Contents of "cmake-out"

[epasveer]

After cloning and building the C++ sdk, I see the build artifacts (libraries) appear in "cmake-out" directory. However, the include files are not there.

Am I wrong to expect the include files (like google-cloud-cpp/cmake-out/) to not be there?

Here are my build commands after cloning the repo.

https://github.com/googleapis/google-cloud-cpp

Building with CMake
This library requires CMake >= 3.10. If you are planning to install the libraries please consult the [packaging guide](https://github.com/googleapis/google-cloud-cpp/blob/main/doc/packaging.md), these instructions will NOT produce artifacts that you can put in /usr/local, or share with your colleagues.

From the top-level directory of google-cloud-cpp run these commands:

git -C $HOME clone https://github.com/microsoft/vcpkg.git
env VCPKG_ROOT=$HOME/vcpkg $HOME/vcpkg/bootstrap-vcpkg.sh
cmake -S . -B cmake-out/ -DCMAKE_TOOLCHAIN_FILE=$HOME/vcpkg/scripts/buildsystems/vcpkg.cmake
cmake --build cmake-out -- -j $(nproc)

The binary artifacts, such as examples, will be placed in cmake-out/.

[coryan]

First: if you are using vcpkg.io to get the dependencies of google-cloud-cpp, then you may want to use it to install google-cloud-cpp too. Mixing manually compiled libraries and libraries compiled with a package manager is full of pitfalls.

If you tell us more about what are you trying to do, maybe we can point you to the right documentation for your use-case. For example, if you wanted to compile google-cloud-cpp from source then /doc/packaging.md is probably what you want. If you want to use vcpkg.io, then just the instructions from that package manager should work. You would just do something like vcpkg install google-cloud-cpp and use what it produces.

---

However, the include files are not there.
Am I wrong to expect the include files (like google-cloud-cpp/cmake-out/) to not be there?

I think you mean "Am i wrong to expect the include files to be there?".

In any case, maybe this can help:

• cmake --build just compiles the binary artifacts (and other generated files, e.g. protobuf-generated *.pb.h files)
• cmake --install compiles the binary artifacts, headers, and support files to a destination

If you want to install the libraries and headers you want something like:

cmake -S . -B cmake-out --toolchain $HOME/vcpkg/scripts/buildsystems/vcpkg.cmake
cmake --build cmake-out -- -j $(nproc)
cmake --install cmake-out --prefix /usr/local

However, that will leave things in /usr/local that depend on the vcpkg binaries in $HOME/vcpkg. In almost every case that is a bad idea.

[epasveer]

Thanks for the quick answer.

I think I'm just missing this step.

cmake --install cmake-out --prefix /usr/local

For now, we don't want the artifacts to end up in /usr/local -- so I'll put it somewhere in my home directory. I'll play around with this command to see what I get.

[coryan]

For now, we don't want the artifacts to end up in /usr/local -- so I'll put it somewhere in my home directory.

Whatever works for you is fine by me, of course. I feel obliged to mention that $HOME/vcpkg/vcpkg install google-cloud-cpp will leave the libraries and headers in $HOME/vcpkg/installed/.... That may be a quicker way to play around with the libraries.

Likewise, you may want to browse:

https://cloud.google.com/cpp/docs/setup#cmake-with-conda

or

https://cloud.google.com/cpp/docs/setup#cmake-with-vcpkg

Conda downloads binary packages, you can be up and running in one minute (that was a speed run, but you get the idea: no time waiting for the compiler).

[epasveer]

That command worked perfectly! Thanks.

[epasveer]

Thanks for the added info. We're just getting into gcloud's C++ api. I'm sure we'll revisit the building of the C++ sdk in the future. I've marked this dicsussion.