# How to set the FOLDER property for all Targets in a given subdirectory
**URL:** https://discourse.cmake.org/t/how-to-set-the-folder-property-for-all-targets-in-a-given-subdirectory/3384
**Category:** Usage
**Created:** [May 21, 2021, 4:20pm UTC](https://discourse.cmake.org/t/how-to-set-the-folder-property-for-all-targets-in-a-given-subdirectory/3384 "2021-05-21T16:20:56Z")
**Posts on this page:** 4
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@RichTea](https://discourse.cmake.org/u/RichTea)
#### Post date: [May 21, 2021, 4:20pm UTC](https://discourse.cmake.org/t/how-to-set-the-folder-property-for-all-targets-in-a-given-subdirectory/3384/1 "2021-05-21T16:20:56Z")
We have an uber-project that brings in several sub-projects via add\_subdirectory().
Several of these creates a large number of static library Targets which they then assemble into the dynamic libraries and executables that we actually consume in the uber-project.
This results in the UI of the Visual Studio IDE “Solution” pane showing all the targets in a flat list, including all the ‘private’ static libraries for each of the subprojects.
As there are a really large number of Targets in some of the sub-directories, this makes it quite difficult to quickly find the proper sub-project.
I’d like to organise them into folders, however the only option I’ve found so far is set\_target\_properties(list of targets PROPERTIES FOLDERS “folder”)
While that works, it’s not really maintainable because I have to list all the Targets created by the sub-project, most of which are static libraries whose names are effectively “hidden” from the uber-project.
Is there a way to set the FOLDER property for _all_ the targets created via add\_directory(), so I can place the whole thing into an appropriate folder without needing to know the names of any of the private targets?
---
### Author:  [@ben.boeckel](https://discourse.cmake.org/u/ben.boeckel)
#### Post date: [May 21, 2021, 4:26pm UTC](https://discourse.cmake.org/t/how-to-set-the-folder-property-for-all-targets-in-a-given-subdirectory/3384/2 "2021-05-21T16:26:09Z")
A suitable approach is described in [this reply](https://discourse.cmake.org/t/clang-format-integration/3358/8), you can instead set the `FOLDER` property instead.
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### Author:  [@tuket](https://discourse.cmake.org/u/tuket)
#### Post date: [May 10, 2024, 8:12am UTC](https://discourse.cmake.org/t/how-to-set-the-folder-property-for-all-targets-in-a-given-subdirectory/3384/3 "2024-05-10T08:12:02Z")
I used this function I found in a gist: [Find all CMake targets declared in a directory (recursively) · GitHub](https://gist.github.com/mikedld/a687baabc952a7f061b6a2fd3069f91c)
```cmake
function(print_all_targets DIR)
get_property(TGTS DIRECTORY "${DIR}" PROPERTY BUILDSYSTEM_TARGETS)
foreach(TGT IN LISTS TGTS)
message(STATUS "Target: ${TGT}")
# TODO: Do something about it
endforeach()
get_property(SUBDIRS DIRECTORY "${DIR}" PROPERTY SUBDIRECTORIES)
foreach(SUBDIR IN LISTS SUBDIRS)
print_all_targets("${SUBDIR}")
endforeach()
endfunction()
print_all_targets(myFolder)
```
---
### Author:  [@Angew](https://discourse.cmake.org/u/Angew)
#### Post date: [May 10, 2024, 2:06pm UTC](https://discourse.cmake.org/t/how-to-set-the-folder-property-for-all-targets-in-a-given-subdirectory/3384/4 "2024-05-10T14:06:12Z")
The target property `FOLDER` is pre-initialised from the variable `CMAKE_FOLDER` if that is set when the target is created (see its [docs](https://cmake.org/cmake/help/latest/variable/CMAKE_FOLDER.html)). So, in order to store all targets from a subdirectory in a particular folder, all you have to do is this:
```auto
set(CMAKE_FOLDER FolderFor/Subdir)
add_subdirectory(sub/dir)
unset(CMAKE_FOLDER)
```