It all started back in 2016, with accumulated frustrations about the absence of proper dependency management in the tools of that time.

In July 2016, Conan was not even a thing. CMake wasn’t as widely adopted, but was definitely ramping up to become the success it is. At the time, I already went through a lot of thinking about how to solve the needs I had with previous scripting attempts, and being tired of it; I decided to start a proper tool on top of Waf to do it. Golem was born.

Years have passed, Golem ended up serving me better than I anticipated in the first place. I witnessed the rise of Conan and CMake, and I thought that Golem had something they didn’t have. Time passed again, and I finally found the time to focus on sharing it properly, publishing it (Dec 27, 2025), documenting it and work on what’s missing for it to not just be my tool, but a tool for everyone.

C++ has progressed a lot in the meantime; safety concerns, C++ modules, etc. Since the beginning, Golem’s spirit is to be helpful and aware of how C++ projects are made today. It is made to be simple to use. Golem’s goals are to provide premium support for both the bleeding edge features C++ can offer and the best safety and programming practices. This is how Golem’s development will continue.

After the neccessary improvements, I’ll advertise Golem to a broader audience.

– @bbalp