How to always run command when building regardless of any dependency?

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While I’m not at all pleased with this solution, posting since I stumbled on this page and didn’t see it mentioned.

You can add a custom target that references a missing file,

eg:

if(EXISTS ${CMAKE_CURRENT_BINARY_DIR}/__header.h)
    message(FATAL_ERROR "File \"${CMAKE_CURRENT_BINARY_DIR}/__header.h\" found, \
    this should never be created, remove!")
endif()

add_custom_target(
    my_custom_target_that_always_runs ALL
    DEPENDS ${CMAKE_CURRENT_BINARY_DIR}/__header.h
)

add_custom_command(
    OUTPUT
        ${CMAKE_CURRENT_BINARY_DIR}/__header.h  # fake! ensure we run!
        ${CMAKE_CURRENT_BINARY_DIR}/header.h    # real header, we write.
    # this command must generate: ${CMAKE_CURRENT_BINARY_DIR}/header.h
    COMMAND some_command
)

This will keep running the custom command because __header.h is not found.

See a working example where this is used.

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