trouble running make on CBLAS – Ubuntu

I’m trying to build a BLAS shared library for use with ghostjat/np cannot get make to run successfully on the CBLAS source code. I performed these exact steps on an Ubuntu 20 workstation:

# create new directory
mkdir ~/blas
cd ~/blas
# fetch and extract the CBLAS source code linked from the BLAS page
wget http://www.netlib.org/blas/blast-forum/cblas.tgz
tar -xvzf cblas.tgz

#cd into the CBLAS dir
cd CBLAS

#get appropriate make file according to README:
rm Makefile.in
ln -s Makefile.LINUX Makefile.in

#then we try make
make

This results in an error because gfortran was not installed:

gfortran -O3   -c sdotsub.f
make[1]: gfortran: Command not found
make[1]: *** [Makefile:247: sdotsub.o] Error 127
make[1]: Leaving directory '/home/foo/biz/machine-learning/blas/CBLAS/src'
make: *** [Makefile:147: allprecision] Error 2

So I install gfortran

sudo apt install gfortran
# answer YES to prompts

I am then able to make most of the project, but it croaks with an error:

make[1]: Entering directory '/home/foo/biz/machine-learning/blas/CBLAS/testing'
gcc -I../include -O3 -DADD_ -c c_sblas1.c
gfortran -O3   -c c_sblat1.f
c_sblat1.f:214:48:

  214 |                CALL STEST1(SNRM2TEST(N,SX,INCX),STEMP,STEMP,SFAC)
      |                                                1
Warning: Rank mismatch in argument ‘strue1’ at (1) (scalar and rank-1) [-Wargument-mismatch]
c_sblat1.f:218:48:

  218 |                CALL STEST1(SASUMTEST(N,SX,INCX),STEMP,STEMP,SFAC)
      |                                                1
Warning: Rank mismatch in argument ‘strue1’ at (1) (scalar and rank-1) [-Wargument-mismatch]
gfortran  -o xscblat1 c_sblat1.o c_sblas1.o ../lib/cblas_LINUX.a libblas.a 
gfortran: error: libblas.a: No such file or directory
make[1]: *** [Makefile:72: xscblat1] Error 1
make[1]: Leaving directory '/home/foo/biz/machine-learning/blas/CBLAS/testing'
make: *** [Makefile:180: alltst] Error 2

What is the problem here? This is mostly greek to me, but it looks like it compiles successfully all the CBLAS source code except it seems to barf when it gets to the testing, complaining that it cannot find a file, libblas.a. Can someone help me make sure this make operation completes?

Also, I was expecting this compilation step to produce a shared library, perhaps cblas.so or something. I am hoping this process will yield a viable BLAS library that I can use with ghostjat/np to perform fast matrix operations from a PHP script. However, there are no files in this directory ending in .so. Should I be looking for some other file?

EDIT: the comments have suggested that perhaps I should ‘install BLAS’ or ‘install the libopenblas-dev package’ on this machine. Let me first say that my goal is to obtain a library that I might distribute with some PHP source code. I am under the impression that building/making CBLAS will provide this library.

EDIT 2: After attempting a lot of trial and error, I think (but am not sure) that CBLAS is not a full-blown implementation of the BLAS functionality, but just a C wrapper around the BLAS functions, which are written in FORTRAN. It would appear that the makefile in CBLAS must be changed to point to a BLAS static library. I’ve been able to build the BLAS 3.11.0 library like so:

cd ~/blas
curl https://netlib.org/blas/blas-3.11.0.tgz > blas-3.11.0.tgz
tar -xvzf blas-3.11.0.tgz
cd BLAS-3.11.0
make

this runs for about a minute or so and yields a static lib, blas_LINUX.a. I take note of this file’s location:
/Users/foo/Desktop/biz/machine-learning/blas2/BLAS-3.11.0/blas_LINUX.a.

I then return to my previously downloaded/extracted CBLAS folder:

cd ~/blas/CBLAS

and note this information in the README file:

BLLIB is your Legacy BLAS library

I edit this line in Makefile.in:

BLLIB = libblas.a

so that it refers instead to the static blas_LINUX. I just compiled above:

BLLIB = /Users/foo/Desktop/biz/machine-learning/blas2/BLAS-3.11.0/blas_LINUX.a

I save the make file and then make CBLAS:

make clean all

This runs for awhile, but fails in the testing phase with a certain gfortrain complaint:

( cd testing && make all )
gcc -I../include -O3 -DADD_ -c c_sblas1.c
gfortran -O3   -c c_sblat1.f
c_sblat1.f:214:48:

  214 |                CALL STEST1(SNRM2TEST(N,SX,INCX),STEMP,STEMP,SFAC)
      |                                                1
Error: Rank mismatch in argument 'strue1' at (1) (scalar and rank-1)
c_sblat1.f:218:48:

  218 |                CALL STEST1(SASUMTEST(N,SX,INCX),STEMP,STEMP,SFAC)
      |                                                1
Error: Rank mismatch in argument 'strue1' at (1) (scalar and rank-1)
make[1]: *** [c_sblat1.o] Error 1
make: *** [alltst] Error 2