ENH: Improve docs of OBJECT_DEPENDS property

Specify exactly what the value of the property should contain and the
resulting behavior.  Note alternatives for a common out-dated usage.

1 files changed, 16 insertions, 4 deletions

diff --git a/Source/cmSourceFile.cxx b/Source/cmSourceFile.cxx
index 3ee370850d..09cce70e49 100644
--- a/Source/cmSourceFile.cxx
+++ b/Source/cmSourceFile.cxx
@@ -507,10 +507,22 @@ void cmSourceFile::DefineProperties(cmake *cm)
      "or Resources directories.");
 
   cm->DefineProperty
-    ("OBJECT_DEPENDS", cmProperty::SOURCE_FILE, 
-     "Additional dependencies.",
-     "Additional dependencies that should be checked as part of "
-     "building this source file.");
+    ("OBJECT_DEPENDS", cmProperty::SOURCE_FILE,
+     "Additional files on which a compiled object file depends.",
+     "Specifies a semicolon-separated list of full-paths to files on which "
+     "any object files compiled from this source file depend.  "
+     "An object file will be recompiled if any of the named files is newer "
+     "than it.\n"
+     "This property need not be used to specify the dependency of a "
+     "source file on a generated header file that it includes.  "
+     "Although the property was originally introduced for this purpose, it "
+     "is no longer necessary.  "
+     "If the generated header file is created by a custom command in the "
+     "same target as the source file, the automatic dependency scanning "
+     "process will recognize the dependency.  "
+     "If the generated header file is created by another target, an "
+     "inter-target dependency should be created with the add_dependencies "
+     "command (if one does not already exist due to linking relationships).");
 
   cm->DefineProperty
     ("OBJECT_OUTPUTS", cmProperty::SOURCE_FILE,