Running from a relative directory

[gvanem]

The directory layout for running programs is a true mess IMHO.

I just built DiligentEngine + the samples using MSVC-2026, CMake and MSBuild.
So after an install, a cd <install-root>\bin\DiligentSamples\Samples\Atmosphere\RelWithDebInfo and
running Atmosphere.exe works just fine.

But running it like ..\<install-root>\bin\DiligentSamples\Samples\Atmosphere\RelWithDebInfo\Atmosphere.exe, it crashes good
on some NULL-ptr access.

Can someone please explain the reason for this? Has nobody really not encountered this before?
Can the samples not cwd() to it's own directory first to obtain the full path to it's assets?

BTW. that also a mystery to me; what is the assumed/hidden directory structure for e.g.
running Atmosphere.exe? It seems to be:

  <install-root>/bin/render_states
  <install-root>/bin/shaders
  <install-root>/bin/Terrain

But why not:

  <install-root>/bin/Atmosphere/render_states
  <install-root>/bin/Atmosphere/shaders
  <install-root>/bin/Atmosphere/Terrain

Thus making it possible to put all programs in one bin directory?

[TheMostDiligent]

But running it like ..<install-root>\bin\DiligentSamples\Samples\Atmosphere\RelWithDebInfo\Atmosphere.exe, it crashes good
on some NULL-ptr access.

Because it can't find the assets that it expects to be in the current directory.

BTW. that also a mystery to me; what is the assumed/hidden directory structure for e.g.
running Atmosphere.exe? It seems to be:

What is the hidden directory structure?

[gvanem]

Because it can't find the assets that it expects to be in the current directory.

Is this good? Why not use GetModuleFileName() etc?

What is the hidden directory structure?

I meant, it's rather obfuscated and hard to understand from looking at the CMake files.
It should be a cleaner directory structure. Imagine GCC with a separated share directory for all .EXEs.

[TheMostDiligent]

Is this good? Why not use GetModuleFileName() etc?

It did not seem to be necessary. Tutorials and Samples are developer sample applications. Their purpose is to demonstrate different aspects of the API. They were never intended to be end-user applications.

It should be a cleaner directory structure. Imagine GCC with a separated share directory for all .EXEs.

Same reason. Each application folder contains all resources needed for each application so that all related files can be easily found by developers in one place.