To make Apache NetBeans cooperate with CMake projects on your Mac it requires just a few extra steps. CMake used to have a tool to do this for you, but now navigating in CMake to Tools->How to Install for Command Line Use shows you this:
I’m going to chose the symlink option, open up the Terminal App and type:
sudo "/Applications/CMake.app/Contents/bin/cmake-gui" --install
Now that CMake is properly installed to the command line tool chain, open up NetBeans and go to the Preferences and click on the C/C++ tab. Enter the newly created symlink path /usr/local/bin/cmake for the CMake Command and click apply:
Now navigate to File->New Project. Choose C/C++ Project with Existing Sources and click next:
Browse to find your project root directory containing the CMakeLists.txt file, and everything should be good to go, just click finish!
NetBeans should run CMake to generate the Makefile, and should you edit your CMakeLists.txt file, just right-click the CMakeLists.txt file in the project tree and select Generate Makefile to generate a fresh one. All done and good to go! Happy coding!