Is Windows Development even possible with QT?

[NotSoQT]

After hours of tears, anger and frustration, I'm no further into my little adventure of trying out Qt development.

My goal : To develop deployable .exe applications in Qt, using VS2010 as my IDE. Yes I know about QtCreator/Eclipse, no I don't want to use either of them.

From the pain I've been through, it seems developing and deploying Windows applications with Visual Studio & Qt is basically impossible. Allow me to explain:

My steps:

• Installed Qt addon 1.1.9 for Visual Studio - had the 1600 vs 1500 bug, so had to change to 1.1.8, nice of the documentation not to point out this known issue.
  
• Built Qt in the VS cmd, about the only part that wasn't painful
  
  

  configure.exe -platform win32-msvc2008 -no-webkit -no-phonon -no-phonon-backend -no-script -no-scripttools -no-multimedia -no-qt3support -fast
   
  nmake

  configure.exe -platform win32-msvc2008 -no-webkit -no-phonon -no-phonon-backend -no-script -no-scripttools -no-multimedia -no-qt3support -fast
  
  nmake

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After setting Include and Bin directories best as I could figure out (some documentation would have been nice) most of the

IntelliSense: cannot open source file "QtGui/QApplication"

IntelliSense: cannot open source file "QtGui/QApplication"

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and

QTCored4.dll missing

QTCored4.dll missing

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Type errors seemed to be cleared up, although intellisense and highlighting doesn't always work.

Now for deployment - how the hell does one generate deployable .exe files?! Even the .exe's generated by QtCreator don't even work :/


So in all honesty, is Qt really cross platform? Or just a great framework for linux, or "well it's better than wxwidgets" ?

I don't understand why it has to be such a painful experience, just to get setup and experiment with Qt on Windows, with my IDE of choice.

I was excited to try Qt as an alternative way to develop, but after so much frustration - and things still do not work properly - File->New MFC application sounds like heaven.

[wysota]

Sorry to be blunt but based on what you have written here most of the problems you had have been caused by you. I'm not going to provide answers to all the questions here but I can point out some things you need to know to be a good developer (Qt or not):
1. executables (exe) depend on libraries (dll) that need to be available for the executable to run
2. the fact that a potential problem with interconnecting two pieces of software (MSVS and Qt-MSVS Add-In) is known doesn't imply that it has to be described in the official documentation for yet another piece of software (Qt); since it is well known, it is relatively easy to find a fix and a good developer should be able to do that
3. if the installation manual doesn't say you should modify some of the settings to make things work, you should think twice if you are on the right path when starting to modify those settings because something didn't work
4. "Cross-platform" doesn't mean "working in every condition on anyone's development machine". Qt works just fine. The only thing you are having problems with is integrating it with Visual Studio.

I have to add a personal comment to the situation -- from the couple of years of experience I had with different developers using Qt and not using Qt, people having most problems with setting up their environments and using their tools were the ones acustomed to using Visual Studio. It seems that many of such developers become confused when clicking "Next" and "Finish" is not enough to get their environment setup. If that was the only issue, that wouldn't be a problem since I can agree that the development environment should be easy to deploy and shouldn't even involve clicking any "Next" or "Finish" buttons. Unfortunately what I observe is that such developers also have little knowledge of how their computers and their software works because they are so used to the fact that installation and deployment happens automatically. Automation doesn't replace skills. Sometimes you need to be able to hack around your problems. In-depth knowledge of your programming environment should help you do that but if you rely on wizards and buttons, the knowledge is often not deep enough. Even if Qt didn't have any installers, scripts or manuals, a good knowledge of computers and Visual Studio should allow you to set it up properly piece by piece.

I have to admit I didn't have such problems when setting up Qt with Visual Studio in spite of the fact I knew little about the latter at that time and I didn't have the next-next-finish-wizard-thingy from the AddIn at hand and there wasn't a version of Qt already compiled for MSVC available. There wasn't even a working mkspecs for it available... You say about "File->New MFC application" sounding like heaven -- are you able to create and deploy an MFC application using just Notepad? If not, does it say anything about the quality of MFC? Does it say something about the quality of Notepad? Or does it say something about you? Think about it.

[NotSoQT]

Hi wysota,

I see you've taken it upon yourself to attack me, as opposed to actually helping..according to your post :

• I'm a bad developer
• I only know how to point and click / Wizard program
• I'm just doing it wrong
• The problems have been caused by me

However you go on to say,

it is relatively easy to find a fix and a good developer should be able to do that

I was able to fix that, does that then make me a good developer?

You've given quite an outlook on what a good developer should do, however keep in mind that good developers aren't born - they learn and everyone starts off as a beginner, I'm merely saying it shouldn't have to be painful.

With regards to your notepad question, I wouldn't use notepad, I prefer vi

If I wanted to "hack around" I would merely do straight Win32 API, but Qt seems to be a wonderful framework - which I was hoping I could easily setup, and sink my teeth into some lovely Qt code.

I'll give you an example, take directx or OpenGL - I'm sure we can agree that the linear algebra and 3d programming involved with DirectX and OpenGL is not so "point and click", but the difference here is that you can download a directx sdk, install it and you're basically ready to start on your first application. You don't need to, and shouldn't have to spend hours and hours before you can even do a helloworld.

I'll say it again, it doesn't have to be painful just to setup a framework, you should just be able to install and get to work with what you want to do with it - not spend all your time on setup.

Perhaps next time someone badly needs some help, you'll point them in the right direction, it doesn't take much for an experienced person to say "have you tried xyz", but I guess it's just easier to blame the person and "click next"

[wysota]

Hi wysota,

I see you've taken it upon yourself to attack me, as opposed to actually helping..

No, not really. I'm just annoyed when people say "oh Qt sucks so much!" when the fault is obviously not Qt's.

according to your post :

• I'm a bad developer
• I only know how to point and click / Wizard program
• I'm just doing it wrong
• The problems have been caused by me

Yes, the problems have been caused by you. I don't know what you did wrong but I can see you're not interested in learning that. Instead you prefer to blame someone/something else.

I was able to fix that, does that then make me a good developer?

No. The fact that a square of x is larger than x doesn't automatically make x+1 the square of x. There is a difference between a required condition and a sufficient condition.

You've given quite an outlook on what a good developer should do, however keep in mind that good developers aren't born - they learn and everyone starts off as a beginner,

I suggest you browse to our discussion about what makes a good developer and share your opinion there.

I'm merely saying it shouldn't have to be painful.

Even the simplest operation can be painful if done the wrong way.

With regards to your notepad question, I wouldn't use notepad, I prefer vi

Go ahead, use vi to develop an MFC app, I don't care. My point is to not use Visual Studio wizards for it.

If I wanted to "hack around" I would merely do straight Win32 API, but Qt seems to be a wonderful framework - which I was hoping I could easily setup, and sink my teeth into some lovely Qt code.

I don't mean "hack around" as in "hack in your free time not having better things to do" but "hack around problems" as in "work around problems". I don't think WinAPI has anything to do with it.

I'll give you an example, take directx or OpenGL - I'm sure we can agree that the linear algebra and 3d programming involved with DirectX and OpenGL is not so "point and click", but the difference here is that you can download a directx sdk, install it and you're basically ready to start on your first application. You don't need to, and shouldn't have to spend hours and hours before you can even do a helloworld.

I don't see the parallel, to be honest. I'm sure that if you wanted to do DirectX programming using only vi without any earlier experience with it (DX, not vi), downloading the sdk would not have been enough. It might be the case if you're using Visual Studio and Windows SDK, which brings us back to my original statement on getting into problems when going beyond Visual Studio. If you attach yourself to a single development environment (or programming language or toolkit or framework or whatever), you'll find it difficult to "detach" yourself from it and use a different tool with similar functionality but different approach.

I'll say it again, it doesn't have to be painful just to setup a framework, you should just be able to install and get to work with what you want to do with it - not spend all your time on setup.

Trust me, it's easier to setup Qt for VS than to setup MFC for Qt Creator. It's even easier to setup MFC for VS and to setup Qt for QtCreator. And I guess it's second to impossible to setup VisualStudio to use MinGW to build MFC apps (and I'm sure there is no wizard in VS to do it). But it doesn't mean any of the three sucks. If you don't want to spend time on setting up the development environment the way you like it the use the recommended approach -- play around using Qt Creator and only when you learn it's worth the effort, convince Visual Studio to work with your Qt installation.

Perhaps next time someone badly needs some help, you'll point them in the right direction, it doesn't take much for an experienced person to say "have you tried xyz", but I guess it's just easier to blame the person and "click next"

Read your post again -- you didn't ask for help. You only wanted to shout out your frustrations. Which is of course ok to do but then you risk such harsh responses as mine.

Try giving Qt another shot. If you can't get the AddIn to work then just ignore it, you don't need it. Use "qmake -tp vc" to generate a Visual Studio project from a Qt project file, open it with Visual Studio and start hacking ("around").

[NotSoQT]

No, not really. I'm just annoyed when people say "oh Qt sucks so much!" when the fault is obviously not Qt's.

I never said Qt sucks - I happen to like it, which is why it is frustrating that there is so little resources for using it for Windows/VS.

No. The fact that a square of x is larger than x doesn't automatically make x+1 the square of x. There is a difference between a required condition and a sufficient condition.

That was sarcasm

Even the simplest operation can be painful if done the wrong way.

But it doesn't have to be painful if done the right way.

Go ahead, use vi to develop an MFC app, I don't care. My point is to not use Visual Studio wizards for it.

Would a Eclipse or QtCreator wizard be better - just a little joke - relax.

I don't see the parallel, to be honest. I'm sure that if you wanted to do DirectX programming using only vi without any earlier experience with it....

What I meant was, when setting up Visual Studio for Directx, I simply had to download and install the sdk, and my environment was setup.

Play around using Qt Creator and only when you learn it's worth the effort, convince Visual Studio to work with your Qt installation.

This is exactly what I'm trying to do - I have been playing around with QtCreator, and have enjoyed it - but would prefer VS due to its debugging features.

Read your post again -- you didn't ask for help. You only wanted to shout out your frustrations. Which is of course ok to do but then you risk such harsh responses as mine.

I did read it again and I'm sorry, I didn't intent to sound that way. What I was really trying to ask is if there is a clear way in which to setup VS as a development environment for Qt or if that's a bad idea? How to generate .exe? My vs projects run, but no .exe are generated.

Try giving Qt another shot. If you can't get the AddIn to work then just ignore it, you don't need it. Use "qmake -tp vc" to generate a Visual Studio project from a Qt project file, open it with Visual Studio and start hacking ("around").

Thank you - I didn't know that you can do that with qmake, and thought the addin was a requirement.

My problem wasn't with Qt, but confusion/frustration on how to setup VS for Qt.

[wysota]

What I meant was, when setting up Visual Studio for Directx, I simply had to download and install the sdk, and my environment was setup.

If you download Qt for Qt Creator/MinGW or GCC, all you have to do is to download and install it and the environment is setup. Can you notice the trend? The maintainer spends more time testing (and supporting) configurations that are more likely to be used than those less likely to be used. Your configuration apparently is not one of the most popular ones.

My vs projects run, but no .exe are generated.

I don't think that's possible

Thank you - I didn't know that you can do that with qmake, and thought the addin was a requirement.

You can even do the whole compilation (qmake && nmake) from the command line and only use VS for writing code and/or running the debugger.

My problem wasn't with Qt, but confusion/frustration on how to setup VS for Qt.

Don't worry. Eventually you'll manage to do it. For me it worked out of the box the last time I tried it (Qt 4.6 + MSVS2008 AFAIR, I don't remember the AddIn version). Recently if I'm using MSVC then only from the command line, I'm doing all the development on Linux. That's why I think Qt is cross-platform.

[NotSoQT]

If you download Qt for Qt Creator/MinGW or GCC, all you have to do is to download and install it and the environment is setup. Can you notice the trend? The maintainer spends more time testing (and supporting) configurations that are more likely to be used than those less likely to be used. Your configuration apparently is not one of the most popular ones.

Yep, that's why I was going crazy :P

I don't think that's possible

It isn't, but it made me think I was missing some kind of config - turned out to be a odd directory structure I had, exe's are generated just fine

You can even do the whole compilation (qmake && nmake) from the command line and only use VS for writing code and/or running the debugger.

Nice.

Don't worry. Eventually you'll manage to do it. For me it worked out of the box the last time I tried it (Qt 4.6 + MSVS2008 AFAIR, I don't remember the AddIn version). Recently if I'm using MSVC then only from the command line, I'm doing all the development on Linux. That's why I think Qt is cross-platform.

I've managed to get everything 100% in VS2010 now, turned out to be an incorrect and duplicated path variable, and some misplaced files - my fault, as you pointed out earlier :P

Thanks for the help, and sorry about my earlier posts!