How to link C++ program with Boost using CMake

What should my CMake file look like for linking my program with the Boost library under Ubuntu?

The errors shown during running make:

main.cpp:(.text+0x3b): undefined reference to `boost::program_options::options_description::m_default_line_length'

The main file is really simple:

#include <boost/program_options/options_description.hpp>
#include <boost/program_options/option.hpp>
using namespace std;
#include <iostream>

namespace po = boost::program_options;

int main(int argc, char** argv) {

	po::options_description desc("Allowed options");
	desc.add_options()
		("help", "produce help message")
		;

    return 0;
}

---

I've managed to do that. The only lines that I've added to my CMake files were:

target_link_libraries(
my_target_file
${Boost_PROGRAM_OPTIONS_LIBRARY}
)

In CMake you could use find_package to find libraries you need. There usually is a FindBoost.cmake along with your CMake installation.

As far as I remember, it will be installed to /usr/share/cmake/Modules/ along with other find-scripts for common libraries. You could just check the documentation in that file for more information about how it works.

An example out of my head:

FIND_PACKAGE( Boost 1.40 COMPONENTS program_options REQUIRED )
INCLUDE_DIRECTORIES( ${Boost_INCLUDE_DIR} )

ADD_EXECUTABLE( anyExecutable myMain.cpp )

TARGET_LINK_LIBRARIES( anyExecutable LINK_PUBLIC ${Boost_LIBRARIES} )

I hope this code helps.

• Here's the official documentation about FindBoost.cmake.

• And the actual FindBoost.cmake (hosted on GitHub)

The following is my configuration:

cmake_minimum_required(VERSION 2.8)
set(Boost_INCLUDE_DIR /usr/local/src/boost_1_46_1)
set(Boost_LIBRARY_DIR /usr/local/src/boost_1_46_1/stage/lib)
find_package(Boost COMPONENTS system filesystem REQUIRED)
include_directories(${Boost_INCLUDE_DIR})
link_directories(${Boost_LIBRARY_DIR})

add_executable(main main.cpp)
target_link_libraries( main ${Boost_LIBRARIES} )

Adapting @MOnsDaR answer for modern CMake syntax with imported targets, this would be:

find_package(Boost 1.40 COMPONENTS program_options REQUIRED)

add_executable(anyExecutable myMain.cpp)

target_link_libraries(anyExecutable Boost::program_options)

Note that it is not necessary to specify the include directories manually, since it is already taken care of through the imported target Boost::program_options.

Two ways, using system default install path, usually /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/:

find_package(Boost REQUIRED regex date_time system filesystem thread graph)
include_directories(${BOOST_INCLUDE_DIRS})
message("boost lib: ${Boost_LIBRARIES}")
message("boost inc:${Boost_INCLUDE_DIR}")

add_executable(use_boost use_boost.cpp)
target_link_libraries(use_boost
        ${Boost_LIBRARIES}
        )

If you install Boost in a local directory or choose local install instead of system install, you can do it by this:

set( BOOST_ROOT "/home/xy/boost_install/lib/" CACHE PATH "Boost library path" )
set( Boost_NO_SYSTEM_PATHS on CACHE BOOL "Do not search system for Boost" )

find_package(Boost REQUIRED regex date_time system filesystem thread graph)
include_directories(${BOOST_INCLUDE_DIRS})
message("boost lib: ${Boost_LIBRARIES}, inc:${Boost_INCLUDE_DIR}")

add_executable(use_boost use_boost.cpp)
target_link_libraries(use_boost
        ${Boost_LIBRARIES}
        )

Note the above dir /home/xy/boost_install/lib/ is where I install Boost:

xy@xy:~/boost_install/lib$ ll -th
total 16K
drwxrwxr-x 2 xy xy 4.0K May 28 19:23 lib/
drwxrwxr-x 3 xy xy 4.0K May 28 19:22 include/

xy@xy:~/boost_install/lib$ ll -th lib/
total 57M
drwxrwxr-x 2 xy xy 4.0K May 28 19:23 ./
-rw-rw-r-- 1 xy xy 2.3M May 28 19:23 libboost_test_exec_monitor.a
-rw-rw-r-- 1 xy xy 2.2M May 28 19:23 libboost_unit_test_framework.a
.......

xy@xy:~/boost_install/lib$ ll -th include/
total 20K
drwxrwxr-x 110 xy xy  12K May 28 19:22 boost/

If you are interested in how to use a local installed Boost, you can see this question https://stackoverflow.com/questions/3016448/how-can-i-get-cmake-to-find-my-alternative-boost-installation.

Here is my take:

cmake_minimum_required(VERSION 3.15)

project(TryOuts LANGUAGES CXX)

find_package(Boost QUIET REQUIRED COMPONENTS program_options)

if(NOT Boost_FOUND)
    message(FATAL_ERROR "Boost Not found")
endif()

add_executable(helloworld main.cpp)

target_link_libraries(helloworld PUBLIC Boost::program_options)

Which Boost library? Many of them are pure templates and do not require linking.

Now with that actually shown concrete example which tells us that you want Boost program options (and even more told us that you are on Ubuntu), you need to do two things:

1. Install libboost-program-options-dev so that you can link against it.
2. Tell cmake to link against libboost_program_options.

I mostly use Makefiles so here is the direct command-line use:

$ g++ boost_program_options_ex1.cpp -o bpo_ex1 -lboost_program_options
$ ./bpo_ex1
$ ./bpo_ex1 -h
$ ./bpo_ex1 --help
$ ./bpo_ex1 -help
$

It doesn't do a lot it seems.

For CMake, you need to add boost_program_options to the list of libraries, and IIRC this is done via SET(liblist boost_program_options) in your CMakeLists.txt.