I've got by with some combination of the following: - message(STATUS ...) or message(FATAL_ERROR ...) for printing stuff out at configure time, e.g. messa

I've got by with some combination of the following: - message(STATUS ...) or message(FATAL_ERROR ...) for printing stuff out at configure time, e.g. message(STATUS "libcurl found: ${HAVE_LIBCURL}") - cmake -E echo for printing stuff out at build time, e.g. add_custom_command(TARGET lorenz POST_BUILD COMMAND ${CMAKE_COMMAND} -E echo "lorenz command line:" COMMAND ${CMAKE_COMMAND} -E echo '$<TARGET_FILE:lorenz>' ${LORENZ_ARGS} VERBATIM) - diagnostic-level MSBuild output for dependency issues - you can configure this in Visual Studio, Tools, Options, Projects and Solutions, I think (it's around there somewhere). You might not expect much from MSBuild debug output, considering how annoying the rest of it is, but it's actually extremely comprehensive, and I've found it useful for figuring out even rather weird stuff. There's quite a lot of it, though, so get a cup of tea A passing familiarity with the MSBuild syntax might be helpful, but I've managed to do mostly without.