[question] CMake variables without calling conan build

[Mirko-von-Leipzig]

We use the CMake generator with targets i.e.

include(${CMAKE_BINARY_DIR}/conanbuildinfo.cmake)
conan_basic_setup(TARGETS)

We keep our conan build as bare bones as possible i.e.

    def build(self):
        cmake = CMake(self)
        cmake.configure()
        cmake.build()

This allows us to utilise our IDE's CMake support during development i.e. we can

1. conan install
2. use the IDE to re-build / integrate intellisense etc

This works great.
Otherwise we need to call conan build each time, which recompiles and is therefore slow.

We now have a situation where we need to pass optional variables to CMake depending on the configuration. So

    def build(self):
        cmake = CMake(self)
        if condition:
             cmake.definitions["XXX"] = "YYY"
        cmake.configure()
        cmake.build()

but then the logic isn't available for the IDE development work-flow.

Is there an appropriate work-around? I was considering appending the variable to the conanbuildinfo.cmake but I'm not entirely sure there is a post conan install method to do that?

One can obviously do it manually each time, but that's not great.

• [ x] I've read the CONTRIBUTING guide.

[memsharded]

Hi @Mirko-von-Leipzig

We are aiming to introduce this as experimental for next release: https://github.com/conan-io/conan/pull/7076/files

It is the "toolchain()" feature. It will allow to generate a toolchain file with your variables for better build-system native integration

[Mirko-von-Leipzig]

Ah great, thank you!

[memsharded]

Looking forward to hearing your feedback when it is released :)