<p>I'm trying to compile/link a <strong>very</strong> old piece of software on a linux system and I can't for some reason link with a shared library that's installed on my system.</p>

<p>I get the following error from the linker:</p>

<pre><code>/usr/bin/ld: cannot find -lXaw
</code></pre>

<p>However, the lib itself is installed. If I run </p>

<pre><code>ldconfig -v | grep libXaw
</code></pre>

<p>I get (among other things) this hit:</p>

<pre><code>libXaw.so.7 -&gt; libXaw7.so.7.0.0
</code></pre>

<p>The library and the links to it are in /usr/lib btw. So nothing special.</p>

<p>So the library is there and ldconfig finds it. What could ld cause ld from not finding the library during link-time? As you may have already guessed I'm quite new to the shared library stuff. </p>

<p>Any ideas?</p>

The linker may be looking, literally, for "libXaw.so".  Is that in /usr/lib?  If not, you could try adding it as another soft link from libXaw7.so.7.0.0.