get_property

Get a property.

get_property(<variable>
             <GLOBAL             |
              DIRECTORY [<dir>]  |
              TARGET    <target> |
              SOURCE    <source> |
                        [DIRECTORY <dir> | TARGET_DIRECTORY <target>] |
              INSTALL   <file>   |
              TEST      <test>   |
              CACHE     <entry>  |
              VARIABLE           >
             PROPERTY <name>
             [SET | DEFINED | BRIEF_DOCS | FULL_DOCS])

Gets one property from one object in a scope.

The first argument specifies the variable in which to store the result. The second argument determines the scope from which to get the property. It must be one of the following:

GLOBAL

Scope is unique and does not accept a name.

DIRECTORY

Scope defaults to the current directory but another directory (already processed by CMake) may be named by the full or relative path <dir>. The <dir> may reference either a source directory, or since CMake 3.19, a binary directory. Relative paths are treated as relative to the current source directory. See also the get_directory_property() command.

TARGET

Scope must name one existing target. See also the get_target_property() command.

SOURCE

Scope must name one source file. By default, the source file’s property will be read from the current source directory’s scope, but this can be overridden with one of the following sub-options:

DIRECTORY <dir>

The source file property will be read from the <dir> directory’s scope. The <dir> may reference either a source directory, or since CMake 3.19, a binary directory. CMake must already know about the directory, either by having added it through a call to add_subdirectory() or <dir> being the top level directory. Relative paths are treated as relative to the current source directory.

TARGET_DIRECTORY <target>

The source file property will be read from the directory scope in which <target> was created (<target> must therefore already exist).

See also the get_source_file_property() command.

INSTALL

Scope must name one installed file path.

TEST

Scope must name one existing test. See also the get_test_property() command.

CACHE

Scope must name one cache entry.

VARIABLE

Scope is unique and does not accept a name.

The required PROPERTY option is immediately followed by the name of the property to get. If the property is not set an empty value is returned, although some properties support inheriting from a parent scope if defined to behave that way (see define_property()).

If the SET option is given the variable is set to a boolean value indicating whether the property has been set. If the DEFINED option is given the variable is set to a boolean value indicating whether the property has been defined such as with the define_property() command.

If BRIEF_DOCS or FULL_DOCS is given then the variable is set to a string containing documentation for the requested property. If documentation is requested for a property that has not been defined NOTFOUND is returned.