[CMake] User configuration files for Visual Studio

[David Cole]

I'm sure there are a handful of interested parties on this topic.

One concern I would have is that if we start to generate this, we
might clobber stuff that users go in and edit by hand in the Visual
Studio UI. It's a minor concern, but if I do go in and add a
"PATH=1;2;3;4" to the environment, then I wouldn't want CMake to
clobber it. I could get used to editing a CMake file or a
configuration .in file for such settings though...

It's a reasonable idea.


On Wed, Jan 11, 2012 at 9:54 AM, Robert Dailey <rcdailey at gmail.com> wrote:
> I guess I have failed to strike the interest of anyone on this?
>
> ---------
> Robert Dailey
>
>
>
> On Mon, Jan 9, 2012 at 5:58 PM, Robert Dailey <rcdailey at gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>> there are .user files generated by newer versions of Visual Studio (since
>> 2005 I believe) that contain per-machine or per-workspace information. For
>> all intents and purposes these are temporary files that are not checked into
>> version control.
>>
>> The normal file naming convention for these are:
>>
>> project.vcproj.DOMAIN.USER.user
>>
>> Where DOMAIN is the machine/domain name, and USER is the local account
>> name.
>>
>> I found out a couple of years ago that if you rename it to this:
>>
>> project.vcproj.user
>>
>> Visual Studio will treat this as "defaults" for the machine-specific
>> version created using the naming convention I first outlined.
>>
>> The user files are useful for setting debug working directory and command
>> arguments. There are some other things you can set but I have never found a
>> use for them. Since I like to set these two parameters, what I've done is
>> keep my template user file in version control, and use CMake's
>> configure_file() to fill in the command arguments and working directory
>> fields for me. This approach is a good workaround but I'd really like to see
>> CMake generate these for me. Right now I have to keep 1 user file for each
>> version of visual studio that can be used, and configure them differently
>> based on VS IDE selection.
>>
>> Would it be suitable for CMake to incorporate this functionality? If CMake
>> provided built-in support for this, we could create target properties that
>> would set these fields on the target (it would set them on the generated
>> user file instead of the vcproj file like normal target properties would
>> do):
>>
>> set_target_properties( project PROPERTIES
>>    DEBUG_COMMAND_ARGUMENTS "-debug -reg"
>>    DEBUG_WORKING_DIRECTORY "${CMAKE_CURRENT_SOURCE_DIR}"
>> )
>>
>> I'd be happy to help implement this should David, Bill, and others find it
>> to be a good idea.
>>
>> PS: I think I can do it without boost this time ;)
>>
>> ---------
>> Robert Dailey
>
>
>
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