[CMake] Managing a local installation of cmake-built open source packages

[ardi]

Hi,

I want to install (on UNIX-like systems) a collection of open source
packages which use cmake as the build tool, but I need the
installation to be performed in a local directory (inside my home
directory), and I wish convenient updating to new versions of the
packages.

I didn't arrive to a convincing solution, so any advice will be welcome.

Here are my thoughts:

The trivial solution is of course to directly install to a non-root
prefix when invoking cmake, but, however, this isn't well suited for
updating a previous installation of the packages (building and
installing a new version will only overwrite files that have the same
name, but it will keep old files that no longer exist in the new
version, cluttering the local installation directory with no longer
needed and mismatched files).

A possibility would be to keep a copy of install_manifest.txt whenever
I install a package, and remembering to always run 'xargs rm <
install_manifest.txt' before installing a different version of a
previously installed package.

But keeping the install_manifest.txt of each installed package (and
using it before updating a package) looks like a too-manual task,
candidate to some kind of automation.

Another (perhaps wiser) possibility would be to use cpack for creating
either a RPM or DEB, and then use the corresponding package manager to
install the package. But this has problems too: most package managers
assume a / root installation directory. Also, I use several OSs: OSX,
Linux, and some BSDs, and I'm not sure that either the RPM nor the DEB
pkg managers will work flawlessly across all the OSs I use.

What would you recommend here?

Thanks a lot!