QtCS2017 Qt Deployment Story

Breakout session from Build System BOF

• Qt Quick deployment

• Differentiation between release and deployment to device

• Making Qt installations movable
  • QLibraryInfo is horrible (Ossi)
  • Not working for bundles

• Asset access: Developer shouldn't need to care about source of asset (qrc, bundle, file ...)
  • Apple e.g. defines pretty clearly App Bundle structure
  • Linux has also some standards
  • Android : Everything is in a zip file
• Arguments for using native format
  • If we use the system specific locations, we can use native API to access it
    • Allows e.g. streaming of video file to external player
  • qrc has limitations regarding large assets
    • Andre fixed this a while ago (?) by merging asset in a post-compilation step
    • Solution is a tad hacky though

• • What's needed?
    • Build System?
    • asset:// accessor?

• Asset Conditioning
  • Preparation of assets at compile time
  • Requires support in build system
  • Should be integrated in IDE, too (e.g. to specify converting png resource into bitmap)
  • Build System and IDE also needs to watch for file changes , e.g. if external app changes assets
  • Can we limit recompilation of resource files to the files that actually changed?
  • For QRC: We have to store metadata about the file format / conditioning

• Qt resources in Qbs
  • QMake has RESOURCES, actual files are in .qrc
    • Historical reason: Qt Designer had to edit them
  • Qbs could make it easier
    • Runtime mapping of qrc:// to file should be transparent. The mapping could be tweaked by developer, but doesn't have to.

• Can we extend QRC path for identifier to native asset system?
  • Exact location / backend can be transparent
  • Therefore no need for an additional system

• What about non-file assets, like colors?
  • say "qt-green" being loaded from runtime resource
  • Are there any other examples of resources that aren't files?