Best/Shortest way to join a list in CMake

Question

What is the best way to join a list in CMake into a string?

By joining I mean convert SET(somelist \"a\" \"b\" \"c\\;c\") to \"a:b:c;c\" where the glue string (\":\") i

Answer 1

You can use the string REPLACE function:

function(JOIN VALUES GLUE OUTPUT)
  string (REPLACE ";" "${GLUE}" _TMP_STR "${VALUES}")
  set (${OUTPUT} "${_TMP_STR}" PARENT_SCOPE)
endfunction()

#USAGE:
SET(somelist a b c)
JOIN("${somelist}" ":" output)
MESSAGE("${output}") # will output "a:b:c"