diff --git a/direct/CMakeLists.txt b/direct/CMakeLists.txt
index 18847d4b9b..48d563eb06 100644
--- a/direct/CMakeLists.txt
+++ b/direct/CMakeLists.txt
@@ -20,6 +20,9 @@ set(P3DIRECT_COMPONENTS
 )
 if(HAVE_PYTHON)
   list(APPEND P3DIRECT_COMPONENTS p3distributed)
+  get_target_property(_p3distributed_exts p3distributed IGATE_EXTENSIONS)
+  set_source_files_properties(${_p3distributed_exts}
+    PROPERTIES COMPILE_DEFINITIONS BUILDING_DIRECT_DISTRIBUTED)
 endif()
 
 set(CMAKE_INSTALL_DEFAULT_COMPONENT_NAME "DirectDevel")
diff --git a/direct/src/distributed/CMakeLists.txt b/direct/src/distributed/CMakeLists.txt
index a5486d56c7..26f8f2414b 100644
--- a/direct/src/distributed/CMakeLists.txt
+++ b/direct/src/distributed/CMakeLists.txt
@@ -16,10 +16,10 @@ set(P3DISTRIBUTED_SOURCES
   cDistributedSmoothNodeBase.cxx
 )
 
-add_component_library(p3distributed SYMBOL BUILDING_DIRECT_DISTRIBUTED
-  ${P3DISTRIBUTED_HEADERS} ${P3DISTRIBUTED_SOURCES})
-target_link_libraries(p3distributed p3directbase p3dcparser panda PKG::PYTHON)
-target_interrogate(p3distributed ALL)
+add_component_library(p3distributed NOINIT SYMBOL BUILDING_DIRECT_DISTRIBUTED
+  ${P3DISTRIBUTED_HEADERS})
+target_link_libraries(p3distributed p3directbase p3dcparser panda)
+target_interrogate(p3distributed ALL EXTENSIONS ${P3DISTRIBUTED_SOURCES})
 
 if(NOT BUILD_METALIBS)
   install(TARGETS p3distributed