path: root/doc/src/platforms/windows.qdoc

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/*!
    \page windows-support.html
    \title Qt for Windows
    \brief Platform support for Windows.
    \ingroup supportedplatform

    Qt's support for different Windows platforms is extensive and mature.
    Before you get started, ensure that your development environment fulfills
    the \l{Qt for Windows Requirements}{requirements}.

    The \e{Reference Configuration} section of the
    \l{Community Supported Platforms#Reference Configurations}{supported platforms}
    page contains a list of Windows versions and compilers tested to work with
    Qt.

    \section1 Downloading and Installing Qt

    There are two ways to install Qt:
    \list 1
    \li through the Qt Installers - downloads and installs Qt
    \li through the \e{Qt sources}.
    \endlist

    You can download the Qt 5 installers and sources from the \l Downloads page.
    For more information, visit the \l{Getting Started with Qt} page.

    \section2 Building Qt 5 from Source

    You can also build Qt 5 from the source package and configure it according
    to your target platform. The source packages are obtained from
    \l{http://www.qt.io/download/}.

    Below, you will find more information about building Qt from source.
    \list
        \li \l{Qt for Windows - Requirements}
        \li \l{Qt for Windows - Building from Source}
    \endlist

    \section1 Deployment and Other Issues

    The pages below covers specific issues and recommendations for creating
    Windows applications.

    \list
    \li \l{Qt for Windows - Deployment}
    \li \l{Qt for Windows - Specific Issues}
    \endlist

    \section1 Where to Go from Here

    We invite you to explore the rest of Qt. We prepared overviews which help
    you decide which APIs to use and our examples demonstrate how to use our
    API.

    \list
    \li \l{Qt Overviews} - list of topics about application development
    \li \l{Qt Examples and Tutorials}{Examples and Tutorials} - code samples and tutorials
    \li \l{Qt Reference Pages} - a listing of C++ and QML APIs
    \li \l{ActiveX in Qt}
    \endlist

    Qt's vibrant and active community site, \l{http://qt.io} houses
    a wiki, a forum, and additional learning guides and presentations.

    \section2 Visual Studio Add-in

    The \l {Qt Visual Studio Add-in} allows programmers to create, build, debug
    and run Qt applications from within non-Express versions of Microsoft Visual Studio
    2008, 2010, and 2012. The add-in contains project wizards, Qt project import/export
    support, integrated Qt resource manager and automated build setup for
    the Qt Meta-Object Compiler, User Interface Compiler, and Resource
    Compiler.

*/

/*!
    \page windows-requirements.html
    \title Qt for Windows - Requirements
    \brief Requirements of the Windows environment.

    This page describes the required libraries and environment for
    \l{Qt for Windows}.

    \section1 Libraries

    The following third-party libraries may be used when running Qt 5
    applications on Windows.

    \list
        \li \l{ICU}: Qt 5 can make use of the ICU library for enhanced UNICODE and Globalization
           support (see QTextCodec, QCollator::setNumericMode()).

           At compile time, the \e include and \e lib folders of the ICU installation must
           be appended to the \c INCLUDE and \c LIB environment variables. At run-time, the ICU DLLs
           need to be found by copying the DLLs to the
           application folder or by adding the \e bin folder of the ICU
           installation to the \c PATH environment variable.

        \li \l{ANGLE}: This library converts OpenGL ES 2.0 API calls to DirectX 11 or DirectX 9
           calls (depending on availability), removing the need to install graphics drivers on
           the target machines.
     \endlist

    Support for Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) communication is provided by the
    \l {OpenSSL Toolkit}, which must be obtained separately. See
    \l {Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) Classes} for instructions on building Qt with
    SSL support.

    \section2 ICU

    From Qt 5.3 and onwards, configure does not link Qt Core against ICU libraries
    anymore by default. This reduces the size of a self-contained
    application package considerably.

    Letting Qt Core utilize the ICU libraries however has following advantages:
    \list
      \li Behavior matches other platforms more closely.
      \li Extended set of text codecs (see \l QTextCodec).
      \li QLocale::toUpper(), QLocale::toLower() always use case conversion rules
      specific to the locale.
      \li QCollator::setNumericMode() does work consistently on all Windows versions.
    \endlist

    To explicitly enable the use of ICU in Qt Core, pass \c -icu to \c configure:

    \code
    configure -icu
    \endcode

    \section1 Graphics Drivers

    For \l{Qt Quick} 2 to work, a graphics driver that provides OpenGL 2.1 or
    higher is required. The default driver from Windows is OpenGL 1.1. Qt
    includes a version of the \l{ANGLE} project which is included from the
    Windows Qt installers. ANGLE implements the
    OpenGL ES 2.0 API on top of DirectX 11 or DirectX 9.
    ANGLE requires that the DirectX SDK is installed when building Qt.

    ANGLE chooses the render backend depending on availability. DirectX 11
    is usually preferable. However, some graphics cards may not fully
    support it. For these cases, the environment variable \c QT_ANGLE_PLATFORM
    (introduced in Qt 5.4) can be used to control the render backend. Possible
    values are \c d3d11, \c d3d9 and \c warp.

    To use a custom version of ANGLE, set the \c ANGLE_DIR environment variable
    to point to the ANGLE source tree before building Qt.

    If you installed additional OpenGL drivers from your hardware vendor, then
    you may want to consider using this version of OpenGL instead of ANGLE. To
    use OpenGL, pass the command line options \c{-opengl desktop} to the
    configure script.

    \code
    configure -opengl desktop
    \endcode

    To use an OpenGL ES 2.0 emulator instead of ANGLE, use the configure
    options: \c{-opengl es2 -no-angle}.

    \code
    configure -opengl es2 -no-angle
    \endcode

    \section2 Dynamically Loading Graphics Drivers

    In addition to the build time configuration, Qt supports choosing
    and loading the OpenGL implementation at runtime. To use this
    mode, pass \c{-opengl dynamic} to the configure script.

    \code
    configure -opengl dynamic
    \endcode

    \note As of Qt 5.5 this is the configuration used by the official, pre-built
    binary packages of Qt. It is strongly recommended to use it also in custom
    builds, especially for Qt binaries that are deployed alongside applications.

    \note Combining \c{-opengl dynamic} with \c{-static} is also possible, but
    be aware that ANGLE will not be statically linked into the applications in
    this case, it will still be built as a shared library.

    This configuration is the most flexible because no dependencies or
    assumptions are hardcoded about the OpenGL implementation during build
    time. It allows robust application deployment. When a given environment
    fails to provide a proper OpenGL 2.0 implementation, it will fall back
    automatically to ANGLE. This fallback will be completely transparent to the
    application, and will allow Qt Quick or other OpenGL code to function by
    translating to Direct3D. Such a fallback could, for example, take place on a
    Windows 7 PC with no additional graphics drivers installed. On other
    machines, where there is sufficient OpenGL support, the normal desktop
    OpenGL drivers will be used. Additionally, pure software-based OpenGL
    implementations may be available as additional fallbacks in the future,
    allowing running Qt Quick applications without a GPU.

    When configured with \c{-opengl dynamic}, neither Qt nor the applications
    built using \c qmake will link to the opengl32 (standard desktop OpenGL) or
    libGLESv2 (ANGLE) libraries. Instead, the appropriate library is chosen at
    runtime. By default, Qt will determine whether the system's opengl32.dll
    provides OpenGL 2 functions. If these are present, opengl32.dll is used,
    otherwise the ANGLE libraries will be used. In case the ANGLE libraries are
    missing or initialization fails for some reason, an additional fallback is
    attempted by trying to load \c{opengl32sw.dll}. See below for details.

    The loading mechanism can be configured through the \c{QT_OPENGL}
    environment variable and the following application attributes:

    \list
    \li \c Qt::AA_UseDesktopOpenGL Equivalent to setting \c{QT_OPENGL} to \c{desktop}.
    \li \c Qt::AA_UseOpenGLES Equivalent to setting \c{QT_OPENGL} to \c{angle}.
    \li \c Qt::AA_UseSoftwareOpenGL Equivalent to setting \c{QT_OPENGL} to \c{software}.
    \endlist

    When a certain configuration is requested explicitly, no checks are done at
    application startup, that is, the system-provided opengl32.dll will not be
    examined.

    The dynamic loading has a significant impact on applications that contain
    native OpenGL calls: they may fail to link since \c qmake no longer
    automatically adds opengl32.lib or libglesv2.lib. Instead, applications are
    expected to use the OpenGL functions via the QOpenGLFunctions class. Thus
    the direct dependency on the OpenGL library is removed and all calls will be
    routed during runtime to the implementation chosen by Qt.

    Applications that require a certain OpenGL implementation (for example,
    desktop OpenGL due to relying on features provided by OpenGL 3.0 or higher)
    should set the application attributes \c Qt::AA_UseOpenGLES or \c
    Qt::AA_UseDesktopOpenGL before instantiating QGuiApplication or
    QApplication. When these attributes are set, no other OpenGL implementations
    are considered. Additionally, if they wish to, such applications are free to
    make direct OpenGL function calls by adding opengl32.lib to their .pro
    project files: \e{LIBS += opengl32.lib} (Visual Studio) or \e{LIBS +=
    -lopengl32} (MinGW). The result is, from the application's perspective,
    equivalent to the \c{-opengl desktop} build configuration of Qt.

    \c Qt::AA_UseSoftwareOpenGL is special in the sense that it will try to load
    an OpenGL implementation with a non-standard name. The default name is
    \c{opengl32sw.dll}. This allows shipping a software-only OpenGL
    implementation, for example a build of
    \l{http://www.mesa3d.org/llvmpipe.html}{Mesa with llvmpipe}, under this
    name. If necessary, the filename can be overridden by setting the
    \c{QT_OPENGL_DLL} environment variable.

    It is possible to provide a JSON-format configuration file specifying which
    OpenGL implementation to use depending on the graphics card and driver version.
    The location is given by the environment variable \c{QT_OPENGL_BUGLIST}. Relative
    paths are resolved using \c {QLibraryInfo::SettingsPath} or
    \c {QStandardPaths::ConfigLocation}. The file utilizes the format of the
    driver bug list used in \l{The Chromium Projects}. It consists of a list of
    entries each of which specifies a set of conditions and a list of feature keywords.
    Typically, device id and vendor id are used to match a specific graphics card.
    They can be found in the output of the \c qtdiag or \c dxdiag tool.

    The following feature keywords are relevant for choosing the OpenGL implementation:

    \list
        \li \c disable_desktopgl - Disables OpenGL. This ensures that Qt does not attempt
        to use regular OpenGL (opengl32.dll), and that it starts with ANGLE right
        away. This is useful to prevent bad OpenGL drivers from crashing the application.

        \li \c disable_angle - Disables ANGLE. Ensures that Qt does not attempt to use
        ANGLE (and so Direct3D).

        \li \c disable_d3d11 - Disables the D3D11 rasterizer in ANGLE. Instead, the next
        D3D rendering option is tried first. The default order is: D3D11, D3D9, WARP,
        reference implementation.

        \li \c disable_d3d9 - Disables the D3D9 rasterizer in ANGLE

        \li \c disable_rotation - Forces the application to run in landscape orientation
        always. It applies to OpengGL only and has no effect when using ANGLE or Software
        OpenGL implementations. This is intended for drivers that have issues with rotation.
        This feature keyword was introduced in Qt 5.6.
    \endlist

    A sample file looks like:

    \badcode
    {
    "entries": [
    {
      "id": 1,
      "description": "Disable D3D11 on older nVidia drivers",
      "os": {
        "type": "win"
      },
      "vendor_id": "0x10de",
      "device_id": ["0x0DE9"],
      "driver_version": {
        "op": "<=",
        "value": "8.17.12.6973"
      },
      "features": [
        "disable_d3d11"
      ]
    },
    ...
    \endcode

    When \c{QT_OPENGL_BUGLIST} is not specified, a built-in list will be
    used. This typically includes some older, less-capable graphics cards with
    \c disable_desktopgl set, in order to prevent Qt from using their unstable
    desktop OpenGL implementations and instead fall back to ANGLE right away.

    In practice the most common combinations are expected to be the following:

    \list
        \li \c disable_desktopgl - In case the system provides OpenGL 2.0 or newer, but
        the driver is known to be unstable and prone to crash.

        \li \c disable_desktopgl, disable_angle - When no accelerated path is
        desired. This ensures that the only option Qt tries is the sofware rasterizer
        (opengl32sw.dll). Can be useful in virtual machines and applications that are
        deployed on a wide range of old systems.

        \li \c disable_d3d11, disable_d3d9 - When the accelerated D3D options are known to
        be unstable and WARP is desired (when available). Can be useful in virtual machines.
    \endlist

    The supported keys for matching a given card or driver are the following. Note that
    some of these are specific to Qt.

    \list
        \li \c os.type - Operating system: \c win, \c linux, \c macosx, \c android
        \li \c os.version - Kernel version
        \li \c os.release - Specifies a list of operating system releases on Windows:
        \c xp, \c vista, \c 7, \c 8, \c 8.1, \c 10.

        \li \c vendor_id - Vendor from the adapter identifier

        \li \c device_id - List of PCI device IDs.

        \li \c driver_version - Driver version from the adapter identifier

        \li \c driver_description - Matches when the value is a substring of the driver
        description from the adapter identifier

        \li \c gl_vendor - Matches when the value is a substring of the \c GL_VENDOR string
    \endlist

    \section1 Building from Source

    These tools are not needed to run Qt 5 applications, but they are required
    for building Qt 5 from source.

    \list
        \li \l ActivePerl - Install a recent version of ActivePerl
            (\l{http://www.activestate.com/activeperl}{download page}) and add
           the installation location to your \c PATH.
        \li Python - Install Python from the \l{http://www.python.org/download/}{here}
           and add the installation location to your PATH.
    \endlist

    \note Please make sure that the \c perl executable from ActivePerl is found
           in the path before the perl executable provided by msysgit, since the
           latter is outdated.


    ANGLE depends on these extra tools from the \l{GnuWin32 Project}{GnuWin32} and
    \l {http://sourceforge.net/projects/winflexbison/}{Win flex-bison}
    projects, which are provided for your convenience in the \e gnuwin32/bin
    folder:
    \list
        \li \l{http://gnuwin32.sourceforge.net/downlinks/gperf.php}{GPerf}
        \li \l{http://sourceforge.net/projects/winflexbison/files/win_flex_bison-2.5.5.zip/download}{Bison, Flex}
    \endlist

    The \e gnuwin32/bin folder should be added to the \c PATH variable.

    \note If you are building qtbase outside of qt5.git, you will need to
    download \e win_bison and \e win_flex from the link above and rename
    them to \e bison and \e flex.

    For instructions for building the Qt 5 source, read
    the \l{Qt for Windows - Building from Source} page.

    \section1 SDKs and Compilers

    A Windows SDK is required to develop Qt applications on Windows.

    \list
        \li Windows SDK 8 (with Visual Studio 2012 Express).
            As of Windows 8, the SDK no longer ships with a complete command-line build environment.
            You must install a compiler and build environment separately. If you require a
            complete development environment that includes compilers and a build environment,
            you can download Visual Studio 2012 Express, which includes the appropriate
            components of the Windows SDK.
            (\l{http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/desktop/hh852363.aspx}{Download page})
        \li Windows SDK 7.1.
            Note that, as of 16.3.2012, if you use this SDK with Visual Studio 2010,
            installing the SDK requires installing the following packages
            in this order (see \e readme.html provided with the service pack):
            \list 1
                \li Install Visual Studio 2010
                \li Install Windows SDK 7.1
                \li Install Visual Studio 2010 SP1
                \li Install Visual C++ 2010 SP1 Compiler Update for the Windows SDK 7.1
            \endlist
        \li Windows SDK 7.
        \li A MinGW toolchain with g++ version 4.7 or higher. Qt 5 is tested regularly with a \
            \l{http://sourceforge.net/projects/mingw-w64/files/Toolchains%20targetting%20Win32/Personal%20Builds/mingw-builds/4.9.1/threads-posix/dwarf/i686-4.9.1-release-posix-dwarf-rt_v3-rev2.7z/download}
            {32 bit gcc 4.9.1 toolchain} from the \l{http://mingw-w64.sourceforge.net/}{MinGW-w64}
            project.

    \endlist

    For the most up-to-date information about the \l{Qt WebEngine} dependencies,
    see the \l{Qt WebEngine on Windows}{Qt WebEngine} wiki for Windows.

*/

/*!
    \page windows-issues.html
    \title Qt for Windows - Specific Issues
    \brief A description of issues with Qt that are specific to Windows.

    This page contains information about \l{Qt for Windows}.

    \section1 Windows XP

    \section2 Targeting XP with Visual Studio 2012 and later

    Visual Studio 2012 and later do not support building for Windows XP out of the box.
    However, support for targeting XP was added in an
    \l{http://blogs.msdn.com/b/vcblog/archive/2012/10/08/windows-xp-targeting-with-c-in-visual-studio-2012.aspx}
    {update of Visual Studio 2012}. This works also with Visual Studio 2013.

    You need to compile Qt from sources. Set up an environment on the command line, for example

    \code
    "C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft Visual Studio 12.0\VC\vcvarsall.bat"
    set PATH=C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft SDKs\Windows\v7.1A\Bin;%PATH%
    set INCLUDE=C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft SDKs\Windows\v7.1A\Include;%INCLUDE%
    set LIB=C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft SDKs\Windows\v7.1A\Include;%LIB%
    set CL=/D_USING_V110_SDK71_
    \endcode

    Then run \c configure with the \c{-target xp} argument:

    \code
    configure -target xp <other arguments>
    nmake
    \endcode

    \note The \c configure option -qtlibinfix cannot take a version number as an argument.
    For example:
    \c{-qtlibinfix 5.6.0} should be specified as \c{-qtlibinfix QtCore5.6.dll}.

    Also compile your own application in the above environment if compiling
    on the command line. If you use Visual Studio, set the \c v110_xp toolset in the project's
    property pages.

    \section2 Installation location

    Installing Qt into a directory with spaces, for example,
    \e{C:\\Program Files}, may cause linker errors like the following:
    \snippet snippets/code/doc_src_platform-notes.qdoc 2

    Install Qt into a sub-directory without spaces to avoid this problem.

    \section1 Possible GL conflict

    There is a known issue when running Microsoft NetMeeting, Lotus SameTime,
    and other applications that require screen grabbing while direct
    rendering is enabled. Other GL-applications may not work as expected,
    unless direct rendering is disabled.

    \section1 GCC (MinGW-builds)

    The minimum version of MinGW-builds supported is GCC 4.7.2.
    \l{http://sourceforge.net/projects/mingwbuilds/files/host-windows/releases/4.7.2/32-bit/threads-posix/sjlj/x32-4.7.2-release-posix-sjlj-rev8.7z}
    {MinGW-builds GCC 4.7.2 32 bit, rev 8} and later should be able
    to build Qt.

    For more information about the MinGW builds, visit the
    \e{Reference Configuration} section of the
    \l{Community Supported Platforms#Reference Configurations}{supported platforms}
    page.

    \section1 Intel C++ Compiler (Windows, Altix)

    Qt has been tested successfully with:

    \list
    \li Windows - Intel(R) C++ Compiler for 32-bit applications,
       Version 9.1.040.
    \li Altix - Intel(R) C++ Itanium(R) Compiler for Itanium(R)-based
       applications Version 8.1 Build 20050406 Package ID: l_cc_pc_8.1.030
    \endlist

    \section1 Visual Studio

    The Visual C++ Linker doesn't understand filenames with spaces (for example,
    \e{C:\\Program files\\Qt\\}) so you will have to move it to another place,
    or explicitly set the path yourself.

    \snippet snippets/code/doc_src_compiler-notes.qdoc 0

    If you are experiencing strange problems with using special flags that
    modify the alignment of structure and union members (such as \c{/Zp2})
    then you will need to recompile Qt with the flags set for the
    application as well.

    Visual Studio 2010 should be updated to Service Pack 1. Otherwise, a
    problem when compiling Qt for 64-bit in release mode may occur (visit
    \l{http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2280741}).

    Consult the \l{Qt for Windows - Requirements} page for specific versions
    of the Windows SDK.
*/

/*!
    \page windows-deployment.html
    \title Qt for Windows - Deployment

    This documentation describes deployment issues for \l{Qt for
    Windows}{Windows}. We 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

    To build static applications, build Qt statically by configuring Qt with
    \c -static:

    \snippet snippets/code/doc_src_deployment.qdoc 11

    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 running \c{nmake distclean} or
    \c{mingw32-make distclean} before running \c configure again.

    \section2 Linking the Application to the Static Version of Qt

    As an example, this section will build the \l{tools/plugandpaint}{Plug & Paint}
    example statically.

    Once Qt finishes building, build the \l{tools/plugandpaint}{Plug & Paint}
    application. First we must go into the directory that contains the
    application:

    \snippet snippets/code/doc_src_deployment.qdoc 13

    Run \c qmake to create a new makefile for the
    application, and perform a clean build to create the statically linked
    executable:

    \snippet 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. To check that the application has the required
    libraries, copy the executable to a machine that does not 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, read the \l {Application Dependencies} section.

    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

    For this example, we assume that Qt is installed as a shared library,
    which is the default when installing Qt, in the \e{C:\\path\\to\\Qt}
    directory.

    \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 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 snippets/code/doc_src_deployment.qdoc 16

    This builds the core application, the following will build the
    plugins:

    \snippet 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 DLLs (corresponding to the Qt modules used in
    the application) and the Windows platform plugin, \c {qwindows.dll},
    as well as the executable to the same directory tree in the \c release
    subdirectory.

    In contrast to user plugins, Qt plugins must be put into subdirectories
    matching the plugin type. The correct location for the platform plugin
    is a subdirectory named \c {platforms}. \l{Qt Plugins} section has
    additional information about plugins and how Qt searches for them.

    Qt relies on the \l{ICU} library for unicode support. 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 \l{ANGLE} (the default) is used, you additionally need to include both
    \c libEGL.dll and \c libGLESv2.dll from Qt's 'lib' directory as well as
    the HLSL compiler from DirectX. The HLSL compiler library,
    d3dcompiler_XX.dll, where XX is the version number that ANGLE (libGLESv2)
    was linked against.

    If your application depends on Qt WebEngine, you must deploy
    \c{<Qt install path>/bin/QtWebEngineProcess.exe} to the application install
    path. If you chose to deploy the binary to a different path, set the
    \c QTWEBENGINEPROCESS_PATH environment variable to the binary's absolute
    path (including its file name). This enables the application to find the
    binary and execute it for every instance of QWebEngineView or
    WebEngineView created. For example, a browser application with two tabs
    open should have two separate processes of \c QtWebEngineProcess.exe
    running. This is a common approach used by most modern web engines to
    provide a stable browsing experience.

    \note To support HTML5 videos, you must additionally deploy
    \c ffmpegsumo.dll (WebM codec plugin) into the \c qtwebengine directory
    under the application install path or under the path that the
    \c PluginsPath variable was set to in
    \c{<Qt install path>/<Qt version>/msvc2013/qt.conf}.

    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 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 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 following \c CONFIG options are available for
    embedding manifests:

    \snippet snippets/code/doc_src_deployment.qdoc 20

    To use the options, add

    \snippet 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 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++ 10.0 (2010)
            \li VC++ 11.0 (2012)
            \li VC++ 12.0 (2013)
            \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 MSVCR100.DLL - The C runtime
               \li MSVCP100.DLL - The C++ runtime
           \endlist
        \li \list
               \li MSVCR110.DLL - The C runtime
               \li MSVCP110.DLL - The C++ runtime
           \endlist
        \li \list
               \li MSVCR120.DLL - The C runtime
               \li MSVCP120.DLL - The C++ runtime
           \endlist
        \li \list
               \li LIBWINPTHREAD-1.DLL
               \li LIBGCC_S_DW2-1.DLL
               \li LIBSTDC++-6.DLL
           \endlist
    \endtable

    When looking at the plugin DLLs the exact same dependencies
    are listed.

    From Qt version 5.2 onwards, the officially supported version
    for OpenSSL is 1.0.0 or later. Versions >= 0.9.7 and < 1.0.0 might
    work, but are not guaranteed to.

    \section2 Qt Plugins

    All Qt GUI applications require a plugin that implements the \l {Qt
    Platform Abstraction} (QPA) layer in Qt 5. For Windows, the name of the
    platform plugin is \c {qwindows.dll}. This file must be located within a
    specific subdirectory (by default, \c platforms) under your distribution
    directory. Alternatively, it is possible to adjust the search path Qt
    uses to find its plugins, as described below.

    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. Similar to the platform plugin, each type of plugin must
    be located within a specific subdirectory (such as \c printsupport,
    \c imageformats or \c sqldrivers) within your distribution directory.

    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 snippets/code/doc_src_deployment.qdoc 54

    Then qApp->libraryPaths() would return something like this:

    \list
    \li \c{C:/customPath/plugins}
    \li \c{C:/Qt/%VERSION%/plugins}
    \li \c{E:/myApplication/directory}
    \endlist

    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 The Windows Deployment Tool
    \target windeployqt
    The Windows deployment tool can be found in QTDIR/bin/windeployqt. It is
    designed to automate the process of creating a deployable folder that contains
    all libraries, QML imports, plugins, translations that are required to run the application
    from that folder. This is used to create the sandbox for \l{Qt for WinRT}{Windows Runtime}
    or an installation tree for Windows desktop applications that can be easily bundled by an installer.

    \badcode
Usage: windeployqt [options] [files]
Qt Deploy Tool 5.6.0

The simplest way to use windeployqt is to add the bin directory of your Qt
installation (e.g. <QT_DIR\bin>) to the PATH variable and then run:
  windeployqt <path-to-app-binary>
If ICU, ANGLE, etc. are not in the bin directory, they need to be in the PATH
variable. If your application uses Qt Quick, run:
  windeployqt --qmldir <path-to-app-qml-files> <path-to-app-binary>

Options:
  -?, -h, --help             Displays this help.
  -v, --version              Displays version information.
  --dir <directory>          Use directory instead of binary directory.
  --libdir <path>            Copy libraries to path.
  --debug                    Assume debug binaries.
  --release                  Assume release binaries.
  --release-with-debug-info  Assume release binaries with debug information.
  --pdb                      Deploy .pdb files (MSVC).
  --force                    Force updating files.
  --dry-run                  Simulation mode. Behave normally, but do not
                             copy/update any files.
  --no-plugins               Skip plugin deployment.
  --no-libraries             Skip library deployment.
  --qmldir <directory>       Scan for QML-imports starting from directory.
  --no-quick-import          Skip deployment of Qt Quick imports.
  --no-translations          Skip deployment of translations.
  --no-system-d3d-compiler   Skip deployment of the system D3D compiler.
  --compiler-runtime         Deploy compiler runtime (Desktop only).
  --no-compiler-runtime      Do not deploy compiler runtime (Desktop only).
  --json                     Print to stdout in JSON format.
  --angle                    Force deployment of ANGLE.
  --no-angle                 Disable deployment of ANGLE.
  --no-opengl-sw             Do not deploy the software rasterizer library.
  --list <option>            Print only the names of the files copied.
                             Available options:
                              source:   absolute path of the source files
                              target:   absolute path of the target files
                              relative: paths of the target files, relative
                                        to the target directory
                              mapping:  outputs the source and the relative
                                        target, suitable for use within an
                                        Appx mapping file
  --verbose <level>          Verbose level.

Qt libraries can be added by passing their name (-xml) or removed by passing
the name prepended by --no- (--no-xml). Available libraries:
bluetooth clucene concurrent core declarative designer designercomponents
enginio gui qthelp multimedia multimediawidgets multimediaquick network nfc
opengl positioning printsupport qml qmltooling quick quickparticles quickwidgets
script scripttools sensors serialport sql svg test
websockets widgets winextras xml xmlpatterns webenginecore webengine
webenginewidgets 3dcore 3drenderer 3dquick 3dquickrenderer 3dinput geoservices
webchannel

Arguments:
  [files]                    Binaries or directory containing the binary.
\endcode

*/

/*!
    \page windows-building.html
    \title Qt for Windows - Building from Source
    \brief Configuring and building Qt for Windows.

    This page describes the process of configuring and building
    \l{Qt for Windows}. Before building, there are some requirements that are
    given in more detail in the \l{Qt for Windows - Requirements} document.

    You can download the Qt 5 sources from the \l{Downloads} page. For
    more information, visit the \l{Getting Started with Qt} page.


    \section1 Step 1: Install the License File (Commercial Editions Only)

        If you have the commercial edition of Qt, copy the license file
        from your account on the distribution server into your home directory
        (this may be known as the \c userprofile environment variable) and
        rename it to \c{.qt-license}. This renaming process must be done
        using a \e{command prompt} on Windows, \b{not} with Windows Explorer.
        For example on Windows 2000, \c{%USERPROFILE%} should be something
        like \c{C:\Documents and Settings\username}

        For the open source version you do not need a license file.

    \section1 Step 2: Unpack the Archive

        Uncompress the files into the directory you want Qt installed;
        e.g. \c{C:\Qt\%VERSION%}.

        \note The install path must not contain any spaces or Windows specific
        file system characters.

    \section1 Step 3: Set the Environment Variables

        We recommend creating a desktop link that opens a command
        prompt with the environment set up similar to the
        \uicontrol{Command Prompt} menu entries provided by the Windows SDKs.
        This is done by creating an application link passing a \c .cmd file setting
        up the environment and the command line option \c /k (remain open)
        to \c cmd.exe.

        Assuming the file is called \c{qt5vars.cmd}
        and the Qt folder is called \c qt-5 and located under \c C:\qt:

        \code
        REM Set up \Microsoft Visual Studio 2013, where <arch> is \c amd64, \c x86, etc.
        CALL "C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft Visual Studio 12.0\VC\vcvarsall.bat" <arch>
        SET _ROOT=C:\qt\qt-5
        SET PATH=%_ROOT%\qtbase\bin;%_ROOT%\gnuwin32\bin;%PATH%
        REM Uncomment the below line when using a git checkout of the source repository
        REM SET PATH=%_ROOT%\qtrepotools\bin;%PATH%
        SET QMAKESPEC=win32-msvc2013
        SET _ROOT=
        \endcode

        A desktop link can then be created by specifying the command
        \c{%SystemRoot%\system32\cmd.exe /E:ON /V:ON  /k c:\qt\qt5vars.cmd}
        as application and \c{c:\qt\qt-5} as working directory.

        \note Setups for MinGW are similar; they differ
        only in that the \c bin folder of the installation should be added to the
        path instead of calling the Windows SDK setup script. For MinGW, please make
        sure that no \c sh.exe can be found in the path, as it affects \c {mingw32-make}.

        Settings required by the additional libraries (see \l{Qt for Windows Requirements})
        should also go this file below the call to the Windows SDK setup script.

    \section1 Step 4: Build the Qt Library

        The default behavior of configure is to create an in-source build
        of Qt 5. If you want to install Qt 5 to a separate location,
        you need to specify the command line option \c{-prefix <location>}.
        Alternatively, the command line option \c -developer-build creates
        an in-source build for developer usage.

        To configure the Qt library for a debug build for your machine, type
        the following command in the command prompt:

        \code
        configure -debug -nomake examples -opensource
        \endcode

        The \l{Qt Configure Options}{Configure Options} page contains more
        information about the configure options.

        To build Qt using \l{jom}, type:

        \code
        jom
        \endcode

        If you do not have \l{jom} installed, type:

        \code
        nmake
        \endcode

        For MinGW, type:

        \code
        mingw32-make
        \endcode

        If an installation prefix was given, type
        \c{jom install}, \c{nmake install} or \c{mingw32-make install}.

        \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.

    \section1 Parallel Builds

        \l{jom} is a replacement for \c nmake which makes use of all CPU cores
        and thus speeds up building.

*/