CMake add header files to target

user_10031533 0
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I know that this is a silly question, but I am new to c++ and it's development environment and I want to learn it the right way.

I am trying to learn how CMake works. Using CLion (which dynamically generated the CMakeList.txt), I saw that when a class is created, both the .cpp and .h are added to the target executable. But when removing the .h file from the add_executable call, the code compiled just fine, even tho in main.cpp there was a #include reference to that header file.

My question is if adding headers to the target executable is optional or not? I normally use VSCode which doesn't generate the CMakeList.txt for me and I wouldn't want to make a habit of not including headers to the target executable if I am supposed to do so.

cmake c++
2 Answers

add_executable simply takes a list of files which it passes on to the compiler. The compiler ignores any file with a conventional header suffix (maybe all suffixes that it doesn't recognise as source file). As such, it is not necessary to list header files, nor will listing them cause problems - as far as compilation is concerned.

Some IDE may use the listed header files for some internal purposes. I'm not sure if Clion does; its behaviour may be to facilitate the use of another IDE.

user_20793030

Generally, I believe you're supposed to

SET_SOURCE_FILE_PROPERTIES(${header_files} PROPERTIES HEADER_FILE_ONLY ON)

then

LIST (APPEND ${project_sources} ${header_files})

. Compile with ${project_sources}.

user_68968660
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