Building Boost BCP

50

votes

I was trying to build Boost C++ Libraries for last two hours and stopped without any result. Since I am new to C++, I am unable to get the build right. How can I build it correctly using Visual Studio 2008?

I need to use the BCP tool to extract a subset of library. So I need to build BCP first, right? How to do this? When I tried to build it, I got the following error

fatal error LNK1104: cannot open file 'libboost_filesystem-vc90-mt-gd-1_37.lib'.

Where can I get the above given library file?

c++boost

130

votes

The current version of Boost (1.50.0) uses Boost.Build. The new workflow for building bcp is as follows:

from the root Boost directory, type:

bootstrap.bat

Then, once Boost.Build has been built, type:

b2 tools/bcp

36

votes

First, you need to have the proper PATH, INCLUDE and LIB environment variables in your command shell. For this, call the file "vcvarsall.bat" (or similar) with parameter:

vcvarsall.bat x86

Next you have to build bjam (you can also download it from the Boost page, but it's almost as quick). Go to the tools\jam\src folder in Boost and type:

build.bat

It should produce a subfolder bin.ntx86 that contains bjam.exe. For convenience, copy it to the Boost main folder. Next, you can build bcp. Go into the tools\bcp folder and type:

..\..\bjam.exe --toolset=msvc

Back in the Boost main folder you can then build any library you wish:

bjam toolset=msvc –-with-{library}

where {library} is one of the libraries to build. All buildable libraries can be shown with:

bjam –-show-libraries

There are many more bjam build parameters. Some parameters with keywords you can specify are:

variant=debug|release
link=shared|static
threading=multi|single

An example would be:

bjam toolset=msvc –-with-filesystem threading=multi variant=debug stage

For more infos, visit the Boost documentation pages.

Edit: Updated link to point to most recent Boost documentation

Edit: Corrected options --with-{library} and –-show-libraries

3

votes

I extracted the source: https://github.com/district10/cmake-bcp (You don't need to configure BOOST, cause all source code are included already).

On Linux, cmake + make to build:

# cd source_dir
mkdir build && cd build
cmake ..
make

On Windows: CMake-GUI + Visual Studio to build. Need help? See HOWTO: Win + CMake + Visual Studio 2010.

My executables:

Windows: http://whudoc.qiniudn.com/2016/bcp_standalone.exe (561 KB)
Linux: http://whudoc.qiniudn.com/2016/bcp_standalone_linux (917 KB)
macOS: https://github.com/district10/cmake-bcp/releases/download/1.0/macOS_bcp (801 KB)

Tip: If you come across linking problems on Windows when using Boost, go check the boost/config/auto_link.hpp and you'll understand. To resolve this, you can just comment out the whole file.

0

votes

Note that you don't need to build your Windows versions of bcp from source -- you can also download a binary version from http://www.boostpro.com/download, and skip all those steps.

(Or, at least, that's the case in theory -- I haven't tried it; I just found that page and this one while looking for a pre-built Linux version.)

Building Boost BCP

4 Answers