[FEATURE] Auto-bootstrap `vcpkg`

[xmkg]

As a user, I'd like to clone the repo and just do a cmake --preset development. I expect vcpkg to be bootstrapped automatically.

https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/vcpkg/users/buildsystems/cmake-integration
https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/vcpkg/examples/installing-and-using-packages

[xmkg]

One possible avenue to implement it is by adding vcpkg as a git submodule.

[efecan0]

Great idea! I will add this after the open issues are resolved.

[jpc0]

This is an option, I have generally not followed this approach because eventually vcpkg should be removed as a dependency. Once folly is out there is no more need for VCPKG, uWebsockets is a header only library and uSockets is trivial to build so we can just wrap it with fetchcontent.

Effectively it would be even easier if everything can be bundled with fetchcontent because that way a consumer does not need to worry about dependencies (other than libc / c++ stdlib) and can just fetchcontent / submodule this and it will just work.

[jpc0]

An alternative option is to finish packaging this as an official vcpkg port.

The issues I keep running into is the dependency on vcpkg is quite explicit in the build system. This would be easier if it was being build as a so/dll however currently it is a static lib which still implicitly bundles all dependencies.

When those dependencies are being pulled in externally by vcpkg, and they do not have a FindXXX module, we rely on the vcpkg find_package information which makes vcpkg required.

I have also found that when installing as a dependency I also need to find_package all the dependencies as well without writing a custom Config that finds all dependencies, but then uWebsockets becomes a pain since upsteam does not expose pkgconfig and explicitly will not support cmake.

[efecan0]

An alternative option is to finish packaging this as an official vcpkg port.

The issues I keep running into is the dependency on vcpkg is quite explicit in the build system. This would be easier if it was being build as a so/dll however currently it is a static lib which still implicitly bundles all dependencies.

When those dependencies are being pulled in externally by vcpkg, and they do not have a FindXXX module, we rely on the vcpkg find_package information which makes vcpkg required.

I have also found that when installing as a dependency I also need to find_package all the dependencies as well without writing a custom Config that finds all dependencies, but then uWebsockets becomes a pain since upsteam does not expose pkgconfig and explicitly will not support cmake.

Being more lightweight is always preferable, and for the future, making it a port seems like a better option. Once we are fully free from dependencies, we can look ahead more clearly and decide accordingly. But your suggestion definitely makes sense.