CMake Tools provides the native developer a full-featured, convenient, and powerful configure+build workflow for CMake-based projects within the Visual Studio Code editor.

This extension itself does not provide language support for the CMake scripting language. For that I recommend this extension.

• Experimental CMake Server support has landed. Read more here.
• Experimental graphical CMake cache editor. The Edit the CMake Cache command now opens up a dedicated UI within VS Code for viewing and modifying values stored in the CMake cache. Read more here.
• CTest coverage! Now code coverage can be viewed inline after it has been collected by CTest. This requires that CTest be executed with -T Coverage from the command line (CMake Tools does not yet do this automatically).
• 0.9.1: Fix issues with CMake Server and cache editor.
• 0.9.2: Fix issues with environment variables on Windows.
• 0.9.3: Various bugfixes. Shiny new icon.
• 0.9.4:
  • Fix issues with GCC template error parsing
  • Do not forcibly set BUILD_SHARED_LIBS
  • Fix issues with incorrect debug paths with cmake-server
  • cmake.platform setting for controlling the -A CMake option.
  • New command cmake.debugTargetProgramPath for usage in launch.json:
    • This means that other debuggers can be used with CMake Tools just by setting them up with launch.json, using ${command.cmake.debugTargetProgramPath} as the path to the program. VSCode will replace that with the path from CMake Tools. This makes setting up permanent debugging configurations easier than before. Also, the Debug button in the status bar is only visible if the Microsoft C/C++ extension is installed, since that button is currently hard-coded to use it.

As always: Please report any issues, questions, or comments to the GitHub project issues list!

PLEASE, if you experience any problems, have any questions, or have an idea for a new feature, create an issue on the GitHub page!

I'm only one person with no QA team, so I can't test all the different possible configurations you may have, but I'll gladly help anyone fix issues relating to this extension.

CMake Tools provides several pieces of functionality to make it easier to work with CMake-based projects within Visual Studio Code. For example, it adds a "CMake: Build" command to the command palette, which is bound to the F7 key by default.

By default, CMake Tools assumes that you place your CMake build tree in a subdirectory of the source tree called build. This can be configured with the cmake.buildDirectory configuration option, which can be set globally or on a per-project basis. If you try to build but do not yet have a build directory, CMake Tools will prompt you to configure the project.

CMake Tools uses a configuration setting cmake.configureSettings to define options to pass to CMake when configuring the project. In this way, build settings can be stored as part of the project in settings.json in the .vscode directory.

CMake Tools provides a few buttons on the statusbar:

1. The name of the current project, the current build type (Debug, Release, etc.), and the current status of CMake Tools. Click this button to change the active configuration.
2. A build button. Click this button to build the default target. Quickly invoking a build is also bound to the F7 key by default. While building, this button changes into a stop button. Clicking the stop button will cancel the currently running build/configure process.
3. The default/active target. This is the target that will be invoked if run the build command. Clicking on this button will let you select a different target to be built by default.
4. The Target Debugging launcher (must be explicitly enabled, se below).
5. The active debug target (must be explicitly enabled).
6. The CTest results button. Click this button to rebuild and run CTest tests.

CMake Tools will also show the most recent line of CMake output as a status message to the right of the buttons. Invoking a command will open the CMake/Build output channel, where the progress and output of the build/configure commands can be seen.

Target Debugging, allows developers to easily use the Visual Studio Code Debugger with their CMake targets without having to write a launch.json. Read about enabling and using the feature here.

CMake Tools also parses the compiler output of GCC, Clang, and MSVC looking for diagnostics. It will populate the diagnostics for files which produce any warnings or errors.

CMake Tools also features integration with CTest, both executing and displaying results, even inline in the editor:

(Currently, only Catch test output is supported)

• Command to quickly generate a very basic CMakeLists.txt and C++ source file.
• Set CMake configuration values in settings.json.
• Provides diagnostics for CMake scripts.
• Quickly jump into CMakeCache.txt