CMake Hierarchical Project Management Without Abusing Libraries - visual-studio

I have a project where there's only a handful of logical groupings for generating static libraries. However for convenience I want to have the library's source code to be managed with more granular folders.
Currently the only way I know to do this in CMake without having a library for each folder is to just list files as you would normally in with their relative paths:
add_library(SystemAbstraction STATIC "Some/Path/File.cpp")
However I can see this getting unwieldy as the project grows in size with all the different paths.
I tried to see if I could have a CMakeLists.txt in each folder and just use a variable in the base CMakeLists.txt when adding library dependencies. But it seems that add_subdirectory doesn't also import variables?

For expanding the scope of a variable inside a subdirectory, use the PARENT_SCOPE option of set. For example, you can test that if you have
# CMakeLists.txt
set(SRCS main.c)
add_subdirectory(foo)
message(${SRCS})
in the root directory and
# foo/CMakeLists.txt
set(SRCS ${SRCS} foo.c PARENT_SCOPE)
in a subdirectory then it will print main.c foo.c, i.e., the variable is correctly imported into the base CMakeLists.txt.

An option would be to use the object library feature of CMake. You still can but doesn't need to organise your CMake script into subdirectories:
add_library(lib1 OBJECT <srcs>)
add_library(lib2 OBJECT <srcs>)
...
add_library(mainlib $<TARGET_OBJECTS:lib1> $<TARGET_OBJECTS:lib2>)
You can set different compile flags for each object library:
target_include_directories(lib1 PRIVATE incl-dir-for-lib1)
target_compile_definitions(lib2 PRIVATE def-for-lib2)
You still need to set link libraries on your main library:
target_link_libraries(mainlib PRIVATE deps-of-lib1 deps-of-lib2)
Related documentation: Object Libraries

Related

CMake: Use variables from existing Makefile of 3rdparty library

I'm facing the following scenario:
Existing project which uses cmake
External 3rdparty library which only comes with Makefiles
The difference of my situation compared to existing questions is that I don't need to have cmake to build the 3rdparty library via the Makefile. Instead, the 3rdparty library provides a library.mk Makefile which has variables like LIB_SRCS and LIB_INCS containing all source and header files required to compile the library.
My idea is to include the library.mk into the project's CMakeLists.txt and then adding those $(LIB_SRCS) and $(LIB_INCS) to target_sources().
My question: How can I include library.mk into the existing CMakeLists.txt to get access to the $(LIB_SRCS) and $(LIB_INCS) for adding them to target_sources()? I'm looking for something like this:
include("/path/to/library.mk") # Somehow include the library's `library.mk` to expose variables to cmake.
add_executable(my_app)
target_sources(
my_app
PRIVATE
main.c
$(LIB_SRCS) # Add 3rd-party library source files
$(LIB_INCS) # Add 3rd-party library header files
)
Using include() does not work as the library.mk is not a CMake list/file.
Since you can't be sure that your target system will even have Make on it, the only option is to parse the strings out of the .mk file, which might be easy if the variables are set directly as a list of filenames, or really hard if they are set with expansions of other variables, conditionals, etc. Do this with FILE(STRINGS) cmake doc.
Your plan will only work if the Makefiles are trivial, and do not set important compiler flags, define preprocessor variables, modify the include directory, etc. And if they really are trivial, skip the parsing, and just do something like aux_source_directory(<dir> <variable>) to collect all the sources from the library directory.
You might also consider building and maintaining a CMakeLists.txt for this third-party library. Do the conversion once, and store it as a branch off of the "vendor" main branch in your version control system. Whenever you update, update the vendor branch from upstream, and merge or rebase your modifications. Or just store it in your existing project, referring to the source directory of the 3rd-party stuff.

Necessity of include_directories command in cmake project

I'm following a tutorial on CMake and I have problems understanding the necessity of using the 'include_directories' command at one point.
Let me explain the project first:
In my working directory I have:
- a main.cpp function, a CMakeLists.txt(the main one), a configuration file, a 'MathFunction' directory and a 'build' directory
In the MathFunction directory I have:
- a CMakeLists.txt file that will be invoked by the main one
- A file 'mysqrt.cxx' that contains the implementation of a function which will be used in 'main.cpp' application
- A 'MathFunctions.h' header file that contains the prototype of that function
In the CMakeLists from 'MathFunction' directory I'm creating a library using code from 'mysqrt.cxx' like this:
add_library(MathFunctions mysqrt.cxx)
This snippet is a part of my main CMake code:
# add the MathFunctions library?
#
if (USE_MYMATH)
include_directories ("${PROJECT_SOURCE_DIR}/MathFunctions") # WHY DO WE NEED THIS
add_subdirectory (MathFunctions)
set (EXTRA_LIBS ${EXTRA_LIBS} MathFunctions)
endif (USE_MYMATH)
add_executable(Tutorial tutorial.cxx)
target_link_libraries (Tutorial MathFunctions)
Now I do not understand why I need too add that 'include_directories' command in order to use the library? Shouldn't it be enough that the last command 'target_link_libraries' links the already created executable and libraries togheter so there would be no need to also include_directories?
Thank you for reading and I'm sorry if I have not explained it very well but I hope you will understand what I mean :D
Command include_directories sets directories for header files (.h) to be searched. Linking (target_link_libraries) with a library basically specifies only a library file (.so, .dll or other type). As you see, these are different things.
When linking executable with a library target, CMake propagates (more precisely, "consumes") some properties of that library target to the executable. Among these properties there is INTERFACE_INCLUDE_DIRECTORIES property, which adds include directories to the executable.
So, when a library target has INTERFACE_INCLUDE_DIRECTORIES property correctly being set, you don't need to explicitly specify include directories for executable:
MathFunctions/CMakeLists.txt:
add_library(MathFunctions mysqrt.cxx)
# Among other things, this call sets INTERFACE_INCLUDE_DIRECTORIES property.
target_include_directories(MathFunctions PUBLIC ${CMAKE_CURRENT_SOURCE_DIR})
CMakeLsits.txt:
add_executable(Tutorial tutorial.cxx)
# This also propagates include directories from the library to executable
target_link_libraries (Tutorial MathFunctions)
Note, that using simple
# This *doesn't* set INTERFACE_INCLUDE_DIRECTORIES property.
include_directories(${CMAKE_CURRENT_SOURCE_DIR})
in MathFunctions/CMakeLists.txt doesn't imply propagating include directories to the linked executable.

Visual Studio Solution Style using CMakelists [duplicate]

I have a CMake project that looks like this:
project/
CMakeLists.txt
subprojectA/
CMakeLists.txt
include/
headerA.hpp
src/
libraryA.cpp
subprojectB/
CMakeLists.txt
src/
mainB.cpp
The "library" subproject, A, is compiled as a static library, becoming libsubprojectA.a. The "main" project, B, is compiled as a binary and depends on the library. mainB.cpp includes a reference to headerA.hpp.
Here is subprojectA/CMakeLists.txt:
project(SubProjectA)
include_directories(include)
add_library(subprojectA STATIC src/libraryA.cpp)
set(${PROJECT_NAME}_INCLUDE_DIRS
${PROJECT_SOURCE_DIR}/include
CACHE INTERNAL "${PROJECT_NAME}: Include Directories" FORCE)
And here is subprojectB/CMakeLists.txt:
project(SubProjectB)
include_directories(${SubProjectA_INCLUDE_DIRS})
add_executable(mainBinary src/mainB.cpp)
target_link_libraries(mainBinary subprojectA)
The main Project CMakeLists.txt looks like:
project(Project)
add_subdirectory(subprojectB)
add_subdirectory(subprojectA)
Note that subprojectB, the main project, is listed before subprojectA.
Here's the problem. When I first run "cmake" on this project, ${SubProjectA_INCLUDE_DIRS} is not set within SubProjectB.
What I think is happening is that the CMakeLists for SubProjectB loads first, when ${SubProjectA_INCLUDE_DIRS} has not yet been set. It sets its own include path to an empty string as a result. However, even though libsubprojectA.a gets built successfully before mainBinary, the include path was already set empty beforehand. As a result, I get this error when trying to make mainBinary:
subprojectB/src/mainB.cpp:1:23: fatal error: headerA.hpp: No such file or directory
#include "headerA.hpp"
^
It's a workaround to put subprojectA before subprojectB in the main Project CMakeLists in the declarative world of CMake. What I really want is to know the proper way to indicate to CMake that the include_directories(${SubProjectA_INCLUDE_DIRS}) line depends on the definitions that exist inside SubProjectA's CMakeLists. Is there a better way to do this?
If you want to express that include directory subprojectA/include is an interface of the library subprojectA, attach this property to the target with target_include_directories command:
subprojectA/CMakeLists.txt:
project(SubProjectA)
add_library(subprojectA STATIC src/libraryA.cpp)
# PUBLIC adds both:
# 1) include directories for compile library and
# 2) include directories for library's interface
target_include_directories(subprojectA PUBLIC include)
So any executable(or other library) which linked with subprojectA will have this include directory automatically:
subprojectB/CMakeLists.txt:
project(SubProjectB)
add_executable(mainBinary src/mainB.cpp)
target_link_libraries(mainBinary subprojectA)
Of course, for use last command properly you need to process directory with library before one with executable:
CMakeLists.txt:
project(Project)
add_subdirectory(subprojectA)
add_subdirectory(subprojectB)

CMake Best Practice for using Targets

I compiled all the information and now iam trying to implement CMake build system for a super project and i really need a guidance here,it would be great to transform all data i acquired by reading about CMake across different sites to practical knowledge
i have a fundamental questions regarding understating CMake Targets
In case of multi directories structure,i want to achieve most portability thus having target for each directory and then use these different targets as link for others in another directories, my goal is to be agile as possible and not be coupled with a certain directory structure, make use of CMake to figure the dependency, where i would be only concerned about targets
my final target is a library of libraries
USE CASE :
First level directory {PROJECT} ( 2 folders ) :
CMakeLists.txt common_env source
​
​First level CMakeLists.txt :
CMAKE_MINIMUM_REQUIRED(VERSION 2.8)
PROJECT(dassys)
# iam using this because target scope change with sub-directory
include(common/CMakeLists.txt)
include(src/CMakeLists.txt)
#Add Library
add_library(dassys INTERFACE)
#Creating library
target_link_libraries(dassys INTERFACE
common
src
)
Second Level directory {{PROJECT} /common}(2 folders 1 file ):
cfgd_*** CMakeLists.txt dstdh header.h
Second Level CMakeLists.txt
#Adding Subdirectory
include(${CMAKE_CURRENT_LIST_DIR}/dstdh/CMakeLists.txt)
include(${CMAKE_CURRENT_LIST_DIR}/cfgd_***/CMakeLists.txt)
#add_subdirectory(dstdh)
#add_subdirectory(cfgd_***)
#Add Library
add_library(common INTERFACE)
#Creating library
target_link_libraries(common INTERFACE
dstdh
cfgd_***
)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
​Thrid Level directory { {PROJECT} /common/dstdh }(6 files ):
CMakeLists.txt dassert.h dfloat.h dstdbit.h dstdbool.h dstdint.h dstdio.h dstring.h
Thrid Level CMakeLists.txt
#Adding Library
add_library(dstdh INTERFACE )
target_sources(dstd INTERFACE
${CMAKE_CURRENT_LIST_DIR}/dassert.h
${CMAKE_CURRENT_LIST_DIR}/dfloat.h
${CMAKE_CURRENT_LIST_DIR}/dstdbit.h
${CMAKE_CURRENT_LIST_DIR}/dstdbool.h
${CMAKE_CURRENT_LIST_DIR}/dstdint.h
${CMAKE_CURRENT_LIST_DIR}/dstdio.h
${CMAKE_CURRENT_LIST_DIR}/dstring.h
)
#Add include for Header only library
target_include_directories(dstdh INTERFACE
"${CMAKE_CURRENT_LIST_DIR}/dstdh/"
)
and here is my question, i need to link against dstd library in another directory
how can this be done because as far as i understand
target_link_libraries ( mylib dstd ) should work in different directory because i have target which is dstd INTERFACE library, and i need Cmake to resolve this dependency by finding this target and link against it
i get compilation error as dstdint.h is not found when mylib is being compiled

cmake: add_custom_command only invoked first time

I'm running into a problem with add_custom_command for a custom target (created using add_custom_target).
My general idea is to incorporate a static code analysis tool into the cmake tool-chain. My solution is based on the one described here: https://github.com/rpavlik/cmake-modules/blob/master/CppcheckTargets.cmake
In a nutshell, each project that I want to run static code analysis for has the following two lines of code:
include(cppcheck)
add_cppcheck(${le_project} STYLE POSSIBLE_ERROR FAIL_ON_WARNINGS)
The module has this at the top of the file:
if (NOT TARGET ANALYZE_CODE)
add_custom_target(ANALYZE_CODE WORKING_DIRECTORY ${LE_LITEN_ROOT})
set_target_properties(ANALYZE_CODE PROPERTIES EXCLUDE_FROM_ALL TRUE)
endif ()
and later on in the function the custom command is added:
add_custom_command(TARGET
ANALYZE_CODE
PRE_BUILD
COMMAND
${CPPCHECK_EXECUTABLE}
${CPPCHECK_QUIET_ARG}
${CPPCHECK_TEMPLATE_ARG}
${_cppcheck_args}
${_files}
WORKING_DIRECTORY
"${CMAKE_CURRENT_SOURCE_DIR}"
COMMENT
"${_name}_cppcheck: Running cppcheck on target ${_name}..."
VERBATIM)
The problem I'm seeing is that the command is only added for the project that included the file first. I'm not sure why and what is going on. I verified the following using message() commands:
The target is only created once
The add_custom_command is run for every project that calls the function, with proper arguments
But when I actually look at the target in visual studio, only the first include / function call command is added.
If the file is only included without calling the function, no custom commands are added at all.
Desired behavior:
I would like ONE target named "ANALYZE_CODE" to run all commands added by calls to the function.
I.e. if 3 projects include the two lines from above, the target ANALYZE_CODE is created once but 3 custom commands are added to it, one for each project.
It turns out you're somewhat stuck between a rock and a hard place here. The issue I think boils down to a couple of factors.
Firstly, although the docs don't make it clear, add_custom_command(TARGET ...) only works for targets created in the same directory. So the first subproject to call include(cppcheck) is the only one which can effectively add custom commands to the target ANALYZE_CODE.
A workaround for this might seem to be to move all calls to add_cppcheck from their respective subdirectories up to the top-level CMakeLists file.
include(cppcheck)
add_cppcheck(${le_first_project} STYLE POSSIBLE_ERROR FAIL_ON_WARNINGS)
add_cppcheck(${le_second_project} STYLE POSSIBLE_ERROR FAIL_ON_WARNINGS)
...
This isn't a great solution, since these really belong inside their own subdirs. But a bigger issue is that properties on source files only persist in the scope of the CMakeLists.txt in which they are added. This isn't obvious at all, but from the docs for set_source_files_properties:
Source file properties are visible only to targets added in the same directory (CMakeLists.txt).
The innards of the add_cppcheck have the following block of code:
foreach(_source ${_cppcheck_sources})
get_source_file_property(_cppcheck_lang "${_source}" LANGUAGE)
get_source_file_property(_cppcheck_loc "${_source}" LOCATION)
if("${_cppcheck_lang}" MATCHES "CXX")
list(APPEND _files "${_cppcheck_loc}")
endif()
endforeach()
So this is checking that each source file for the given target is designated as a C++ file before adding it to the list of files to be given to cppcheck. If this function is invoked from within the CMakeLists.txt where the target is defined (i.e. the subdir) then the files all have the appropriate property and are correctly added.
However, if the function is called from the parent CMakeLists.txt, the files have lost their properties, and so none are added and cppcheck is passed an empty list!
Now for the possible fixes. There are probably few ways to get out of this hole - I can point to a couple.
You could continue with the option to always call add_cppcheck from the top-level CMake file and avoid using the source files' properties. So the problem codeblock above could be changed to something more like:
set(CxxExtensions .cpp .CPP .cc .CC .cxx .CXX)
foreach(_source ${_cppcheck_sources})
get_filename_component(Extension "${_source}" EXT)
list(FIND CxxExtensions "${Extension}" IsCxxFile)
if(IsCxxFile GREATER -1)
list(APPEND _files "${_source}")
endif()
endforeach()
You could even enforce that the function is only called from the top-level CMakeLists.txt by adding something like this at the start of the function:
if(NOT "${CMAKE_SOURCE_DIR}" STREQUAL "${CMAKE_CURRENT_SOURCE_DIR}")
message(FATAL_ERROR "This can only be called from the top-level CMakeLists.txt")
endif()
The second fix (which I'd personally favour) is to leave the add_cppcheck calls inside the subdirs and have the function add a custom target rather than command. These targets can successfully be applied as dependencies of the top-level target ANALYZE_CODE. So for example, change the add_custom_command to something like:
add_custom_target(ANALYZE_${_name}
${CPPCHECK_EXECUTABLE}
${CPPCHECK_QUIET_ARG}
${CPPCHECK_TEMPLATE_ARG}
${_cppcheck_args}
${_files}
WORKING_DIRECTORY "${CMAKE_CURRENT_SOURCE_DIR}"
COMMENT "ANALYZE_${_name}: Running cppcheck on target ${_name}..."
VERBATIM)
add_dependencies(ANALYZE_CODE ANALYZE_${_name})
set_target_properties(ANALYZE_${_name} PROPERTIES FOLDER "Code Analysis")
This should cause building ANALYZE_CODE to trigger building each of the subordinate ANALYZE_... targets.
It has the downside of "polluting" the solution with a lot of extra targets, but an upside is that you could use these targets in the add_test calls (although this may be a step too far):
# CMake 2.8.0 and newer
add_test(NAME ${_name}_cppcheck_test
COMMAND ${CMAKE_COMMAND}
--build ${CMAKE_BINARY_DIR}
--target ANALYZE_${_name})

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