[SOLVED] boost_unit_test_framework{-mt , -gcc }

damien_d · 08-07-2009, 04:06 AM

Hello all,

I've recently reinstalled Linux (ubuntu 9.04) due to a hard disk failure and and trying to reconfigure my programming environment.

Back on my old system, the following snippet from my CMake file happliy compiled:

Code:

# Testing for library
add_executable(Test_Maths_Array2D Maths/Test_Array2D.cpp)
target_link_libraries(Test_Maths_Array2D boost_unit_test_framework m)
add_test(Test_Maths_Array2D Test_Maths_Array2D)

But now, it spits out:

Code:

/usr/bin/ld: cannot find -lboost_unit_test_framework
collect2: ld returned 1 exit status

However, if I change it from:

Code:

boost_unit_test_framework       # <- Broken
boost_unit_test_framework-mt    # <- Working

What is the -mt suffix? There's also a lot of the -gcc suffix as well when I look in /usr/lib. For example:

Code:

lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root   51 2009-07-28 23:38 /usr/lib/libboost_unit_test_framework-gcc41-1_34_1.so.1.34.1 -> libboost_unit_test_framework-gcc42-1_34_1.so.1.34.1
lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root   54 2009-07-28 23:38 /usr/lib/libboost_unit_test_framework-gcc41-mt-1_34_1.so.1.34.1 -> libboost_unit_test_framework-gcc42-mt-1_34_1.so.1.34.1
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 274K 2009-02-26 22:22 /usr/lib/libboost_unit_test_framework-gcc42-1_34_1.so.1.34.1
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 274K 2009-02-26 22:22 /usr/lib/libboost_unit_test_framework-gcc42-mt-1_34_1.so.1.34.1
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 1.1M 2009-03-27 12:28 /usr/lib/libboost_unit_test_framework-mt.a
lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root   41 2009-08-07 18:37 /usr/lib/libboost_unit_test_framework-mt.so -> libboost_unit_test_framework-mt.so.1.37.0
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 325K 2009-02-27 09:10 /usr/lib/libboost_unit_test_framework-mt.so.1.35.0
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 373K 2009-03-27 12:28 /usr/lib/libboost_unit_test_framework-mt.so.1.37.0
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 325K 2009-02-27 09:10 /usr/lib/libboost_unit_test_framework.so.1.35.0

So once upon a time, there must have been a symlink of some sort, but I never put anything like that there.

It now works, but I wish I had an explanation as to why...

-- Damien

neonsignal · 08-07-2009, 08:51 AM

The '-mt' suffix indicates libraries that were built with multithreading support.

If you were using non '-mt' libraries on a multithreaded program, there would be problems (probably intermittent ones).

But you are doing the opposite, using '-mt' libraries on (presumably) a single threaded program, so this should be fine.

Incidentally, it looks like you have more than one version of the boost libraries. The single threaded version of the unit test library was an older version than the multi threaded version (and was missing the symlink). The single/multi threaded version depends on how the library was compiled (the distro repositories usually supply both).

damien_d · 08-08-2009, 12:44 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by neonsignal

The '-mt' suffix indicates libraries that were built with multithreading support.

If you were using non '-mt' libraries on a multithreaded program, there would be problems (probably intermittent ones).

But you are doing the opposite, using '-mt' libraries on (presumably) a single threaded program, so this should be fine.

Incidentally, it looks like you have more than one version of the boost libraries. The single threaded version of the unit test library was an older version than the multi threaded version (and was missing the symlink). The single/multi threaded version depends on how the library was compiled (the distro repositories usually supply both).

Thanks. I haven't done any multi-threading with Boost, so that explains that.

I was installing, then uninstalling, then installing again a bunch of different boost versions offered by my distro (Ubuntu 9.04) in an attempt to get it working.

-- Damien