[CMake] skip install of subdirectory

[Alan W. Irwin]

On 2016-07-20 11:02-0700 Tiago Macarios wrote:

> Hi,
>
> I have a project which uses git submodules to manage it's dependencies.
> Right now we want to add a installer to it, problem we have is that some of
> the dependencies have their own "install" directives. Is there a way to
> ignore a project install command?
>
> Long version case it is unclear:
>
> main project
>   submodule - has a install directive
>   myCode - actual code, links statically to submodule above
>
> I would like to only issue the install of myCode. is there a way to tell
> cmake or cpack to ignore "submodule" install directives?

Hi Tiago:

You could brute force it by surrounding each install directive in
submodule by

if(INSTALL_SUBMODULE)
....
endif(INSTALL_SUBMODULE)

Then add

option(INSTALL_SUBMODULE, "Install submodule?" OFF)

to your top-level CMakeLists.txt file.

Then because of that OFF, by default users would not install
submodule, but if users desired that install, they could specify the
-DINSTALL_SUBMODULE=ON option on the cmake command line.  Or you could
choose to default to ON.

Note, I have characterized the above as brute force, but in fact the
method is completely flexible, and most mature CMake projects use this
kind of option-based method a lot.

Alan
__________________________
Alan W. Irwin

Astronomical research affiliation with Department of Physics and Astronomy,
University of Victoria (astrowww.phys.uvic.ca).

Programming affiliations with the FreeEOS equation-of-state
implementation for stellar interiors (freeeos.sf.net); the Time
Ephemerides project (timeephem.sf.net); PLplot scientific plotting
software package (plplot.sf.net); the libLASi project
(unifont.org/lasi); the Loads of Linux Links project (loll.sf.net);
and the Linux Brochure Project (lbproject.sf.net).
__________________________

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