Boost 1.70's cmake config makes cmake stop looking where I tell it to

[tonyelewis]

Boost 1.70's cmake config makes cmake stop looking where I tell it to in two ways:

1. With Boost 1.68, I could tell cmake the location of the Boost I wanted to use with either a BOOST_ROOT environment variable or a -DBOOST_ROOT=[...] command line flag but with 1.70.0, the latter option has stopped working.
2. If I have a Boost 1.70 directory in /opt/, cmake uses that one instead of the Boost (either 1.68 or 1.70) in another location that I explicitly request (via either a BOOST_ROOT environment variable or a -DBOOST_ROOT=[...] command line flag). Even if I have two Boost 1.70 directories in /opt/, cmake chooses which one to use itself, disregarding my explicit choice.

I have seen these issues with cmake-3.12.1-Linux-x86_64 and cmake-3.15.0-rc3-Linux-x86_64.

Apologies: I'm not sure whether this issue should be raised here or against FindBoost.cmake on https://gitlab.kitware.com/cmake — I'm guessing here because the problem appears to be associated with a change in the Boost version not the CMake version. Sorry if that's incorrect.

[tonyelewis]

More info in case it helps…

I'm testing with a CMakeLists.txt like this:

cmake_minimum_required( VERSION 3.7 )

project( cmake-boost-problems )

find_package( Boost 1.68.0 REQUIRED program_options )

add_executable( example_exe example_exe.cpp )

target_link_libraries( example_exe Boost::program_options )

…and a C++ file like this:

#include <iostream>

#include <boost/program_options.hpp>

using ::boost::program_options::notify;
using ::boost::program_options::options_description;
using ::boost::program_options::parse_command_line;
using ::boost::program_options::store;
using ::boost::program_options::value;
using ::boost::program_options::variables_map;
using ::std::cout;

int main(int ac, char **av) {
  ::std::cout << "Hello world\n";

  // Declare the supported options.
  options_description desc("Allowed options");
  desc.add_options()("help", "produce help message")(
      "compression", value<int>(), "set compression level");

  variables_map vm;
  store(parse_command_line(ac, av, desc), vm);
  notify(vm);

  if (vm.count("help")) {
    cout << desc << "\n";
    return 1;
  }

  if (vm.count("compression")) {
    cout << "Compression level was set to " << vm["compression"].as<int>()
         << ".\n";
  } else {
    cout << "Compression level was not set.\n";
  }
}

^{I'm using program_options so that I get obvious link errors on attempts to link against the wrong Boost (GCC+libstc++ / Clang+libc++).}

I'm using invocations like:

/some/specific/cmake -Bcmbi-clang -DBOOST_ROOT=/opt/obscure/boost_1_70_0_clang_c++14_build  -H. -DCMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=RELEASE -DCMAKE_C_COMPILER=/usr/bin/clang -DCMAKE_CXX_COMPILER=/usr/bin/clang++ -DCMAKE_CXX_FLAGS=-stdlib=libc++
/some/specific/cmake -Bcmbi-gcc   -DBOOST_ROOT=/opt/obscure/boost_1_70_0_gcc_c++14_build    -H. -DCMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=RELEASE

I'm using cmake from the Linux-x86_64.tar.gz downloads on https://cmake.org/download. I'm running on Ubuntu 18.04.2.

[pdimov]

find_package has two modes, "module mode", using FindBoost.cmake, and "config mode", using BoostConfig.cmake. The default is module mode, but FindBoost has logic to automatically find and use a config file. This is documented here: https://cmake.org/cmake/help/v3.15/module/FindBoost.html#boost-cmake

If you want to disable the use of BoostConfig (installed by 1.70), set Boost_NO_BOOST_CMAKE=ON. If you want to keep using BoostConfig, but control the directory in which it's found, set Boost_DIR, which is the documented mechanism to control the search. See https://cmake.org/cmake/help/v3.15/command/find_package.html#search-procedure

For this specific use case, you may consider building and installing Boost with --layout=versioned, in which case the gcc and clang libraries can go into a single directory; BoostConfig will select the correct libraries based on the CMake compiler id.

[tonyelewis]

Thanks very much for your very quick and very helpful response.

I think your explanation is much clearer than the ones in the documentation to which you linked - even after you've highlighted the relevant sections, I can barely make out the solution to my problem from it.

I feel like many people are likely to hit this sort of issue and will, like me, waste a lot of time wondering what they've done wrong. Is there some way we could try to mitigate this? Could the config mode detect when BOOST_ROOT has been specified an print a helpful warning message?

From my experiments, I think I'm finding that:

• for Boost_NO_BOOST_CMAKE, it will be heeded if specified via a command-line flag of -DBoost_NO_BOOST_CMAKE=ON but ignored if via an environment variable
• for Boost_DIR, it will be heeded if specified via an environment variable Boost_DIR=/my/dir but ignored if via command line flag

Is that correct? Is it possible to make both work via both?

Thanks very much for all your work on this really important area. It's much appreciated.

[tonyelewis]

For reference (potentially for other people that may stumble across this issue), I'm finding these toolchain files (-DCMAKE_TOOLCHAIN_FILE=file.cmake) do the trick:

clang-168.toolchain.cmake :

set( Boost_NO_BOOST_CMAKE ON                                  )
set( BOOST_ROOT           /opt/boost_1_68_0_clang_c++14_build )
set( CMAKE_BUILD_TYPE     RELEASE                             )
set( CMAKE_C_COMPILER     /usr/bin/clang                      )
set( CMAKE_CXX_COMPILER   /usr/bin/clang++                    )
set( CMAKE_CXX_FLAGS      -stdlib=libc++                      )

clang-170.toolchain.cmake :

set( ENV{Boost_DIR}       /opt/boost_1_70_0_clang_c++14_build )
set( CMAKE_BUILD_TYPE     RELEASE                             )
set( CMAKE_C_COMPILER     /usr/bin/clang                      )
set( CMAKE_CXX_COMPILER   /usr/bin/clang++                    )
set( CMAKE_CXX_FLAGS      -stdlib=libc++                      )

gcc-168.toolchain.cmake :

set( Boost_NO_BOOST_CMAKE ON                                  )
set( BOOST_ROOT           /opt/boost_1_68_0_gcc_c++14_build   )
set( CMAKE_BUILD_TYPE     RELEASE                             )

gcc-170.toolchain.cmake :

set( ENV{Boost_DIR}       /opt/boost_1_70_0_gcc_c++14_build   )
set( CMAKE_BUILD_TYPE     RELEASE                             )

[pdimov]

I think that set(Boost_DIR "/my/dir") needs CACHE in order to work.

There is also the option of using Boost_ROOT, both as an environment variable and a CMake variable. The subtlety there is that pre-3.12, it's ignored for compatibility reasons. In other words, cmake_minimum_required(3.7) will turn it off. See https://cmake.org/cmake/help/v3.15/policy/CMP0074.html#policy:CMP0074

This is all CMake behavior, we have no control over it.

[pdimov]

No control, that is, apart from filing issues against CMake. :-)

https://gitlab.kitware.com/cmake/cmake/issues?scope=all&utf8=%E2%9C%93&state=opened&search=boost

[tonyelewis]

So my current understanding is:

• For Boost ≤ 1.69, we can specify the location with BOOST_ROOT as a command line parameter, set(), or environment variable.
• The world is ❤️ 🌷 🌞 😎 👍
• But from ≥ Boost 1.70, it will start preferring to use "config mode", meaning it will silently ignore the BOOST_ROOT if we specify it via the command line or set().
• But it will continue heeding it if we specify it via an environment variable.
• But the new config mode will find Boost directories in new places (eg /opt) and these will silently override our BOOST_ROOT, even if specified via an environment variable (that it otherwise heeds).
• To revert to the previous, non "config mode" behaviour, we must specify Boost_NO_BOOST_CMAKE=ON
• But this must be specified via a command line parameter or set(); if we specify it via an environment variable, it will be silently ignored.
• To specify the location under "config mode", we can specify Boost_DIR
• But this must be specified as an environment variable or set( Boost_DIR <value> CACHE ); if it is specified via the command line or the a plain set( Boost_DIR <value ), it will be silently ignored.
• There is further complexity with Boost_ROOT (the same as BOOST_ROOT?) and the version of cmake we're using and the version of cmake we've required.
• The world is 💔 🔥 ⛈️ 😕 👎

Does that sound about right?

To me, this story, even if only rougly accurate is a recipe for much confusion and frustration. I'm happy to raise issues against CMake if that might help but I'm unclear about what can be plausibly fixed. In particular, what are issues in FindBoost.cmake rather than fundamental issues with the CMake architecture?

[pdimov]

To confuse matters further, BOOST_ROOT is not the same as Boost_ROOT. The former is what FindBoost.cmake looks at; the latter is what CMake looks at (<PACKAGE>_ROOT, with <PACKAGE> being Boost in our case - the argument given to find_package).

Since FindBoost.cmake was written before the CMake naming conventions were established, it deviates from them. It arguably should be changed to look at Boost_ROOT, if it doesn't already, but even so, we can't retroactively fix older CMake versions.

[pdimov]

I suppose that FindBoost.cmake can be changed to look for BoostConfig.cmake in BOOST_ROOT, when that is set, via something like find_package(Boost CONFIG PATHS ${BOOST_ROOT}). You could try filing a CMake issue to that effect.

[Bagira80]

* To specify the location under "config mode", we can specify `Boost_DIR`

* But this must be specified as an environment variable or `set( Boost_DIR <value> CACHE )`; if it is specified via the command line or the a plain `set( Boost_DIR <value )`, it will be silently ignored.

You could also add the path you would otherwise set in a Boost_DIR cache-variable to the list stored in the CMAKE_PREFIX_PATH variable (no need for a cache-variable) before trying to locate Boost in "config mode".

The only side-effect is, that if you do not restore the former value of CMAKE_PREFIX_PATHafterwards other calls to find_package for other libraries might also consider that path (and might find non-desired versions in that path).

Then again you could always use the PATHS or HINTSoption of find_package to point to a search-location.

[jdmairs]

Dang even with this great help after 4 hours I still cannot get my Centos7 gcc 8.2 static build of Boost 1.72 to be found from CMake 3.15.

Arrrgghh!

Update: I had to set via shell environment variable
export Boost_DIR=/opt/boost/boost_1_72_0/stage/lib/cmake

It also worked via the ENV trick in the toolchain file.