"Paul A Bristow" <pbristow@hetp.u-net.com> wrote in message news:E1DarwS-0004uN-KK@he303war.uk.vianw.net...
Recently we had a flurry of discussion of why Boost is not more widely used.
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But if we are to interest your average Windows IDE programmer, for whom MAKE is a blank or a distant nightmare, IMO we need some much better and simpler instructions, including lots of examples of input and output, and to be as well tested as the rest of Boost code. Like it or not, these are the potential customers and I spoken to many who are put off by the 'build barrier'.
I suggest that we explicitly say that you can use all of Boost (except the ones that must have built libraries) by adding to the include list - and say exactly how in Windows IDE-ese.
Something like this as a start? For MSVC ======== Organizing boost files ====================== 1) Create a main boost directory which will contain the current and future boost library verstions. For example: C:\boost 2) Download the desired version(s) of boost (.exe or .zip files ) from http://sourceforge.net/project/showfiles.php?group_id=7586&package_id=8041 to the boost directory created in step 1. 3) Extract the .exe or .zip file(s) from Step 2 into the directory from Step 1. These sub-directories should retain the boost version within it's name. For example C:\boost\boost_1_32_0 C:\boost\boost_1_31_0 Using the header only boost libraries from MSVC7.1 ================================================== Using a single version of boost header only libraries installation wide ----------------------------------------------------------------------- 1) Open an instance of MSVC 7.1 IDE. 2) Click the 'Tools | Options...' menu. 3) Select the 'Projects | VC++ Directories' item from the tree view on the left of the Options dialog. 4) Select 'Include Files' from the 'Show directories for' dropdown. 5) Double-click just below the last entry in the directory list box, and enter the path to the sub-directory for the desired version of boost. For example: C:\boost\boost_1_33_0. 6) Repeat 5 for each Platform of interest after selecting another platform from the 'Platform' dropdown. 7) Click Ok. OR Using a single version of boost header only libraries on a project by project basis ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 1) Open your project with the MSVC 7.1 IDE. 2) Select the desired project from the Class View or Solution View browsers. 3) Click the 'Project | Properties' menu. 4) Select 'All Configurations' from the 'Configuration' dropdown. 5) Select 'Configuration Properties | C/C++ | General' item from the tree view on the left of the '<project> Property Pages' dialog. 6) Enter the desired boost version directory name in the 'Additional Include Directories' value field in the properties listbox. For example: C:\boost\boost_1_33_0. Note that directories are delimited with ';'. 7) Click Ok. Jeff Flinn