cpp-app-template

Personal template for starting a C++ project.

Requirements

This template works under GNU+Linux distributions, however, this template should work under Windows and other UNIX based operating systems (e.g. macOS, FreeBSD, etc.) with the following utilities:

1. gcc and g++
2. git
3. make
4. cmake

Directory Structure

• extern/: Contains imported submodules
• include/: Contains header files
• src/: Contains cpp source files
• .gitmodules: Stores submodules repository information
• CMakeLists.txt: CMake config
• Makefile: Makefile which contains tasks for CMake

.
+--extern
|   +--...
+--include
|   +--...
+--src
|   +--main.cc
|   +--...
+--.gitignore
+--.gitmodules
+--CMakeLists.txt
+--Makefile
+--README.md

Compile Project

You can use make to run the compile process which is a make task called build, this is the default task:

make build

or

make

However, the task build will not run unless the output of CMake does not exist. To recompile changes one must use the rebuild task:

make rebuild

Run Project

Like with make build, you can use make to run the compiled executable by using the task called run:

make run

Clean Binaries

We can clean the generated files and directories from our compiling by using the clean task:

make clean

Importing Libraries

This template uses the common methods of bring in libraries. In the CMakeLists.txt file:

1. We must include the libraries using add_subdirectory statements for each library.
2. We must link the includes and binaries of the libraries by defining:
   1. A target_include_directories block that contains paths to libraries include directories for each library.
   2. target_link_libraries statements for each library.

CMakeLists.txt Structure

CMAKE Version Requirement

cmake_minimum_required(VERSION <cmake-version-req>)

Project definitions

project(
    <project-name>
    VERSION <version>
    LANGUAGES <c-or-cxx>)

Variables

set(<var-name> <val>)

Examples

set(CMAKE_CXX_STANDARD 11)
set(CMAKE_CXX_STANDARD_REQUIRED True)
set(SOURCE_DIR "${PROJECT_SOURCE_DIR}/src/")
set(INCLUDE_DIR "${PROJECT_SOURCE_DIR}/include/")

Add submodules

add_subdirectory(extern/<submodule>)
...

Link project includes

include_directories(<dir-with-includes>)

Get source files

file(GLOB_RECURSE SOURCES <src-patterns>)

Compile executable for project

add_executable(${PROJECT_NAME} ${SOURCES})

Link submodules

target_include_directories(${PROJECT_NAME}
    PUBLIC extern/<submodule>/include
    ...
)
target_link_libraries(${PROJECT_NAME} <submodule_binary_name>)
...