How to Get CMake to Use Default Compiler on System PATH?

cmake, compiler-construction

Solution

CMake honors the setting of the `PATH` environment variable, but gives preference to the generic compiler names `cc` and `c++`. To determine which C compiler will be used by default under UNIX by CMake, run:

$ which cc

To determine the default C++ compiler, run:

$ which c++

If you generate a symbolic link `c++` in `/opt/gcc-4.8/bin` which points to `/opt/gcc-4.8/bin/g++`, CMake should use GCC 4.8 by default.

Problem

Currently, I invoke CMake from my build directory as follows: CXX="/opt/gcc-4.8/bin/g++" cmake .. to get CMake to use this particular compiler. Otherwise it uses the operating system default compiler. My PATH has "`/opt/gcc-4.8/bin`" in front of everything else. So, instead of prepending the environmental variable is there way to specify in the "`CMakeLists.txt" file to use the default g++ on the path?

Original source

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