Linking libssh statically for MinGW - c++

Question

I am trying to statically link libssh to my project which is built using a mingw/mysys makefile, however no matter what I try I get a whole bunch of undefined reference errors. I've spent hours researching this but I still can't fix it. Below is my makefile and some example output. I also compiled the libssh.a file using cmake with the WITH_STATIC_LIB option set to 1. I don't understand how I can continue to get these errors even though my linker can find the libssh.a file. Did I build it incorrectly?
Example output:
c:/mingw/bin/../lib/gcc/mingw32/8.2.0/../../../../mingw32/bin/ld.exe: build/BMU.o: in function `ZN3ssh7SessionC1Ev':
./include/libssh/libsshpp.hpp:130: undefined reference to `_imp__ssh_new'
.
.
.
Makefile
CC := g++
TARGET := "dist/target"
BUILDDIR := build
SRCDIR := src
CFLAGS := -std=c++17 -g -mconsole
SRCEXT := cpp
SOURCES := $(wildcard $(SRCDIR)/*.$(SRCEXT))
OBJECTS := $(patsubst $(SRCDIR)/%, $(BUILDDIR)/%, $(SOURCES:.$(SRCEXT)=.o))
INCLUDE := -I./include
LIB := -L./lib -lws2_32 -lssh -lmodbus -static
$(BUILDDIR)/%.o: $(SRCDIR)/%.$(SRCEXT)
#printf "\e[33m\e[1mBuilding...\e[0m\n";
#mkdir -p $(BUILDDIR)
#echo " $(notdir $#) from $(notdir $<)"
#$(CC) $(CFLAGS) $(INCLUDE) -c -o $# $<
$(TARGET): $(OBJECTS)
#printf "\e[35m\e[1mLinking...\e[0m\n";
#mkdir -p dist
#echo " $(notdir $(OBJECTS))"
#$(CC) $(CFLAGS) -o $# $^ $(LIB)
Building Libssh:
First I did
git clone https://git.libssh.org/projects/libssh.git libssh
then using cmake-gui built it for MySys makefile with 'WITH_STATIC_LIB" set to 'ON' and 'WITH_SHARED_LIB' to 'OFF'
Then I ran make from my terminal and it created a libssh.a file which I moved to the ./lib folder in my project.
The make file was able to find the libssh.a file but I still got these errors.
Any help is appreciated and yes I looked a tons of other stackoverflow posts before posting myself.
Other things I tried
#define LIBSSH_STATIC 1 and without it
using vcpkg to install libssh, but this generates a .lib file which has the same problems as the .a file
Edit:
Including LIBSSH_STATIC causes the output to look like:
c:/mingw/bin/../lib/gcc/mingw32/8.2.0/../../../../mingw32/bin/ld.exe: ./lib\libssh.a(channels.c.obj):channels.c:(.text+0x1979): undefined reference to `_imp__ssh_buffer_add_data'

Answer 1

The correct CMake parameter for building static libraries (including for libssh) is -DBUILD_SHARED_LIBS:BOOL=OFF
As long as you're seeing _imp__ in the undefined reference to errors your linker is looking for the symbols exported from a shared library (DLL).
To make sure the project that uses libssh looks for the static library you must define LIBSSH_STATIC, for example by adding compiler flag -DLIBSSH_STATIC to CFLAGS in your Makefile.