zig-fetch

simple dependency management for zig projects!

intro

zig-fetch is a way to handle fetching dependencies for your project with:

no installation required
no submodules
no package config files

the goal is to add some basic package management without having to change much about your zig workflow.

for library developers, there are only a few changes needed to set up this workflow

for library users, no change is needed - zig build will work just like normal!

features

zig-fetch provides the following features:

fetch and cache git repo dependencies
recursive fetch support - dependencies using zig-fetch will automatically fetch their dependencies recursively
add build steps and build options which get passed through to your build file

getting started

there are three simple steps to use zig-fetch

copy fetch.zig into your project folder
rename your build.zig to something different, like compile.zig
add a new build.zig where you define your project dependencies and call fetchAndBuild

here's an example of a build.zig file:

const fetch = @import("fetch.zig");
const std = @import("std");

const deps = [_]fetch.Dependency{
    .{
        .name = "zig-fetch-example",
        .vcs = .{
            .git = .{
                .url = "https://github.com/bootradev/zig-fetch-example",
                .commit = "88548fb9f4ed307abd78d8d45bf590dcf9da17ed",
                .recursive = true,
            },
        },
    },
};

pub fn build(builder: *std.build.Builder) !void {
    fetch.addStep(builder, "example-step", "Test passing a step through build.zig");
    fetch.addOption(builder, bool, "example-option", "Test passing an option through build.zig");
    try fetch.fetchAndBuild(builder, "zig-deps", &deps, "compile.zig");
}

fetchAndBuild takes 4 arguments:

the builder
the name of the directory where dependencies are fetched to
array of dependencies to fetch
the name of the build file to call after fetching is complete

build options

(use zig build --help to see all available build options)

fetch-skip - Skip fetching dependencies entirely
fetch-only - Only fetch dependencies, do not build
fetch-force - Force fetch dependencies, even if already cached
--verbose - not a zig-fetch specific option, but this will add additional logging during the build

additional notes

see build.zig and compile.zig in this repo for an example of the workflow

you can also check out https://github.com/bootradev/zig-fetch-example as additional reference

credits

thanks to https://github.com/desttinghim for coming up with idea for a separate build file!