What version of spack were you using and what was your spack command?

I will see if I can reproduce on a docker container.

It looks like spack has yet to make a new release since updating the spack recipe for H5Z-ZFP 1.1.1. Its on their develop branch now and so should go into the next spack release. That said, I dunno if their current develop branch will build all dependencies correctly. But, I'd say give it a try.

Following guidance here instead of doing git checkout releases/v0.20 do git checkout develop (which I think is default branch just after cloning anyways). And, if you cloned it in the distant past, do a git pull first to pull in everything on their develop branch.

Then follow other instructions as before.

So, this worked for me on an ubuntu docker system (ubuntu-jammy)

git clone https://github.com/llnl/spack.git
cd spack/
. ./share/spack/setup-env.sh
spack install h5z-zfp~fortran ^hdf5~mpi~fortran ^zfp~openmp

Note, default branch in the clone is develop.

It installed 19 packages and took about 20 mins.

spack find -p h5z-zfp
-- linux-ubuntu22.04-ivybridge / gcc@11.4.0 ---------------------
h5z-zfp@1.1.1  /tmp/spack/opt/spack/linux-ubuntu22.04-ivybridge/gcc-11.4.0/h5z-zfp-1.1.1-oxkdje4krexkyfnlo36y6kjm5qxf4stq
==> 1 installed package

home/tech/spack/var/spack/repos/builtin/packages/sw4/package.py:51, in edit:
48 os.environ["fftw"] = "yes"
49 os.environ["SW4ROOT"] = spec["proj"].prefix
50 os.environ["HDF5ROOT"] = spec["hdf5"].prefix

51        os.environ["H5ZROOT"] = spec["h5z-zfp"].prefix

     52        os.environ["ZFPROOT"] = spec["zfp"].prefix
     53        os.environ["FFTWHOME"] = spec["fftw"].prefix
     54        os.environ["EXTRA_LINK_FLAGS"] = "-lstdc++ -lm -ldl "

See build log for details:
/tmp/tech/spack-stage/spack-stage-sw4-3.0-pimxejebklplgx2wsg4a7ulo35jij5pc/spack-build-out.txt

tech@tech1:~$ spack find -p h5z-zfp
-- linux-ubuntu22.04-skylake / gcc@11.4.0 -----------------------
h5z-zfp@1.1.1 /home/tech/spack/opt/spack/linux-ubuntu22.04-skylake/gcc-11.4.0/h5z-zfp-1.1.1-y6dhjpupaev2dy2oulaol2gms4uujyhk

==> Error: KeyError: 'No spec with name h5z-zfp in sw4@=3.0%gcc@=11.4.0+fftw+hdf5+openmp+proj~zfp build_system=makefile arch=linux-ubuntu22.04-skylake ^autoconf

51        os.environ["H5ZROOT"] = spec["h5z-zfp"].prefix

==> Error: KeyError: 'No spec with name h5z-zfp in sw4@=3.0%gcc@=11.4.0+fftw+hdf5+openmp+proj~zfp build_system=makefile arch=linux-ubuntu22.04-skylake ^autoconf

The ~zfp is disabling zfp in the sw4 build. If you disable zfp, you certainly cannot have h5z-zfp. The fact that spack failed instead of proceeding with sw4 build sounds like its not handling cases where zfp has been removed from the build. Lets go look at that code...

So, I think you need to change ~zfp to +zfp. Have you tried that.