Impossible to build shared Arrow with ZSTD without hitting xtl dependency (Debian 12)

[aborruso]

Describe the bug, including details regarding any error messages, version, and platform.

Hi folks,

I'm trying to build Apache Arrow from source on Debian 12 with Parquet and ZSTD support, but without optional dependencies like xtl, xsimd, xtensor, etc.

Despite setting what I believe are the correct CMake flags:

cmake .. \
  -DCMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=Release \
  -DARROW_PARQUET=ON \
  -DARROW_WITH_ZSTD=ON \
  -DARROW_WITH_ZLIB=ON \
  -DARROW_WITH_SNAPPY=ON \
  -DARROW_WITH_LZ4=OFF \
  -DARROW_WITH_BROTLI=OFF \
  -DARROW_WITH_XSIMD=OFF \
  -DARROW_SIMD_LEVEL=NONE \
  -DARROW_DEPENDENCY_SOURCE=SYSTEM

…the build always fails when linking libarrow.so, with:

/usr/bin/ld: cannot find -lxtl: No such file or directory

I’ve confirmed there are no direct references to xtl in the codebase (grep -ri xtl returns nothing in src/).
I've tried all of the following:

• clean builds from scratch
• -DARROW_WITH_XSIMD=OFF
• -DARROW_SIMD_LEVEL=NONE
• cloning a fresh copy of the repo to avoid contaminated CMakeCache
• even tried forcing all dependencies to SYSTEM

🧩 Related issues & workarounds

I’ve seen this mentioned in:

• https://github.com/apache/arrow/issues/37678
• and the linked xsimd issue: Fix find_package(xsimd) for xtl enabled xsimd xtensor-stack/xsimd#788

…but it's still unclear why Arrow links to xtl even with xsimd disabled

---

🙏 Request

Could we please:

• clarify in the documentation how to avoid xtl / xsimd altogether
• explain how xtl gets into the shared build path even when not requested
• maybe provide a proper flag like -DARROW_WITH_XTL=OFF?

Thanks a lot for all your great work — I love Arrow, but this one really stumped me.

All the best,

Andrea

Component(s)

Parquet

[aborruso]

After a lot of digging, the root cause was that I had a version of xsimd compiled with -DENABLE_XTL_COMPLEX=ON. This caused CMake to inject -lxtl in the link step, even though I explicitly disabled xtl, xtensor, and SIMD in my Arrow build.

The key points that led to a working build: clean rebuild of xsimd without xtl

git clone https://github.com/xtensor-stack/xsimd.git
cd xsimd
mkdir build && cd build
cmake .. -DCMAKE_INSTALL_PREFIX=/usr/local -DENABLE_XTL_COMPLEX=OFF
make -j$(nproc)
sudo make install

Thank you

[assignUser]

Thanks for not just closing the issue as solved :D

And thanks for the very detailed and nicely styled issue!

[aborruso]

Thanks for not just closing the issue as solved :D

And thanks for the very detailed and nicely styled issue!

Such an important library, which makes life easier for many people, deserves such care, even in issues