[AlexRMU]

Problem

The npm tarball for talib@2.0.4 ships prebuilt object files in src/lib/temp/csr/ (*.o). On install, make compares timestamps, considers these objects up-to-date, skips recompilation and archives them into the .a libraries. Depending on the toolchain, this surfaces in two ways:

1. New binutils (Debian trixie, binutils >= 2.44) — the archives built from stale objects have no symbol index, and the linker rejects them during node-gyp build:

   /usr/bin/ld: ../src/lib/lib/libta_abstract_csr.a: error adding symbols: archive has no index; run ranlib to add one
   

2. Older binutils — the link succeeds but the addon fails at load time, because the stale objects are missing symbols from parts of the source tree (e.g. table_*.c):

   Error: .../talib/build/Release/talib.node: undefined symbol: TA_DEF_TableASize
     code: 'ERR_DLOPEN_FAILED'
   

Both are reproducible in clean containers with a fresh toolchain; on dev machines they are often masked by local rebuilds.

Reproduction

Single Dockerfile — uncomment the workaround block to apply the fix (the workaround is exactly what this PR moves into src/lib/build.js, so it runs against the unmodified talib@2.0.4 from npm):

FROM node:24-slim
RUN apt-get update && apt-get install -y --no-install-recommends \
    build-essential python3 \
    && rm -rf /var/lib/apt/lists/*
WORKDIR /app
RUN npm init -y
RUN npm install talib@2.0.4

# --- FIX (what this PR moves into src/lib/build.js) — uncomment to apply ---
# RUN cd node_modules/talib \
#  # 1) drop stale prebuilt objects shipped in the npm tarball
#  && rm -f src/lib/temp/csr/*.o src/lib/temp/csr/*.obj \
#  # 2) rebuild the static TA-LIB archives from source
#  && make -C src/lib/make/csr/linux/g++ \
#  # 3) add symbol index to the archives for new binutils
#  && for f in src/lib/lib/*.a; do ranlib "$f"; done \
#  # 4) build the N-API addon
#  && GYP=/usr/local/lib/node_modules/npm/node_modules/node-gyp/bin/node-gyp.js \
#  && node $GYP configure && node $GYP build
# --- end FIX ---

RUN node -e "const t = require('talib'); console.log(t.version, t.functions.length)"

Note: with the fix uncommented, use npm install --ignore-scripts talib@2.0.4 (the stock install script fails before the workaround gets a chance to run) — see the verified logs below.

Without the fix (actual log)

docker build --progress=plain . fails inside npm install talib@2.0.4. The make phase completes in ~13 s with zero gcc -c invocations — the stale objects from the tarball are archived as-is — and then the addon link step dies:

#8 13.48 npm error building talib functions...
...
#8 13.49 npm error /usr/bin/ld: ../src/lib/lib/libta_abstract_csr.a: error adding symbols: archive has no index; run ranlib to add one
#8 13.49 npm error collect2: error: ld returned 1 exit status
#8 13.49 npm error make: *** [talib.target.mk:142: Release/obj.target/talib.node] Error 1
#8 13.49 npm error gyp ERR! build error
#8 13.49 npm error gyp ERR! stack Error: `make` failed with exit code: 2
#8 13.49 npm error gyp ERR! System Linux 6.18.40.1-microsoft-standard-WSL2
#8 13.49 npm error gyp ERR! node -v v24.21.0
#8 13.49 npm error gyp ERR! node-gyp -v v12.4.0
#8 13.49 npm error gyp ERR! $npm_package_version 2.0.4
#8 ERROR: process "/bin/sh -c npm install talib@2.0.4" did not complete successfully: exit code: 1

With the fix (actual log)

Full recompile — 196 gcc -c lines in the build log, ~20 s of real compilation, then ranlib and a successful addon build:

#9 [6/7] RUN cd node_modules/talib && rm -f src/lib/temp/csr/*.o src/lib/temp/csr/*.obj && make -C src/lib/make/csr/linux/g++ && for f in src/lib/lib/*.a; do ranlib "$f"; done && ...
#9 0.433 building talib functions...
#9 21.18 make[1]: Leaving directory '/app/node_modules/talib/src/lib/make/csr/linux/g++/ta_libc'
...
#10 [7/7] RUN node -e "const t = require('talib'); console.log(t.version, t.functions.length)"
#10 1.359 1.1.6 161
#10 DONE 1.4s

Environment: node:24-slim (Debian trixie, binutils 2.44), Node v24.21.0, node-gyp v12.4.0, Docker 27.5.0 on WSL2.

Changes

In the linux/darwin branch of src/lib/build.js:

• Delete prebuilt *.o/*.obj files in src/lib/temp/csr/ before running make, so the full source tree is recompiled for the current toolchain. Non-fatal on failure (try/catch with a warning).
• After a successful make, run a best-effort ranlib pass over all built .a archives in src/lib/lib/ so the linker accepts them on new binutils. Also non-fatal.

Verification

• node --check src/lib/build.js passes.
• Both reproduction builds above were run locally; the same logic has been running as a downstream pnpm patch (patchedDependencies) in a production project since 2026-09 (Dokploy deploy on Debian trixie), where it fixed both the archive has no index link failure and the undefined symbol: TA_DEF_TableASize dlopen failure.