Getting ready

CMake supports an extensive list of native build tools for different platforms. Both command-line tools, such as Unix Makefiles and Ninja, and integrated development environment (IDE) tools are supported. You can find an up-to-date list of the generators available on your platform and for your installed version of CMake by running the following:

$ cmake --help

The output of this command will list all options to the CMake command-line interface. At the bottom, you will find the list of available generators. For example, this is the output on a GNU/Linux machine with CMake 3.11.2 installed:

Generators

The following generators are available on this platform:
  Unix Makefiles = Generates standard UNIX makefiles.
  Ninja = Generates build.ninja files.
  Watcom WMake = Generates Watcom WMake makefiles.
  CodeBlocks - Ninja = Generates CodeBlocks project files.

  CodeBlocks - Unix Makefiles = Generates CodeBlocks project files.
  CodeLite - Ninja = Generates CodeLite project files.
  CodeLite - Unix Makefiles = Generates CodeLite project files.
  Sublime Text 2 - Ninja = Generates Sublime Text 2 project files.
  Sublime Text 2 - Unix Makefiles = Generates Sublime Text 2 project files.
  Kate - Ninja = Generates Kate project files.
  Kate - Unix Makefiles = Generates Kate project files.
  Eclipse CDT4 - Ninja = Generates Eclipse CDT 4.0 project files.
  Eclipse CDT4 - Unix Makefiles= Generates Eclipse CDT 4.0 project files.

With this recipe, we will show how easy it is to switch generators for the same project.