I want to build qt application that will gather all the necessary binaries for standalone execution on install.
I know that can be done in lines of:
QT_DIR=C:/Qt/4.8.4
dlls_to_move.files += $$DIR/bin/QtCore.dll
however that seems clumsy. Is there a way to retrieve Qt binary folder actually used, like project directory that can be retrieved with $$PWD?
From qmake Advanced Usage:
The special $$[...] operator can be used to access various configuration options that were set when Qt was built:
So I think you'd want to do this in your project file:
dlls_to_move.files += $$[QT_INSTALL_BINS]/QtCore.dll
Related
Question
a) How do we add library paths where the project should look for depended libraries in Qt Creator?
b) How are the settings in project >> Run >> Build Environment related to similar in .pro file? Does the environment variable listed there applies to .pro file as well (well they don't) so what are they exactly?
Context/Details:
Visual Studio has a various environment variables for folders where a project looks for include files, library files or executable files etc. This is rather confusing in Qt Creator and I havne't seen good documentation on it.
The only thing which is obvious is INCLUDEPATHvariable which points to the directories where to look for the include files (.h)
However how do I set the library paths, the path where it should look for dependent libraries/dlls etc? I can specify the exact library with LIBS variable in .pro file, there don't seem to equivalent of LIBPATH variable where it should look for other libraries if not found in current folder.
I have worked around this be adding library path the following way basically using LIBS variable but dropping the library file name and that seems to work and add the path but I don't see this documented anywhere.
LIBS += -L"$$_PRO_FILE_PWD_/Xerces/bin/"
But what makes things more interesting is the settings in Projects >> select 'Run' from current configuration and expand the Run Environment settings.
''
Here there is LIB variable and LIBPATH variable but there are clearly not .pro environment available. It also says here that these settings are local to user and saved in .pro.user file which perhaps suggest it's a different way to set but it doesn't say how to set them in .pro file but it does suggest to set them there if want to apply for all users!
Likewise there are DEPENDPATH AND VPATH and it is not really clearly what they are used for.
I don't have enough Rep to add comments to your question, So am adding my comment in form of answer. I am pretty new to Qt and have been developing Qt GUI application on Linux.
I set this LD_LIBRARY_PATH environment variable with the path to my Qt libraries. Am not sure how much it will be helpful to you since you are using visual studio on windows.
in Projects property go to Build Environment and add a variable with the libs path, example NAME_LIBPATH. So in the .pro file add the following:
# your lib configuration
LIBS += -L$$(NAME_LIBPATH) \
-llibname
I have a QT project which runs on x86 linux and ARM linux embedded (yocto).
For each platform I defined a Kit within QtCreator referencing the appropriate compiler etc.
Now I want to add LIBS to my pro file, but I got different libraries on each platform. I didn't find a way to specify the LIBS-directive dependant on the compiling Kit.
I search something like:
if (Kit == "Desktop")
LIBS += ...
if (Kit == "Embedded Yocto")
LIBS += ...
How to achieve this?
Thank you in advance
I scraped together a solution to the OP's problem by using the answer suggested by #vsz in the comments found here.
I have two kits, one for the local Desktop and one for the Target_ARM device, and I wanted a way to easily build for both of those without having to specially modify the .pro file or anything else. I followed the linked answer and added the following:
In my Desktop kit (for both Debug and Release), I added CONFIG+=Desktop as an additional qmake argument in the qmake build step.
For the Target_ARM kit, I added CONFIG+=Target_ARM in the same spot.
Now, this is where things shifted from the linked answer to the OP's problem. I didn't simply want #defineed variables in my code, I wanted to alter the behavior of qmake based on the selected kit. I don't know if the CONFIG built-in test function supports block designations or not (ie, CONFIG { _several lines here_ }), but it turned out I could copy and paste the CONFIG test function in front of each line that I wanted to be conditional; in fact I could string multiple CONFIGs together, like this:
CONFIG(Desktop, Desktop|Target_ARM):unix:!macx:CONFIG(debug, debug|release): LIBS += /path/to/Desktop/debug/lib
else:CONFIG(Desktop, Desktop|Target_ARM):unix:!macx:CONFIG(release, debug|release): LIBS += /path/to/Destop/release/lib
As it suggests, the above statement will run qmake with the appropriate LIBS path depending on which kit and configuration I have selected. Desktop->debug will generate a Makefile with /path/to/Desktop/debug/lib in it whereas Desktop->release will generate a Makefile with /path/to/Desktop/release/lib. I have similar statements for the Target_ARM kit. Below is an example of selecting the correct INCLUDEPATH: Both tests will evaluate to true when Target_ARM->release is selected.
CONFIG(Target_ARM, Desktop|Target_ARM):CONFIG(release, debug|release): INCLUDEPATH += /include/path/for/Target_ARM/release
In all, I used this method to modify LIBS, INCLUDEPATH, DEPENDPATH, and PRE_TARGETDEPS. I have 4 possible configurations of include paths and libraries depending on which kit I select (Desktop or Target_ARM) and which build configuration I select (build or release). Once this is set up, there is no need to modify the .pro file, simply pick your kit, your build configuration, run qmake, then rebuild.
I don't know off the top of my head where the CONFIG+=Desktop (for example) data is stored, but I would guess in the .pro.user file. So if somebody pulls your .pro file from a repo, they may have to initially configure the project in this manner at least once, but not afterwards (as long as the .pro.user file persists). QT should really have an easy mechanism for doing this front-and-center, especially since one of their selling points is multiple-platform integration. If there's a better way of doing this, I haven't seen it on SO or in the QT documentation yet.
You have all qmake variables here: qt-project.org/doc/qt-4.8/qmake-function-reference.html
You can define a variable
KIT = Desktop
#KIT = EmbeddedYocto
And use contains function
contains( KIT, Desktop ) {
LIBS += ...
}
contains( KIT, EmbeddedYocto ) {
LIBS += ...
}
MY_QT_INSTALL_PREFIX=$$[QT_INSTALL_PREFIX]
equals(MY_QT_INSTALL_PREFIX,"C:/Qt/Qt5.3.1/5.3/msvc2010_opengl"){
message($$[QT_INSTALL_PREFIX])
}
I have several Qt projects that are dependent upon a Qt library that I've developed.
The project files (.pro) for projects which use the library define the LIBS and PRE_TARGETDEPS paths. For example: -
PRE_TARGETDEPS += ../ProjectLibrary_Qt_5_2_1_clang_64bit-Debug/projectlibrary.dylib
LIBS += -L../ProjectLibrary_Qt_5_2_1_clang_64bit-Debug -lProjectLibrary
As you can see, there is a defined path to the linked library and they have been building with Shadow Builds, via Qt Creator. The file hierarchy is like this: -
Projects
ProjectLibrary_Qt_5_2_1_clang_64bit-Debug
ProjectLib.dylib (the built library)
DependentProject
DependentProject.pro
(dylib is an OSX extension, but it could equally be .lib for Windows, or .so for linux)
However, Jenkins creates a different folder structure:-
jobs
ProjectLib
workspace
Project.dylib
DependentProject
workspace
DependentProject.pro
Now there is an extra directory (workspace), which would need this reflected in the .pro file and the names of the folders are different.
Obviously, If I just call qmake on the .pro with a Jenkins build, the path to the library is going to be wrong.
So, do I need to create a separate .pro just to be able to reflect the paths when building with Jenkins, or is there another way to handle specifying the location of libraries in the project file, for Jenkins, without having to change the directory structures?
Solution 1) Based on your current build configration
Modify your .pro file like this :
isEmpty(PROJECT_PATH) {
PROJECT_PATH=../ProjectLibrary_Qt_5_2_1_clang_64bit-Debug
}
LIBS += -L$${PROJECT_PATH} -lProjectLibrary
Then in Jenkins , you should pass PROJECT_PATH={path to your project} to qmake
Solution 2)
Using git submodule to fetch ProjectLibrary as a part of your building project. Then you don't need to build the ProjectLibrary by Qt Creator manually.
I compiled a library using the MinGW toolchain provided with Qt 5.0.2 on Windows. As a result I received a library.so file. First I failed using the library in a Qt application, but now I found out that everything works fine when I make a copy of the liblibrary.so file and call it liblibrary.dll or liblibrary.lib (which is the only file ending supported by the add library wizard in QtCreator).
Now I wonder if this is normal or if I should change something in order not to have both files (which are exact copies). Leaving one away makes the application crash during start up. I added the library as follows to my Qt pro file:
LIBS += -L"../path/to/library" -llibrary
INCLUDEPATH += $$quote(../path/to/library)
EDIT: I compiled the library using the MinGW of Qt, not as Qt project but using mingw32-make and the provided Makefile. As a result I get the liblibrary.so.
EDIT: It seems to work also when renaming the copy to liblibrary.dll instead of .lib. But still, I need two files to make the application work -- the .so and the .dll.
Chris
That's weird, I think you should get a *.a and *.dll files when building a shared lib with MinGW on Windows, as said in the documentation:
In windows, MinGW will output .a and .dll, MSVC2010 will ouput .lib and .dll. In linux, MinGW will output .so, .so.1, .so.1.0 and .so.1.0.0 – .lib, .a and .so are import libraries.
You definitely shouldn't rename your file!
Be careful to:
not to include the "lib" prefix after "-l" in your project file.
put everything after after "-l" in lower case as you're on Windows
not adding any extension to your library name after "-l"
add and reference the .h file used in your library
A real example using QtWebsocket lib:
INCLUDEPATH += "$${PWD}/include/"
LIBS += -L"$${PWD}/libs/" -lqtwebsocket
...
HEADERS += ... \
$${PWD}/include/QWsSocket.h \
...
In my include/ folder, I have the following file:
QWsSocket.h (taken from original project - required)
In my libs/ folder, I have the following file:
libQtWebsocket.a
QtWebsocket.dll
Edit: I struggled with this too initially. Have you tried to build your lib as a static lib instead (CONFIG += staticlib in your library project)? This might help you getting you *.pro file right before switching to using the shared library.
Edit 2: Ok, the fact that you get a *.so file is still a bit odd. In this question
the user has the same issue as you and keep both files, which is just a workaround. According to a later answer it seems that you need to modify your makefile to generate a file with the proper extension. Maybe this will help: http://www.mingw.org/wiki/sampleDLL
I have a project that uses Qt. So I have "qmake" make my Makefile from the .pro file. But Qmake can also make that .pro file: qmake -project . This worked until I needed to add an external extra library to my project.
I get lots of hits on google that tell me to add LIBS += ... to my project file, but I want to tell qmake -project something that causes it to add it for me. In effect of course I'll be doing it myself, but I don't think that it's proper that I am editing the generated project file.
If for example I add files to the project directory, I'll have to recreate it and add in the library again, or I'll have to manually add the files to the (almost completely computer-generated) project file. I'm now using a script to auto-generate the project file, and then add in the LIBS += directive, but is there a proper way to do this?
When you are developing without the Qt Creator IDE, unless the IDE includes by itself some automatic utilities, you must edit manually the .pro configuration file.
The generated .pro file is a skeleton file which YOU must fill in with the libraries that you need, then the qmake system figures out the other dependencies and compiles your project. It is a essentially a much better version of pkg-config of gtk + Makefiles.
When you add more source and resource files to your project then manually you must add them to the .pro file.
Example:
QT += core gui
TARGET = qtcp1
TEMPLATE = app
SOURCES += main.cpp\
mainwindow.cpp \
miwidget1.cpp \
lcdrange.cpp
HEADERS += mainwindow.h \
miwidget1.h \
lcdrange.h
FORMS += mainwindow.u
Alternately, you can issue qmake -project over and over again, but this can cause some unforseen accidents, since it includes everything that is in the current directory at the time, including the pre-processed files for conversion to standard C++ from QT dialect. This intermediate files must be erased (cleaned), before the remaking the project and the next make or can lead to tricky problems.
Using the official and free QT Creator IDE takes away most of this burden by adding automatically the new data to the .pro file and cleaning loose ends. Some other IDEs like Code::BLocks and Codelite provide some facilities for QT, but not to the level of QT creator. Some prefer to edit the .pro themselves for custom reasons, other like more other styles of IDEs, like Eclipse.
You should test the waters and decide by yourself what fits best to your needs.
ReEdited, to clarify a few things.