## Using GoogleTest from various build systems ## GoogleTest comes with pkg-config files that can be used to determine all necessary flags for compiling and linking to GoogleTest (and GoogleMock). Pkg-config is a standardised plain-text format containing * the includedir (-I) path * necessary macro (-D) definitions * further required flags (-pthread) * the library (-L) path * the library (-l) to link to All current build systems support pkg-config in one way or another. For all examples here we assume you want to compile the sample `samples/sample3_unittest.cc`. ### CMake ### Using `pkg-config` in CMake is fairly easy: ``` cmake_minimum_required(VERSION 3.0) cmake_policy(SET CMP0048 NEW) project(my_gtest_pkgconfig VERSION 0.0.1 LANGUAGES CXX) find_package(PkgConfig) pkg_search_module(GTEST REQUIRED gtest_main) add_executable(testapp samples/sample3_unittest.cc) target_link_libraries(testapp ${GTEST_LDFLAGS}) target_compile_options(testapp PUBLIC ${GTEST_CFLAGS}) include(CTest) add_test(first_and_only_test testapp) ``` It is generally recommended that you use `target_compile_options` + `_CFLAGS` over `target_include_directories` + `_INCLUDE_DIRS` as the former includes not just -I flags (GoogleTest might require a macro indicating to internal headers that all libraries have been compiled with threading enabled. In addition, GoogleTest might also require `-pthread` in the compiling step, and as such splitting the pkg-config `Cflags` variable into include dirs and macros for `target_compile_definitions()` might still miss this). The same recommendation goes for using `_LDFLAGS` over the more commonplace `_LIBRARIES`, which happens to discard `-L` flags and `-pthread`. ### Autotools ### Finding GoogleTest in Autoconf and using it from Automake is also fairly easy: In your `configure.ac`: ``` AC_PREREQ([2.69]) AC_INIT([my_gtest_pkgconfig], [0.0.1]) AC_CONFIG_SRCDIR([samples/sample3_unittest.cc]) AC_PROG_CXX PKG_CHECK_MODULES([GTEST], [gtest_main]) AM_INIT_AUTOMAKE([foreign subdir-objects]) AC_CONFIG_FILES([Makefile]) AC_OUTPUT ``` and in your `Makefile.am`: ``` check_PROGRAMS = testapp TESTS = $(check_PROGRAMS) testapp_SOURCES = samples/sample3_unittest.cc testapp_CXXFLAGS = $(GTEST_CFLAGS) testapp_LDADD = $(GTEST_LIBS) ``` ### Meson ### Meson natively uses pkgconfig to query dependencies: ``` project('my_gtest_pkgconfig', 'cpp', version : '0.0.1') gtest_dep = dependency('gtest_main') testapp = executable( 'testapp', files(['samples/sample3_unittest.cc']), dependencies : gtest_dep, install : false) test('first_and_only_test', testapp) ``` ### Plain Makefiles ### Since `pkg-config` is a small Unix command-line utility, it can be used in handwritten `Makefile`s too: ``` GTEST_CFLAGS = `pkg-config --cflags gtest_main` GTEST_LIBS = `pkg-config --libs gtest_main` .PHONY: tests all tests: all ./testapp all: testapp testapp: testapp.o $(CXX) $(CXXFLAGS) $(LDFLAGS) $< -o $@ $(GTEST_LIBS) testapp.o: samples/sample3_unittest.cc $(CXX) $(CPPFLAGS) $(CXXFLAGS) $< -c -o $@ $(GTEST_CFLAGS) ``` ### Help! pkg-config can't find GoogleTest! ### Let's say you have a `CMakeLists.txt` along the lines of the one in this tutorial and you try to run `cmake`. It is very possible that you get a failure along the lines of: ``` -- Checking for one of the modules 'gtest_main' CMake Error at /usr/share/cmake/Modules/FindPkgConfig.cmake:640 (message): None of the required 'gtest_main' found ``` These failures are common if you installed GoogleTest yourself and have not sourced it from a distro or other package manager. If so, you need to tell pkg-config where it can find the `.pc` files containing the information. Say you installed GoogleTest to `/usr/local`, then it might be that the `.pc` files are installed under `/usr/local/lib64/pkgconfig`. If you set ``` export PKG_CONFIG_PATH=/usr/local/lib64/pkgconfig ``` pkg-config will also try to look in `PKG_CONFIG_PATH` to find `gtest_main.pc`.