I’m encountering linker errors when trying to use Boost::filesystem with Conan package manager and CMake. I’ve successfully installed Boost via Conan, but I’m unable to link against Boost::filesystem. Here are the details:

This is my project/conanfile.txt :

[requires]
boost/1.86.0

[generators]
CMakeDeps
CMakeToolchain

To install dependencies, I navigate to the root directory (cd project) and run:
conan install . -of=external --build=MISSING

which outputs:

======== Finalizing install (deploy, generators) ========
conanfile.txt: Writing generators to <redacted>/TestProject/external
conanfile.txt: Generator 'CMakeDeps' calling 'generate()'
conanfile.txt: CMakeDeps necessary find_package() and targets for your CMakeLists.txt
    find_package(Boost)
    target_link_libraries(... boost::boost)
conanfile.txt: Generator 'CMakeToolchain' calling 'generate()'
conanfile.txt: CMakeToolchain generated: conan_toolchain.cmake
conanfile.txt: CMakeToolchain: Preset 'conan-release' added to CMakePresets.json.
    (cmake>=3.23) cmake --preset conan-release
    (cmake<3.23) cmake <path> -G "Unix Makefiles" -DCMAKE_TOOLCHAIN_FILE=conan_toolchain.cmake  -DCMAKE_POLICY_DEFAULT_CMP0091=NEW -DCMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=Release
conanfile.txt: CMakeToolchain generated: <redacted>/TestProject/external/CMakePresets.json
conanfile.txt: CMakeToolchain generated: <redacted>/TestProject/CMakeUserPresets.json
conanfile.txt: Generating aggregated env files
conanfile.txt: Generated aggregated env files: ['conanbuild.sh', 'conanrun.sh']
Install finished successfully

This successfully installs all dependencies (and transitive dependencies). The issue I’m having relates to linking the libraries from Boost. In my project/CMakeLists.txt

cmake_minimum_required(VERSION 3.29)
project(TestProject)

add_executable(TestProject main.cpp)

find_package(Boost)

set(Boost_FILESYSTEM_LIB_PATH ${Boost_INCLUDE_DIRS}/../lib/libboost_filesystem.a)

target_include_directories(TestProject PUBLIC ${Boost_INCLUDE_DIRS})

target_link_libraries(TestProject
        PUBLIC
        # This works
        Boost::boost
        # This works (When commented out, linker error below occurs)
        #${Boost_FILESYSTEM_LIB_PATH}
        # Using this to link introduces linker errors
        Boost::filesystem
)

Here is the code which attempts to use filesystem symbols project/main.cpp:

#include <iostream>
#include <boost/filesystem.hpp>

int main()
{
  auto ret = boost::filesystem::exists("/foo");
  std::cout << ret << std::endl;
  return 0;
}

I now run the program. The general structure of the project is as follows:

project/CMakeLists.txt
project/external (Conan output folder)
project/main.cpp
project/build

To build (via terminal) using Makefile:

cd project/build
cmake -DCMAKE_TOOLCHAIN_FILE=external/conan_toolchain.cmake -DCMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=Debug ..
make 

Here is the linker error output when attempting to link via Boost::filesystem:

[ 50%] Building CXX object CMakeFiles/TestProject.dir/main.cpp.o
[100%] Linking CXX executable TestProject
Undefined symbols for architecture arm64:
  "boost::filesystem::detail::status(boost::filesystem::path const&, boost::system::error_code*)", referenced from:
      boost::filesystem::exists(boost::filesystem::path const&) in main.cpp.o
ld: symbol(s) not found for architecture arm64
clang: error: linker command failed with exit code 1 (use -v to see invocation)

Here is the output when attempting to link via ${Boost_FILESYSTEM_LIB_PATH:

[ 50%] Building CXX object CMakeFiles/TestProject.dir/main.cpp.o
[100%] Linking CXX executable TestProject
[100%] Built target TestProject

I have attempted to change the line:

find_package(Boost) to: find_package(Boost REQUIRED COMPONENTS filesystem) to no avail.

How can I resolve these linker errors (instead of using explicit library pathing)? I have read the Conan tutorials and watched a few videos. I have encountered it with several libraries. I am still learning how to use Conan, so I may be missing something painfully obvious. Thank you for any assistance.