How to set up googleTest as a shared library on Linux

Question

Debian does not provide any precompiled packages for gTest anymore. They suggest you integrate the framework into your project\'s makefile. But I want to keep my makefile cl

Answer 1

Let me answer this specifically for ubuntu users. First start by installing the gtest development package.

sudo apt-get install libgtest-dev

Note that this package only install source files. You have to compile the code yourself to create the necessary library files. These source files should be located at /usr/src/gtest. Browse to this folder and use cmake to compile the library:

sudo apt-get install cmake # install cmake
cd /usr/src/gtest
sudo mkdir build
cd build
sudo cmake ..
sudo make
sudo make install

Now to compile your programs that uses gtest, you have to link it with:

-lgtest -lgtest_main -lpthread

This worked perfectly for me on Ubuntu 14.04LTS.