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Dependencies

Formats​

The [dependencies] section supports three formats:

String (registry)​

[dependencies]
fmt = "10.1.1"
spdlog = "1.12"
catch2 = "3.4.0"

The version string is used as-is for registry lookup.

Table (git)​

[dependencies]
fmt = { git = "https://github.com/fmtlib/fmt", tag = "10.1.1" }

Fields: git, branch, tag, rev.

Table (path)​

[dependencies]
mylib = { path = "../mylib" }

Registry​

DCR uses a package registry for dependency lookup by name.

# ~/.dcr/config.toml
[registry.default]
url = "https://index.dcr.pm"
priority = 1

Registry priority: order in config.toml. The DCR_INDEX_PATH variable overrides the path to index.json.

Git dependencies​

Git dependencies are parsed and recorded in dcr.lock. DCR supports specifying branch/tag/rev for git sources:

  • branch — switch to a branch
  • tag — switch to a tag
  • rev — switch to a specific commit
  • features — feature flags (parsed, but does not affect build)

Path dependencies​

Local paths. DCR automatically discovers include and lib directories from the neighbor's dcr.toml.

[dependencies]
mylib = { path = "/abs/path/to/lib" }
mylib = { path = "../relative/path" }

Note: Header resolution automatically checks the packaged target/include directory of path dependencies, ensuring consumer packages can find headers from compiled static or dynamic libraries.

dcr.lock​

Dependency lock file. Contains package names and sources.

Created during dcr build when registry dependencies are present. Not updated during dcr add — only on the next dcr build.

Resolution process​

  1. Load all dependencies (registry → git → path)
  2. For path deps: recursively read their dcr.toml
  3. For registry deps: search index.json
  4. For git deps: clone to cache
  5. Collect include_dirs, lib_dirs, libs for the compiler