Is there a C++ dependency index somewhere?

Question

When trying new software and compiling with the classic ./configure, make, make install process, I frequently see something like:

error: ____.h: No such file or directory

Sometimes, I get really lucky and apt-get install ____ installs the missing piece and all is well. However, that doesn't always happen and I end up googling to find the package that contains what I need. And sometimes the package is the wrong version or flavor and is already used by another package that I downloaded.

How do people know which packages contain which .h files or whatever resource the compiler needs? Is there a dependency resolver website or something that people use to decode failed builds to missing packages? Is there a more modern method of automatically downloading and installing transitive dependencies for a build (somewhat like Java's Maven)?

Answer 1

If it's a package in Debian, you can use apt-get build-dep to get all deps.

Otherwise, read the README that comes with the program -- hopefully, it lists all the deps for that program.

Answer 2

You can also use "auto-apt ./configure" (on Ubuntu, and probably also on Debian?) and it will attempt to download dependencies automatically.