How to link to dynamic boost libs?

I compiled boost lib and got these.

//Shared/dynamic link libraries

24/03/2010  11:25 PM            53,248 boost_thread-vc80-mt-1_42.dll
24/03/2010  11:25 PM            17,054 boost_thread-vc80-mt-1_42.lib
24/03/2010  11:25 PM            17,054 boost_thread-vc80-mt.lib

24/03/2010  11:25 PM            73,728 boost_thread-vc80-mt-gd-1_42.dll
24/03/2010  11:25 PM            17,214 boost_thread-vc80-mt-gd-1_42.lib
24/03/2010  11:25 PM            17,214 boost_thread-vc80-mt-gd.lib

// Static libs... does not need any dlls

24/03/2010  11:25 PM           381,716 libboost_thread-vc80-mt-1_42.lib
24/03/2010  11:25 PM           381,716 libboost_thread-vc80-mt.lib

24/03/2010  11:25 PM           999,552 libboost_thread-vc80-mt-gd-1_42.lib
24/03/2010  11:25 PM           999,552 libboost_thread-vc80-mt-gd.lib

24/03/2010  11:25 PM           421,050 libboost_thread-vc80-mt-s-1_42.lib
24/03/2010  11:25 PM           421,050 libboost_thread-vc80-mt-s.lib

24/03/2010  11:25 PM         1,015,688 libboost_thread-vc80-mt-sgd-1_42.lib
24/03/2010  11:25 PM         1,015,688 libboost_thread-vc80-mt-sgd.lib

In Visual Studio, I have written a test app using the boost thread library. Based on code generation settings it asks for these four libs only (like multithreading debug, multithreading, multithreading debug dll, and multithreading dll)

24/03/2010  11:25 PM           381,716 libboost_thread-vc80-mt-1_42.lib
24/03/2010  11:25 PM           381,716 libboost_thread-vc80-mt.lib

24/03/2010  11:25 PM           999,552 libboost_thread-vc80-mt-gd-1_42.lib
24/03/2010  11:25 PM           999,552 libboost_thread-vc80-mt-gd.lib

24/03/2010  11:25 PM           421,050 libboost_thread-vc80-mt-s-1_42.lib
24/03/2010  11:25 PM           421,050 libboost_thread-vc80-mt-s.lib

24/03/2010  11:25 PM         1,015,688 libboost_thread-vc80-mt-sgd-1_42.lib
24/03/2010  11:25 PM         1,015,688 libboost_thread-vc80-mt-sgd.lib

Now my question is how can I link my app to the other 2 libs so that it uses the dlls?

24/03/2010  11:25 PM            53,248 boost_thread-vc80-mt-1_42.dll
24/03/2010  11:25 PM            17,054 boost_thread-vc80-mt-1_42.lib
24/03/2010  11:25 PM            17,054 boost_thread-vc80-mt.lib

24/03/2010  11:25 PM            73,728 boost_thread-vc80-mt-gd-1_42.dll
24/03/2010  11:25 PM            17,214 boost_thread-vc80-mt-gd-1_42.lib
24/03/2010  11:25 PM            17,214 boost_thread-vc80-mt-gd.lib

Question 2. What does the g, s stands for?


Solution 1:

You can force Boost to use the DLLs by defining BOOST_ALL_DYN_LINK - either in your C++ preprocessor settings or by a #define in your stdafx.h pre-compiled header, e.g.:

#define BOOST_ALL_DYN_LINK

Solution 2:

To configure boost use the user config header

<boost/config/user.hpp>

Then just look for the dynamic link lines and change to your desired configuration

// BOOST_ALL_DYN_LINK: Forces all libraries that have separate source, 
// to be linked as DLL's rather than static libraries on Microsoft Windows 
// (this macro is used to turn on __declspec(dllimport) modifiers, so that 
// the compiler knows which symbols to look for in a DLL rather than in a 
// static library).  Note that there may be some libraries that can only 
// be statically linked (Boost.Test for example) and others which may only 
// be dynamically linked (Boost.Threads for example), in these cases this 
// macro has no effect.
// #define BOOST_ALL_DYN_LINK

Solution 3:

  1. The .lib files are linked statically, while .dll files are linked dynamically. I believe it's a VC project setting.

The "lib" prefix is for static libraries. Use link=static 
The 's' letter is to static linking to runtime. Use runtime-link=static 
The 'd' is debug, use variant=debug 
The 'g' is using debug runtime, I think it's included in 'debug' variant 
already. If not runtime-debugging=on will help. 

Source: http://old.nabble.com/Build-statically-linked-boost-libs-*-vc90-mt-sgd.lib-td16301103.html