> I should say that many > opensource projects practice a separate directory for build-related stuff > and it doesn't > hurt anyone (quite the contrary, I'd say).
which ones?
From the ones I have locally: TBB, openh264, webrtc, libvpx, libresiprocate. Well, ok, some of them have a configure script or a single Makefile at the root directory, but most of the build stuff is put in a subdirectory.
The way I use CMake and see other use it is indeed to have a single CMakeFiles.txt config file in the root, and then do "out of source" building.
some IDEs (e.g. qtcreator) populate projects depending on the location of the root CMakeFiles.txt. so for users of these IDEs the UX will differ. hope that this won't end in a dogmatic discussion, but a pragmatic way can be found. afaict that killed the last effort to introduce a cmake-based buildsystem ...