path: root/doc/src/platforms/platform-notes.qdoc

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/*!
    \group platform-specific
    \title Platform-Specific Documentation
    \brief Documents describing platform-specific features of Qt.

    These documents describe platform-specific features provided by Qt, and
    discuss issues related to particular platforms and environments.

    \generatelist{related}
*/

/*!
    \page platform-notes.html
    \ingroup platform-specific
    \title Platform Notes
    \brief Information about the platforms on which Qt can be used.

    This page contains information about the platforms Qt is currently known
    to run on, with links to platform-specific notes, including any known bugs
    or incompatibilities.

    \list
    \o \l{Platform Notes - X11}
    \tableofcontents{1 Platform Notes - X11}
    \o \l{Platform Notes - Windows}
    \tableofcontents{1 Platform Notes - Windows}
    \o \l{Platform Notes - Mac OS X}
    \tableofcontents{1 Platform Notes - Mac OS X}
    \o \l{Platform Notes - Symbian}
    \tableofcontents{1 Platform Notes - Symbian}
    \o \l{Platform Notes - Embedded Linux}
    \tableofcontents{1 Platform Notes - Embedded Linux}
    \o \l{Platform Notes - Windows CE}
    \tableofcontents{1 Platform Notes - Windows CE}
    \o \l{Platform Notes - QNX}
    \tableofcontents{1 Platform Notes - QNX}
    \o \l{Platform Notes - VxWorks}
    \tableofcontents{1 Platform Notes - VxWorks}
    \endlist

    See also the \l{Compiler Notes} for information about compiler-specific
    build issues. Information about the combinations of platforms and compilers
    supported by Qt can be found on the \l{Supported Platforms} page.

    If you have anything to add to this list or any of the platform or
    compiler-specific pages, please submit it via the \l{Bug Report Form}
    or through the \l{Public Qt Repository}.
*/

/*!
    \page platform-notes-x11.html
    \title Platform Notes - X11
    \contentspage Platform Notes

    This page contains information about the X11 platforms Qt is currently
    known to run on, with links to platform-specific notes. More information
    about the combinations of platforms and compilers supported by Qt can be
    found on the \l{Supported Platforms} page.

    \tableofcontents

    \target AIX
    \section1 AIX - 5.2

    Qt has been tested on AIX 5.2, using the
    \l{Compiler Notes#IBM xlC (AIX)}{xlC} compiler.

    \table
    \header \o Compiler \o Notes
    \row    \o xlC
    \o If Qt is built correctly but all symbols are reported to be missing
    when you link an application, your makeC++SharedLib script might be out
    of date. Make sure you have the latest version from the
    \l{http://www-306.ibm.com/software/awdtools/vacpp/support/}{IBM website}.
    \row    \o GCC
    \o We have tested earlier versions of Qt 4 successfully with GCC version
    3.3 and above. Some versions of GCC may fail to link Qt with a "TOC overflow"
    message.
    Fix this by upgrading to the latest maintenance release of the dynamic
    linker. On AIX this is bos.rte.bind_cmds.4.1.5.3 or later.
    Some versions of GCC may fail to build Qt with STL and large-file support
    enabled, due to
    \l{http://gcc.gnu.org/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=9551}{a bug in GCC}.
    Fix this by upgrading to the latest maintenance release of the compiler.
    It is also possible to work around this problem by running configure with
    either \c{-no-stl} or \c{-no-largefile}.
    \endtable

    \target FreeBSD
    \section1 FreeBSD - 6.0-RELEASE

    \note FreeBSD is a community supported platform. See the
    \l{Supported Platforms} page for more information.

    The system compiler on FreeBSD 4.x is gcc 2.95.4, which is not
    officially supported by Qt 4. We develop using and recommend
    ports/lang/gcc34. You will need to run configure with the
    \c{-platform freebsd-g++34} arguments. Optionally, you may use
    ports/lang/icc.

    The system compiler on FreeBSD 5.x and 6.x is GCC 3.4.4, which should be
    sufficient to build Qt. You do not need to add any special arguments when
    running configure. Optionally, you may use ports/lang/icc.

    Note that we do not actively test FreeBSD 4.x and 5.x. Our developers
    migrated to 6.x after the Qt 4 launch. FreeBSD-CURRENT is not supported.

    \target HP-UX
    \section1 HP-UX

    Qt supports HP-UX on both PA-RISC and the Itanium (IA64) architectures.

    \section2 PA-RISC - B.11.11 or later

    You can configure Qt for aCC in 32 and 64 bit mode (hpux-acc-64 or
    hpux-acc-32), or gcc in 32 bit mode (hpux-g++).  The default platform is
    hpux-acc-32. The minimum required version for aCC (HP ANSI C++) on PA-RISC
    is A.03.57. The supported gcc compiler is gcc 3.4.3.

    \section2 Itanium - B.11.23 or later

    You can configure Qt for aCC in 32 and 64 bit mode (hpuxi-acc-64 or
    hpuxi-acc-32). gcc is currently unsupported.  The default platform is
    hpuxi-acc-64. The minimum required version for aCC (HP ANSI C++) on
    Itanium is A.06.12.

    \section2 OpenGL Support

    Qt's \l{QtOpenGL}{OpenGL} module requires GLX 1.3 or later to be installed.
    This is available for HP-UX 11i - see the
    \l{http://docs.hp.com/en/5992-2331/ch04s02.html}{Graphics and Technical Computing Software}
    section of the release notes for more information.

    \target IRIX
    \section1 IRIX - 6.5.x

    \bold{IRIX is an unsupported platform - please see Qt's online
    \l{Platform Support Policy} for details.}

    Unpackaging and IRIX tar:
    Because of long filenames some files will be cut off incorrectly with IRIX
    tar. Please use GNU tar to unpack Qt packages.

    \section1 Linux

    There are no known problems with using Qt on production versions of
    Linux/x86, Linux/ppc, Linux/amd64 and Linux/ia64 (including Altix(R)).

    For the gcc/g++ compiler, please also see the relevant
    \l{Compiler Notes#GCC}{compiler page}.

    \section2 Installation problems

    See also the \l{Installation FAQ}.

    If you experience problems when installing new open source versions of Qt
    versions, try to use the open source Qt archives (e.g., RPM)
    provided by your Linux distribution. If you need to install the source (.tgz)
    archive, be aware that you will probably end up with two different
    versions of the Qt library installed on your system, which will probably
    lead to link errors, like this:
    \snippet doc/src/snippets/code/doc_src_platform-notes.qdoc 0
    Fix this by removing the old version of the library.

    If you have problems installing open source versions of Qt
    provided by your Linux distribution (e.g., RPM), please consult the
    maintainers of the distribution, not us.

    Some RPM versions have problems installing some of the Qt RPM archives
    where installation stops with an error message warning about a
    "Failed Dependency". Use the \c{--nodeps} option to \c rpm to workaround
    this problem.

    \target Solaris
    \section1 Solaris - 9 or later

    \section2 Unpackaging and Solaris tar

    On some Solaris systems, both Solaris tar and GNU tar have been reported
    to truncate long filenames. We recommend using star instead
    (http://star.berlios.de).

    \section2 CC on Solaris

    Be sure to check our \l{Compiler Notes#Sun Studio}{Forte Developer / Sun Studio}
    notes.

    \section2 GCC on Solaris

    Be sure to check the installation notes for \l{GCC on Solaris}.
    Do not use GCC with Sun's assembler/linker, this will result in link-time
    errors in shared libraries. Use GNU binutils instead. 

    GCC 3.2.* is known to miscompile Qt due to an optimizer bug that will
    cause the resulting binaries to hang. Please use GCC 3.4.2 or later.
*/

/*!
    \page platform-notes-windows.html
    \title Platform Notes - Windows
    \contentspage Platform Notes

    This page contains information about the Windows platforms Qt is currently
    known to run on, with links to platform-specific notes. More information
    about the combinations of platforms and compilers supported by Qt can be
    found on the \l{Supported Platforms} page.

    \tableofcontents

    \section1 Windows Vista

    At the time Qt %VERSION% was released, there were no known Vista-specific issues.

    \target Windows NT
    \section1 Windows XP, Windows 2000 and Windows NT

    \section2 Installation location

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

    Install Qt into a subdirectory without spaces to avoid this problem.

    \section2 Possible GL conflict

    There is a known issue with 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.
*/

/*!
    \page platform-notes-mac.html
    \title Platform Notes - Mac OS X
    \contentspage Platform Notes

    This page contains information about the Mac OS X versions Qt is currently
    known to run on, with links to platform-specific notes. More information
    about the combinations of platforms and compilers supported by Qt can be
    found on the \l{Supported Platforms} page.

    \tableofcontents

    \section1 General Information

    Qt 4.6 applications can only be deployed on Mac OS X 10.4 (Tiger)
    and higher. 

    Qt 4.4 and Qt 4.5 development is only supported on Mac OS X 10.4 and up.
    Applications built against these version of Qt can be deployed on Mac OS X
    10.3, but cannot be developed on that version of the operating system due
    to compiler issues.

    Qt 4.3 has been tested to run on Mac OS X 10.3.9 and up. See notes on
    the binary package for more information.

    Qt 4.1 has been tested to run on Mac OS X 10.2.8 and up. Qt 4.1.4 is the
    last release to work with Mac OS X 10.2.

    \section2 Required GCC version

    Apple's gcc 4 that is shipped with the Xcode Tools for both Mac OS X 10.4
    and 10.5 will compile Qt. There is preliminary support for gcc 4.2 which
    is included with Xcode Tools 3.1+ (configurable with
    \c{-platform macx-g++42}).

    \section2 Binary Package

    The binary package requires that you have your .qt-license file in your
    home directory. Installer.app cannot complete without a valid .qt-license
    file. Evaluation users of Qt will have information about how to create
    this file in the email they receive.

    The binary package was built on Mac OS X 10.4 with Xcode Tools 2.1
    (gcc 4.0.0) for Qt 4.1.0, Xcode Tools 2.2 (gcc 4.0.1) for Qt 4.1.1-4.1.4
    and Xcode Tools 2.3 for 4.2.0. It will only link executables built
    against 10.4 (or a 10.4 SDK). You should be able to run applications
    linked against these frameworks on Mac OS X 10.3.9 and Mac OS X 10.4+.
    If you require a different configuration, you will have to use the
    source package and build with GCC 3.3.

    \section2 Mac OS X on Intel hardware

    Qt 4 fully supports both the Intel and PowerPC architectures on the Mac.
    As of Qt 4.1 it is possible to support the Intel architecture by
    creating Universal Binaries with qmake. As of Qt 4.1 it is possible to
    build Qt as a set of universal binaries and frameworks from configure by
    adding these extra flags:

    \snippet doc/src/snippets/code/doc_src_platform-notes.qdoc 3

    If you are building on Intel hardware you can omit the sdk parameter, but
    PowerPC hardware requires it.

    You can also generate universal binaries using qmake. Simply add these
    lines to your .pro file:

    \snippet doc/src/snippets/code/doc_src_platform-notes.qdoc 4

    \section2 Build Issues

    If Qt does not build upon executing make, and fails with an error message
    such as

    \snippet doc/src/snippets/code/doc_src_platform-notes.qdoc 5

    this could be an indication you have upgraded your version of Mac OS X
    (e.g. 10.3 to 10.4), without upgrading your Developer Tools (Xcode Tools).
    These must match in order to successfully compile files.

    Please be sure to upgrade both simultaneously. If problems still occur,
    contact support.

    \section2 Fink

    If you have installed the Qt for X11 package from \l{Fink},
    it will set the QMAKESPEC environment variable to darwin-g++. This will
    cause problems when you build the Qt for Mac OS X package. To fix this, simply
    unset your QMAKESPEC or set it to macx-g++ before you run configure.
    You need to have a fresh Qt distribution (make confclean).

    \section2 MySQL and Mac OS X

    There seems to be a issue when both -prebind and -multi_module are
    defined when linking static C libraries into dynamic library. If you
    get the following error message when linking Qt:

    \snippet doc/src/snippets/code/doc_src_platform-notes.qdoc 6

    re-link Qt using -single_module. This is only a problem when building the
    MySQL driver into Qt. It does not affect plugins or static builds.

    \section2 Qt and Precompiled Headers (PCH)

    Starting with Qt 3.3.0 it is possible to use precompiled headers. They
    are not enabled by default as it appears that some versions of Apple's
    GCC and make have problems with this feature. If you want to use
    precompiled headers when building the Qt source package, specify the
    -pch option to configure. If, while using precompiled headers, you
    encounter an internal compile error, try removing the -include header
    statement from the compile line and trying again. If this solves the
    problem, it probably is a good idea to turn off precompiled headers.
    Also, consider filing a bug report with Apple so that they can
    improve support for this feature.
*/

/*!
    \page platform-notes-windows-ce.html
    \title Platform Notes - Windows CE
    \contentspage Platform Notes

    This page contains information about the Windows CE and Windows Mobile
    platforms Qt is currently known to run on, with links to platform-specific
    notes. More information about the combinations of platforms and compilers
    supported by Qt can be found on the \l{Supported Platforms} page.
*/

/*!
    \page platform-notes-symbian.html
    \title Platform Notes - Symbian
    \contentspage Platform Notes
    \ingroup platform-specific
    \brief Information about the state of support for the Symbian platform.

    As with any port, the maturity for Qt for Symbian has not yet reached the
    same level as other established Qt ports. This page documents the current
    notes for the Symbian port.

    \section1 Source Compatibility

    Qt for Symbian provides the same level of source compatibility guarantee as
    given for other platforms. That is, a program which compiles against a given
    version of Qt for Symbian will also compile against all future versions of the
    same major release.

    \section1 Binary Compatibility

    As with every supported platform, we will strive to maintain
    application behavior and binary compatibility throughout the lifetime of
    the Qt 4.x series. However, due to the fact that Symbian support is newly
    added in 4.6.0, there is a slight possibility that minor corrections to the
    application binary interface (ABI) might be required in 4.6.1, in order to
    ensure compatibility going forward. Any such change will be clearly
    documented in the release notes for 4.6.1.

    \section1 Supported Devices

    Qt is designed to work on any device which runs one of the following
    versions of Symbian:

    \table
    \header \o Symbian Version
    \row \o S60 3.1
    \row \o S60 3.2
    \row \o S60 5.0 (Symbian ^1)
    \endtable

    Qt has received \l{Tier 1 Platforms}{Tier 1} testing on the following phone models:

    \table
    \header \o Phone
    \row    \o Nokia 5800
    \row    \o Nokia E71
    \row    \o Nokia E72
    \row    \o Nokia N78
    \row    \o Nokia N95
    \row    \o Nokia N97
    \row    \o Samsung i8910
    \endtable

    \section1 Supported Functionality

    The following technologies and classes are not currently supported:

    \table
    \header \o Technology
            \o Note
    \row    \o QtConcurrent
            \o Planned for future release.
    \row    \o QtDBus
            \o No current plans to support this feature.
    \row    \o QtOpenGL ES
            \o Planned for future release.
    \row    \o Printing support
            \o No current plans to support this feature.
    \row    \o Qt3Support
            \o No current plans to support this feature.
    \endtable

    The following technologies have limited support:

    \table
    \header \o Technology
            \o Note
    \row    \o QtSql
            \o The only driver supported is SQLite.
    \row    \o QtMultimedia
            \o Although the module itself is supported, no backend for Symbian
               is currently available. However, there is a backend available
               for Phonon.
    \endtable

    \section1 Known Issues

    Known issues can be found by visiting the
    \l{http://qt.gitorious.org/qt/pages/QtKnownIssues}{wiki page} with an
    up-to-date list of known issues, and the list of bugs can be found by
    \l{http://bugreports.qt.nokia.com/browse/QTBUG/component/19171}{browsing} the
    S60 component in Qt's public task tracker, located at
    \l{http://bugreports.qt.nokia.com/}{http://bugreports.qt.nokia.com/}.

    For information about mixing exceptions with Symbian leaves, see
    \l{Exception Safety with Symbian}.

    \section1 Required Capabilities

    The Qt libraries are typically signed with \c{All -TCB} capabilites, but
    that does not mean your Qt application needs to be signed with the same
    capabilities to function properly. The capabilities your application needs
    to function properly depends on which parts of Qt you use, here is an
    overview:

    \table
    \header \o Module
            \o Required Symbian Capability
    \row    \o QtCore
            \o \c PowerMgmt if QProcess::kill(...) or QProcess::terminate(...) is called.
    \row    \o QtCore
            \o \c AllFiles when \l{http://developer.symbian.org/wiki/index.php/Capabilities_%28Symbian_Signed%29/AllFiles_Capability}{accessing specific areas.}
    \row    \o QtNetwork
            \o \c NetworkServices is basically always required for this module.
    \row    \o QtMultiMedia
            \o \c UserEnvironment if QAudioInput is used.
    \endtable

    Note that some modules rely on other modules. If your application uses
    QtXmlPatterns, QtWebkit or QtScript it may still require \c NetworkServices
    as these modules rely on QtNetwork to go online.

    For more information see the documentation of the individual Qt classes. If
    a class does not mention Symbian capabilities, it requires none.

    \section1 Multimedia and Phonon Support

    Qt provides a backend for Qt's Phonon module, which supports
    video and sound playback through Symbian's Multimedia Framework, MMF.

    In this release the support is experimental. Video playback may have
    flickering issues, and support for effects and playback queueing is
    incomplete.

    The audio and video formats that Phonon supports depends on what support
    the platform provides for MMF. The emulator is known to have limited
    codec support.

    In addition, there exists a backend for the Helix framework. However, due
    to it not shipping with Qt, its availability depends on the Symbian
    platform in use. If available, it is loaded in preference over the MMF
    plugin. If the Helix plugin fails to load, the MMF plugin, if present on
    the device, will be loaded instead.

    \section1 UI Performance in devices prior to Symbian^3

    Qt uses the QPainter class to perform low-level painting on widgets and
    other paint devices. QPainter provides functions to draw complex shapes,
    aligned text and pixmaps. It can also do vector path clipping, coordinate
    transformations and Porter-Duff composition. If the underlying graphics
    architecture does not support all of these operations then Qt uses the
    raster graphics system for rendering.

    Most of the Symbian devices prior to Symbian^3 use a non-ScreenPlay
    graphics architecture which does not have native support for all functions
    provided by QPainter. In non-ScreenPlay devices Qt uses the raster
    graphics system by default which has a performance penalty when compared
    to native Symbian rendering.

    In order to be able to perform all functions provided by QPainter, the
    raster graphics system needs to have pixel level framebuffer access. To
    make this possible in non-ScreenPlay devices Qt has to create an
    additional offscreen buffer that is the target for all Qt rendering
    operations. Qt renders the widget tree to the offscreen buffer and the
    offscreen buffer is blitted to the framebuffer via Symbian Window Server.

    The following table shows the rendering stacks of native Symbian and Qt in
    non-ScreenPlay devices.

    \table
    \header \o Symbian
            \o Qt
    \row    \o \image symbian-rendering-stack-non-screenplay.png
            \o \image symbian-qt-rendering-stack-non-screenplay.png
    \endtable

    The following diagrams show a simplified sequence of drawing a pixmap in
    a non-ScreenPlay device.

    \table
    \header \o Symbian
    \row    \o \image symbian-draw-pixmap-sequence.png
    \endtable

    \table
    \header \o Qt
    \row    \o \image symbian-qt-draw-pixmap-sequence.png
    \endtable

    When compared to a native Symbian application, Qt does an additional blit
    to the offscreen buffer before drawing to the framebuffer. That is the
    performance penalty which needs to be paid to get all functionality
    provided by QPainter in non-ScreenPlay architecture.
*/

/*!
    \page platform-notes-embedded-linux.html
    \title Platform Notes - Embedded Linux
    \contentspage Platform Notes

    This page contains information about the Embedded Linux platforms Qt is
    currently known to run on, with links to platform-specific notes. More
    information about the combinations of platforms and compilers supported
    by Qt can be found on the \l{Supported Platforms} page.
*/