Re: [boost] Proposal for moving Boost to CMake

Subject: Re: [boost] Proposal for moving Boost to CMake
From: Louis Dionne (ldionne.2_at_[hidden])
Date: 2017-06-18 21:24:36

> I am totally for a better support of CMake, and what you suggest is ok 
> to me. However (and since the topic is already very huge), maybe I 
> missed some elements. This is usually what I do:
> 
> 1. I build boost using bjam and install it in some folder
> 2. in "my_other_project" that uses cmake, I just specify 
> -DBOOST_ROOT=/myboostinstallfolder and everything works like a charm.
> 
> This is something I always did and it always worked, I do not see any 
> strong limitation on it. So when you say "properly", does it mean the 
> support the user gets in case of failure? or for maintaining his own 
> configuration for having FindBoost running ok?

No, what I mean is that you don't have working per-library targets with the
vanilla FindBoost module. You only have some targets for non-header-only
libraries, and the Boost::boost target for including the headers. So you
can't do something like:

  find_package(Boost COMPONENTS interprocess)
  target_link_libraries(my_exe PRIVATE Boost::interprocess)

and have it "just work". Instead, you'll have to create the proper target
yourself by doing something like:

  # Create a proper Boost::interprocess target
  find_package(Boost COMPONENTS date_time)
  add_library(boost_interprocess INTERFACE)
  add_library(Boost::interprocess ALIAS boost_interprocess)
  target_link_libraries(boost_interprocess INTERFACE Boost::boost
Boost::date_time)
  if ("${CMAKE_SYSTEM_NAME}" STREQUAL "Linux")
    target_link_libraries(boost_interprocess INTERFACE -lrt)
  endif()

  # Now link against it
  target_link_libraries(my_exe PRIVATE Boost::interprocess)

This is actually taken from a CMakeLists.txt I use at work. Note that I'm
not picking on Boost.IPC, it's just the example I had at hand.

Louis

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