.. _getting_started: Getting Started =============== ``aqt`` is a tool that can be used to install Qt, modules, tools related to Qt, source, docs, and examples, available at https://download.qt.io/. Before running ``aqt``, you will need to tell ``aqt`` exactly what you want it to install. This section of the documentation is meant to walk you through the process of finding out what packages are available to ``aqt``, so you can tell ``aqt`` what you want to install. Please note that every ``aqt`` subcommand has a ``--help`` option; please use it if you are having trouble! Installing Qt ------------- General usage of ``aqt`` looks like this: .. code-block:: bash aqt install-qt [] If you have installed ``aqt`` with pip, you can run it with the command script ``aqt``, but in some cases you may need to run it as ``python -m aqt``. Some older operating systems may require you to specify Python version 3, like this: ``python3 -m aqt``. To use ``aqt`` to install Qt, you will need to tell ``aqt`` four things: 1. The host operating system (windows, mac, or linux) 2. The target SDK (desktop, android, ios, or winrt) 3. The version of Qt you would like to install 4. The target architecture Keep in mind that Qt for IOS is only available on Mac OS, and Qt for WinRT is only available on Windows. To find out what versions of Qt are available, you can use the :ref:`aqt list-qt command `. This command will print all versions of Qt available for Windows Desktop: .. code-block:: console $ aqt list-qt windows desktop 5.9.0 5.9.1 5.9.2 5.9.3 5.9.4 5.9.5 5.9.6 5.9.7 5.9.8 5.9.9 5.10.0 5.10.1 5.11.0 5.11.1 5.11.2 5.11.3 5.12.0 5.12.1 5.12.2 5.12.3 5.12.4 5.12.5 5.12.6 5.12.7 5.12.8 5.12.9 5.12.10 5.12.11 5.13.0 5.13.1 5.13.2 5.14.0 5.14.1 5.14.2 5.15.0 5.15.1 5.15.2 6.0.0 6.0.1 6.0.2 6.0.3 6.0.4 6.1.0 6.1.1 6.1.2 6.2.0 Notice that the version numbers are sorted, grouped by minor version number, and separated by a single space-character. The output of all of the :ref:`aqt list-qt ` commands is intended to make it easier for you to write programs that consume the output of :ref:`aqt list-qt `. Because the :ref:`aqt list-qt ` command directly queries the Qt downloads repository at https://download.qt.io/, the results of this command will always be accurate. The `Available Qt versions`_ wiki page was last modified at some point in the past, so it may or may not be up to date. .. _Available Qt versions: https://github.com/miurahr/aqtinstall/wiki/Available-Qt-versions Now that we know what versions of Qt are available, let's choose version 6.2.0. The next thing we need to do is find out what architectures are available for Qt 6.2.0 for Windows Desktop. To do this, we can use :ref:`aqt list-qt ` with the ``--arch`` flag: .. code-block:: console $ aqt list-qt windows desktop --arch 6.2.0 win64_mingw81 win64_msvc2019_64 win64_msvc2019_arm64 Notice that this is a very small subset of the architectures listed in the `Available Qt versions`_ wiki page. If we need to use some architecture that is not on this list, we can use the `Available Qt versions`_ wiki page to get a rough idea of what versions support the architecture we want, and then use :ref:`aqt list-qt ` to confirm that the architecture is available. Let's say that we want to install Qt 6.2.0 with architecture `win64_mingw81`. The installation command we need is: .. code-block:: console $ aqt install-qt windows desktop 6.2.0 win64_mingw81 External 7-zip extractor ------------------------ By default, ``aqt`` extracts the 7zip archives stored in the Qt repository using py7zr_, which is installed alongside ``aqt``. You can specify an alternate 7zip command path instead by using the ``-E`` or ``--external`` flag. For example, you could use 7-zip_ on a Windows desktop, using this command: .. code-block:: doscon C:\> aqt install-qt windows desktop 6.2.0 gcc_64 --external 7za.exe On Linux, you can specify p7zip_, a Linux port of 7-zip_, which is often installed by default, using this command: .. code-block:: console $ aqt install-qt linux desktop 6.2.0 gcc_64 --external 7z .. _py7zr: https://pypi.org/project/py7zr/ .. _p7zip: http://p7zip.sourceforge.net/ .. _7-zip: https://www.7-zip.org/ Changing the output directory ----------------------------- By default, ``aqt`` will install all of the Qt packages into the current working directory, in the subdirectory ``.///``. For example, if we install Qt 6.2.0 for Windows desktop with arch `win64_mingw81`, it would end up in ``./6.2.0/win64_mingw81``. If you would prefer to install it to another location, you will need to use the ``-O`` or ``--outputdir`` flag. This option also works for all of the other subcommands that begin with ``aqt install-``. To install to ``C:\Qt``, the default directory used by the standard gui installer, you may use this command: .. code-block:: doscon C:\> mkdir Qt C:\> aqt install-qt --outputdir c:\Qt windows desktop 6.2.0 win64_mingw81 Installing Modules ------------------ Let's say we need to install some modules for Qt 5.15.2 on Windows Desktop. First we need to find out what the modules are called, and we can do that with :ref:`aqt list-qt ` with the ``--modules`` flag. Each version of Qt has a different list of modules for each host OS/ target SDK combination, so we will need to supply :ref:`aqt list-qt ` with that information: .. code-block:: console $ aqt list-qt windows desktop --modules 5.15.2 debug_info qtcharts qtdatavis3d qtlottie qtnetworkauth qtpurchasing qtquick3d qtquicktimeline qtscript qtvirtualkeyboard qtwebengine qtwebglplugin Let's say that we want to install `qtcharts` and `qtnetworkauth`. We can do that by using the `-m` flag with the :ref:`aqt install-qt ` command. This flag receives the name of at least one module as an argument: .. code-block:: console $ aqt install-qt windows desktop 5.15.2 win64_mingw81 -m qtcharts qtnetworkauth If we wish to install all the modules that are available, we can do that with the ``all`` keyword: .. code-block:: console $ aqt install-qt windows desktop 5.15.2 win64_mingw81 -m all Remember that the :ref:`aqt list-qt ` command is meant to be scriptable? One way to install all modules available for Qt 5.15.2 is to send the output of :ref:`aqt list-qt ` into :ref:`aqt install-qt `, like this: .. code-block:: console $ aqt install-qt windows desktop 5.15.2 win64_mingw81 \ -m $(aqt list-qt windows desktop --modules 5.15.2) You will need a Unix-style shell to run this command, or at least git-bash on Windows. The ``xargs`` equivalent to this command is an exercise left to the reader. If you want to install all available modules, you are probably better off using the ``all`` keyword, as discussed above. This scripting example is presented to give you a sense of how to accomplish something more complicated. Perhaps you want to install all modules except `qtnetworkauth`; you could write a script that removes `qtnetworkauth` from the output of :ref:`aqt list-qt `, and pipe that into :ref:`aqt install-qt `. This exercise is left to the reader. Installing Qt for Android ------------------------- Let's install Qt for Android. Installing Qt 5 will be similar to installing Qt for Desktop on Windows, but there will be differences when we get to Qt 6. .. code-block:: console $ aqt list-qt windows android # Print Qt versions available 5.9.0 5.9.1 ... ... 6.2.0 $ aqt list-qt windows android --arch 5.15.2 # Print architectures available android $ aqt list-qt windows android --modules 5.15.2 # Print modules available qtcharts qtdatavis3d qtlottie qtnetworkauth qtpurchasing qtquick3d qtquicktimeline qtscript $ aqt install-qt windows android 5.15.2 android -m qtcharts qtnetworkauth # Install Let's see what happens when we try to list architectures and modules for Qt 6: .. code-block:: console $ aqt list-qt windows android --arch 6.2.0 # Print architectures available Command line input error: Qt 6 for Android requires one of the following extensions: ('x86_64', 'x86', 'armv7', 'arm64_v8a'). Please add your extension using the `--extension` flag. $ aqt list-qt windows android --modules 6.2.0 # Print modules available Command line input error: Qt 6 for Android requires one of the following extensions: ('x86_64', 'x86', 'armv7', 'arm64_v8a'). Please add your extension using the `--extension` flag. The Qt 6 for Android repositories are a little different than the Qt 5 repositories, and the :ref:`aqt list-qt ` tool doesn't know where to look for modules and architectures if you don't tell it what architecture you need. I know, it sounds a little backwards, but that's how the Qt repo was put together. There are four architectures available, and the error message from :ref:`aqt list-qt ` just told us what they are: `x86_64`, `x86`, `armv7`, and `arm64_v8a`. If we want to install Qt 6.2.0 for armv7, we use this command to print available modules: .. code-block:: console $ aqt list-qt windows android --extension armv7 --modules 6.2.0 qt3d qt5compat qtcharts qtconnectivity qtdatavis3d qtimageformats qtlottie qtmultimedia qtnetworkauth qtpositioning qtquick3d qtquicktimeline qtremoteobjects qtscxml qtsensors qtserialbus qtserialport qtshadertools qtvirtualkeyboard qtwebchannel qtwebsockets qtwebview We know we want to use `armv7` for the architecture, but we don't know exactly what value for 'architecture' we need to pass to :ref:`aqt install-qt ` yet, so we will use :ref:`aqt list-qt ` again: .. code-block:: console $ aqt list-qt windows android --extension armv7 --arch 6.2.0 android_armv7 You should be thinking, "Well, that was silly. All it did was add `android_` to the beginning of the architecture I gave it. Why do I need to use ``aqt list-qt --arch`` for that?" The answer is, ``aqt list-qt --arch`` is checking to see what actually exists in the Qt repository. If it prints an error message, instead of the obvious `android_armv7`, we would know that Qt 6.2.0 for that architecture doesn't exist for some reason, and any attempt to install it with :ref:`aqt install-qt ` will fail. Finally, let's install Qt 6.2.0 for Android armv7 with some modules: .. code-block:: console $ aqt install-qt linux android 6.2.0 android_armv7 -m qtcharts qtnetworkauth Installing Qt for WASM ---------------------- To find out how to install Qt for WASM, we need to tell :ref:`aqt list-qt ` that we are using the `wasm` architecture. We can do that by using the ``--extension wasm`` flag. .. code-block:: console $ aqt list-qt windows desktop --extension wasm 5.13.1 5.13.2 5.14.0 5.14.1 5.14.2 5.15.0 5.15.1 5.15.2 There are only a few versions of Qt that support WASM, and they are only available for desktop targets. If we tried this command with `android`, `winrt`, or `ios` targets, we would have seen an error message. We can check the architecture and modules available as before: .. code-block:: console $ aqt list-qt windows desktop --extension wasm --arch 5.15.2 # Print architectures available wasm_32 $ aqt list-qt windows desktop --extension wasm --modules 5.15.2 # Print modules available qtcharts qtdatavis3d qtlottie qtnetworkauth qtpurchasing qtquicktimeline qtscript qtvirtualkeyboard qtwebglplugin We can install Qt for WASM as before: .. code-block:: console $ aqt install-qt windows desktop 5.15.2 wasm_32 -m qtcharts qtnetworkauth Installing Tools ---------------- Let's find out what tools are available for Windows Desktop by using the :ref:`aqt list-tool ` command: .. code-block:: console $ aqt list-tool windows desktop tools_vcredist ... tools_qtcreator tools_qt3dstudio tools_openssl_x86 tools_openssl_x64 tools_openssl_src tools_ninja tools_mingw tools_ifw tools_conan tools_cmake Let's see what tool variants are available in `tools_mingw`: .. code-block:: console $ aqt list-tool windows desktop tools_mingw qt.tools.mingw47 qt.tools.win32_mingw48 qt.tools.win32_mingw482 qt.tools.win32_mingw491 qt.tools.win32_mingw492 qt.tools.win32_mingw530 qt.tools.win32_mingw730 qt.tools.win32_mingw810 qt.tools.win64_mingw730 qt.tools.win64_mingw810 This gives us a list of things that we could install using :ref:`aqt install-tool `. Let's see some more details, using the ``-l`` or ``--long`` flag: .. code-block:: console $ aqt list-tool windows desktop tools_mingw -l Tool Variant Name Version Release Date ============================================================= qt.tools.mingw47 4.7.2-1-1 2013-07-01 qt.tools.win32_mingw48 4.8.0-1-1 2013-07-01 qt.tools.win32_mingw482 4.8.2 2014-05-08 qt.tools.win32_mingw491 4.9.1-3 2016-05-31 qt.tools.win32_mingw492 4.9.2-1 2016-05-31 qt.tools.win32_mingw530 5.3.0-2 2017-04-27 qt.tools.win32_mingw730 7.3.0-1-202004170606 2020-04-17 qt.tools.win32_mingw810 8.1.0-1-202004170606 2020-04-17 qt.tools.win64_mingw730 7.3.0-1-202004170606 2020-04-17 qt.tools.win64_mingw810 8.1.0-1-202004170606 2020-04-17 The ``-l`` flag causes :ref:`aqt list-tool ` to print a table that shows plenty of data pertinent to each tool variant available in `tools_mingw`. :ref:`aqt list-tool ` additionally prints the 'Display Name' and 'Description' for each tool if your terminal is wider than 95 characters; terminals that are narrower than this cannot display this table in a readable way. Now let's install `mingw`, using the :ref:`aqt install-tool ` command. This command receives four parameters: 1. The host operating system (windows, mac, or linux) 2. The target SDK (desktop, android, ios, or winrt) 3. The name of the tool (this is `tools_mingw` in our case) 4. (Optional) The tool variant name. We saw a list of these when we ran :ref:`aqt list-tool ` with the `tool name` argument filled in. To install `mingw`, you could use this command (please don't): .. code-block:: console $ aqt install-tool windows desktop tools_mingw # please don't run this! Using this command will install every tool variant available in `tools_mingw`; in this case, you would install 10 different versions of the same tool. For some tools, like `qtcreator` or `ifw`, this is an appropriate thing to do, since each tool variant is a different program. However, for tools like `mingw` and `vcredist`, it would make more sense to use :ref:`aqt list-tool ` to see what tool variants are available, and then install just the tool variant you are interested in, like this: .. code-block:: console $ aqt install-tool windows desktop tools_mingw qt.tools.win64_mingw730 Please note that ``aqt install-tool`` does not recognize the ``installscript.qs`` related to each tool. When you install these tools with the standard gui installer, the installer may use the ``installscript.qs`` script to make additional changes to your system. If you need those changes to occur, it will be your responsibility to make those changes happen, because ``aqt`` is not capable of running this script.