Re: [Boost-users] Dependencies between boost libraries

From: John Maddock (john_at_[hidden])
Date: 2006-11-08 09:04:23

Jeff Garland wrote:
> I'll just point out that things are more complicated than the
> 'answers' provided by bcp.  As an example, date_time depends on
> serialization, but only if you actually include specific date_time
> serialization headers.  Since bcp just mechanically traces
> dependencies it can't *know* that if you don't want to user
> serialization that dependency and any that serialization pulls in
> goes away.

Right, the answer to the question depends upon your definition of "depends
on".

Generally it's best to ask this question of a specific header rather than a 
whole library (which pulls in testing and example program dependencies).

bcp also has a scan mode that will scan *your code* for Boost dependencies, 
but even then you may get misleading results - see the shared_ptr example in 
the docs for an explanation.

It's really annoying when the simple things turn out to be hard isn't it? 
:-)

John.