Hunter

Cross-platform package manager for CMake (based on ExternalProject)
Supported platforms: Linux, Mac, Windows, iOS

What is it?

Every hunter release archive is a meta-package with build instructions and URLs of real packages, i.e.:

Hunter (0.4.2) = { Boost (1.55.0), GTest (1.7.0), JsonSpirit(0.0.1), OpenSSL(1.0.1h), ... }

Currently used versions can be found in cmake/config.cmake file and are customizable (though there are no guaranties that some combinations are workable)
Per package versions are available in corresponding hunter.cmake file (e.g. GTest). You can pick one version that already exists or add a new one

Features

Automatic dependencies download
No more emerge, apt-get, brew etc. Now it's simply cmake --build
Reusable ExternalProject_Add recipies
Once written formula can be used by other projects, subprojects etc. without copying of collection of superbuild files. Just change 2 lines of code: SHA1 and URL of hunter archive
Customizable builds
Does your package manager support 32/64 bit libraries?
Debug/Release version of libraries?
Can you build your third-party dependencies with Clang Memory Sanitizer?
Can you install your favorite library in static variant instead of dynamic?
...

Usage

Set HUNTER_ROOT environment variable (recommended but not mandatory, see other options)
Copy gate module to your project and include it:

include("cmake/HunterGate.cmake")

This module will download archive automatically from URL that you provide:

HunterGate(
    URL "https://github.com/ruslo/hunter/archive/v0.5.0.tar.gz"
    SHA1 "8c9a553d3dbde74d411167ae67423416dd0e1a31"
)

Now you can use it. For example let's download and install boost.regex and boost.filesystem:

hunter_add_package(Boost COMPONENTS regex filesystem)

That's all. And now well known cmake-style kung-fu:

find_package(Boost REQUIRED regex filesystem)

include_directories(${Boost_INCLUDE_DIR})
add_executable(foo foo.cpp)
target_link_libraries(foo ${Boost_LIBRARIES})

... and build:

> cmake -H. -B_builds -DHUNTER_STATUS_DEBUG=ON -DCMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=Release
> cmake --build _builds --config Release

iOS note

Install is broken on iOS. Patched version of cmake need to be used (+ install universal libraries instread of one-arch).

Tagged builds

Each build can be tagged by HUNTER_INSTALL_TAG variable. Tags used to differentiate one build from another on one OS. For example on windows you can simultaniously build Visual Studio (32/64), NMake, Cygwin and MinGW projects, on Linux gcc/clang, on Mac Xcode, Makefile, iOS. Or choose different clang tools like static analyzer and sanitizers. Tags designed to be used in cmake toolchain files. Each toolchain file will be forwarded to external project so if you create toolchain with compiler g++ and flag -std=c++11 all dependent projects will be built by g++ -std=c++11.

Uninstall

All directories inside <HUNTER_ROOT>/_Base are reconstructible. You can remove all temps (downloads, unpacked directories, installed directories etc.) by command:

rm -rf "${HUNTER_ROOT}/_Base"

or remove particular snapshot by command:

rm -rf "${HUNTER_ROOT}/_Base/3a6c66670d-BLABLA-2567c3d44b2a99e288e3c8"

How to update?

There is no such thing as update here. If you create a new version (meta-version, i.e. snapshot of different packages' versions) then you will build all of them from scratch (see rationale).

Cons Big one and kind of obvious - it can take a long time to compile, not for every-day update
Pros One versions of all packages independently on all platforms
Pros You can use different meta-versions simultaniously (which is really usefull in CI testing). E.g.:

<HUNTER_ROOT>/_Base/3a6c66670d-BLABLA-2567c3d44b2a99e288e3c8 # Boost 1.55 + OpenSSL 0.9.8 + GTest 1.6
<HUNTER_ROOT>/_Base/f46f105449-BLABLA-9f866237038b70d03ebcc8 # Boost 1.53 + OpenSSL 1.0.1h + GTest 1.7

So put a stable releases inside config.cmake and something like submodules for everything else.

stinvi/hunter