cmake: Selecting a generator within CMakeLists.txt

Question

I would like to force CMake to use the \"Unix Makefiles\" generator from within CMakeLists.txt.

This is the command I use n

Answer 1

You need to set the generator at the Generate stage so it is written into the cache. You only need to run this command once for the first configuration

cmake .. -DCMAKE_GENERATOR:INTERNAL=Ninja

This will configure Ninja as the default generator.

Later you can simply run

cmake ..

And it would use the Ninja generator as default

You can read more about it under Running CMake from the command line

When running cmake from the command line, it is possible to specify command line options to cmake that will set values in the cache. This is done with a -DVARIABLE:TYPE=VALUE syntax on the command line. This is useful for non-interactive nightly test builds.