How to copy Qt runtime DLLs to project output

Question

I have a simple project created in Qt Creator (installed using Qt SDK 1.1.4). It runs just fine from within Qt Creator, but if I then browse to the output directory in Windows

Answer 1

Copy Dependencies with windeployqt

# Deployment - Automatically Detect and Copy Dependencies to Build Folder

TARGET_CUSTOM_EXT = .exe
DEPLOY_COMMAND = windeployqt

DEPLOY_OPTIONS = "--no-svg --no-system-d3d-compiler --no-opengl --no-angle --no-opengl-sw"

CONFIG( debug, debug|release ) {
    # debug
    DEPLOY_TARGET = $$shell_quote($$shell_path($${OUT_PWD}/debug/$${TARGET}$${TARGET_CUSTOM_EXT}))
    DEPLOY_OPTIONS += "--debug"
} else {
    # release
    DEPLOY_TARGET = $$shell_quote($$shell_path($${OUT_PWD}/release/$${TARGET}$${TARGET_CUSTOM_EXT}))
    DEPLOY_OPTIONS += "--release"
}

# Uncomment the following line to help debug the deploy command when running qmake
#message($${DEPLOY_COMMAND} $${DEPLOY_OPTIONS} $${DEPLOY_TARGET})

QMAKE_POST_LINK = $${DEPLOY_COMMAND} $${DEPLOY_OPTIONS} $${DEPLOY_TARGET}

or Copy dependencies manually

# Deployment - Copy Dependencies to Build Folder

dlls.path  =  $${DESTDIR}
dlls.files += $$[QT_INSTALL_BINS]/icudt51.dll
dlls.files += $$[QT_INSTALL_BINS]/icuin51.dll
dlls.files += $$[QT_INSTALL_BINS]/icuuc51.dll
dlls.files += $$[QT_INSTALL_BINS]/libgcc_s_dw2-1.dll
dlls.files += $$[QT_INSTALL_BINS]/libstdc++-6.dll
dlls.files += $$[QT_INSTALL_BINS]/libwinpthread-1.dll
dlls.files += $$[QT_INSTALL_BINS]/Qt5Core.dll
dlls.files += $$[QT_INSTALL_BINS]/Qt5Network.dll
dlls.files += $$[QT_INSTALL_BINS]/Qt5Gui.dll
dlls.files += $$[QT_INSTALL_BINS]/Qt5Widgets.dll
dllA.path   += $${DESTDIR}/platforms
dllA.files  += $$[QT_INSTALL_PLUGINS]/platforms/qwindows.dll
dllB.path   += $${DESTDIR}/plugins/imageformats/
dllB.files  += $$[QT_INSTALL_PLUGINS]/imageformats/qico.dll
dllB.files  += $$[QT_INSTALL_PLUGINS]/imageformats/qwbmp.dll
INSTALLS   += dlls dllA dllB

Referencing: http://doc.qt.io/qt-5/qmake-variable-reference.html#deployment

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In case you need to identify prerequisites / dependencies cross-platform, please take a look at CMake's getPrerequisites(). It uses dumpbin, objbin, ldd, otool for the identification of dependencies.

Referencing: https://cmake.org/cmake/help/v3.0/module/GetPrerequisites.html