depends: check required host tools before Qt downloads #35631

vicjuma commented at 1:09 PM on July 1, 2026: contributor

Motivation

When NO_QT is not set, the depends build requires several host tools for building the Qt dependencies. If one of these tools (for example, pkg-config or bison) is missing, the build only reports the error after the Qt dependency download process has already begun.

This change performs an early check for the required host tools before downloading Qt dependencies, allowing the build to fail immediately with a clear error message instead of failing later in the build process.

This change follows the depends build instructions, which document additional host tool requirements when NO_QT is not set (see depends/README.md). The checks are implemented only for the operating systems where these requirements are explicitly documented: Linux (Ubuntu/Debian and Alpine) and FreeBSD. The documentation does not currently specify equivalent requirements for the remaining supported operating systems.

Testing

Built depends with all required host tools installed.
Verified that removing pkgconf causes the new early check to fail with the expected error:

Error: bison host package is required to build Qt dependencies. Pass NO_QT=1 option to make if you wish to skip Qt.
make: *** [Makefile:258: check-host-tools] Error 1

Verified that removing bison causes the new early check to fail with the expected error:

Error: bison host package is required to build Qt dependencies. Pass NO_QT=1 option to make if you wish to skip Qt.
make: *** [Makefile:258: check-host-tools] Error 1

Verified that make NO_QT=1 skips the host tool check.

depends: check required host tools before Qt downloads

When NO_QT is not set, building depends requires certain host tools,
such as pkg-config and bison, for the Qt dependency build.

Check for these tools before downloading Qt dependencies so the build
fails immediately with a clear error rather than waiting until the Qt
download step to report the missing host tools.

3e2a94185d

DrahtBot added the label Build system on Jul 1, 2026

DrahtBot commented at 1:09 PM on July 1, 2026: contributor

The following sections might be updated with supplementary metadata relevant to reviewers and maintainers.

Code Coverage & Benchmarks

For details see: https://corecheck.dev/bitcoin/bitcoin/pulls/35631.

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maflcko commented at 2:00 PM on July 1, 2026: member

No. It should be possible to download without having to install build tools, because download can happen on a different machine/context than building.

vicjuma commented at 2:21 PM on July 1, 2026: contributor

No. It should be possible to download without having to install build tools, because download can happen on a different machine/context than building.

Looking at the dependency graph though, check-host-tools is only wired as a prerequisite of install. make download is not affected in any way. If there's a specific path you're seeing where download does end up depending on it (maybe through a target I'm missing), let me know, and I'll fix it

maflcko added the label DrahtBot Guix build requested on Aug 19, 2026

DrahtBot commented at 4:30 AM on August 20, 2026: contributor

Guix builds (on x86_64) [untrusted test-only build, possibly unsafe, not for production use]

File	commit fe5e2a6319b851a6883c94e568eab57a25e31a1b<br>(master)	commit aaf2538121e37fdfcd7abb8abf62422964847aa3<br>(pull/35631/merge)
*-aarch64-linux-gnu-debug.tar.gz	`2ce7679c71f316f9...`
*-aarch64-linux-gnu.tar.gz	`08d65e7f923c6107...`
*-arm-linux-gnueabihf-debug.tar.gz	`76f1f46d0a924b52...`
*-arm-linux-gnueabihf.tar.gz	`43a47114963e616b...`
*-arm64-apple-darwin-codesigning.tar.gz	`d2dd693be77b6c5f...`
*-arm64-apple-darwin-unsigned.tar.gz	`12ed62b0f4de2f27...`
*-arm64-apple-darwin-unsigned.zip	`c7486e2ff432e2f7...`
*-powerpc64-linux-gnu-debug.tar.gz	`1dc3a5a127f8c681...`
*-powerpc64-linux-gnu.tar.gz	`dc91ad99b24ebf78...`
*-riscv64-linux-gnu-debug.tar.gz	`06e2d5833a939e05...`
*-riscv64-linux-gnu.tar.gz	`5c5cb2ee3c9bd502...`
*-win64-codesigning.tar.gz	`c6209c1ca707d1f9...`
*-win64-debug.zip	`24c9dffa23289570...`
*-win64-setup-unsigned.exe	`ac6c72eb706fae09...`
*-win64-unsigned.zip	`172c57fb80690723...`
*-x86_64-apple-darwin-codesigning.tar.gz	`3bd50be9fd6394ed...`
*-x86_64-apple-darwin-unsigned.tar.gz	`f997f5e5d8b4a985...`
*-x86_64-apple-darwin-unsigned.zip	`7d7076556cb08872...`
*-x86_64-linux-gnu-debug.tar.gz	`cd88cf38726b3bd1...`
*-x86_64-linux-gnu.tar.gz	`167828ffdd4cf35e...`
*.tar.gz	`03b7af44eaa38d1f...`	`911be7ed90842f3f...`
SHA256SUMS.part	`744136a93e4ca74f...`
guix_build.log	`31aa59fde5a51374...`	`0d04b82bbe4fec51...`
guix_build.log.diff		`4d77787002f0661e...`

DrahtBot removed the label DrahtBot Guix build requested on Aug 20, 2026

maflcko commented at 4:34 AM on August 20, 2026: member

Are you still working on this, or can it be closed? (The guix build still fails)

fanquake commented at 9:05 AM on August 20, 2026: member

I don't really think we need to do this, so going to close for now.

fanquake closed this on Aug 20, 2026

vicjuma deleted the branch on Aug 20, 2026