On 2010-11-16 09:35-0500 Torri, Stephen CIV NSWCDD, W15 wrote:
I am trying to merge a project that was using autoconf and GNUMakefiles. When you use automake you can build static libraries in sub directories and then link them together into one shared library in the end that was install. This is not possible with Visual Studio. In GNU Make for the project I can see that there are GNMakefiles in the subdirectories that build the object files where they are linked together in the top level GNUMakefile. In projects I have done where I have had source files in subdirectories I could include all of them in a variable in the single CMakeLists.txt file in the top directory. This project has 1079 C++ and C files in a variety of subdirectories. The only way I can see to make a single shared library with CMake is to include all the source files into a single variable in the single CMakeLists.txt file like I do in my own projects. So to do this same technique with this project seems unreasonable to ask these developers to adopt. So I am wondering if I can set a single variable used across a variety of CMakeLists.txt files? So that way in subdirectoryA I can add files to a variable called SOURCES that I append files in from subdirectoryB. Therefore in the top level CMakeLists.txt file I can declare: add_library ( target ${SOURCES} ) target_link_libraries ( target ${DEPENDENCY_LIBRARIES} ) In a similar way I can include those headers I want to install in all the subdirectories.
CMake deliberately reduces scope to help reduce side effects. But there are ways to beat that for needs like yours. You should look at the documentation of PARENT_SCOPE in the set command. It might be suitable for your needs, but a drawback is you must have (I assume) an unbroken recursive chain of such set commands to communicate data from some deep subdirectory to your top-level directory, and I would think that is a pretty fragile structure subject to hard-to-find bugs if some subdirectories are moved around in the future. For my own similar needs, I far prefer setting a GLOBAL property (see documentation of set_property(GLOBAL...[APPEND]...)). Alan __________________________ Alan W. Irwin Astronomical research affiliation with Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Victoria (astrowww.phys.uvic.ca). Programming affiliations with the FreeEOS equation-of-state implementation for stellar interiors (freeeos.sf.net); PLplot scientific plotting software package (plplot.org); the libLASi project (unifont.org/lasi); the Loads of Linux Links project (loll.sf.net); and the Linux Brochure Project (lbproject.sf.net). __________________________ Linux-powered Science __________________________ _______________________________________________ Powered by www.kitware.com Visit other Kitware open-source projects at http://www.kitware.com/opensource/opensource.html Please keep messages on-topic and check the CMake FAQ at: http://www.cmake.org/Wiki/CMake_FAQ Follow this link to subscribe/unsubscribe: http://www.cmake.org/mailman/listinfo/cmake