global.conf

Warning

This new configuration mechanism is an experimental feature subject to breaking changes in future releases.

The global.conf file is located in the Conan user home directory.

Global configuration

  • core:required_conan_version = expression allows defining a version expression like >=1.30. Conan will raise an error if its current version does not satisfy the condition

  • core.package_id:msvc_visual_incompatible allows opting-out the fallback from the new msvc compiler to the Visual Studio compiler existing binaries

Tools configurations

Tools and user configurations allows them to be defined both in the global.conf file and in profile files. Profile values will have priority over globally defined ones in global.conf, and can be defined as:

[settings]
...

[conf]
tools.microsoft.msbuild:verbosity=Diagnostic
tools.microsoft.msbuild:max_cpu_count=20
tools.microsoft.msbuild:vs_version = 16
tools.build:processes=10
tools.ninja:jobs=30
tools.gnu.make:jobs=40

To list all possible configurations available, run conan config list.

  • core:required_conan_version: Raise if current version does not match the defined range.

  • core.package_id:msvc_visual_incompatible: Allows opting-out the fallback from the new msvc compiler to the Visual Studio compiler existing binaries

  • core:default_profile: Defines the default host profile (‘default’ by default)

  • core:default_build_profile: Defines the default build profile (None by default)

  • tools.android:ndk_path: Argument for the CMAKE_ANDROID_NDK

  • tools.build:skip_test: Do not execute CMake.test() and Meson.test() when enabled

  • tools.build:processes: Default jobs number

  • tools.cmake.cmaketoolchain:generator: User defined CMake generator to use instead of default

  • tools.cmake.cmaketoolchain:msvc_parallel_compile: Argument for the /MP when running msvc

  • tools.cmake.cmaketoolchain:find_package_prefer_config: Argument for the CMAKE_FIND_PACKAGE_PREFER_CONFIG

  • tools.cmake.cmaketoolchain:toolchain_file: Use other existing file rather than conan_toolchain.cmake one

  • tools.cmake.cmaketoolchain:user_toolchain: Inject existing user toolchain at the beginning of conan_toolchain.cmake

  • tools.cmake.cmaketoolchain:system_name: Define CMAKE_SYSTEM_NAME in CMakeToolchain

  • tools.cmake.cmaketoolchain:system_version: Define CMAKE_SYSTEM_VERSION in CMakeToolchain

  • tools.cmake.cmaketoolchain:system_processor: Define CMAKE_SYSTEM_PROCESSOR in CMakeToolchain

  • tools.env.virtualenv:auto_use: Automatically activate virtualenv file generation

  • tools.files.download:retry: Number of retries in case of failure when downloading

  • tools.files.download:retry_wait: Seconds to wait between download attempts

  • tools.gnu:make_program: Indicate path to make program

  • tools.gnu.make:jobs: Argument for the -j parameter when running Make generator

  • tools.google.bazel:config: Define Bazel config file

  • tools.google.bazel:bazelrc_path: Defines Bazel rc-path

  • tools.microsoft.msbuild:verbosity: Verbosity level for MSBuild: ‘Quiet’, ‘Minimal’, ‘Normal’, ‘Detailed’, ‘Diagnostic’

  • tools.microsoft.msbuild:max_cpu_count: Argument for the /m (/maxCpuCount) when running MSBuild

  • tools.microsoft.msbuild:vs_version: Defines the IDE version when using the new msvc compiler

  • tools.microsoft.msbuild:installation_path: VS install path, to avoid auto-detect via vswhere, like C:/Program Files (x86)/Microsoft Visual Studio/2019/Community

  • tools.microsoft.msbuilddeps:exclude_code_analysis: Suppress MSBuild code analysis for patterns

  • tools.microsoft.msbuildtoolchain:compile_options: Dictionary with MSBuild compiler options

  • tools.ninja:jobs: Argument for the –jobs parameter when running Ninja generator

Configuration from build_requires

From Conan 1.37, it is possible to define configuration in packages that are build_requires. For example, assuming there is a package that bundles the AndroidNDK, it could define the location of such NDK to the tools.android:ndk_path configuration as:

import os
from conans import ConanFile

class Pkg(ConanFile):
    name = "android_ndk"

    def package_info(self):
        self.conf_info["tools.android:ndk_path"] = os.path.join(self.package_folder, "ndk")

Note that this only propagates from the immediate, direct build_requires of a recipe.