I want to know, or get a clue how to search through a directory in C++ with its own standard libraries or to see if it is possible at all.
Currently I have found several solution to searching directory, but they all use some external libraries such as this SO question:
recursive folder scanning in c++
How should we approach this?
There is no filesystem facilities in the C++ standard. There is a technical specification for it which may be included in a future version of C++.
Until then, you will have to use platform specific functions or a library that wraps them. Apparently the new proposal is almost the same as boost's API, so I recommend using boost even if it's ubiquitousness wasn't good enough reason already.
I would like to start using boost in an embedded environment. I can live without boost libraries that require compilation for quite sometime. I suppose just moving boost directory into appropriate place in our code base will do the trick
Am I right about it or it is more involved than that?
How to get rid of header files for the libraries that are not being used?
Are there any gcc version dependencies in boost libraries. E.g. can use gcc-4.1.1 with the latest?
Am I right about it or it is more involved than that?
That will do it.
How to get rid of header files for the libraries that are not being used?
Why bother? They're not going to be compiled into the program. When you deploy your distribution won't be any different whether you remove them or not.
Are there any gcc version dependencies in boost libraries. E.g. can use gcc-4.1.1 with the latest?
vOv - That's a very old version. Boost takes things a lot further than most, more that I think they should most of the time, trying to make sure it works with old and/or broken compilers. You're really pushing it though.
I have not tried it myself, but if you compile Boost with a directory prefix, then I suppose you could move the directory later. I can't see a big problem with that or at least one that can't be fixed quickly.
As for getting rid of header files for libraries that aren't use, look into the bcp utility for the version with which you are using:
http://www.boost.org/doc/libs/1_49_0/tools/bcp/doc/html/index.html
It is "a tool for extracting subsets of Boost" -- exactly what you are looking for.
As for your last question, I think it depends on what version of Boost you are using. I've never had a problem with gcc dependencies...it seems their requirements are fairly liberal. I don't think you need to be worried too much about it unless you plan to use a version of gcc that is "much" older (than the Boost you plan to use). I would guess 'old' here is old enough that you don't need to worry -- any number that I would say would be merely a guess...
Hope this helps!
Boost is meant to be the standard non-standard C++ library that every C++ user can use. Is it reasonable to assume it's available for an open source C++ project, or is it a large dependency too far?
Basically your question boils down to “is it reasonable to have [free library xyz] as a dependency for a C++ open source project.”
Now consider the following quote from Stroustrup and the answer is really a no-brainer:
Without a good library, most interesting tasks are hard to do in
C++; but given a good library, almost any task can be made easy
Assuming that this is correct (and in my experience, it is) then writing a reasonably-sized C++ project without dependencies is downright unreasonable.
Developing this argument further, the one C++ dependency (apart from system libraries) that can reasonably be expected on a (developer's) client system is the Boost libraries.
I know that they aren't but it's not an unreasonable presumption for a software to make.
If a software can't even rely on Boost, it can't rely on any library.
Take a look at http://www.boost.org/doc/tools.html. Specifically the bcp utility would come in handy if you would like to embed your boost-dependencies into your project. An excerpt from the web site:
"The bcp utility is a tool for extracting subsets of Boost, it's useful for Boost authors who want to distribute their library separately from Boost, and for Boost users who want to distribute a subset of Boost with their application.bcp can also report on which parts of Boost your code is dependent on, and what licences are used by those dependencies."
Of course this could have some drawbacks - but at least you should be aware of the possibility to do so.
I used to be extremely wary of introducing dependencies to systems, but now I find that dependencies are not a big deal. Modern operating systems come with package managers that can often automatically resolve dependencies or, at least,make it very easy for administrators to install what is needed. For instance, Boost is available under Gentoo-Postage as dev-libs/boost and under FreeBSD ports as devel/boost.
Modern open source software builds a lot on other systems. In a recent study, by tracking the dependencies of the FreeBSD packages, we established that the 12,357 ports packages in our FreeBSD 4.11 system, had in total 21,135 library dependencies; i.e., they required a library, other than the 52 libraries that are part of the base system, in order to compile. The library dependencies comprised 688 different libraries, while the number of different external libraries used by a single project varied between 1 and 38, with a mode value of 2. Furthermore, 5,117 projects used at least one external library and 405 projects used 10 or more.
In the end the answer to your question will come from a cost versus benefit analysis. Is the benefit of re-using a mature, widely used, reviewed, and tested library like Boost and larger than the low and falling cost of a dependency? For any non-trivial use of Boost's facilities the answer is that you should go ahead and use Boost.
It depends. If you're using a header file only defined class template in Boost - then yes go ahead and use it because it doesn't suck in any Boost shared library, as all the code is generated at compile time with no external dependencies. Versioning problems are a pain for any shared c++ library, and Boost is not immune from this, so if you can avoid the problem altogether it's a good thing.
The benefits of using boost when writing C++ code that they significantly outweigh the extra complexity of distributing the open source code.
I work on Programmer's Notepad and the code takes a dependency on boost for test, smart pointers, and python integration. There have been a couple of complaints due to the requirement, but most will just get on with it if they want to work on the code. Taking the boost dependency was a decision I have never regretted.
To make the complexity slightly less for others, I include versioned pre-built libraries for boost python so that all they need to do is provide boost in their include directories.
KDE also depends on Boost.
However it mostly depends on your goals, and even more so on your target audience, rather than the scope of your project. for example TinyJSON (very small project), is almost 100% Boost, but thats fine because the API it provides is Boost-like and targeted at Boost programmers that need JSON bindings. However many other JSON libraries don't use Boost because they target other audiences.
On the other hand I can't use Boost at work, and I know lots of other developers (in their day jobs) are in the same boat. So I guess you could say if your Target is OpenSource, and a group that uses Boost, go ahead. If you target enterprise you might want to think it over and copy-paste just the necessary parts from Boost(and commit to their support) for your project to work.
Edit: The reason we can't use it at work is because our software has
to be portable to about 7 different
platforms and across 4 compilers. So
we can't use boost because it hasn't
been proven to be compatible with
all our targets, so the reason is a
technical one. (We're fine with the
OpenSource and Boost License part,
as we use Boost for other things at
times)
I would say yes. Both Mandriva (Red Hat based) and Ubuntu (Debian based) have packages for the Boost libriaries.
I think the extensive functionality that Boost provides and, as you say, it is the standard non-standard C++ library justifies it as a dependency.
Unfortunately yes, for ubuntu they're readily available but for RHEL 4&5 I've almost always ended up making them from tarballs. They're great libraries, just really big... like using a rail spike when sometimes all you really need is a thumbtack.
It all depends on the way you're going to use Boost. As Diomidis said, if you're going to use some non-trivial facilities from Boost, just go ahead. Using libraries is not a crime.
Of course, there are many people who prefer not to use Boost, because introducing new dependencies has always some cons and extra worries, but in an open source project... in my opinion it's even alright to use them if you just want to learn them or improve your skills on them.
I can't seem to find the _findfirst / findfirst, _findnext / findnext API on gcc for Linux, and would actually rather use the Standard Template Library (STL) for that if it is included there.
Does anyone know what API there is available for listing files in a directory under Linux for C++ (gcc)?
It's not a C++-style API, but the API you aren't finding (the Linux/Unix correspondent of DOS/Windows-style findfirst/findnext) is opendir/readdir/closedir.
The main advantage of using opendir/readdir/closedir is that you do not need any extra library (it's part of the C library, which you are already using). In fact, the Boost filesystem library uses opendir/readdir/closedir to get the list of files in a directory.
References:
http://www.opengroup.org/onlinepubs/009695399/functions/opendir.html
http://www.opengroup.org/onlinepubs/009695399/functions/readdir.html
http://www.opengroup.org/onlinepubs/009695399/functions/closedir.html
Check out the Boost.Filesystem library.
In particular, the basic_directory_iterator.
The STL does not, yet, have functions for listing files in a directory. But it does have functions for opening files you are already aware of.
Aside from Boost.Filesystem, there is also STLSoft
Since C++17 the standard library contains std::filesystem which has its source in Boost.Filesystem. Nowadays std::filesystem::directory_iterator is the obvious choice since it is platform-independent, offers better abstraction than _findfirst/findnext/opendir/readdir/closedir and doesn't introduce any dependencies. If you can't use a C++17-compliant compiler use Boost for now and switch over later.
Is Boost the only way for VS2005 users experience TR2? Also is there a idiot proof way of downloading only the TR2 related packages?
I was looking at the boost installer provided by BoostPro Consulting. If I select the options for all the threading options with all the packages for MSVC8 it requires 1.1GB. While I am not short of space, it seems ridiculous that a library needs over a gigabyte of space and it takes BPC a long time to catch up with the current release.
What packages do I need? I'm really only interested in those that comprise std::tr2 and can find that out by comparing those on offer to those in from the TR2 report and selecting those from the list but even then it isn't clear what is needed and the fact that it is a version behind annoys me.
I know from previous encounters with Boost (1.33.1) that self compiling is a miserable experience: A lot of time wasted to get it started and then a hoard of errors passes across your screen faster than you can read, so what you are left with is an uneasy feeling that something is broken but you don't quite know what.
I've never had these problems with any Apache library but that is another rant...
I believe you're actually referring to TR1, rather than TR2. The call for proposals for TR2 is open, but don't expect to see much movement until the new C++ standard is out. Also, although boost is a provider of an implementation of TR1, dinkumware and the GNU FSF are other providers - on VC2005 boost is probably the easiest way to access this functionality.
The libraries from boost which are likely to be of most importance are
reference
smart pointer
bind
type traits
array
regular expressions
The documentation for building boost has been gradually improving for the last few releases, the current getting started guide is quite detailed. smart pointer and bind, should work from header files, and IMO, these are the most useful elements of TR1.
Part of the beauty of Boost is that all code is in header files. They have to for template reasons. So probably downloading the code and including it in your project will work. There are some libraries in Boost that do need compiling, but as long as you don't need those...
The libraries I am most interested in from TR1/TR2 are threads and the related atomics.
Compiling the boost libraries for yourself is actually quite simple, if not that well documented. The documentation is in the jamroot file. Run bjam --help in the boost root directory for a detailed list of options. As an example I used the following command line to build my current set up with boost 1.36.0:
bjam --build-type=complete --toolset=msvc --build-dir=c:\boost\build install
It ran for about a half hour on my machine and put the resulting files into c:\boost