BEST Visual Studio Setup for C++ Projects! — Transcript

Full transcript

1. 0:04[Music]
2. 0:06Hey, what's up guys? My name is Aerno.
3. 0:08Welcome back to another
4. 0:10video. Got my coffee means I can make a
5. 0:13video now. So, today I thought I would
6. 0:15kind of just make a little video. It's
7. 0:18going to be a small one. Kind of a
8. 0:19midweek thing for you guys where I just
9. 0:21I just wanted to talk about something
10. 0:23that I didn't feel would take that long.
11. 0:25That being said, the amount of videos
12. 0:26that I've started off being like this is
13. 0:28going to be a short video and then it's
14. 0:30ended up being something that's like
15. 0:32half an hour long has been like I mean
16. 0:34all of them really. But today we're just
17. 0:36going to talk about the way that I set
18. 0:37up my C++ projects. These aren't
19. 0:40necessarily going to be the best
20. 0:42settings for everyone ever. However, it
21. 0:44is what I use. It's what I've kind of
22. 0:45learned like grown into using over the
23. 0:48years. And honestly, every single C++
24. 0:50project or like and I'm not just talking
25. 0:52about a single project. I'm talking
26. 0:53about like a whole solution of projects.
27. 0:55For every single one that I create from
28. 0:57now on, pretty much I use these
29. 0:59settings. So, let's just let's just jump
30. 1:00in and take a look. So, we've just
31. 1:02opened Visual Studio. We've got our
32. 1:03start page here. Nothing's I haven't
33. 1:05opened any kind of solution yet. I'm
34. 1:07going to create a brand new project and
35. 1:08solution here by hitting file, new, and
36. 1:11then project. For now, I'm just going to
37. 1:12go under Visual C++ General and create
38. 1:15an empty project. And then I'll just
39. 1:16call it something like new project. Now,
40. 1:20in terms of the location, I like to
41. 1:21store the projects that I develop under
42. 1:23the C directory and not inside the user
43. 1:25folder. That way, when I'm switching
44. 1:27computers or anything like that, it's
45. 1:28not going to break any paths. And
46. 1:29really, it's just a lot easier to kind
47. 1:31of store your development projects in
48. 1:32some kind of central directory. So, I
49. 1:34like to do something like C/dev and then
50. 1:36maybe we'll call it new project or
51. 1:38something like that. Now, because we've
52. 1:40got create directory for solution, it
53. 1:41will actually automatically create that
54. 1:42new project folder. So, I don't need to
55. 1:44write that. I'll just hit okay and we'll
56. 1:45see what happens.
57. 1:50I'm sure it's taking a while. Okay, so
58. 1:52once we've got this new empty project,
59. 1:54you can see we have absolutely no files
60. 1:56here or anything like that. If I right
61. 1:57click on the actual project and hit open
62. 2:00folder in file explorer, you'll see the
63. 2:02actual directory structure that Visual
64. 2:04Studio has created for us. So what we've
65. 2:06actually got is inside that dev folder,
66. 2:08we've got that new project. We've got a
67. 2:09solution file right next to there. You
68. 2:11can see that also what Visual Studio has
69. 2:13done is it's called our solution the
70. 2:15exact same name as our project. So
71. 2:17that's not necessarily something that
72. 2:20you want. If this is just going to be a
73. 2:22solution with a single project in it,
74. 2:24then maybe it is. But, you know, if
75. 2:26we're making like a game or something,
76. 2:27then it's very it's very rare for us to
77. 2:29kind of want our solution and project
78. 2:31name to be identical. But anyway, this
79. 2:34structure is actually not bad. Um, we've
80. 2:36got a folder dedicated for our for our
81. 2:38project. We've got both a VCX project
82. 2:40file and a filters file. I'm not going
83. 2:42to get too ind depth about all the
84. 2:43different files Visual Studio creates.
85. 2:45That might be an idea for another video,
86. 2:46but basically the VCX project is our
87. 2:49project file, which is just an XML file.
88. 2:51And then we've also got a solution file,
89. 2:53which is its own kind of weird format.
90. 2:55It's a text file, though. Um, and that's
91. 2:57in its own kind of directory. Okay,
92. 2:59cool. I actually like this structure.
93. 3:00I'm not going to change it too much, but
94. 3:02you'll notice that also what we get here
95. 3:04is a bunch of various folders. Now,
96. 3:06these are not folders, right? These are
97. 3:08things called filters. Filters are not
98. 3:10folders. If I right click on new project
99. 3:12here and do add, you'll see there's no
100. 3:14new folder. It says new filter. And if I
101. 3:16add a filter called churno or something,
102. 3:18nothing is going to change on our disc.
103. 3:20That's not the way that it works. This
104. 3:21filters file, however, does contain
105. 3:23these kind of virtual folders that we
106. 3:25create. So these are fantastic for just
107. 3:27organizing your source code within
108. 3:28folders that don't actually exist on
109. 3:30disk, but they do exist in this solution
110. 3:33explorer view. So if I was to go into
111. 3:35source files, for example, and add a new
112. 3:37item, source files is in a folder. So,
113. 3:39if I add an item or something called
114. 3:41main.cpp, once it creates the file and
115. 3:43everything, you'll see that it's
116. 3:44actually just created that right here
117. 3:45next to my project. And that's just I
118. 3:47just that's just that's just messy,
119. 3:49right? What like what why? So, what I
120. 3:51like to do is I like to create a folder
121. 3:53called source or src, which contains all
122. 3:55of my source code and header files and
123. 3:57all that stuff kind of in that folder so
124. 3:59that my project files and any other
125. 4:01resources that I might be using in my
126. 4:03project are actually kind of nicely
127. 4:04separated into folders. And that's
128. 4:06something that that Visual Studio
129. 4:07doesn't set up for you automatically. So
130. 4:09you kind of have to roll with it. So if
131. 4:10we go back to Visual Studio, we can
132. 4:12click on our project here and a little
133. 4:14button will appear here which says show
134. 4:16all files. If we click that this view,
135. 4:20this view is actually your directory
136. 4:24structure that is on your disk that is
137. 4:26on your hard drive. So if I right click
138. 4:28now and hit add, you'll see the filter
139. 4:29is replaced with new folder and I can
140. 4:32actually make a folder called src.
141. 4:34Right? If I alt tab back to my file
142. 4:36explorer, look at that. We've got a
143. 4:37folder called source. So, let's move
144. 4:39this main.cpp file into that source
145. 4:41directory. Now, I can do so using
146. 4:43Windows Explorer, which would mean that
147. 4:44I would have to manually update it in
148. 4:46Visual Studio. Or I can just click and
149. 4:47drag it like that. And you can see that
150. 4:49on disk, it's actually moved it into
151. 4:51that directory. Okay. So, now Visual
152. 4:53Studio is actually behaving a little bit
153. 4:54more like I would like it to. So, this
154. 4:56kind of show all files button is
155. 4:59incredibly useful and honestly, I kind
156. 5:01of use that mostly. If we go back to our
157. 5:03filters, you can see that main is still
158. 5:05inside the source files. This is just a
159. 5:07virtual organization kind of scheme,
160. 5:11right? I can drag this to header files.
161. 5:13It doesn't matter where this is, right?
162. 5:14It could be just in no filters, which
163. 5:16would mean it's here. I can just go
164. 5:18ahead and delete all of these. In fact,
165. 5:20it doesn't really matter. These this
166. 5:22filter view is all just it's all fake,
167. 5:25right? It's all just kind of there for
168. 5:27you to just organize things into groups.
169. 5:29It has no no relation to actual
170. 5:32directory structure on disk. So, if I go
171. 5:34back to show all files mode, there is my
172. 5:36main.cpp file and I can do all of my
173. 5:38code here. Let's go ahead and just write
174. 5:40a quick hello world program. Just
175. 5:42something for us to build. All right.
176. 5:43Now, I'm going to compile this. So, I'll
177. 5:44right click on my project, hit build,
178. 5:46and you can see that everything will
179. 5:48build successfully. So, where has Visual
180. 5:51Studio put our .exe file? If we look at
181. 5:53the output, you can see it's gone to new
182. 5:55project, then debug, then new
183. 5:56project.exe. So, debug being our
184. 5:58currently selected configuration. If we
185. 6:00open our file explorer once again and we
186. 6:03check this out. So it hasn't actually
187. 6:05you can see there's a debug folder here
188. 6:07which is in the same directory as our
189. 6:08VCS project file. However, if we open
190. 6:10it, I don't see no no new project.exe in
191. 6:14here, right? So what's going on here? If
192. 6:15we read this a bit more closely, looks
193. 6:16like it's just new project then debug.
194. 6:18So it's not in that project folder. Huh.
195. 6:20Interesting. So let's go back to new
196. 6:22project and then go back again and then
197. 6:24debug and then oh it's in here. How
198. 6:27strange. Visual Studio. So, what's
199. 6:29actually happened is it's put our
200. 6:30intermediate files into a folder called
201. 6:33debug in our project directory and our
202. 6:36actual final executable binary into a
203. 6:38folder called debug in our solution
204. 6:40directory. I don't know who makes this
205. 6:42stuff up. It's really quite annoying. I
206. 6:45have not actually met any professional
207. 6:48developer who leaves these settings.
208. 6:51Everyone changes them because they just
209. 6:54honestly they are weird. Now, it's not a
210. 6:56really big problem to change these and
211. 6:57you can create templates and stuff like
212. 6:59that. So, I'm not roasting Microsoft too
213. 7:01much for deciding to do this. I'm just
214. 7:03saying that it's a little bit weird and
215. 7:04especially for people kind of starting
216. 7:06out who might not know that you can
217. 7:07change this. It's it could actually be
218. 7:10quite difficult to find your damn
219. 7:11executable binary once you've built it.
220. 7:13So anyway, so if we go back to Visual
221. 7:16Studio, if we right click on our project
222. 7:18and hit properties, you'll see that
223. 7:21under active under our active
224. 7:23configuration and platform, we have an
225. 7:25output directory and we have an
226. 7:27intermediate directory. So that's
227. 7:28actually where everything's going. So
228. 7:29you can see that everything that we
229. 7:31write here, by the way, is going to be
230. 7:32relative to the project file. So if I
231. 7:35put something like intermediates here,
232. 7:38it's going to be relative to that
233. 7:40project file. So in the same directory
234. 7:42as our project file which is this VCX
235. 7:44project file it will actually make a
236. 7:46folder called intermediates in this case
237. 7:47and put them all there. Okay. So what I
238. 7:49like to change this to now first of all
239. 7:51I like to go to all configurations so
240. 7:52that I'm editing all configurations. I'm
241. 7:54not going to make any any I'm not going
242. 7:56to save any of these changes that I made
243. 7:57here. Um even all platforms. Okay. And
244. 8:00then what I like to do is this for my
245. 8:02output directory. I like to put my
246. 8:04output directory in my solution
247. 8:07directory slashbin
248. 8:10slashplatform and then slash
249. 8:12configuration and then end that with a
250. 8:15slash as well. Okay, so what it's going
251. 8:17to do in our case is put this into the
252. 8:19solution directory which is the root of
253. 8:21this whole thing. What that means and
254. 8:24the reason I've actually chosen solution
255. 8:25directory is because if we have multiple
256. 8:28projects, right, for example, we build
257. 8:30DLL files or something that are needed
258. 8:32by our main application, we want them
259. 8:34all to be in the same folder, right? I
260. 8:36don't want to have to go into every
261. 8:37project's folder and then deal with
262. 8:39that. I just want all of my built
263. 8:41binaries in one place because that's
264. 8:43usually the typical case. You want them
265. 8:45all there. So, they're going to be in my
266. 8:47solution directory in a folder called
267. 8:48bin, which stands for binaries, in the
268. 8:50appropriate platform folder. So in our
269. 8:52case really it'll only be win32 or x64
270. 8:56and then inside a configuration. So
271. 8:58either debug or release in our case. Now
272. 9:00this last part putting it into a
273. 9:02separate folder for each configuration.
274. 9:04Again not something that I do all the
275. 9:06time. Sometimes I just like to change
276. 9:08the target name to maybe have debug
277. 9:10appended to it for the debug build and
278. 9:12potentially release or nothing at all
279. 9:14appended to it for the release build.
280. 9:16It's it varies honestly based on how I
281. 9:19how I deal with my projects, but in this
282. 9:20case, I'm just going to put them into a
283. 9:22separate folder. Now, intermediate
284. 9:24directories are going to be very
285. 9:25similar. I'm going to put I'm going to
286. 9:27I'm just going to copy everything from
287. 9:29the output directory, put it into the
288. 9:30intermediate directory. The only
289. 9:32difference is that inside bin, I'm going
290. 9:34to make a folder called intermediates
291. 9:38and then put them there by platform, by
292. 9:40configuration. Again, sometimes I put
293. 9:42this intermediates folder at the very
294. 9:43end so that it's already inside
295. 9:44everything. But this way, it's just a
296. 9:46little bit cleaner for you to be able to
297. 9:47copy, say, the platform that you want
298. 9:49and only have all the built binaries, no
299. 9:51intermediate files. So, if I now hit
300. 9:53okay, right, we can clean our project,
301. 9:55which should get rid of a lot of the
302. 9:57previous files. If not, cuz it never
303. 9:59really does work that well. I like to go
304. 10:00into the file explorer and just delete
305. 10:02all of these files that I don't care
306. 10:04about. So, all the debug directory. You
307. 10:06can see that now I'll even delete this
308. 10:07bin directory. You can see that now all
309. 10:09we have is a solution file, the project,
310. 10:12we've got the project filters and a user
311. 10:13file which is just basically our current
312. 10:15Visual Studio configuration. And then in
313. 10:17source we've got main. So it's nice and
314. 10:18clean. I'm going to go back to Visual
315. 10:19Studio and I'm going to build. All
316. 10:22right, cool. So if we go back here and
317. 10:24we go to bin, we can see we've got
318. 10:26intermediates and then Win32. So inside
319. 10:28intermediates, we've got Win32 debug.
320. 10:30That's all of our intermediate files
321. 10:31such as our OBJ files. And then if we go
322. 10:34back, you can see we've got win32 debug
323. 10:36and then that is our exe file and we can
324. 10:38run that and everything's fine. All
325. 10:40right, cool. One little thing as well.
326. 10:41You can see that we've got a double
327. 10:42backslash here because of course I did
328. 10:45forget that the solution directory,
329. 10:46anything that has like project directory
330. 10:48or solution directory actually has a
331. 10:50backslash on it already because it's a
332. 10:52directory name. So we can just go back
333. 10:54and fix that up so that we don't get the
334. 10:56double backslash. If you're not sure
335. 10:57what one of these macros is equal to or
336. 11:00you would like to see what it is, you
337. 11:02can just go under edit here and then we
338. 11:04can expand this macros view. And then
339. 11:07over here we've got everything we want.
340. 11:08So for example, that solution directory
341. 11:10that I was talking about, you can see
342. 11:11it's cdev new project. And you can see
343. 11:13it does in fact end with a backslash.
344. 11:15All right, cool. So that's pretty much
345. 11:16it. That's all I just wanted to say.
346. 11:17Setting up your directories, really
347. 11:19important, really quick tip that that
348. 11:21will just kind of make your life easier
349. 11:22as far as organization goes. These are
350. 11:24the settings that I use all the time. We
351. 11:27might talk about more or less the
352. 11:28compiler settings and linking settings
353. 11:30and all of those kind of maybe release
354. 11:31mode optimization settings in another
355. 11:33video. I just wanted to show you guys
356. 11:35the basis of how I set up every new C++
357. 11:37project that I do. If you guys enjoy
358. 11:39this video, please hit that like button,
359. 11:41follow me on Twitter and
360. 11:43Instagram, and and I will see you guys
361. 11:48in the next video. Goodbye.
362. 11:50[Music]
363. 11:59[Music]
364. 12:01Hey, hey,
365. 12:03[Music]
366. 12:04hey, hey, hey.