This GitHub action downloads, builds and installs SDL and its satellite libraries from source.

By caching the result, subsequent workflow runs will be fast(er).

name: "sdl"
on: [push]

jobs:
  build:
    runs-on: ubuntu-latest
    steps:
      - uses: libsdl-org/setup-sdl@main
        id: sdl
        with:
          install-linux-dependencies: true
          version: 2-latest
          version-sdl-image: 2-latest
          
      - name: 'Configure and build your project'
        run: |
          cmake -S . -B build
          cmake --build build --verbose

This action will build SDL using the default c/c++ toolchain, with CMake configuring the build.

An alternative build toolchain can be configured by using a CMake toolchain file.

Using the version option, a SDL release can be used or the latest git tag:

• 2-latest: use the latest SDL2 release
• x.y.z: use exactly a SDL x.y.z release (example: 2.8.1)
• 2-head: use the latest SDL2 development commit
• 3-latest: use the latest SDL3 release
• 3-head: use the latest SDL3 development commit
• <git hash>: use an exact SDL git hash (repo: https://github.com/libsdl-org/SDL.git)

Using the version-sdl-* inputs, it is possible to install the satellite libraries. They accept the same kind of input as version.

See action.yml for an overview of all options, and its defaults.

First, make sure you're looking for SDL using find_package:

# SDL2
find_package(SDL2 REQUIRED CONFIG)

# SDL3
find_package(SDL3 REQUIRED CONFIG)

If CMake is still not able to find SDL, the minimum required CMake version of your project is probably less than 3.12. Since this version, CMake will also look for packages using environment variables as hints (see CMP0074).

When bumping the minimum required CMake version is not desirable, here are 2 alternative methods (pick one!):

• Add -DCMAKE_PREFIX_PATH=${{ steps.sdl.outputs.prefix }} to the CMake configure command (or add SDL's prefix to an already-existing -DCMAKE_PREFIX_PATH= argument)
• Add -DCMAKE_POLICY_DEFAULT_CMP0074=NEW to the CMake configure command (this only works when the actual CMake version is >= 3.12).

This input will be renamed to install-dependencies.