CI cmake workflow not building as expected

Question

I am working on a pet project in C++ in which I am using SDL (SimpleDirectmediaLayer) library to provide GUI and CMake to build and run tests. I want to try CI from GitHub actions and I am having a cmake build error that does not happen locally.

I used the cmake template provided from github actions which looks like this

name: CMake

on:
  push:
    branches: [ "master", "develop" ]
  pull_request:
    branches: [ "master" ]

env:
  # Customize the CMake build type here (Release, Debug, RelWithDebInfo, etc.)
  BUILD_TYPE: Release

jobs:
  build:
    # The CMake configure and build commands are platform agnostic and should work equally well on Windows or Mac.
    # You can convert this to a matrix build if you need cross-platform coverage.
    # See: https://docs.github.com/en/free-pro-team@latest/actions/learn-github-actions/managing-complex-workflows#using-a-build-matrix
    runs-on: ubuntu-latest

    steps:
    - uses: actions/checkout@v3

    - name: Configure CMake
      # Configure CMake in a 'build' subdirectory. `CMAKE_BUILD_TYPE` is only required if you are using a single-configuration generator such as make.
      # See https://cmake.org/cmake/help/latest/variable/CMAKE_BUILD_TYPE.html?highlight=cmake_build_type
      run: cmake -B ${{github.workspace}}/build -DCMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=${{env.BUILD_TYPE}}

    - name: Build
      # Build your program with the given configuration
      run: cmake --build ${{github.workspace}}/build --config ${{env.BUILD_TYPE}}

    - name: Test
      working-directory: ${{github.workspace}}/build
      # Execute tests defined by the CMake configuration.
      # See https://cmake.org/cmake/help/latest/manual/ctest.1.html for more detail
      run: ctest -C ${{env.BUILD_TYPE}}

In my project, I am using SDL2 library, and when I build cmake locally, everything works, however, when I push to develop branch, I see the following output from the cmake building command

cmake -B /home/runner/work/maze-solver/maze-solver/build -DCMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=Release
  shell: /usr/bin/bash -e {0}
  env:
    BUILD_TYPE: Release
-- The C compiler identification is GNU 11.3.0
-- The CXX compiler identification is GNU 11.3.0
-- Detecting C compiler ABI info
-- Detecting C compiler ABI info - done
-- Check for working C compiler: /usr/bin/cc - skipped
-- Detecting C compile features
-- Detecting C compile features - done
-- Detecting CXX compiler ABI info
-- Detecting CXX compiler ABI info - done
-- Check for working CXX compiler: /usr/bin/c++ - skipped
-- Detecting CXX compile features
-- Detecting CXX compile features - done
CMake Warning (dev) at /usr/local/share/cmake-3.26/Modules/FetchContent.cmake:1282 (message):
  The DOWNLOAD_EXTRACT_TIMESTAMP option was not given and policy CMP0135 is
  not set.  The policy's OLD behavior will be used.  When using a URL
  download, the timestamps of extracted files should preferably be that of
  the time of extraction, otherwise code that depends on the extracted
  contents might not be rebuilt if the URL changes.  The OLD behavior
  preserves the timestamps from the archive instead, but this is usually not
  what you want.  Update your project to the NEW behavior or specify the
  DOWNLOAD_EXTRACT_TIMESTAMP option with a value of true to avoid this
  robustness issue.
Call Stack (most recent call first):
  CMakeLists.txt:9 (FetchContent_Declare)
This warning is for project developers.  Use -Wno-dev to suppress it.

-- Found Python: /usr/bin/python3.10 (found version "3.10.6") found components: Interpreter 
-- Performing Test CMAKE_HAVE_LIBC_PTHREAD
-- Performing Test CMAKE_HAVE_LIBC_PTHREAD - Success
-- Found Threads: TRUE  
CMake Error at CMakeLists.txt:31 (find_package):
  By not providing "FindSDL2.cmake" in CMAKE_MODULE_PATH this project has
  asked CMake to find a package configuration file provided by "SDL2", but
  CMake did not find one.
-- Configuring incomplete, errors occurred!

  Could not find a package configuration file provided by "SDL2" with any of
  the following names:

    SDL2Config.cmake
    sdl2-config.cmake

  Add the installation prefix of "SDL2" to CMAKE_PREFIX_PATH or set
  "SDL2_DIR" to a directory containing one of the above files.  If "SDL2"
  provides a separate development package or SDK, be sure it has been
  installed.

I don't really how I can solve it, and after some research, the solutions I've found seem to be really particular ones and not standard.

Can anyone suggest me how to proceed?

Answer 1

As mentioned by @Azeem SDL2 is not preinstalled on the ubuntu-latest runner. Try adding

- name: Install sld2
  run: sudo apt-get -y update && sudo apt-get -y install libsdl2-dev

as a first step in your job to install it.