On Wed, 2019-09-11 at 21:40 +0300, Avraham Shukron wrote: > Hi! > > I'm pretty new to cmake and I came across a question which I could > not find any information about in the official documentation or blog > posts. > > When adding a target through add_library / add_executable - should > the header files of the target also be listed? > The question also applies to target_sources I guess. > > On one hand - as far as I can tell it compiles perfectly fine without > doing so, and the implicit dependency is also recognized (e.g if the > header changes - the target will be recompiled) > In addition most of the online examples do not list headers. > > On the other hand - it seems wrong not to list them. They ARE part of > the target, even if they do not passed to the compiler directly. > I can also assume that some IDEs will want to know about the > existence of these headers and their relationship with the target. > > So what is the correct answer? should header files be listed as part > of the target?
You can list them or not list them. CMake will recognize them as header files and ignore them (not attempt to compile them.) It's a matter of personal preference. CMake's own CMake script lists them, but there are plenty of projects that don't and work just fine. > Another question - how does cmake know to create the > dependency between the target and the header file, even when it is > not listed explicitly? It uses GCC's -MD and -MF options (and the equivalents for other compilers), which spits out the header dependency information. Kyle -- Powered by www.kitware.com Please keep messages on-topic and check the CMake FAQ at: http://www.cmake.org/Wiki/CMake_FAQ Kitware offers various services to support the CMake community. For more information on each offering, please visit: CMake Support: http://cmake.org/cmake/help/support.html CMake Consulting: http://cmake.org/cmake/help/consulting.html CMake Training Courses: http://cmake.org/cmake/help/training.html Visit other Kitware open-source projects at http://www.kitware.com/opensource/opensource.html Follow this link to subscribe/unsubscribe: https://cmake.org/mailman/listinfo/cmake
