Hello, Elektra

This basic tutorial shows you how to compile and run a very basic Elektra application. For this tutorial we assume that you installed Elektra and CMake on your machine. We also assume that you work a Unix based OS like Linux or macOS.

1. Create a folder called Hello somewhere on your disk
2. Copy the file examples/helloElektra.c to the folder Hello you just created
3. Save a file with the following content

cmake_minimum_required(VERSION 3.0)

find_package(Elektra REQUIRED)

if (ELEKTRA_FOUND)
    message (STATUS "Elektra ${ELEKTRA_VERSION} found")
    include_directories (${ELEKTRA_INCLUDE_DIR})

    add_executable (hello helloElektra.c)
    target_link_libraries (hello ${ELEKTRA_LIBRARIES})
else (ELEKTRA_FOUND)
    message (FATAL_ERROR "Elektra not found")
endif (ELEKTRA_FOUND)

as CMakeLists.txt in the folder Hello.

1. Open a shell and change into the directory Hello
2. Create a build directory inside Hello, change into the build directory, and run Cmake:

mkdir build
cd build
cmake ..

. If everything worked until now, then CMake should print messages that look something like this:

-- The C compiler identification is AppleClang 8.1.0.8020042
-- The CXX compiler identification is AppleClang 8.1.0.8020042
-- Check for working C compiler: usr/bin/cc
-- Check for working C compiler: usr/bin/cc -- works
-- Detecting C compiler ABI info
-- Detecting C compiler ABI info - done
-- Detecting C compile features
-- Detecting C compile features - done
-- Check for working CXX compiler: usr/bin/c++
-- Check for working CXX compiler: usr/bin/c++ -- works
-- Detecting CXX compiler ABI info
-- Detecting CXX compiler ABI info - done
-- Detecting CXX compile features
-- Detecting CXX compile features - done
-- Elektra 0.8.19 found
-- Configuring done
-- Generating done
-- Build files have been written to: Hello/build

1. No it’s time to build your application. For that step run make inside the folder Hello/build:

make

. If the last step completed successfully, then the build directory now contains the application hello.

1. You can now run your Elektra application by calling ./hello inside the build directory. The output of the application should look something like this:

Open key database
Retrieve key set
Number of mappings: 0
Add new key system/test/hello
Number of mappings: 1

hello, elektra

Delete mappings
Close key database

1. You can now change the content of helloElektra.c. If you want to compile and execute the updated code, then repeat steps 6 and 7.