QFileDialog fails to use platform-native dialog if static linked #33

issue hebasto openend this issue on July 15, 2020

hebasto commented at 9:21 am on July 15, 2020: member
While investigating #32 I found a buggy (?) behavior of QFileDialog.

From the Qt docs:

By default, a platform-native file dialog will be used if the platform has one.

When Qt and QPA plugin are dynamic linked:
0$ ./src/qt/bitcoin-qt -printtoconsole 12020-07-15T09:15:39Z [main] Bitcoin Core version v0.20.0 (release build) 22020-07-15T09:15:39Z [main] Qt 5.12.8 (dynamic), plugin=xcb (dynamic)
QFileDialog works as expected, and uses a platform-native file dialog.

When Qt and QPA plugin are static linked (gitian builds):
0$ /home/hebasto/bitcoin-0.20.0/bin/bitcoin-qt -printtoconsole 12020-07-15T09:07:04Z Bitcoin Core version v0.20.0 (release build) 22020-07-15T09:07:04Z Qt 5.9.8 (static), plugin=xcb (static)
QFileDialog fails to recognize the platform, and uses a widget-based implementation.

Even running with QT_QPA_PLATFORM=xcb doesn’t help.
hebasto added the label Bug on Jul 15, 2020
hebasto commented at 9:28 am on July 15, 2020: member
https://forum.kde.org/viewtopic.php?t=90626#p172050:

In order to use the native KDE file dialog, you need to link to Qt dynamically.

https://forum.kde.org/viewtopic.php?t=90626#p172100:

This is a limitation in Qt, not KDE. Qt cannot guarantee that plugin loading works on all platforms when being linked statically.

Especially not when the plugin is linked against a different version of Qt.

Could be related:
- https://bugreports.qt.io/browse/QTBUG-14138
- https://bugreports.qt.io/browse/QTBUG-14246
MarcoFalke commented at 9:44 am on July 15, 2020: contributor

So why is the widget based dialog unable to detect any folders?
hebasto commented at 9:47 am on July 15, 2020: member

So why is the widget based dialog unable to detect any folders?

That is the question in #32, and I’m still working on it :)

This issue differs from #32.
ryanofsky commented at 9:51 am on July 15, 2020: contributor

Nice find!
hebasto commented at 5:38 pm on July 16, 2020: member

@MarcoFalke

So why is the widget based dialog unable to detect any folders?

A: https://github.com/bitcoin/bitcoin/pull/19536
hebasto commented at 6:14 pm on August 9, 2020: member

UPDATE: such behavior observed on Linux only.

Static builds work fine on Windows (tested Windows 10) and macOS (tested macOS 10.15.6).
fanquake commented at 5:51 am on August 10, 2020: member

UPDATE: such behavior observed on Linux only.

~~I thought this was fixed by https://github.com/bitcoin/bitcoin/pull/19536?~~

This change partially reverts 248e22b (#16386) and makes QFileDialogs work again for static builds. Fixes bitcoin-core/gui#32.

Right, I see these are separate.

hebasto commented at 4:56 pm on August 10, 2020: member

 0$ make -C depends
 1make: Entering directory '/home/hebasto/guix/GitHub/bitcoin/depends'
 2Extracting qt...
 3/home/hebasto/guix/GitHub/bitcoin/depends/sources/qtbase-opensource-src-5.9.8.tar.xz: OK
 4/home/hebasto/guix/GitHub/bitcoin/depends/sources/qttranslations-opensource-src-5.9.8.tar.xz: OK
 5/home/hebasto/guix/GitHub/bitcoin/depends/sources/qttools-opensource-src-5.9.8.tar.xz: OK
 6Preprocessing qt...
 7...
 8Configuring qt...
 9Creating qmake...
10...
11Done running configuration tests.
12
13Configure summary:
14...
15Qt Widgets:
16  GTK+ ................................... no
17  Styles ................................. Fusion Windows
18...

@theuni Could missed GTK+ support cause this bug?

hebasto commented at 7:30 pm on August 11, 2020: member

This @laanwj’s comment is old enough but seems related:

As I’ve said before many times, I’m not happy about statically linking qt on Linux - and certainly not everything it depends on like font libraries. This should be up to the system. This will mess up appmenu integration in Ubuntu, for example, and other distro-specific customization.

hebasto commented at 11:36 am on August 12, 2020: member

Could missed GTK+ support cause this bug?

It seems missed GTK+ support does not cause this bug. I’ve configured and compiled static Qt with

0Qt Widgets:
1  GTK+ ................................... yes
2  Styles ................................. Fusion Windows

then compiled bitcoin-qt with statically linked Qt:

0$ ldd src/qt/bitcoin-qt | grep -i qt
1# empty output
2$ src/qt/bitcoin-qt -regtest -printtoconsole
32020-08-12T11:25:36Z [main] Bitcoin Core version v0.20.99.0-7c8e2ecf0 (release build)
42020-08-12T11:25:36Z [main] Qt 5.9.8 (static), plugin=xcb (static)
52020-08-12T11:25:36Z [main] System: Linux Mint 20, x86_64-little_endian-lp64
62020-08-12T11:25:36Z [main] Screen: HDMI-2 1600x1200, pixel ratio=1.0
7...

and a widget-based QFileDialog is still openning.

hebasto added the label Linux on Mar 5, 2021
hebasto commented at 4:28 am on June 24, 2021: member
Here is another observation. A non-native QFileDialog requires ICU support, but it is disabled: https://github.com/bitcoin-core/gui/blob/7317e14a44c6efc545e6fb9bcedee7174e93a8fa/depends/packages/qt.mk#L40

As a consequence, users experience Qt warnings every time they open a filesystem dialog:
02021-06-23T15:48:26Z GUI: Case insensitive sorting unsupported in the posix collation implementation 12021-06-23T15:48:26Z GUI: Numeric mode unsupported in the posix collation implementation
Just removing -no-icu is not an option as it introduces new dependencies and exported symbols.

Contributors
hebasto MarcoFalke ryanofsky fanquake

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