Someone can help me to write an .mk file and add custom library to buildroot.
Example:
I have foo.c and foo.h and this library that i wrote, have to be installed on a custom Linux to make my main app running successfully.
I also want to know if until this Linux was deployed, Could I use <foo.h> instead of ".../foo.h"
thanks in advance.
As I understand it you have a simple library with a .c and .h.
The Makefile needs to do the following.
Compile the .c to a .o
Put the .o inside a .a (Static library).
Put the .a (static library) into the "build root" as you call it. If the "prefix/build root" chosen is /usr/local (the default in most cases) the correct place is /usr/local/lib.
Copy the .h to the "build root". The correct place is "include". "/usr/local/include".
You can see a simple Makefile example here. Also you can make the project a single header project. Like here
Related
it is awkward, but until now i always copy the *.h and the *.c files to my projekts location. this is a mess and i want to change it!
i want to build my own c library and have a few questions about it.
where should i locate the *.h files?
should i copy them in the global /usr/include/ folder or should i create my own folder in $HOME (or anywhere else)?
where should i locate the *.a files and the *.o files and where the *.c files.
i am using debian and gcc. my c projects are in $HOME/dev/c/.
i would keep my lib-sources in $HOME/dev/c/lib (if this is the way you could recommend) and copy the *.o, *.a and *.h files to the location i am asking for.
how would you introduce the lib-location to the compiler? should i add it to the $PATH or should i introduce it in the makefiles of my projekt (like -L PATH/TO/LIBRARY -l LIBRARY).
do you have anny further tips and tricks for building a own library?
I would recommend putting the files somewhere in your $HOME directory. Let's say you've created a library called linluk and you want to keep that library under $HOME/dev/c/linluk. That would be your project root.
You'll want a sensible directory structure. My suggestion is to have a lib directory containing your library and an include directory with the header files.
$PROJECT_ROOT/
lib/
liblinluk.so
include/
linluk.h
src/
linluk.c
Makefile
Compiling: When you want to use this library in another project, you'd then add -I$PROJECT_ROOT/include to the compile line so that you could write #include <linluk.h> in the source files.
Linking: You would add -L$PROJECT_ROOT/lib -llinluk to the linker command line to pull in the compiled library at link time. Make sure your .so file has that lib prefix: it should be liblinluk.so, not linluk.so.
A src directory and Makefile are optional. The source code wouldn't be needed by users of the library, though it might be helpful to have it there in case someone wants to remake the .so file.
As I commented, you should try first to build and install from its source code several free software libraries, e.g. like libonion or gdbm or GNU readline etc (don't use any distribution package, but compile and install these from source code). This will teach you some good practice.
You probably want to install these libraries system-wide, not for your particular user. Then, assuming that your library is called foo (you need to give it some name!),
the header files *.h go into /usr/local/include/foo/
the shared objects (dynamic libraries) go into /usr/local/lib/libfoo.so (with perhaps some version numbering)
if relevant, static library go into /usr/local/lib/libfoo.a
You need to add once /usr/local/lib/ into /etc/ld.so.conf and run ldconfig(8)
and you usually don't want to copy any source file *.c or object file *.o
(except for homoiconic programs, bootstrapped compilers, Quine programs, generated C code, etc... See RefPerSys or Jacques Pitrat systems as an incomplete example of self generated C or C++). In some weird cases, you may want to copy such "source" or "generated C" code under /usr/src/.
Read Program Library HowTo (and later, Drepper's paper: How To Write Shared Libraries)
You could consider making your library known by pkg-config. Then install some foo.pc under /usr/local/lib/pkgconfig/
BTW, I strongly suggest you to publish your library as free software, perhaps on github or elsewhere. You'll get useful feedback and could get some help and some bug reports or enhancements.
You probably should use some builder like make and have an install target in your Makefile (hint: make it use the DESTDIR convention).
I downloaded the libftp source from here, and compiled it using make. Now I just have a binary called "ftp" in the same directory. Do I need to move it to one of the root directories, like /usr/bin? Do I still need the source files so that I can #include the library?
To use a library in your own code, first you need that library - generally named lib{name}.a or lib{name}.so. The library will be required during linking. So when you make, make sure it creates the library and not just the ftp binary.
Secondly, at compile time you will need the header files so that the #include's don't throw errors. So as far as source goes, you will at least need the header files.
I am using the Pelles C IDE and for certain projects have to tell the linker to include a certain library e.g. Ws2_32.lib. Currently I am developing a function I plant to reuse frequently throughout numerous projects, so I decided to make a header file for it. Is there a way to tell the linker to include a certain library from the header file ?
You have link the library, no other way.
If compiler is gcc in linux, you can link the lirary libtemp.so like
gcc youfile.c -ltemp
And before running the executable add the path of libtemp.so to LD_LIBRARY_PATH
In your IDE you can config the samething.
I'm working on a project from school, and we were given a .o and a corresponding .h file.
We need to use several functions from the .o file in our .c program.
Just placing it in the same directory doesn't work.
I tried to look for something like this in the project properties, but no good.
I keep getting ../code_files/Search.c:116: undefined reference to 'reportError'
I'm using Eclipse (Juno) CDT, gcc MinGW under Windows 7
I know it's possible to include .a files, but I couldn't find any indication on how to include a .o file
#include "ErrorHandle.h" is included in the main c file.
Anyone knows how to include a .o file to a project?
Thanks!
I found this answer:
I tried doing something similar, only I didn't think of the miscellaneous thing
You can trivially turn the .o into a .a with ar cvs library.a object.o, and then add the .a to your project.
I'm sure this question has been asked many times, but I can't figure this out. Bear with me.
So when you download a library, you get a bunch of .c and .h files, plus a lot of other stuff. Now say you want to write a program using this library.
I copy all the .h files into my project directory. It just doesn't compile.
Great, so then I get the library as a bunch of .dll's, and i copy the dlls into my project directory. Still doesn't compile.
How does this work?
What do you do, like right after creating the folder for your project? What parts of the library package do you copy/paste into the folder? How do you make it so that it can compile? Go through the steps with me please.
Where to put the .h files?
Where to put the .dll files?
How to compile?
Thanks.
(the library I'm trying to get working is libpng, I'm in windows with MinGW, and i'm looking to compile from command-line like usual.)
(from what i gather, you put the .h files in directory A and the .dll files in directory B and you can use -l and -L compiler options to tell the compiler where to find them, is this correct?)
Here's a brief guide to what happens when you compile and build a basic C project:
The first stage compiles all your source files - this takes the source files you've written and translates them into what are called object files. At this stage the compiler needs to know the declaration of all functions you use in your code, even in external libraries, so you need to use #include to include the header files of whatever libraries you use. This also means that you need to tell the compiler the location of those header files. With GCC you can use the -I command line to feed in directories to be searched for header files.
The next stage is to link all the object files together into one executable. At this stage the linker needs to resolve the calls to external libraries. This means you need the library in object form. Most libraries will give you instructions on how to generate this or might supply it ready built. Under Linux the library file is often a .a or .so file, though it might just be a .o. Again you can feed the location of the library's object file to GCC with the -L option.
Thus your command line would look like this:
gcc myProg.c -I/path/to/libpng/include -L/path/to/libpng/lib -lpng -o myProg.exe
(Note that when using the -l command line GCC automatically adds lib to the start of the library, so -lpng causes libpng.a to be linked in.)
Hope that helps.
Doing it under windows (supposing you user Visual Studio)
After unpacking add the library include directories to your projects' settings (Project -> Properties -> C/C++ -> Additional Include Directories)
Do the same thing for the Libraries Directory (Project -> Properties -> Linker -> Additional Library Directories)
Specify the name of the library in your Linker Input: Project -> Properties -> Linker -> Input -> Additional Dependencies
After this hopefully should compile.
I don't recommend adding the directories above to the Global settings in Visual Studio (Tools -> Options -> Project and Solutions) since it will create and environment where something compiles on your computer and does NOT compile on another one.
Now, the hard way, doing it for a Makefile based build system:
Unpack your stuff
Specify the include directory under the -I g++ flag
Specify the Library directory under the -L g++ flag
Specify the libraries to use like: -llibrary name (for example: -lxml2 for libxml2.so)
Specify the static libraries like: library name.a
at the end you should have a command which is ugly and looks like:
g++ -I/work/my_library/include -L/work/my_library/lib -lmylib my_static.a -o appname_exe MYFILE.CPP
(the line above is not really tested just a general idea)
I recommend go, grab a template makefile from somewhere and add in all your stuff.
You must link against a .lib or something equivalent i.e. add the ".lib" to the libraries read by the linker. At least that's how it works under Linux... haven't done Windows so a long while.
The ".lib" contains symbols to data/functions inside the .dll shared library.
It depends on the library. For examples, some libraries contain precompiled binaries (e.g. dlls) and others you need to compile them yourself. You'd better see the library's documentation.
Basically, to compile you should:
(1) have the library's include (.h) file location in the compiler's include path,
(2) have the library stubs (.lib) location in the linker's library path, and have the linker reference the relevant library file.
In order to run the program you need to have the shared libraries (dlls) where the loader can see them, for example in your system32 directory.
There are two kinds of libraries: static and dynamic (or shared.)
Static libraries come in an object format and you link them directly into your application.
Shared or dynamic libraries reside in a seperate file (.dll or .so) which must be present at the time your application is run. They also come with object files you must link against your application, but in this case they contain nothing more than stubs that find and call the runtime binary (the .dll or the .so).
In either case, you must have some header files containing the signatures (declarations) of the library functions, else your code won't compile.
Some 'libraries' are header-only and you need do nothing more than include them. Some consist of header and source files. In that case you should compile and link the sources against your application just as you would do with a source file you wrote.
When you compile, assuming you have the libs and the headers in the same folder as the sources you are compiling, you need to add to your compile line -L . -I . -lpng. -L tells the linker where to look for the library, -I tells the compiler where to look for the headers and -lpng tells the linker to link with the png library.
[Edit]
Normal projects would have some sort of hierarchy where the headers are in an /include folder and the 3rd party libs are in a /libs folder. In this case, you'd put -I ./include and -L ./libs instead of -I . and -L.
[Edit2] Most projects make use of makefile in order to compile from the command line. You can only compile manually for a small number of files, it gets quite hectic after that
Also,
you may want to look over Dynamic Loading support in various languages and on various
platforms.
This support is very handy in cases when you want to use a library optionally and you don't want your program to fail in case that library is not available.