Including the Boost C++ library in XCode

For those of you Mac OS X programmers trying to use the Boost C++ library who are confused with all this #include and #include-path nonsense and can't get your program to compile, I have finally figured it out.

All you need to do is follow these steps.

  1. Unzip the Boost library somewhere, for example /usr/local (tip: Use Finder's “Go > Go to folder...” command to go to this hidden folder)
  2. Open or create your XCode project
  3. In the project window, click on the project name (right under the heading “Groups & Files”)
  4. Click the Info button (blue circle with i)
  5. Locate “Header Search Paths” and edit it. Add the path of wherever you unzipped the Boost library, for example, /usr/local/boost_1_34_1
  6. Compile and run!

Hope that helped. If you are still having problems, try Googling lists.boost.org.


November 27th, 2007. (Updated: November 27, 2007 at 10:13pm.)
Alan Hogan (@alanhogan_com).  Contact · About