Qt Creator fails to open

[Darroch]

I recently installed the qt-sdk (version 2ubuntu3) on an old PC (AthlonXP 2000+) under Linux Mint 17 via the Software Manager. Four applications appeared to have been successfully installed namely Qt Designer 4, Qt Linguist 4, Qt Assistant 4, all of which seem to run properly, and Qt Creator (Qt Creator 3.0.1 based on Qt 5.2.1) which starts for a few seconds and then fails to open. Running Qt Creator from a terminal (qtcreator) produces the cryptic message "Illegal Instruction".

(AthlonXPs don't have the sse2 instruction set built into the CPU and I have seen "Illegal instruction" appear when trying to run programmes compiled to use sse2. However, since three out of the four Qt-SDK applications run successfully and hence cannot need sse2 my natural assumption is that Qt Creator should also run with non-sse2 processors.)

Anybody else had this problem? Or know how to get Qt Creator working? Is there a solution or is the problem hardware based? I assumed that the package I downloaded from the Linux Mint repository would contain everything necessary to install and make the Qt software usable. Do I need to download and install further libraries/packages to use Qt Designer? If so which ones? Any help or advice would be welcome. Thank you in advance.

[Spearmint2]

http://www.agner.org/optimize/blog/read.php?i=118#49

You'll need to fake your CPUID to an Intel chip or one with sse2.

a thread of those attempting it using a virtual machine.

https://communities.vmware.com/thread/4 ... 0&tstart=0

[Darroch]

Thanks for that.

If worst comes to worst I will give it a go.

However: Since I previously had Qt Creator working last year on this system (under Linux Mint 15 - Olivia) I'm wondering whether a simpler solution to my problem might be to try to get an older legacy version installed. I believe qt-project.org has an archive containing all previous versions; trouble is I can't remember which version of Qt Creator worked properly on this machine.

If anybody still has Qt Creator (or the full qt-sdk) working on a non-sse2 system, like mine with an AthlonXP, I would very much appreciate it if you could tell me which version works.

Thanks for the advice and thanks for reading.

[Mute Ant]

The situation is similar to the transition from i386 without an i387 floating point unit to i486, where programmers knew floating point instructions would always work.

Possible Solutions [in no special order]...

o Compile the software you want on the machine where you want to use it. Proper 'NIX solution, a huge amount of learning, blood, sweat, tears etc etc. The compiler will take note of the CPU abilities and generate machine-code that works.

o Sneak behind the back of the package-manager. Manually download and unpack the Debian Stable qtcreator package you want and move the contents into /usr/local/. Linux doesn't care where a binary came from; it's like you compiled it yourself. Make a note of every file you add, so you can remove them again. Run ''ldconfig'' so Linux knows something has been added.

o Use hardware that supports the software you want to install. I am amazed a generic Mint17 doesn't just fall over anyway.

o Change the OS to LMDE-32. Comes with a plain-vanilla 486 sticker and a qtcreator package compiled to match.

o Find, install and activate an SSE2 exception trap, to ''upgrade'' the CPU abilities in software.

o Inform Ubuntu that their compiled version is less-than-perfect in the portability department + ignore the mocking laughter.

[Darroch]

Cheers! What a pain. I am surprised that the open source community are dropping support for older processors without warning considering that many people in the third world do use old equipment and look to open source for operating systems and software to enable them to use those systems. I suppose initially I'll try to dig up an old version of Qt Creator (Qt-SDK 3.x open source work fine with MinGw under Windows XP on this very machine) then try compiling the application from source (which on a machine as old as this with 1 GB of SDRAM ain't much fun) and proceed from there. The only reason I haven't upgraded my hardware is that the PC I'm using dual boots with WIndows XP which has hundred of gigabytes of assorted software, code and other stuff on it which I dread having to re-install/transfer to a new Windows system. Again thanks for the detailed advice which I hope will enable me to squeeze a bit more life out of my Athlon XP.

[Darroch]

SOLUTION!

After installing the qt-sdk package in Linux Mint 17 (Trusty) I was disappointed to discover that Qt Creator wouldn't open due to the fact that my CPU, an Athlon XP, had no sse2 instruction set. Most of the sdk was Qt4: Assistant, Designer and Linguist all worked fine. After playing about a little here's the quick and dirty solution I used to get an earlier version of Qt Creator working on my system.


So if you've downloaded qt-sdk from the trusty (or later) repository and find that all is well (Qt Designer, Qt Assistant and Qt Linguist all open) except that Qt Creator doesn't open (giving the “illegal instruction” message when run from a terminal) chances are your system has a CPU without the sse2 instruction set; the version of Qt Creator in the trusty repository is compiled to use sse2.

This happened to me on my old AthlonXP system.

Now, if you want a working version of Qt Creator to use with the trusty version of the qt-sdk here's a quick and dirty way to fenagle it.

1.

Download the qtcreator_2.4.1-0ubuntu10_i386.deb from http://packages.ubuntu.com

(For i386 use: http://packages.ubuntu.com/precise/i386 ... r/download)

and download its associated help file:

qtcreator-doc_2.4.1-0ubuntu2_all.deb

(For i386 use: http://packages.ubuntu.com/precise/all/ ... c/download)

2.

Create a writeable directory somewhere for files in the packages above. I decided to put the files in my home directory, e.g.,

/home/<username>/qtcreator2.4.1

3.

Use the archive manager on your system to extract the usr directory inside the qtcreator_2.4.1-0ubuntu10_i386.deb package to the qtcreator2.4.1 directory, or whatever you called it, mentioned above. Do the same with the file qtcreator.qch file inside the folder /usr/share/qtcreator/doc in the qtcreator-doc_2.4.1-0ubuntu2_all.deb file.

4.

Create a launcher on your desktop, or menu, to the executable file qtcreator in the bin directory inside the directory you previously extracted the qtcreator_2.4.1-0ubuntu10_i386.deb package files. In the example I've given this would be the /home/<username>/qtcreator2.4.1/usr/bin directory.

(The icon for the launcher can be selected from /home/<username>/qtcreator2.4.1usr/share/icons)

5.
You should now be able to execute Qt Creator by double-clicking the launcher you kust created. In order to use the appropriate helpfile you need to register the file using Qt Creator via Tools->Help->Documentation->Add then browse to and select the qtcreator.qch which you extracted above.

All done and dusted! You now have a working version of Qt Creator 2.4.1!

To complete the installation install the qt4-demos package from Synaptic and you will be able to browse all of the Qt demos and examples while inside Qt Creator, which is great for learning.

[Spearmint2]

the PC I'm using dual boots with WIndows XP which has hundred of gigabytes of assorted software, code and other stuff on it which I dread having to re-install/transfer to a new Windows system.

When you do move up on the windows side and have old software that refuses to install, there's a trick to get around it. Run the install program itself in compatibility mode. Right clk and choose compatibility and then run the install file and it likely will install OK. I had an old Broadcom 56k modem on a computer I setup with Vista as a giveaway, and the install file refused with a note about it not being the correct system or some such. On a lark I ran the install file itself in compatibility mode and it did perfect, and worked perfect for the new user still on dialup.