Cross-compiling Qt for Pandaboard

Question

I spend weeks trying to cross compile Qt for my Panda board and no way, I can't pass the ./configure. If someone could give me a help I'll appreciate.

My host system is Ubuntu-13.04 ×86_64bit(running un Virtualbox)

My target system is Pandaboard ES Ubuntu-12.04.

All the steps in host box:

sudo apt-get install arm-linux-gnueabihf

sudo mkdir /opt/qt-485-armhf

cd /usr/src

sudo wget http://download.qt-project.org/official_releases/qt/4.8/4.8.5/qt-everywhere-opensource-src-4.8.5.tar.gz

sudo tar xf qt-everywhere-opensource-src-4.8.5.tar.gz

cd /usr/src/qt-everywhere-opensource-src-4.8.5

sudo cp -r mkspecs/qws/linux-arm-gnueabi-g++ mkspecs/qws/linux-arm-gnueabihf-g++

sudo vim mkspecs/qws/linux-arm-gnueabihf-g++/qmake.conf
-------------------------------
include(../../common/gcc-base-unix.conf)
include(../../common/g++-unix.conf)
include(../../common/linux.conf)
include(../../common/qws.conf)

#Compiler Flags to take advantage of the ARM architecture
#N.B.:I also tried to uncomment the two following instructions with no success   
QMAKE_CFLAGS = -march=armv7-a -mtune=cortex-a9 -mfpu=neon -mfloat-abi=hard
QMAKE_CXXFLAGS = -march=armv7-a -mtune=cortex-a9 -mfpu=neon -mfloat-abi=hard

# modifications to g++.conf
QMAKE_CC                = arm-linux-gnueabihf-gcc
QMAKE_CXX               = arm-linux-gnueabihf-g++
QMAKE_LINK              = arm-linux-gnueabihf-g++
QMAKE_LINK_SHLIB        = arm-linux-gnueabihf-g++

# modifications to linux.conf
QMAKE_AR                = arm-linux-gnueabihf-ar cqs
QMAKE_OBJCOPY           = arm-linux-gnueabihf-objcopy
QMAKE_STRIP             = arm-linux-gnueabihf-strip

load(qt_config)
---------------------------------

sudo sed -i -e "/#if/d" -e "/#error/d" -e "/#endif/d" config.tests/unix/libmng/libmng.cpp (This command fixes detection of libmng 2.0.)
export QTDIR=/opt/qt4-485-armhf
And finally:
sudo ./configure -prefix /opt/qt4-485-armhf -sysconfdir /etc/xdg -embedded arm -little-endian -host-big-endian -no-qt3support -nomake examples -nomake demos -opensource -confirm-license -release -openssl-linked -no-phonon -no-phonon-backend -no-nis -platform qws/linux-x86_64-g++ -xplatform qws/linux-arm-gnueabihf-g++ -optimized-qmake

With this result:
Creating qmake. Please wait...
g++ -c -o option.o -pipe -m64 -DQMAKE_OPENSOURCE_EDITION -O2 -g -I. -Igenerators -Igenerators/unix -Igenerators/win32 -Igenerators/mac -Igenerators/symbian -Igenerators/integrity -I/usr/src/qt-everywhere-opensource-src-4.8.5/include -I/usr/src/qt-everywhere-opensource-src-4.8.5/include/QtCore -I/usr/src/qt-everywhere-opensource-src-4.8.5/src/corelib/global -I/usr/src/qt-everywhere-opensource-src-4.8.5/src/corelib/xml -I/usr/src/qt-everywhere-opensource-src-4.8.5/tools/shared -DQT_NO_PCRE -DQT_BUILD_QMAKE -DQT_BOOTSTRAPPED -DQLIBRARYINFO_EPOCROOT -DQT_NO_TEXTCODEC -DQT_NO_UNICODETABLES -DQT_NO_COMPONENT -DQT_NO_STL -DQT_NO_COMPRESS -I/usr/src/qt-everywhere-opensource-src-4.8.5/mkspecs/qws/linux-x86_64-g++ -DHAVE_QCONFIG_CPP -DQT_NO_THREAD -DQT_NO_QOBJECT -DQT_NO_GEOM_VARIANT -DQT_NO_DEPRECATED  option.cpp
g++ -o "/usr/src/qt-everywhere-opensource-src-4.8.5/bin/qmake" project.o property.o main.o makefile.o unixmake2.o unixmake.o mingw_make.o option.o winmakefile.o projectgenerator.o meta.o makefiledeps.o metamakefile.o xmloutput.o pbuilder_pbx.o borland_bmake.o msvc_vcproj.o msvc_vcxproj.o msvc_nmake.o msvc_objectmodel.o msbuild_objectmodel.o symmake.o initprojectdeploy_symbian.o symmake_abld.o symmake_sbsv2.o symbiancommon.o registry.o epocroot.o gbuild.o qtextcodec.o qutfcodec.o qstring.o qtextstream.o qiodevice.o qmalloc.o qglobal.o qbytearray.o qbytearraymatcher.o qdatastream.o qbuffer.o qlist.o qfile.o qfilesystementry.o qfilesystemengine_unix.o qfilesystemengine.o qfilesystemiterator_unix.o qfsfileengine_unix.o qfsfileengine.o qfsfileengine_iterator.o qregexp.o qvector.o qbitarray.o qdir.o qdiriterator.o quuid.o qhash.o qfileinfo.o qdatetime.o qstringlist.o qabstractfileengine.o qtemporaryfile.o qmap.o qmetatype.o qsettings.o qsystemerror.o qlibraryinfo.o qvariant.o qvsnprintf.o qlocale.o qlocale_tools.o qlocale_unix.o qlinkedlist.o qnumeric.o qcryptographichash.o qxmlstream.o qxmlutils.o  


You have not explicitly asked to use pkg-config and are cross-compiling.
pkg-config will not be used to automatically query cflag/lib parameters for
dependencies


The system floating point format could not be detected.
This may cause data to be generated in a wrong format
Turn on verbose messaging (-v) to see the final report.
OpenSSL support cannot be enabled due to functionality tests!
 Turn on verbose messaging (-v) to ./configure to see the final report.
 If you believe this message is in error you may use the continue
 switch (-continue) to ./configure to continue.

Thanks in advance.

Answer 1

To cross-compile a program on a PC you must have the development files for the same packages installed on the PC as the ARM target. Qt 4.8 depends on OpenSSL, so you must get the correct development files for the ARM release if you wish to compile Qt.

1. Install a Ubuntu 12.04 PC virtual box. SAME VERSION as the board.
2. Get the compiler. apt-get install arm-linux-gnueabihf (You knew that).
3. Get required development packages. apt-get install libssl-dev or
   apt-get build-dep -aarmhf qt4 (which only works for X11).
4. Edit your Qt configuration to suit your needs and build it.

The current step you are missing is step 3; but to perform it you need step 1 or some other way to get the OpenSSL development files for Ubuntu 12.04. There is probably some other way to do this using apt.sources. I think the steps above will be easiest for you.

Answer 2

Here is an alternative approach. As you are going to use Qt, you don't necessarily need Ubuntu. Simple rootfs with Qt Embedded could be sufficient.

I'll describe, how you can create rootfs and your application using Buildroot(BR). BR already has a config file for Pandaboard. All you need to is to download BR and execute:

make pandaboard_defconfig

After that you can choose between Qt4 and Qt5 in the menuconfig.

For your application I'd suggest using CMake infrastructure, but it is a matter of taste. This article is about source directory override mechanism in BR.