I spent several years creating and maintaining a large, proprietary build system for a Linux-based operating system at a previous gig. Much of userspace was C/C++, and thus used CMake. To further complicate things, most of userspace needed to be cross-compilable for a macOS-based "simulator" environment.

I ended up being fairly proficient with the "modern" CMake language after investing a ton of time into it, but as the size of the company grew, I ended up being a bottleneck. Every other team found themselves subject to CMake's many footguns, and I'd end up having to step in to help.

It was maddening, but I 100% get that other teams just wanted to focus on getting their work done, rather than fighting with a poorly-documented and frustrating build system.

I, for one, would be very happy to see a new CMake scripting language. Ideally, one that is a lot more friendly for beginners and occasional users.