[Doc] How To Add Third Party Libraries

Hello, c++ newbie here: can someone make a tutorial on how to add third party libraries so that they compile alongside urho? Specifically I’d like to add raknet for linux and android. Any links would also be appreciated.

Hello,

After you’ve installed the libraries, you would typically add a few lines to your app’s CMakeLists.txt

Might want to bookmark this… I made several return trips:
cmake.org/Wiki/CMake:How_To_Find_Libraries

Rough sketch that might look familiar…

find_package(MyLib REQUIRED)
include_directories(…)
define_source_files(…)

And what else?
I’m not comfortable with CMake / Urho3D-CMake-common yet.
But I did manage to link to shared TurboBadger if that’s any use.
cmakelists: topic1413.html#p8431

'nother post on linking dependent libs and Urho CMake macros…
topic146.html

Since this is written on the feature request forum, I take it to mean that Urho’s documentation should contain instructions on this. However I’m not sure if the documentation could be much more than “follow the example of existing thirdparty libraries”.

You’ll see that Urho usually likes to rewrite the thirdparty CMakeLists so that they don’t define a separate project, but a target. How easy or difficult this is depends on the library. But: this applies only to 3rd party libraries that Urho uses by itself in a subsystem, and are combined into the Urho library. So if you’d want Raknet compiled into Urho you would also need to write a RaknetNetwork subsystem.

On the other hand, when it’s your application and not Urho using the library, you don’t need to abide by the Urho conventions and CMake utility commands. Rather you can use whatever CMake commands you need to get the job done. Again, I don’t think it’s necessarily Urho documentation’s job to teach you CMake.

Well said, Lasse. Additionally I want to say this. Just do it, as long as it works, don’t care how long winded it might be compared to other project’s CMakeLists.txt, don’t care about what other people might say or do it differently. You get things done faster that way than keep referencing others. Your understanding of how CMake works will only grow better if you keep using it.

License is the hard / absolute rule. The other points are less absolute; a couple of guidelines could be written into the integration / contribution guide. However best course of action is to talk here before starting any major work (that you want to propose into master some day) using some library.

Generally the history has been to favor small and no-bullshit libraries. There’s also the matter of use; assimp would not look nice in the Urho runtime itself but in an offline tool it’s perfectly OK.

EDIT: added guidelines to the bottom of the contribution checklist page. Should appear shortly in the HEAD documentation, or you can take a look at the end of github.com/urho3d/Urho3D/blob/m … erence.dox