How to set warning level in CMake?
As per Cmake 3.23.1 documentation:
if (MSVC)
# warning level 4 and all warnings as errors
add_compile_options(/W4 /WX)
else()
# lots of warnings and all warnings as errors
add_compile_options(-Wall -Wextra -pedantic -Werror)
endif()
GCC and Clang share these flags, so this should cover all 3.
In modern CMake, the following works well:
if(MSVC)
target_compile_options(${TARGET_NAME} PRIVATE /W4 /WX)
else()
target_compile_options(${TARGET_NAME} PRIVATE -Wall -Wextra -Wpedantic -Werror)
endif()
My colleague suggested an alternative version:
target_compile_options(${TARGET_NAME} PRIVATE
$<$<CXX_COMPILER_ID:MSVC>:/W4 /WX>
$<$<NOT:$<CXX_COMPILER_ID:MSVC>>:-Wall -Wextra -Wpedantic -Werror>
)
Replace ${TARGET_NAME}
with the actual target name. -Werror
is optional, it turns all warnings into errors.
Or use add_compile_options(...)
if you want to apply it to all targets as suggested by @aldo in the comments.
Also, be sure to understand the difference between PRIVATE
and PUBLIC
(public options will be inherited by targets that depend on the given target).
UPDATE: This answer predates the Modern CMake era. Every sane CMake user should refrain from fiddling with CMAKE_CXX_FLAGS
directly and call the target_compile_options
command instead. Check the mrts' answer which presents the recommended best practice.
You can do something similar to this:
if(MSVC)
# Force to always compile with W4
if(CMAKE_CXX_FLAGS MATCHES "/W[0-4]")
string(REGEX REPLACE "/W[0-4]" "/W4" CMAKE_CXX_FLAGS "${CMAKE_CXX_FLAGS}")
else()
set(CMAKE_CXX_FLAGS "${CMAKE_CXX_FLAGS} /W4")
endif()
elseif(CMAKE_COMPILER_IS_GNUCC OR CMAKE_COMPILER_IS_GNUCXX)
# Update if necessary
set(CMAKE_CXX_FLAGS "${CMAKE_CXX_FLAGS} -Wall -Wno-long-long -pedantic")
endif()
Some CMake modules I've written include experimental cross-platfrom warning suppression:
sugar_generate_warning_flags(
target_compile_options
target_properties
ENABLE conversion
TREAT_AS_ERRORS ALL
)
set_target_properties(
foo
PROPERTIES
${target_properties}
COMPILE_OPTIONS
"${target_compile_options}"
)
Result for Xcode:
- Set
CLANG_WARN_SUSPICIOUS_IMPLICIT_CONVERSION
Xcode attribute (aka build settings -> warnings -> suspicious implicit conversions -> YES) - Add compiler flag:
-Werror
Makefile gcc and clang:
- Add compiler flags:
-Wconversion
,-Werror
Visual studio:
- Add compiler flags:
/WX
,/w14244
Links
- List of available warnings
- Usage and more options