and copied my old version of dylab to that directory. This solved the problem.

This solution seems very practicle and logical as well.

Regards Theo