qt_cef_poc

Proof of concept of a very simplistic cross-platform Qt browser using Chromium Embedded Framework.

Building

Windows Prerequisites

Before running the build script on Windows, you must have the prerequisites:

• Latest Qt (5.x) installed w/ qmake.exe on the PATH
• Latest CMake installed w/ cmake.exe on the PATH
• Latest Python (2.x) installed w/ python.exe on the PATH
• Latest Go installed w/ go.exe on the PATH
• MSVC 2015 Build Tools installed w/ the following executed to put 64-bit VC compiler on the PATH: "C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft Visual Studio 14.0\VC\vcvarsall.bat" amd64
• Latest Windows 64-bit standard dist of CEF extracted w/ CEF_DIR environment variable set to the base CEF extracted dir
• This repo cloned w/ the shell at the repo root

Linux Prerequisites

Before running the build script on Windows, you must have the prerequisites:

• Latest Qt (5.x) installed w/ qmake on the PATH
• Latest CMake installed w/ cmake on the PATH
• Latest Python (2.x) installed w/ python on the PATH
• Latest Go installed w/ go on the PATH
• Latest GCC installed w/ gcc and g++ on the PATH
• Latest Make installed w/ make on the PATH
• Latest Linux 64-bit standard dist of CEF extracted w/ CEF_DIR environment variable set to the base CEF extracted dir
• Latest GTK 2.x installed and on the library path
• This repo cloned w/ the shell at the repo root

MacOS Prerequisites

(TODO)

Running Build

The application uses the CEF C++ wrapper, which can be built via:

go run build.go build-cef

Now the application can easily be run via:

go run build.go run

That will run the debug version. For the release version, run:

go run build.go run release

Internally, that just builds and runs the exe. To just build, call build instead. To package a deployment artifact from a previously run build, package is used. For example, to package a release deployment artifact from a previously run release build, run:

go run build.go package release

Once complete, the package(s) will in release/package (e.g. qt_cef_poc.zip in Windows)

TODO

• Fix focus issues between browser and URL bar on all platforms
• Move everything but the exe to a sub folder for cleaner deployment
  • For CEF, see this post
  • May need to manually LoadLibrary and/or use SetDllDirectory
  • Consider instead cross platform shortcuts at the top level instead
  • Chrome does this, see their deployment dir and then look at their code on how they do it