CPackComponent

Configure components for binary installers and source packages.

Introduction

This module is automatically included by CPack.

Certain binary installers (especially the graphical installers) generated by CPack allow users to select individual application components to install. This module allows developers to configure the packaging of such components.

Contents is assigned to components by the COMPONENT argument of CMake's install() command. Components can be annotated with user-friendly names and descriptions, inter-component dependencies, etc., and grouped in various ways to customize the resulting installer, using the commands described below.

To specify different groupings for different CPack generators use a CPACK_PROJECT_CONFIG_FILE.

Variables

The following variables influence the component-specific packaging:

CPACK_COMPONENTS_ALL

The list of component to install.

The default value of this variable is computed by CPack and contains all components defined by the project. The user may set it to only include the specified components.

Instead of specifying all the desired components, it is possible to obtain a list of all defined components and then remove the unwanted ones from the list. The get_cmake_property() command can be used to obtain the COMPONENTS property, then the list(REMOVE_ITEM) command can be used to remove the unwanted ones. For example, to use all defined components except foo and bar:

get_cmake_property(CPACK_COMPONENTS_ALL COMPONENTS)
list(REMOVE_ITEM CPACK_COMPONENTS_ALL "foo" "bar")
CPACK_<GENNAME>_COMPONENT_INSTALL

Enable/Disable component install for CPack generator <GENNAME>.

Each CPack Generator (RPM, DEB, ARCHIVE, NSIS, DMG, etc...) has a legacy default behavior. e.g. RPM builds monolithic whereas NSIS builds component. One can change the default behavior by setting this variable to 0/1 or OFF/ON.

CPACK_COMPONENTS_GROUPING

Specify how components are grouped for multi-package component-aware CPack generators.

Some generators like RPM or ARCHIVE (TGZ, ZIP, ...) may generate several packages files when there are components, depending on the value of this variable:

  • ONE_PER_GROUP (default): create one package per component group

  • IGNORE : create one package per component (ignore the groups)

  • ALL_COMPONENTS_IN_ONE : create a single package with all requested components

CPACK_COMPONENT_<compName>_DISPLAY_NAME

The name to be displayed for a component.

CPACK_COMPONENT_<compName>_DESCRIPTION

The description of a component.

CPACK_COMPONENT_<compName>_GROUP

The group of a component.

CPACK_COMPONENT_<compName>_DEPENDS

The dependencies (list of components) on which this component depends.

CPACK_COMPONENT_<compName>_HIDDEN

True if this component is hidden from the user.

CPACK_COMPONENT_<compName>_REQUIRED

True if this component is required.

CPACK_COMPONENT_<compName>_DISABLED

True if this component is not selected to be installed by default.

Commands

Add component

cpack_add_component

Describe an installation component.

cpack_add_component(compname
                    [DISPLAY_NAME name]
                    [DESCRIPTION description]
                    [HIDDEN | REQUIRED | DISABLED ]
                    [GROUP group]
                    [DEPENDS comp1 comp2 ... ]
                    [INSTALL_TYPES type1 type2 ... ]
                    [DOWNLOADED]
                    [ARCHIVE_FILE filename]
                    [PLIST filename])

compname is the name of an installation component, as defined by the COMPONENT argument of one or more CMake install() commands. With the cpack_add_component command one can set a name, a description, and other attributes of an installation component. One can also assign a component to a component group.

DISPLAY_NAME is the displayed name of the component, used in graphical installers to display the component name. This value can be any string.

DESCRIPTION is an extended description of the component, used in graphical installers to give the user additional information about the component. Descriptions can span multiple lines using \n as the line separator. Typically, these descriptions should be no more than a few lines long.

HIDDEN indicates that this component will be hidden in the graphical installer, so that the user cannot directly change whether it is installed or not.

REQUIRED indicates that this component is required, and therefore will always be installed. It will be visible in the graphical installer, but it cannot be unselected. (Typically, required components are shown grayed out).

DISABLED indicates that this component should be disabled (unselected) by default. The user is free to select this component for installation, unless it is also HIDDEN.

DEPENDS lists the components on which this component depends. If this component is selected, then each of the components listed must also be selected. The dependency information is encoded within the installer itself, so that users cannot install inconsistent sets of components.

GROUP names the component group of which this component is a part. If not provided, the component will be a standalone component, not part of any component group. Component groups are described with the cpack_add_component_group command, detailed below.

INSTALL_TYPES lists the installation types of which this component is a part. When one of these installations types is selected, this component will automatically be selected. Installation types are described with the cpack_add_install_type command, detailed below.

DOWNLOADED indicates that this component should be downloaded on-the-fly by the installer, rather than packaged in with the installer itself. For more information, see the cpack_configure_downloads command.

ARCHIVE_FILE provides a name for the archive file created by CPack to be used for downloaded components. If not supplied, CPack will create a file with some name based on CPACK_PACKAGE_FILE_NAME and the name of the component. See cpack_configure_downloads for more information.

PLIST gives a filename that is passed to pkgbuild with the --component-plist argument when using the productbuild generator.

Add component group

cpack_add_component_group

Describes a group of related CPack installation components.

cpack_add_component_group(groupname
                         [DISPLAY_NAME name]
                         [DESCRIPTION description]
                         [PARENT_GROUP parent]
                         [EXPANDED]
                         [BOLD_TITLE])

The cpack_add_component_group describes a group of installation components, which will be placed together within the listing of options. Typically, component groups allow the user to select/deselect all of the components within a single group via a single group-level option. Use component groups to reduce the complexity of installers with many options. groupname is an arbitrary name used to identify the group in the GROUP argument of the cpack_add_component command, which is used to place a component in a group. The name of the group must not conflict with the name of any component.

DISPLAY_NAME is the displayed name of the component group, used in graphical installers to display the component group name. This value can be any string.

DESCRIPTION is an extended description of the component group, used in graphical installers to give the user additional information about the components within that group. Descriptions can span multiple lines using \n as the line separator. Typically, these descriptions should be no more than a few lines long.

PARENT_GROUP, if supplied, names the parent group of this group. Parent groups are used to establish a hierarchy of groups, providing an arbitrary hierarchy of groups.

EXPANDED indicates that, by default, the group should show up as "expanded", so that the user immediately sees all of the components within the group. Otherwise, the group will initially show up as a single entry.

BOLD_TITLE indicates that the group title should appear in bold, to call the user's attention to the group.

Add installation type

cpack_add_install_type

Add a new installation type containing a set of predefined component selections to the graphical installer.

cpack_add_install_type(typename
                       [DISPLAY_NAME name])

The cpack_add_install_type command identifies a set of preselected components that represents a common use case for an application. For example, a "Developer" install type might include an application along with its header and library files, while an "End user" install type might just include the application's executable. Each component identifies itself with one or more install types via the INSTALL_TYPES argument to cpack_add_component.

DISPLAY_NAME is the displayed name of the install type, which will typically show up in a drop-down box within a graphical installer. This value can be any string.

Configure downloads

cpack_configure_downloads

Configure CPack to download selected components on-the-fly as part of the installation process.

cpack_configure_downloads(site
                          [UPLOAD_DIRECTORY dirname]
                          [ALL]
                          [ADD_REMOVE|NO_ADD_REMOVE])

The cpack_configure_downloads command configures installation-time downloads of selected components. For each downloadable component, CPack will create an archive containing the contents of that component, which should be uploaded to the given site. When the user selects that component for installation, the installer will download and extract the component in place. This feature is useful for creating small installers that only download the requested components, saving bandwidth. Additionally, the installers are small enough that they will be installed as part of the normal installation process, and the "Change" button in Windows Add/Remove Programs control panel will allow one to add or remove parts of the application after the original installation. On Windows, the downloaded-components functionality requires the ZipDLL plug-in for NSIS, available at:

http://nsis.sourceforge.net/ZipDLL_plug-in

On macOS, installers that download components on-the-fly can only be built and installed on system using macOS 10.5 or later.

The site argument is a URL where the archives for downloadable components will reside, e.g., https://cmake.org/files/v3.25/ All of the archives produced by CPack should be uploaded to that location.

UPLOAD_DIRECTORY is the local directory where CPack will create the various archives for each of the components. The contents of this directory should be uploaded to a location accessible by the URL given in the site argument. If omitted, CPack will use the directory CPackUploads inside the CMake binary directory to store the generated archives.

The ALL flag indicates that all components be downloaded. Otherwise, only those components explicitly marked as DOWNLOADED or that have a specified ARCHIVE_FILE will be downloaded. Additionally, the ALL option implies ADD_REMOVE (unless NO_ADD_REMOVE is specified).

ADD_REMOVE indicates that CPack should install a copy of the installer that can be called from Windows' Add/Remove Programs dialog (via the "Modify" button) to change the set of installed components. NO_ADD_REMOVE turns off this behavior. This option is ignored on Mac OS X.