cmake ignores -D CMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=Debug

Question

I\'m just trying to build a cmake project in debug-mode to enable asserts. I tried the following versions:

cmake -D CMAKE_BUILD_TYPE:STRING=Debug -L ../../
cmake         


        

Answer 1

I assume that there is something wrong with your config..

I wrote a complete, simple example here: https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/68798379/cmake-build-type.tar.bz2

cmake_minimum_required (VERSION 2.8)

project(playlib)

message("CMAKE_BUILD_TYPE = ${CMAKE_BUILD_TYPE}")

IF(CMAKE_BUILD_TYPE MATCHES Debug)
  message("Debug build.")
ELSEIF(CMAKE_BUILD_TYPE MATCHES Release)
  message("Release build.")
ELSE()
  message("Some other build type.")
ENDIF()

add_library(TESTLIB SHARED src/test.c)

When you execute cmake with

cmake -DCMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=Debug ../../

It gives the following output:

$ ./gen-linux.sh
-- The C compiler identification is GNU 4.8.2
-- The CXX compiler identification is GNU 4.8.2
-- Check for working C compiler: /usr/bin/cc
-- Check for working C compiler: /usr/bin/cc -- works
-- Detecting C compiler ABI info
-- Detecting C compiler ABI info - done
-- Check for working CXX compiler: /usr/bin/c++
-- Check for working CXX compiler: /usr/bin/c++ -- works
-- Detecting CXX compiler ABI info
-- Detecting CXX compiler ABI info - done
CMAKE_BUILD_TYPE = Debug
Debug build.
-- Configuring done
-- Generating done
-- Build files have been written to: /home/wojci/stack-overflow/cmake-build-type/build/linux

It shows that CMAKE_BUILD_TYPE is being set from the command line and it being recognized in the CMakeLists.txt config.

What happens when you run it on your system using your version of CMake?