Running a QT app on MacOS

I was able to compile and debug my app on MacOS with QT Creator:

All C++ code compiled successfully, but something went wrong with OpenGLES shaders. It is probably because I included OpenGLES headers from a wrong place.

The following fragment shader did not compile:

//precision mediump float;
uniform vec4 u_color;
varying float v_lifetime;
uniform sampler2D s_texture;
void main()
{
    vec4 texColor;
    texColor = texture2D(s_texture, gl_PointCoord);
    float a = texColor.r * texColor.g * texColor.b;
    gl_FragColor = u_color;
    gl_FragColor.a *= v_lifetime * a;
}

At first the error was with precision mediump float, but after I commented it out, I got an error with gl_PointCoord:

ERROR: 0:1: Use of undeclared identifier 'gl_PointCoord'

but fortunately it was the only shader that did not compile and finally I started my app without it:

as you can see, antialiasing is not enabled yet.

To find OpenGLES headers I did a global search

sudo find / -iname "gl3.h"

and found /Applications/Xcode.app/Contents/Developer/Platforms/MacOSX.platform/Developer/SDKs/MacOSX.sdk/System/Library/Frameworks/OpenGL.framework/Versions/A/Headers/ directory containing the following headers:

-rw-r--r--  1 root  wheel     557 Feb 29 11:36 CGLContext.h
-rw-r--r--  1 root  wheel     467 Feb 29 11:36 CGLCurrent.h
-rw-r--r--  1 root  wheel     980 Feb 29 11:36 CGLDevice.h
-rw-r--r--  1 root  wheel   14632 Feb 29 11:36 CGLIOSurface.h
-rw-r--r--  1 root  wheel  134620 Feb 29 11:36 CGLMacro.h
-rw-r--r--  1 root  wheel    3135 Feb 29 11:36 CGLRenderers.h
-rw-r--r--  1 root  wheel   21090 Feb 29 11:36 CGLTypes.h
-rw-r--r--  1 root  wheel    6713 Feb 29 11:36 OpenGL.h
-rw-r--r--  1 root  wheel     775 Feb 29 11:36 OpenGLAvailability.h
-rw-r--r--  1 root  wheel  170748 Feb 29 11:36 gl.h
-rw-r--r--  1 root  wheel  182502 Feb 29 11:36 gl3.h
-rw-r--r--  1 root  wheel   14653 Feb 29 11:36 gl3ext.h
-rw-r--r--  1 root  wheel  217568 Feb 29 11:36 glext.h
-rw-r--r--  1 root  wheel     327 Feb 29 11:36 gliContext.h
-rw-r--r--  1 root  wheel   87660 Feb 29 11:36 gliDispatch.h
-rw-r--r--  1 root  wheel    1410 Feb 29 11:36 gltypes.h
-rw-r--r--  1 root  wheel   18745 Feb 29 11:36 glu.h
-rw-r--r--  1 root  wheel    3841 Feb 29 11:36 gluContext.h
-rw-r--r--  1 root  wheel    2838 Feb 29 11:36 gluMacro.h

Finally, I figured out that I include OpenGL on Desktop platform as follows:

#include <OpenGL/gl3.h>
#include <OpenGL/glu.h>

Compiling the app for iOS

To compile the app for iOS I included OpenGLES header as follows:

#include <OpenGLES/ES3/gl.h>

and all my code compiled, so I was able to start the app on the simulator:

Notes about setting up the development environment

By the way I figured out what is the command key on my home-made Macintosh:

it is actually Windows key!

The only extremely annoying thing is that NumPad arrows does not work and this makes editing the text absolutely annoying, so I need to figure out how to fix this. The next significantly annoying thing is that I can’t use Ctrl+Ins, Shif+Ins, Shif+Del, etc… for working with the clipboard and select the text with Ctrl+Shift+ arrows.

QT installation path:

/Users/admin/Qt5.14.2

Running QT Creator from the terminal:

cd /Users/admin/Qt5.14.2/Qt\ Creator.app/Contents/MacOS
./Qt\ Creator &

Component versions

system_profiler SPDeveloperToolsDataType
Developer:

    Developer Tools:

      Version: 11.4.1 (11E503a)
      Location: /Applications/Xcode.app
      Applications:
          Xcode: 11.4.1 (16137)
          Instruments: 11.4.1 (64535.74)
      SDKs:
          iOS:
              13,4: (17E8258)
          iOS Simulator:
              13,4: (17E8258)
          macOS:
              10.15.4: (19E258)
              19,0: 
          tvOS:
              13,4: (17L255)
          tvOS Simulator:
              13,4: (17L255)
          watchOS:
              6,2: (17T255)
          watchOS Simulator:
              6,2: (17T255)

OpenGLES/GLSL versions

It is common to do:

#if defined(__APPLE__)
#include <OpenGL/gl.h>
#include <OpenGL/glu.h>
#else
#include <GL/gl.h>
#include <GL/glu.h>
#endif

Links

2 Responses to Running a QT app on MacOS

  1. dmitriano says:

    While compiling some other app I get “error: ‘any_cast’ is unavailable: introduced in macOS 10.14”

  2. dmitriano says:

    OpenGL version = 2.1 INTEL-14.3.9

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