Comment by flohofwoe
2 years ago
My stuff for instance:
https://github.com/floooh/sokol
...inspired by:
https://github.com/nothings/stb
(here's how the sokol headers are integrated into a Zig project, note that there is only a build.zig which builds everything: https://github.com/floooh/kc85.zig)
But it's not so much about build systems, but requiring a separate compiler toolchain to build any C++ or ObjC dependencies (Rust needs this, Zig currently does not - unless that controversial proposal is implemented).
(also even complex C++ libraries can be wrapped in a build.zig, so you don't require a separate build system like cmake for the C++ dependencies)
I still don't see why this is a problem. Single-header dependencies are cute but blow up compile times, and most of the world needs CMake/Meson/Autotools anyways so there's not an added cost to using it for your own projects.
Similarly I don't really understand why you want one toolchain for a multi-language project. It's not that useful or convenient since it's going to need to be orchestrated with a buildsystem somehow.
Like with Rust, you probably only have a build.rs file. It invokes a separate (possibly multiple) toolchains. Or with CMake. A simple project has a single CMakeLists.txt that can invoke any number of toolchains. I don't see why zig can't do that with a build.zig file, or why it matters.
Did you try the stuff you are proposing? This is all a royal pita in real world projects which the Zig toolchain solved wonderfully.
(also it's a myth that STB style libs increase compile time, that's only true for typical C++ header-only libs with inline methods and template code)