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Please review the following information to ensure ** the GNU Free Documentation License version 1.3 requirements ** will be met: http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/fdl.html. ** $QT_END_LICENSE$ ** ****************************************************************************/ /*! \page deployment.html \title Deploying Qt Applications Deploying an Qt application does not require any C++ programming. All you need to do is to build Qt and your application in release mode, following the procedures described in this documentation. We will demonstrate the procedures in terms of deploying the \l {tools/plugandpaint}{Plug & Paint} application that is provided in Qt's examples directory. \section1 Static vs. Shared Libraries There are two ways of deploying an application: \list \li Static Linking \li Shared Libraries (Frameworks on Mac) \endlist Static linking results in a stand-alone executable. The advantage is that you will only have a few files to deploy. The disadvantages are that the executables are large and with no flexibility (i.e a new version of the application, or of Qt, will require that the deployment process is repeated), and that you cannot deploy plugins. To deploy plugin-based applications, you can use the shared library approach. Shared libraries also provide smaller, more flexible executables. For example, using the shared library approach, the user is able to independently upgrade the Qt library used by the application. Another reason why you might want to use the shared library approach, is if you want to use the same Qt libraries for a family of applications. In fact, if you download the binary installation of Qt, you get Qt as a shared library. The disadvantage with the shared library approach is that you will get more files to deploy. For more information, see \l{Creating Shared Libraries}. \section1 Deploying Qt's Libraries \table \header \li {4,1} Qt Libraries \row \li \l{Qt Core C++ Classes}{QtCore} \li \l{Qt Network C++ Classes}{QtNetwork} \li \l{Qt GUI C++ API}{QtGui} \li \l{Qt SQL Module C++ Classes}{QtSql} \row \li \l{Qt TestLib}{QtTestLib} \li \l{Qt Widgets C++ Classes}{QtWidgets} \li \l{Qt QML Module C++ Classes}{QtQml} \li \l{Qt Quick Module C++ Classes}{QtQuick} \row \li \l{Qt Multimedia C++ Classes}{QtMultimedia} \li \l{Qt WebKit}{QtWebkit} \li \l{Qt WebKit Widgets}{QtWetkitWidgets} \li \l{QtXml Module}{QtXml} \row \li \l{Qt XML Patterns C++ Classes}{QtXmlPatterns} \li \l{Qt Svg C++ Classes}{QtSvg} \li \l{Qt Concurrent C++ Classes}{QtConcurrent} \li \l{Qt Print Support Module}{QtPrintSupport} \row \li \l{Qt D-Bus C++ Classes}{QtDBus} \li \l{QtOpenGL Module}{QtOpenGL} \li \l{Qt Active Qt}{QtActiveQt} \li \l{Qt Graphical Effects}{QtGraphicalEffects} \row \li \l{Qt Script C++ Classes}{QtScript} \li \l{QtDeclarative} \li \l{Qt Image Formats}{QtImageFormats} \endtable Qt is not a system library, so it must be redistributed with your application. The minimum is to redistribute the run-time of the libraries used by the application. However, with static linking, the Qt run-times can be compiled into the executable. In general, you should deploy all plugins that your Qt build uses, excluding those that you have identified as unnecessary for your application and its users. For instance, you may need to deploy plugins for JPEG support and SQL drivers, but you should also deploy plugins that your users may require, including those for accessibility. For more information about plugins, see \l{How to Create Qt Plugins}. While deploying an application using the shared library approach, you must ensure that the Qt libraries use the correct path to find the Qt plugins, documentation, translation, and so on. To do this, you can use a \c qt.conf file. For more information, see \l {Using qt.conf}. Depending on configuration, compiler-specific libraries must be redistributed as well. For more information, see the platform-specific application dependencies for \l{deployment-x11.html#application-dependencies}{X11}, \l{deployment-windows.html#application-dependencies}{Windows}, and \l{deployment-mac.html#application-dependencies}{Mac}. \section1 Licensing Some of Qt's libraries are based on third party libraries that are not licensed using the same dual-license model as Qt. As a result, care must be taken when deploying applications that use these libraries, particularly when the application is statically linked to them. The following table summarizes a few issues that you should be aware of. \table \header \li Qt Library \li Dependency \li Licensing Issue \row \li \l{QtHelp} \li CLucene \li The version of clucene distributed with Qt is licensed under the GNU LGPL version 2.1 or later. This has implications for developers of closed source applications. Please see \l{QtHelp Module#License Information}{the QtHelp module documentation} for more information. \row \li \l{QtNetwork} \li OpenSSL \li Some configurations of QtNetwork use OpenSSL at run-time. Deployment of OpenSSL libraries is subject to both licensing and export restrictions. More information can be found in the \l{Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) Classes} documentation. \row \li \l{QtWebKit} \li WebKit \li WebKit is licensed under the GNU LGPL version 2 or later. This has implications for developers of closed source applications. Please see \l{WebKit in Qt#License Information}{the QtWebKit module documentation} for more information. \endtable \section1 Platform-Specific Notes The procedure of deploying Qt applications is different for the various platforms: \list \li \l{Deploying an Application on X11 Platforms}{Qt for X11 Platforms} \li \l{Deploying an Application on Windows}{Qt for Windows} \li \l{Deploying an Application on Mac OS X}{Qt for Mac OS X} \endlist \sa Installation, {Platform-Specific Documentation} */ /*! \page deployment-x11.html \contentspage Deploying Qt Applications \title Deploying an Application on X11 Platforms Due to the proliferation of Unix systems (commercial Unices, Linux distributions, etc.), deployment on Unix is a complex topic. Before we start, be aware that programs compiled for one Unix flavor will probably not run on a different Unix system. For example, unless you use a cross-compiler, you cannot compile your application on Irix and distribute it on AIX. Contents: \tableofcontents This documentation will describe how to determine which files you should include in your distribution, and how to make sure that the application will find them at run-time. We will demonstrate the procedures in terms of deploying the \l {tools/plugandpaint}{Plug & Paint} application that is provided in Qt's examples directory. \section1 Static Linking Static linking is often the safest and easiest way to distribute an application on Unix since it relieves you from the task of distributing the Qt libraries and ensuring that they are located in the default search path for libraries on the target system. \section2 Building Qt Statically To use this approach, you must start by installing a static version of the Qt library: \snippet doc/src/snippets/code/doc_src_deployment.qdoc 0 We specify the prefix so that we do not overwrite the existing Qt installation. The example above only builds the Qt libraries, i.e. the examples and Qt Designer will not be built. When \c make is done, you will find the Qt libraries in the \c /path/to/Qt/lib directory. When linking your application against static Qt libraries, note that you might need to add more libraries to the \c LIBS line in your project file. For more information, see the \l {Application Dependencies} section. \section2 Linking the Application to the Static Version of Qt Once Qt is built statically, the next step is to regenerate the makefile and rebuild the application. First, we must go into the directory that contains the application: \snippet doc/src/snippets/code/doc_src_deployment.qdoc 1 Now run qmake to create a new makefile for the application, and do a clean build to create the statically linked executable: \snippet doc/src/snippets/code/doc_src_deployment.qdoc 2 You probably want to link against the release libraries, and you can specify this when invoking \c qmake. Note that we must set the path to the static Qt that we just built. To check that the application really links statically with Qt, run the \c ldd tool (available on most Unices): \snippet doc/src/snippets/code/doc_src_deployment.qdoc 3 Verify that the Qt libraries are not mentioned in the output. Now, provided that everything compiled and linked without any errors, we should have a \c plugandpaint file that is ready for deployment. One easy way to check that the application really can be run stand-alone is to copy it to a machine that doesn't have Qt or any Qt applications installed, and run it on that machine. Remember that if your application depends on compiler specific libraries, these must still be redistributed along with your application. For more information, see the \l {Application Dependencies} section. The \l {tools/plugandpaint}{Plug & Paint} example consists of several components: The core application (\l {tools/plugandpaint}{Plug & Paint}), and the \l {tools/plugandpaintplugins/basictools}{Basic Tools} and \l {tools/plugandpaintplugins/extrafilters}{Extra Filters} plugins. Since we cannot deploy plugins using the static linking approach, the executable we have prepared so far is incomplete. The application will run, but the functionality will be disabled due to the missing plugins. To deploy plugin-based applications we should use the shared library approach. \section1 Shared Libraries We have two challenges when deploying the \l {tools/plugandpaint}{Plug & Paint} application using the shared libraries approach: The Qt runtime has to be correctly redistributed along with the application executable, and the plugins have to be installed in the correct location on the target system so that the application can find them. \section2 Building Qt as a Shared Library We assume that you already have installed Qt as a shared library, which is the default when installing Qt, in the \c /path/to/Qt directory. For more information on how to build Qt, see the \l {Installation} documentation. \section2 Linking the Application to Qt as a Shared Library After ensuring that Qt is built as a shared library, we can build the \l {tools/plugandpaint}{Plug & Paint} application. First, we must go into the directory that contains the application: \snippet doc/src/snippets/code/doc_src_deployment.qdoc 4 Now run qmake to create a new makefile for the application, and do a clean build to create the dynamically linked executable: \snippet doc/src/snippets/code/doc_src_deployment.qdoc 5 This builds the core application, the following will build the plugins: \snippet doc/src/snippets/code/doc_src_deployment.qdoc 6 If everything compiled and linked without any errors, we will get a \c plugandpaint executable and the \c libpnp_basictools.so and \c libpnp_extrafilters.so plugin files. \section2 Creating the Application Package There is no standard package management on Unix, so the method we present below is a generic solution. See the documentation for your target system for information on how to create a package. To deploy the application, we must make sure that we copy the relevant Qt libraries (corresponding to the Qt modules used in the application) as well as the executable to the same directory. Remember that if your application depends on compiler specific libraries, these must also be redistributed along with your application. For more information, see the \l {Application Dependencies} section. We'll cover the plugins shortly, but the main issue with shared libraries is that you must ensure that the dynamic linker will find the Qt libraries. Unless told otherwise, the dynamic linker doesn't search the directory where your application resides. There are many ways to solve this: \list \li You can install the Qt libraries in one of the system library paths (e.g. \c /usr/lib on most systems). \li You can pass a predetermined path to the \c -rpath command-line option when linking the application. This will tell the dynamic linker to look in this directory when starting your application. \li You can write a startup script for your application, where you modify the dynamic linker configuration (e.g., adding your application's directory to the \c LD_LIBRARY_PATH environment variable. \note If your application will be running with "Set user ID on execution," and if it will be owned by root, then LD_LIBRARY_PATH will be ignored on some platforms. In this case, use of the LD_LIBRARY_PATH approach is not an option). \endlist The disadvantage of the first approach is that the user must have super user privileges. The disadvantage of the second approach is that the user may not have privileges to install into the predetermined path. In either case, the users don't have the option of installing to their home directory. We recommend using the third approach since it is the most flexible. For example, a \c plugandpaint.sh script will look like this: \snippet doc/src/snippets/code/doc_src_deployment.qdoc 7 By running this script instead of the executable, you are sure that the Qt libraries will be found by the dynamic linker. Note that you only have to rename the script to use it with other applications. When looking for plugins, the application searches in a plugins subdirectory inside the directory of the application executable. Either you have to manually copy the plugins into the \c plugins directory, or you can set the \c DESTDIR in the plugins' project files: \snippet doc/src/snippets/code/doc_src_deployment.pro 8 An archive distributing all the Qt libraries, and all the plugins, required to run the \l {tools/plugandpaint}{Plug & Paint} application, would have to include the following files: \table 100% \header \li Component \li {2, 1} File Name \row \li The executable \li {2, 1} \c plugandpaint \row \li The script to run the executable \li {2, 1} \c plugandpaint.sh \row \li The Basic Tools plugin \li {2, 1} \c plugins\libpnp_basictools.so \row \li The ExtraFilters plugin \li {2, 1} \c plugins\libpnp_extrafilters.so \row \li The Qt xcb platform plugin \li {2, 1} \c platforms\libqxcb.so \row \li The Qt Core module \li {2, 1} \c libQt5Core.so.5 \row \li The Qt GUI module \li {2, 1} \c libQt5Gui.so.5 \row \li The Qt Widgets module \li {2, 1} \c libQt5Widgets.so.5 \endtable On most systems, the extension for shared libraries is \c .so. A notable exception is HP-UX, which uses \c .sl. Remember that if your application depends on compiler specific libraries, these must still be redistributed along with your application. For more information, see the \l {Application Dependencies} section. To verify that the application now can be successfully deployed, you can extract this archive on a machine without Qt and without any compiler installed, and try to run it, i.e. run the \c plugandpaint.sh script. An alternative to putting the plugins in the \c plugins subdirectory is to add a custom search path when you start your application using QApplication::addLibraryPath() or QApplication::setLibraryPaths(). \snippet doc/src/snippets/code/doc_src_deployment.cpp 9 \section1 Application Dependencies \section2 Additional Libraries To find out which libraries your application depends on, run the \c ldd tool (available on most Unices): \snippet doc/src/snippets/code/doc_src_deployment.qdoc 10 This will list all the shared library dependencies for your application. Depending on configuration, these libraries must be redistributed along with your application. In particular, the standard C++ library must be redistributed if you're compiling your application with a compiler that is binary incompatible with the system compiler. When possible, the safest solution is to link against these libraries statically. You will probably want to link dynamically with the regular X11 libraries, since some implementations will try to open other shared libraries with \c dlopen(), and if this fails, the X11 library might cause your application to crash. It's also worth mentioning that Qt will look for certain X11 extensions, such as Xinerama and Xrandr, and possibly pull them in, including all the libraries that they link against. If you can't guarantee the presence of a certain extension, the safest approach is to disable it when configuring Qt (e.g. \c {./configure -no-xrandr}). FontConfig and FreeType are other examples of libraries that aren't always available or that aren't always binary compatible. As strange as it may sound, some software vendors have had success by compiling their software on very old machines and have been very careful not to upgrade any of the software running on them. When linking your application against the static Qt libraries, you must explicitly link with the dependent libraries mentioned above. Do this by adding them to the \c LIBS variable in your project file. \section2 Qt Plugins Your application may also depend on one or more Qt plugins, such as the JPEG image format plugin or a SQL driver plugin. Be sure to distribute any Qt plugins that you need with your application, and note that each type of plugin should be located within a specific subdirectory (such as \c imageformats or \c sqldrivers) within your distribution directory, as described below. \note If you are deploying an application that uses QtWebKit to display HTML pages from the World Wide Web, you should include all text codec plugins to support as many HTML encodings possible. The search path for Qt plugins (as well as a few other paths) is hard-coded into the QtCore library. By default, the first plugin search path will be hard-coded as \c /path/to/Qt/plugins. As mentioned above, using predetermined paths has certain disadvantages, so you need to examine various alternatives to make sure that the Qt plugins are found: \list \li \l{qt-conf.html}{Using \c qt.conf}. This is the recommended approach since it provides the most flexibility. \li Using QApplication::addLibraryPath() or QApplication::setLibraryPaths(). \li Using a third party installation utility or the target system's package manager to change the hard-coded paths in the QtCore library. \endlist The \l{How to Create Qt Plugins} document outlines the issues you need to pay attention to when building and deploying plugins for Qt applications. */ /*! \page deployment-windows.html \contentspage Deploying Qt Applications \title Deploying an Application on Windows This documentation will describe how to determine which files you should include in your distribution, and how to make sure that the application will find them at run-time. We will demonstrate the procedures in terms of deploying the \l {tools/plugandpaint}{Plug & Paint} application that is provided in Qt's examples directory. Contents: \tableofcontents \section1 Static Linking If you want to keep things simple by only having a few files to deploy, i.e. a stand-alone executable with the associated compiler specific DLLs, then you must build everything statically. \section2 Building Qt Statically Before we can build our application we must make sure that Qt is built statically. To do this, go to a command prompt and type the following: \snippet doc/src/snippets/code/doc_src_deployment.qdoc 11 Remember to specify any other options you need, such as data base drivers, as arguments to \c configure. Once \c configure has finished, type the following: \snippet doc/src/snippets/code/doc_src_deployment.qdoc 12 This will build Qt statically. Note that we have used \c nmake in all the examples, but \c mingw32-make should be used for MinGW. \note If you later need to reconfigure and rebuild Qt from the same location, ensure that all traces of the previous configuration are removed by entering the build directory and typing \c{nmake distclean} before running \c configure again. \section2 Linking the Application to the Static Version of Qt Once Qt has finished building we can build the \l {tools/plugandpaint}{Plug & Paint} application. First we must go into the directory that contains the application: \snippet doc/src/snippets/code/doc_src_deployment.qdoc 13 We must then run \c qmake to create a new makefile for the application, and do a clean build to create the statically linked executable: \snippet doc/src/snippets/code/doc_src_deployment.qdoc 14 You probably want to link against the release libraries, and you can specify this when invoking \c qmake. Now, provided that everything compiled and linked without any errors, we should have a \c plugandpaint.exe file that is ready for deployment. One easy way to check that the application really can be run stand-alone is to copy it to a machine that doesn't have Qt or any Qt applications installed, and run it on that machine. Remember that if your application depends on compiler specific libraries, these must still be redistributed along with your application. You can check which libraries your application is linking against by using the \c depends tool. For more information, see the \l {Application Dependencies} section. The \l {tools/plugandpaint}{Plug & Paint} example consists of several components: The application itself (\l {tools/plugandpaint}{Plug & Paint}), and the \l {tools/plugandpaintplugins/basictools}{Basic Tools} and \l {tools/plugandpaintplugins/extrafilters}{Extra Filters} plugins. Since we cannot deploy plugins using the static linking approach, the application we have prepared is incomplete. It will run, but the functionality will be disabled due to the missing plugins. To deploy plugin-based applications we should use the shared library approach. \section1 Shared Libraries We have two challenges when deploying the \l {tools/plugandpaint}{Plug & Paint} application using the shared libraries approach: The Qt runtime has to be correctly redistributed along with the application executable, and the plugins have to be installed in the correct location on the target system so that the application can find them. \section2 Building Qt as a Shared Library We assume that you already have installed Qt as a shared library, which is the default when installing Qt, in the \c C:\path\to\Qt directory. For more information on how to build Qt, see the \l {Installation} documentation. \section2 Linking the Application to Qt as a Shared Library After ensuring that Qt is built as a shared library, we can build the \l {tools/plugandpaint}{Plug & Paint} application. First, we must go into the directory that contains the application: \snippet doc/src/snippets/code/doc_src_deployment.qdoc 15 Now run \c qmake to create a new makefile for the application, and do a clean build to create the dynamically linked executable: \snippet doc/src/snippets/code/doc_src_deployment.qdoc 16 This builds the core application, the following will build the plugins: \snippet doc/src/snippets/code/doc_src_deployment.qdoc 17 If everything compiled and linked without any errors, we will get a \c plugandpaint.exe executable and the \c pnp_basictools.dll and \c pnp_extrafilters.dll plugin files. \section2 Creating the Application Package To deploy the application, we must make sure that we copy the relevant Qt DLL (corresponding to the Qt modules used in the application) and the windows platform plugin as well as the executable to the same directory in the \c release subdirectory. In contrast to user plugins, Qt plugins have to be put into subdirectories matching the plugin type. As we want to deploy the windows platform plugin it has to be put into a "platforms" subdirectory. Additional information about user and Qt plugins will be covered later. Qt relies on the \l{ICU} library for unicode support. Therefore, you must include the ICU DLLs that are located in the \c bin directory of your Qt installation if Qt was configured to use ICU. The Qt version bundled in the Qt5 package uses ICU, so deployment is needed there. The ICU DLLs are version dependent and have to match the ones your Qt version was linked against. If you are using \l{ANGLE} (the default) then you additionally need to include both libEGL.dll and libGLESv2.dll from Qt's 'lib' directory as well as the HLSL compiler from DirectX. The HLSL compiler library is called d3dcompiler_XX.dll where XX is the version number that ANGLE (libGLESv2) was linked against. Remember that if your application depends on compiler specific libraries, these must be redistributed along with your application. You can check which libraries your application is linking against by using the \c depends tool. For more information, see the \l {Application Dependencies} section. We'll cover the plugins shortly, but first we'll check that the application will work in a deployed environment: Either copy the executable and the Qt DLLs to a machine that doesn't have Qt or any Qt applications installed, or if you want to test on the build machine, ensure that the machine doesn't have Qt in its environment. If the application starts without any problems, then we have successfully made a dynamically linked version of the \l {tools/plugandpaint}{Plug & Paint} application. But the application's functionality will still be missing since we have not yet deployed the associated plugins. Plugins work differently to normal DLLs, so we can't just copy them into the same directory as our application's executable as we did with the Qt DLLs. When looking for plugins, the application searches in a \c plugins subdirectory inside the directory of the application executable. So to make the plugins available to our application, we have to create the \c plugins subdirectory and copy over the relevant DLLs: \snippet doc/src/snippets/code/doc_src_deployment.qdoc 18 An archive distributing all the Qt DLLs and application specific plugins required to run the \l {tools/plugandpaint}{Plug & Paint} application, would have to include the following files: \table 100% \header \li Component \li {2, 1} File Name \row \li The executable \li {2, 1} \c plugandpaint.exe \row \li The Basic Tools plugin \li {2, 1} \c plugins\pnp_basictools.dll \row \li The ExtraFilters plugin \li {2, 1} \c plugins\pnp_extrafilters.dll \row \li The Qt Windows platform plugin \li {2, 1} \c platforms\qwindows.dll \row \li The Qt Core module \li {2, 1} \c Qt5Core.dll \row \li The Qt GUI module \li {2, 1} \c Qt5Gui.dll \row \li The Qt Widgets module \li {2, 1} \c Qt5Widgets.dll \endtable In addition, the archive must contain the following compiler specific libraries depending on your version of Visual Studio: \table 100% \header \li \li VC++ 8.0 (2005) \li VC++ 9.0 (2008) \li VC++ 10.0 (2010) \row \li The C run-time \li \c msvcr80.dll \li \c msvcr90.dll \li \c msvcr100.dll \row \li The C++ run-time \li \c msvcp80.dll \li \c msvcp90.dll \li \c msvcp100.dll \endtable If ICU was used, the archive must contain: \table 100% \header \li{3,1} File Name \row \li icudtXX.dll \li icuinXX.dll \li icuucXX.dll \endtable Finally, if ANGLE was used, then the archive must additionally contain: \table 100% \header \li{3,1} File Name \row \li libEGL.dll \li libGLESv2.dll \li d3dcompiler_XX.dll \endtable To verify that the application now can be successfully deployed, you can extract this archive on a machine without Qt and without any compiler installed, and try to run it. An alternative to putting the plugins in the plugins subdirectory is to add a custom search path when you start your application using QApplication::addLibraryPath() or QApplication::setLibraryPaths(). \snippet doc/src/snippets/code/doc_src_deployment.cpp 19 One benefit of using plugins is that they can easily be made available to a whole family of applications. It's often most convenient to add the path in the application's \c main() function, right after the QApplication object is created. Once the path is added, the application will search it for plugins, in addition to looking in the \c plugins subdirectory in the application's own directory. Any number of additional paths can be added. \section2 Manifest files When deploying an application compiled with Visual Studio 2005 onwards, there are some additional steps to be taken. First, we need to copy the manifest file created when linking the application. This manifest file contains information about the application's dependencies on side-by-side assemblies, such as the runtime libraries. The manifest file needs to be copied into the \b same folder as the application executable. You do not need to copy the manifest files for shared libraries (DLLs), since they are not used. If the shared library has dependencies that are different from the application using it, the manifest file needs to be embedded into the DLL binary. Since Qt 4.1.3, the follwoing \c CONFIG options are available for embedding manifests: \snippet doc/src/snippets/code/doc_src_deployment.qdoc 20 To use the options, add \snippet doc/src/snippets/code/doc_src_deployment.pro 21 to your .pro file. The \c embed_manifest_dll option is enabled by default. The \c embed_manifest_exe option is NOT enabled by default. You can find more information about manifest files and side-by-side assemblies at the \l {http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa376307.aspx}{MSDN website}. The correct way to include the runtime libraries with your application is to ensure that they are installed on the end-user's system. To install the runtime libraries on the end-user's system, you need to include the appropriate Visual C++ Redistributable Package (VCRedist) executable with your application and ensure that it is executed when the user installs your application. For example, on an 32-bit x86-based system, you would include the \l{http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=32BC1BEE-A3F9-4C13-9C99-220B62A191EE}{vcredist_x86.exe} executable. The \l{http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?familyid=526BF4A7-44E6-4A91-B328-A4594ADB70E5}{vcredist_IA64.exe} and \l{http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?familyid=90548130-4468-4BBC-9673-D6ACABD5D13B}{vcredist_x64.exe} executables provide the appropriate libraries for the IA64 and 64-bit x86 architectures, respectively. \note The application you ship must be compiled with exactly the same compiler version against the same C runtime version. This prevents deploying errors caused by different versions of the C runtime libraries. \section2 Manual installations with Visual Studio 2008 and 2010 As well as the above details for VS 2005 and onwards, Visual Studio 2008/2010 applications may have problems when deploying manually, say to a USB stick. The recommended procedure is to configure Qt with the \c -plugin-manifests option using the 'configure' tool. Then follow the \l {http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms235291(VS.80).aspx}{guidelines} for manually deploying private assemblies. In brief the steps are \list 1 \li create a folder structure on the development computer that will match the target USB stick directory structure, for example '\\app' and for your dlls, '\\app\\lib'. \li on the development computer, from the appropriate 'redist' folder copy over Microsoft.VC80.CRT and Microsoft.VC80.MFC to the directories '\\app' and '\\app\\lib' on the development PC. \li xcopy the \\app folder to the target USB stick. \endlist Your application should now run. Also be aware that even with a service pack installed the Windows DLLs that are linked to will be the defaults. See the information on \l {http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc664727.aspx}{how to select the appropriate target DLLs}. \section1 Application Dependencies \section2 Additional Libraries Depending on configuration, compiler specific libraries must be redistributed along with your application. For example, if Qt is built using \l{ANGLE}, its shared libraries and the required shared libraries of the \l{Direct X SDK} need to be shipped as well. You can check which libraries your application is linking against by using the \l{Dependency Walker} tool. All you need to do is to run it like this: \snippet doc/src/snippets/code/doc_src_deployment.qdoc 24 This will provide a list of the libraries that your application depends on and other information. \image deployment-windows-depends.png When looking at the release build of the Plug & Paint executable (\c plugandpaint.exe) with the \c depends tool, the tool lists the following immediate dependencies to non-system libraries: \table 100% \header \li Qt \li VC++ 8.0 (2005) \li VC++ 9.0 (2008) \li VC++ 10.0 (2010) \li MinGW \row \li \list \li QT5CORE.DLL - The QtCore runtime \li QT5GUI.DLL - The QtGui runtime \li QT5WIDGETS.DLL - The QtWidgets runtime \endlist \li \list \li MSVCR80.DLL - The C runtime \li MSVCP80.DLL - The C++ runtime \endlist \li \list \li MSVCR90.DLL - The C runtime \li MSVCP90.DLL - The C++ runtime \endlist \li \list \li MSVCR100.DLL - The C runtime \li MSVCP100.DLL - The C++ runtime \endlist \li \list \li MINGWM10.DLL - The MinGW run-time \li LIBGCC_S_DW2-1.DLL \li LIBSTDC++-6.dll \endlist \endtable When looking at the plugin DLLs the exact same dependencies are listed. \section2 Qt Plugins Your application may also depend on one or more Qt plugins, such as the print support plugin, the JPEG image format plugin or a SQL driver plugin. Be sure to distribute any Qt plugins that you need with your application, and note that each type of plugin should be located within a specific subdirectory (such as \c printsupport, \c imageformats or \c sqldrivers) within your distribution directory, as described below. \note If you are deploying an application that uses QtWebKit to display HTML pages from the World Wide Web, you should include all text codec plugins to support as many HTML encodings possible. The search path for Qt plugins is hard-coded into the QtCore library. By default, the plugins subdirectory of the Qt installation is the first plugin search path. However, pre-determined paths like the default one have certain disadvantages. For example, they may not exist on the target machine. For that reason, you need to examine various alternatives to make sure that the Qt plugins are found: \list \li \l{qt-conf.html}{Using \c qt.conf}. This approach is the recommended if you have executables in different places sharing the same plugins. \li Using QApplication::addLibraryPath() or QApplication::setLibraryPaths(). This approach is recommended if you only have one executable that will use the plugin. \li Using a third party installation utility to change the hard-coded paths in the QtCore library. \endlist If you add a custom path using QApplication::addLibraryPath it could look like this: \snippet doc/src/snippets/code/doc_src_deployment.qdoc 54 Then qApp->libraryPaths() would return something like this: "C:/customPath/plugins" "C:/Qt/%VERSION%/plugins" "E:/myApplication/directory/" The executable will look for the plugins in these directories and the same order as the QStringList returned by qApp->libraryPaths(). The newly added path is prepended to the qApp->libraryPaths() which means that it will be searched through first. However, if you use qApp->setLibraryPaths(), you will be able to determine which paths and in which order they will be searched. The \l{How to Create Qt Plugins} document outlines the issues you need to pay attention to when building and deploying plugins for Qt applications. \section1 Related Third Party Resources \list \li \l{http://silmor.de/29}{Cross compiling Qt/Win Apps on Linux} covers the process of cross-compiling Windows applications on Linux. \li \l{http://divided-mind.blogspot.com/2007/09/cross-compiling-qt4win-on-linux.html} {Cross-compiling Qt4/Win on Linux} provides another Linux-to-Windows cross-compilation guide. \endlist */ /*! \page deployment-mac.html \contentspage Deploying Qt Applications \title Deploying an Application on Mac OS X Beginning with Qt 4.5, a \l {macdeploy}{deployment tool} is included that automates the procedures described here. This document describes how to create a bundle and make sure that the application finds the resources it needs at run-time. We demonstrate the procedures in terms of deploying the \l {tools/plugandpaint}{Plug & Paint} example application that comes with the Qt installation package. \tableofcontents \section1 The Bundle On Mac, a GUI application must be built and run from a bundle, which is a directory structure that appears as a single entity when viewed in the Finder. A bundle for an application typically contains the executable and all the resources it needs. Here is the snapshot of an application bundle structure: \image deployment-mac-bundlestructure.png The bundle provides many advantages to the user: \list \li It is easily installable as it is identified as a single entity. \li Information about a bundle is accessible from code. \endlist This is specific to Mac OS X and beyond the scope of this document. For more information about bundles, see \l {http://developer.apple.com/documentation/CoreFoundation/Conceptual/CFBundles/index.html}{Apple's Developer Website}. Add the following statement to your application's project file (\c{.pro}): \snippet doc/src/snippets/code/doc_src_deployment.pro 26 This tells \c qmake not to put the executable inside a bundle. \section1 Static Linking If you want to keep things simple and have a few files to deploy, you must build your application with statically linked libraries. \section2 Building Qt Statically Start by installing a static version of the Qt library. Remember that you cannot use plugins and that you must build the dependent libraries such as image formats, SQL drivers, and so on with static linking. \snippet doc/src/snippets/code/doc_src_deployment.qdoc 27 You can check the various options that are available by running \c configure -help. \section2 Linking the Application to the Static Version of Qt Once Qt is built statically, the next step is to regenerate the makefile and rebuild the application. First, we must go into the directory that contains the application: \snippet doc/src/snippets/code/doc_src_deployment.qdoc 28 Now run \c qmake to create a new makefile for the application, and do a clean build to create the statically linked executable: \snippet doc/src/snippets/code/doc_src_deployment.qdoc 29 You probably want to link against the release libraries, and you can specify this when invoking \c qmake. If you have Xcode Tools 1.5 or higher installed, you may want to take advantage of "dead code stripping" to reduce the size of your binary even more. You can do this by passing \c {LIBS+= -dead_strip} to \c qmake in addition to the \c {-config release} parameter. Now, provided that everything compiled and linked without any errors, we should have a \c plugandpaint.app bundle ready for deployment. Try installing the bundle on a Mac OS x machine that does not have Qt or any Qt applications installed. You can check what other libraries your application links to using the \c otool: \snippet doc/src/snippets/code/doc_src_deployment.qdoc 30 Here is what the output looks like for the statically linked \l {tools/plugandpaint}{Plug & Paint}: \snippet doc/src/snippets/code/doc_src_deployment.qdoc 31 If you see \e Qt libraries in the output, it probably means that you have both dynamic and static Qt libraries installed on your machine. The linker always chooses dynamic linking over static. If you want to use only static libraries, you can either: \list \li move your Qt dynamic libraries (\c .dylibs) away to another directory while you link the application and then move them back, \li or edit the \c Makefile and replace link lines for the Qt libraries with the absolute path to the static libraries. \endlist For example, replace the following: \snippet doc/src/snippets/code/doc_src_deployment.qdoc 32 with this: \snippet doc/src/snippets/code/doc_src_deployment.qdoc 33 The \l {tools/plugandpaint}{Plug & Paint} example consists of several components: The core application (\l {tools/plugandpaint}{Plug & Paint}), and the \l {tools/plugandpaintplugins/basictools}{Basic Tools} and \l {tools/plugandpaintplugins/extrafilters}{Extra Filters} plugins. As we cannot deploy plugins using the static linking approach, the bundle we have prepared so far is incomplete. The application will run, but the functionality will be disabled due to the missing plugins. To deploy plugin-based applications we should use the framework approach, which is specific to Mac OS x. \section1 Frameworks In this approach, ensure that the Qt runtime is redistributed correctly with the application bundle, and that the plugins are installed in the correct location so that the application finds them. There are two ways to distribute Qt with your application in the frameworks approach: \list \li Private framework within your application bundle. \li Standard framework (alternatively use the Qt frameworks in the installed binary). \endlist The former is good if you have Qt built in a special way, or want to make sure the framework is there. It just comes down to where you place the Qt frameworks. The latter option is good if you have many Qt applications and you want them use a single Qt framework rather than multiple versions of it. \section2 Building Qt as Frameworks We assume that you already have installed Qt as frameworks, which is the default when installing Qt, in the /path/to/Qt directory. For more information on how to build Qt, see the \l Installation documentation. When installing, the identification name of the frameworks is set. This name is used by the dynamic linker (\c dyld) to find the libraries for your application. \section2 Linking the Application to Qt as Frameworks After building Qt as frameworks, we can build the \l {tools/plugandpaint}{Plug & Paint} application. First, we must go to the directory that contains the application: \snippet doc/src/snippets/code/doc_src_deployment.qdoc 34 Run \c qmake to create a new makefile for the application, and do a clean build to create the dynamically linked executable: \snippet doc/src/snippets/code/doc_src_deployment.qdoc 35 This builds the core application. Use the following to build the plugins: \snippet doc/src/snippets/code/doc_src_deployment.qdoc 36 Now run the \c otool for the Qt frameworks, for example Qt Gui: \snippet doc/src/snippets/code/doc_src_deployment.qdoc 37 You would get the following output: \snippet doc/src/snippets/code/doc_src_deployment.qdoc 38 For the Qt frameworks, the first line (i.e. \c {path/to/Qt/lib/QtGui.framework/Versions/4/QtGui (compatibility version 4.0.0, current version 4.0.1)}) becomes the framework's identification name which is used by the dynamic linker (\c dyld). But when you are deploying the application, your users may not have the Qt frameworks installed in the specified location. For that reason, you must either provide the frameworks in an agreed location, or store the frameworks in the bundle. Regardless of which solution you choose, you must make sure that the frameworks return the proper identification name for themselves, and that the application looks for these names. Luckily we can control this with the \c install_name_tool command-line tool. The \c install_name_tool works in two modes, \c -id and \c -change. The \c -id mode is for libraries and frameworks, and allows us to specify a new identification name. We use the \c -change mode to change the paths in the application. Let's test this out by copying the Qt frameworks into the Plug & Paint bundle. Looking at \c otool's output for the bundle, we can see that we must copy both the QtCore and QtGui frameworks into the bundle. We will assume that we are in the directory where we built the bundle. \snippet doc/src/snippets/code/doc_src_deployment.qdoc 39 First we create a \c Frameworks directory inside the bundle. This follows the Mac OS X application convention. We then copy the frameworks into the new directory. As frameworks contain symbolic links, we use the \c -R option. \snippet doc/src/snippets/code/doc_src_deployment.qdoc 40 Then we run \c install_name_tool to set the identification names for the frameworks. The first argument after \c -id is the new name, and the second argument is the framework that we want to rename. The text \c @executable_path is a special \c dyld variable telling \c dyld to start looking where the executable is located. The new names specifies that these frameworks are located in the directory directly under the \c Frameworks directory. \snippet doc/src/snippets/code/doc_src_deployment.qdoc 41 Now, the dynamic linker knows where to look for QtCore and QtGui. We must ensure that the application also knows where to find the library, using \c install_name_tool's \c -change mode. This basically comes down to string replacement, to match the identification names that we set earlier to the frameworks. Finally, the QtGui framework depends on QtCore, so we must remember to change the reference for QtGui: \snippet doc/src/snippets/code/doc_src_deployment.qdoc 42 After this, we run \c otool again and see that the application can find the libraries. The plugins for the \l {tools/plugandpaint}{Plug & Paint} example makes it interesting. The basic steps we need to follow with plugins are: \list \li put the plugins inside the bundle, \li run the \c install_name_tool to check whether the plugins are using the correct library, \li and ensure that the application knows where to look for the plugins. \endlist We can put the plugins anywhere we want in the bundle, but the best location is to put them under Contents/Plugins. When we built the Plug & Paint plugins, based on the \c DESTDIR variable in their \c .pro file, the plugins' \c .dylib files are in the \c plugins subdirectory under the \c plugandpaint directory. We just have to move this director. \snippet doc/src/snippets/code/doc_src_deployment.qdoc 43 For example, If we run \c otool on the \l {tools/plugandpaintplugins/basictools}{Basic Tools} plugin's \c .dylib file, we get the following information. \snippet doc/src/snippets/code/doc_src_deployment.qdoc 44 Then we can see that the plugin links to the Qt frameworks it was built against. As we want the plugins to use the framework in the application bundle, we change them the same way as we did for the application. For example for the Basic Tools plugin: \snippet doc/src/snippets/code/doc_src_deployment.qdoc 45 We must also modify the code in \c tools/plugandpaint/mainwindow.cpp to \l {QDir::cdUp()}{cdUp()} to ensure that the application finds the plugins. Add the following code to the \c mainwindow.cpp file: \snippet doc/src/snippets/code/doc_src_deployment.qdoc 46 \table \row \li \inlineimage deployment-mac-application.png \li The additional code in \c tools/plugandpaint/mainwindow.cpp also enables us to view the plugins in the Finder, as shown in the image. We can also add plugins extending Qt, for example adding SQL drivers or image formats. We just need to follow the directory structure outlined in plugin documentation, and make sure they are included in the QCoreApplication::libraryPaths(). Let's quickly do this with the image formats, following the procedure outlined earlier. Copy Qt's image format plugins into the bundle: \snippet doc/src/snippets/code/doc_src_deployment.qdoc 47 Use \c install_name_tool to link the plugins to the frameworks in the bundle: \snippet doc/src/snippets/code/doc_src_deployment.qdoc 48 Update the source code in \c tools/plugandpaint/main.cpp to look for the new plugins. After constructing the QApplication, we add the following code: \snippet doc/src/snippets/code/doc_src_deployment.cpp 49 First, we tell the application to only look for plugins in this directory. In our case, we want the application to look for only those plugins that we distribute with the bundle. If we were part of a bigger Qt installation we could have used QCoreApplication::addLibraryPath() instead. \endtable \warning While deploying plugins, we make changes to the source code and that resets the default identification names when the application is rebuilt. So you must repeat the process of making your application link to the correct Qt frameworks in the bundle using \c install_name_tool. Now you should be able to move the application to another Mac OS X machine and run it without Qt installed. Alternatively, you can move your frameworks that live outside of the bundle to another directory and see if the application still runs. If you store the frameworks in another location outside the bundle, the technique of linking your application is similar; you must make sure that the application and the frameworks agree where to be looking for the Qt libraries as well as the plugins. \section2 Creating the Application Package When you are done linking your application to Qt, either statically or as frameworks, the application is ready to be distributed. For more information, refer to the \l {https://developer.apple.com/library/mac/#documentation/ToolsLanguages/Conceptual/OSXWorkflowGuide/Introduction/Introduction.html}{Tools Workflow Guide}. Although the process of deploying an application do have some pitfalls, once you know the various issues you can easily create packages that all your Mac OS X users will enjoy. \section1 Application Dependencies \section2 Qt Plugins Your application may also depend on one or more Qt plugins, such as the JPEG image format plugin or a SQL driver plugin. Be sure to distribute any Qt plugins that you need with your application, and note that each type of plugin must be located within a specific subdirectory (such as \c imageformats or \c sqldrivers) in your distribution directory, as described below. \note If you are deploying an application that uses QtWebKit to display HTML pages from the World Wide Web, you must include all text codec plugins to support as many HTML encodings possible. The search path for Qt plugins (as well as a few other paths) is hard-coded into the QtCore library. By default, the first plugin search path will be hard-coded as \c /path/to/Qt/plugins. But using pre-determined paths has certain disadvantages. For example, they may not exist on the target machine. So you must check various alternatives to ensure that the Qt plugins are found: \list \li \l{qt-conf.html}{Using \c qt.conf}. This is the recommended approach as it provides the most flexibility. \li Using QApplication::addLibraryPath() or QApplication::setLibraryPaths(). \li Using a third party installation utility to change the hard-coded paths in the QtCore library. \endlist The \l{How to Create Qt Plugins} document outlines the issues you need to pay attention to when building and deploying plugins for Qt applications. \section2 Additional Libraries You can check which libraries your application is linking against by using \c otool. Run this with the application path as an argument: \snippet doc/src/snippets/code/doc_src_deployment.qdoc 50 Unlike the deployment processes on \l {Deploying an Application on X11 Platforms}{X11} and \l {Deploying an Application on Windows}{Windows}, compiler-specific libraries rarely have to be redistributed with your application. But there are several ways to deploy applications, as Qt can be configured, built, and installed in several ways on Mac OS X. Typically your goals help determine how you are going to deploy the application. The last sections describe a few things that you must be aware of while deploying your application. \section2 Mac OS X Version Dependencies Qt 5 applications can be built and deployed on Mac OS X 10.6 (Snow Leopard) and higher. This is achieved using \e{weak linking}. In \e{weak linking}, Qt tests whether a function added in a newer version of Mac OS X is available on the computer it is running on. This allows Qt to use newer features when it runs on a newer version of OS X, while remaining compatible on the older versions. For more information about cross development issues on Mac OS X, see \l {https://developer.apple.com/library/mac/#documentation/DeveloperTools/Conceptual/cross_development/Introduction/Introduction.html}{Apple's Developer Website}. The linker is set to be compatible with all OS X versions, so you must change the \c MACOSX_DEPLOYMENT_TARGET environment variable to get \e{weak linking} to work for your application. You can add the following: \snippet doc/src/snippets/code/doc_src_deployment.pro 51 to your .pro file, and qmake will take care of this for you. For more information about C++ runtime environment, see \l {https://developer.apple.com/library/mac/#documentation/DeveloperTools/Conceptual/CppRuntimeEnv/CPPRuntimeEnv.html}{Apple's Developer Website} \section1 The Mac Deployment Tool \target macdeploy The Mac deployment tool can be found in QTDIR/bin/macdeployqt. It is designed to automate the process of creating a deployable application bundle that contains the Qt libraries as private frameworks. The mac deployment tool also deploys the Qt plugins, according to the following rules: \list \li Debug versions of the plugins are not deployed. \li The designer plugins are not deployed. \li The Image format plugins are always deployed. \li SQL driver plugins are deployed if the application uses the QtSql module. \li Script plugins are deployed if the application uses the QtScript module. \li The svg icon plugin is deployed if the application uses the QtSvg module. \li The accessibility plugin is always deployed. \endlist \note If you want a 3rd party library to be included in your application bundle, you must copy the library into the bundle manually, after the bundle is created. \c macdeployqt supports the following options: \list \li -no-plugins: Skip plugin deployment \li -dmg : Create a .dmg disk image \li -no-strip : Don't run 'strip' on the binaries \endlist */