catkin dependency of other packages and python-libs

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Hi @stfn

rosdep can only resolve system dependencies which have rosdep keys defined here:

https://github.com/ros/rosdistro/tree/master/rosdep

Or released ROS packages.

So from your question I can only guess that the packaged called my_package which you are referring to has not been released into hydro. Had it been released into hydro rosdep would have resolved it and tried to install it with the command sudo apt-get install ros-hydro-my-package.

Just because you package is not released, and therefore not resolvable by rosdep, it doesn't mean you cannot list it in your package.xml as a build_depend and/or run_depend. This dependency listing, just like it was for rosbuild, is then used to determine the order in which your packages will be built. Since my_package is not released and cannot be found via rosdep you are responsible for ensuring it is either in the same workspace or installed somewhere which is on the CMAKE_PREFIX_PATH for other packages to find it when you are building.

If you provide more information about the workflow you are using and the exact rosdep error I can probably help guide you some more.

For the dependency python-flask, as @KruseT said rosdep does not currently have a rule to install that for Ubuntu, so you would either need to add a local rule for your own personal use or better yet open a pull request against our repository which adds the rosdep rule for python-flask. That process is described here:

http://docs.ros.org/independent/api/rosdep/html/contributing_rules.html