Building qt-android on windows

Building Qt/Android on Windows

Tested last time on branch 5.4 2015-01-22

Note, it is not currently possible to use Microsoft’s compilers to build the Windows host tools for Qt Android.

—————————— Configuration ——————————

• Install the latest Perl:
  http://strawberryperl.com/
  Select Destination folder (we’ll call this <PERL_ROOT>, and refer similarly to other install locations).

• Install the latest mingwbuilds MSYS and external binaries (for git):
  http://sourceforge.net/projects/mingwbuilds/files/external-binary-packages/msys+7za+wget+svn+git+mercurial+cvs-rev13.7z/download
  Extract this to <MINGW_BUILDS_ROOT> (I use C:\mingw-builds\ so I end up with C:\mingw-builds\msys\)

• Install the latest MinGW-w64 from mingwbuilds:
  http://sourceforge.net/projects/mingwbuilds/files/host-windows/releases/4.8.1/32-bit/threads-win32/dwarf/x32-4.8.1-release-win32-dwarf-rev1.7z/download
  extract to <MINGW_BUILDS_ROOT> and add <MINGW_BUILDS_ROOT>\mingw32\bin to the front of your PATH.

• Install the latest JDK 7:
  http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/java/javase/downloads/index.html
  Add <JDK_ROOT>\bin to PATH.

• Install Android NDK:
  https://developer.android.com/tools/sdk/ndk/index.html
  Extract to <ANDROID_NDK_PATH>
  If you have ndk9 installed update it to latest version cause it doesn’t work any more.

• Install the latest Android SDK (tools only):
  http://developer.android.com/sdk/index.html
  Run the Android SDK Manager and install the latest version of “SDK Platform”, “Google APIs” and “build-tools” in <ANDROID_SDK_PATH>

• Open cmd.exe window and perform some checks:
  Ensure “where gcc.exe” lists <MINGW_ROOT>\bin\gcc.exe first (before <PERL_ROOT>\c\bin\gcc.exe)
  Ensure “where mingw32-make.exe” lists <MINGW_ROOT>\bin\mingw32-make.exe first.
  Ensure “where perl.exe” lists <PERL_ROOT>\perl\bin\perl.exe first.
  Ensure “where javac.exe” lists <JDK_ROOT>\bin first.

• Add some environment variables:
  set “ANDROID_API_VERSION=android-21”
  set “ANDROID_SDK_ROOT=<ANDROID_SDK_PATH>”
  set “ANDROID_TARGET_ARCH=armeabi-v7a”
  set “ANDROID_BUILD_TOOLS_REVISION=21.1.2”
  set “ANDROID_NDK_PATH=<ANDROID_NDK_PATH>”
  set “ANDROID_TOOLCHAIN_VERSION=4.9”
  set “ANDROID_NDK_HOST=windows-x86_64”
  or
  set “ANDROID_NDK_HOST=windows”
  .. depending on which NDK you downloaded.

—————————— Cloning ——————————

• Make the root folder for the Qt/Android build:
  Make sure there are no spaces in this path and that it doesn’t contain too many characters.
  I went for “C:\work\build”
  

• Follow step 4 at http://wiki.qt.io/Qt5ForAndroidBuilding

—————————— Build steps ——————————

..where <N> is the number of parallel jobs your system can optimally exploit. If you have trouble, remove the -j<N>, and try again.

• Follow steps 8..11 at http://wiki.qt.io/Qt5ForAndroidBuilding (replacing make with mingw32-make.exe)

—————————— Finally ——————————

You can also build Qt/Android from the MSYS shell – the one from mingw-builds that you already downloaded – following much the same procedure and using exactly the same software. This is currently left as an exercise for the reader.