[KDE/Mac] Fwd: Qtbase patch for configurable standard paths

[David Faure]

On Tuesday 19 January 2016 10:10:22 René J.V. Bertin wrote:
> On Tuesday January 19 2016 09:05:21 David Faure wrote:
> >What about this solution, providing a qt.conf which extends QStandardPaths?
> >Very flexible, you can add paths without changing any code, once this patch is in.
> >
> >And if it makes QSP work on both Windows and OSX, that's even better.
> 
> Didn't we already discuss using qt.conf (and reject it), or did I look into it myself and decide it appeared to be interesting but probably not tailored for the job?

Don't know.

> The end result is that QSP::writableLocation is specified through qt.conf.

Once more, writableLocation isn't the interesting part (and I don't recommend changing it). What's interesting
is the lookup of installed files, which is standardLocations()

> What does the patch change in the existing support of a qt.conf file?

AFAIU it allows to add search paths for standardLocations() in qt.conf.
Talk to the author of the patch directly if you have more specific questions ;)

> Two big questions come to mind:
> 
> 1) Where is this qt.conf file expected, in user or system file space, or (probably worse) do you need one qt.conf per application? If you use this feature to build libraries that should find their files in XDG-compliant locations the user shouldn't be able to modify that location. At least that'd be the working POV for MacPorts; give users the chance to mess things up, drawing their attention to it with a big fat warning, and they will ... and then file bug reports ;)

I'll let you read the documentation for qt.conf, since I don't know all the search paths for it. Or you can ask Patrick.
I'm pretty sure the usual way is "as part of the Qt installation", but you could even provide it on top of a "native OSX" Qt build I suppose.

> 2) Wouldn't this force all applications built on Qt5 to use the locations specified in qt.conf?

Yes, where "use" means "also look into".

> Bonus question: what about your own Scribus example?

No breakage when only adding *additional* search paths.

-- 
David Faure, faure at kde.org, http://www.davidfaure.fr
Working on KDE Frameworks 5