Inconsistent dll linkage

[Defohin]

Hi guys, I have a project with subdirs, myproject, pluginmanager, pluginfoo.

I have a header file called pluginmanager_global.hpp with this:

#ifndef PLUGINMANAGER_GLOBAL_HPP
#define PLUGINMANAGER_GLOBAL_HPP

#include <QtCore/qglobal.h>

#if defined(MYPROJECT_LIBRARY)
#  define MYPROJECT_EXPORT Q_DECL_EXPORT
#else
#  define MYPROJECT_EXPORT Q_DECL_IMPORT
#endif

#endif // PLUGINMANAGER_GLOBAL_HPP

I created another library called core with core_global.hpp with the same content of pluginmanager_global.hpp and I wanted to remove pluginmanager_global.hpp then I included on the pro file and tried to use the header but I'm getting an error saying:

PluginManager::qt_static_metacall inconsistent dll linkage

staticMetaObject: inconsistent dll linkage

...

PluginManager::staticMetaObject: definition of dllimport static data member not allowed

Why can't I use a simple header from another library with the exactly same content?

[jsulm]

@Defohin Did you run qmake and did you a complete rebuild after these changes?

[Defohin]

Yes, I did and nothing... The error continues.

[SGaist]

Hi,

Did you properly define MYPROJECT_LIBRARY when building the library and not when using it ?

[Defohin]

@SGaist Yes, DEFINES += CORE_LIBRARY in the core library and DEFINES += PLUGINMANAGER_LIBRARY in the pluginmanager.

[SGaist]

Can you exactly how your project is organised ?

[Defohin]

@SGaist https://forum.qt.io/topic/75042/abstract-plugin-inheritance-error/14

I created another library called core that is not listed there and create the core_global.hpp, tried to include that header on the pluginmanager and I get the errors... - core_global.hpp has the same content as pluginmanager_global.hpp but it only works with it, not with core_global.hpp.

[dheerendra]

Check if your plugin class inherited from QObject and Q_OBJECT is included in private section

[Defohin]

@dheerendra I don't think that it has anything to do with the plugins, and the plugins doesn't inherent from QObject cause AbstractPlugin does that already and if I make a plugin inherent from QObject as well the compiler throws me a warning saying that the two of them is inheriting the same class.

[SGaist]

Did you adjust the define value when changing the header ?

[Defohin]

@SGaist Yes, I did, both the files are exactly equal, the only thing that changes is CORE_LIBRARY and PLUGINMANAGER_LIBRARY, and they are both defined on their related pro files. I just can't use the header from one library on the other one and these errors happen.

[SGaist]

What do you mean by you can't use the header ? What exactly goes wrong ?

[Defohin]

@SGaist I get the errors mentioned above about inconsistent dll linkage.

I'm going to post the entire working code and then I will post the change so you can see what is going on.

Here is the link to download the entire project: download

That is how the structure looks like:

|-- myproject
    |-- myproject.pro
    |-- core
    |   |-- core.pro
    |   |-- core_global.hpp
    |-- myproject
    |   |-- main.cpp
    |   |-- myproject.pro
    |   |-- myprojectwindow.cpp
    |   |-- myprojectwindow.hpp
    |-- pluginmanager
    |   |-- abstractplugin.cpp
    |   |-- abstractplugin.hpp
    |   |-- plugininterface.hpp
    |   |-- pluginmanager.cpp
    |   |-- pluginmanager.hpp
    |   |-- pluginmanager.pro
    |   |-- pluginmanager_global.hpp
    |-- plugins
        |-- plugins.pro
        |-- pluginfoo
            |-- pluginfoo.cpp
            |-- pluginfoo.hpp
            |-- pluginfoo.json
            |-- pluginfoo.pro

myproject.pro

TEMPLATE = subdirs
SUBDIRS  = core \
           pluginmanager \
           plugins \
           myproject
CONFIG  += ordered

core.pro

QT      += core
TARGET   = core
TEMPLATE = lib
DEFINES += CORE_LIBRARY

DESTDIR  = $$OUTPWD/bin

HEADERS += core_global.hpp

core_global.hpp

#ifndef CORE_GLOBAL_HPP
#define CORE_GLOBAL_HPP

#include <QtCore/qglobal.h>

#if defined(CORE_LIBRARY)
#  define MYPROJECT_EXPORT Q_DECL_EXPORT
#else
#  define MYPROJECT_EXPORT Q_DECL_IMPORT
#endif

#endif // CORE_GLOBAL_HPP

main.cpp

#include "myprojectwindow.hpp"
#include <QApplication>

int main(int argc, char *argv[])
{
    QApplication application(argc, argv);

    MyProjectWindow window;
    window.show();

    return application.exec();
}

myproject.pro

QT      += core gui widgets xml network
TARGET   = myproject
TEMPLATE = app
DEFINES += QT_DEPRECATED_WARNINGS
DEFINES += MYPROJECT_LIBRARY

INCLUDEPATH += ../core ../pluginmanager
DESTDIR      = $$OUTPWD/bin
LIBS        += -L$$OUTPWD/bin -lcore -lpluginmanager

HEADERS   += myprojectwindow.hpp
SOURCES   += main.cpp \
             myprojectwindow.cpp

myprojectwindow.cpp

#include "myprojectwindow.hpp"

MyProjectWindow::MyProjectWindow(QWidget *parent) : QMainWindow(parent)
{

}

myprojectwindow.hpp

#ifndef MYPROJECTWINDOW_HPP
#define MYPROJECTWINDOW_HPP

#include <QMainWindow>

class MyProjectWindow : public QMainWindow
{
    Q_OBJECT

public:
    MyProjectWindow(QWidget *parent = 0);
};

#endif // MYPROJECTWINDOW_HPP

abstractplugin.cpp

#include "abstractplugin.hpp"

abstractplugin.hpp

#ifndef ABSTRACTPLUGIN_HPP
#define ABSTRACTPLUGIN_HPP

#include "plugininterface.hpp"

class MYPROJECT_EXPORT AbstractPlugin : public QObject, public PluginInterface
{
    Q_OBJECT
    Q_INTERFACES(PluginInterface)
};

#endif // ABSTRACTPLUGIN_HPP

plugininterface.hpp

#ifndef PLUGININTERFACE_HPP
#define PLUGININTERFACE_HPP

#include "pluginmanager_global.hpp"
#include <QObject>

class MYPROJECT_EXPORT PluginInterface
{
public:
    virtual ~PluginInterface() {}
};

#define PluginInterface_iid "PluginInterface/1.0"

Q_DECLARE_INTERFACE(PluginInterface, PluginInterface_iid)

#endif // PLUGININTERFACE_HPP

pluginmanager.cpp

#include "pluginmanager.hpp"

PluginManager::PluginManager(QObject *parent) : QObject(parent)
{

}

pluginmanager.hpp

#ifndef PLUGINMANAGER_HPP
#define PLUGINMANAGER_HPP

#include "pluginmanager_global.hpp"
#include <QObject>

class MYPROJECT_EXPORT PluginManager : public QObject
{
    Q_OBJECT

public:
    explicit PluginManager(QObject *parent = 0);
};

#endif // PLUGINMANAGER_HPP

pluginmanager.pro

QT      += core
TARGET   = pluginmanager
TEMPLATE = lib
DEFINES += PLUGINMANAGER_LIBRARY

INCLUDEPATH += ../core
DESTDIR      = $$OUTPWD/bin

SOURCES += abstractplugin.cpp \
           pluginmanager.cpp
HEADERS += pluginmanager_global.hpp \
           abstractplugin.hpp \
           pluginmanager.hpp \
           plugininterface.hpp

pluginmanager_global.hpp

#ifndef PLUGINMANAGER_GLOBAL_HPP
#define PLUGINMANAGER_GLOBAL_HPP

#include <QtCore/qglobal.h>

#if defined(PLUGINMANAGER_LIBRARY)
#  define MYPROJECT_EXPORT Q_DECL_EXPORT
#else
#  define MYPROJECT_EXPORT Q_DECL_IMPORT
#endif

#endif // PLUGINMANAGER_GLOBAL_HPP

plugins.pro

TEMPLATE = subdirs
SUBDIRS  = pluginfoo

pluginfoo.cpp

#include "pluginfoo.hpp"

pluginfoo.hpp

#ifndef PLUGINFOO_HPP
#define PLUGINFOO_HPP

#include "abstractplugin.hpp"

class PluginFoo : public AbstractPlugin
{
    Q_OBJECT
    Q_PLUGIN_METADATA(IID PluginInterface_iid FILE "pluginfoo.json") \
    Q_INTERFACES(PluginInterface)
};

#endif // PLUGINFOO_HPP

pluginfoo.json

{}

pluginfoo.pro

QT          += core gui
TARGET       = pluginfoo
TEMPLATE     = lib
CONFIG      += plugin
DEFINES     += QT_DEPRECATED_WARNINGS

INCLUDEPATH += ../../core ../../pluginmanager
DESTDIR      = $$OUTPWD/bin/plugins
LIBS        += -L$$OUTPWD/bin -lcore -lpluginmanager

SOURCES     += pluginfoo.cpp \
               pluginfoo.cpp
HEADERS     += pluginfoo.hpp \
               pluginfoo.hpp
DISTFILES   += pluginfoo.json

The error happens if I change this:

plugininterface.hpp

from:

#include "pluginmanager_global.hpp"

to:

#include "core_global.hpp"

debug\moc_abstractplugin.cpp:56: warning: C4273: 'AbstractPlugin::qt_static_metacall': inconsistent dll linkage

debug\moc_abstractplugin.cpp:63: warning: C4273: 'staticMetaObject': inconsistent dll linkage

debug\moc_abstractplugin.cpp:63: error: C2491: 'AbstractPlugin::staticMetaObject': definition of dllimport static data member not allowed

debug\moc_abstractplugin.cpp:70: warning: C4273: 'AbstractPlugin::metaObject': inconsistent dll linkage

debug\moc_abstractplugin.cpp:75: warning: C4273: 'AbstractPlugin::qt_metacast': inconsistent dll linkage

debug\moc_abstractplugin.cpp:87: warning: C4273: 'AbstractPlugin::qt_metacall': inconsistent dll linkage

Yes, I tried qmake but it doesn't work either.

[Defohin]

Anyone knows how to solve this?

[SGaist]

If you want to use the same export macros everywhere you also have to modify the DEFINES everywhere.

[Defohin]

@SGaist I tried what you said and it worked. But I have a question, do you think that it's right doing that way? I don't want to be repeating code as I was doing. Is there a better way or it's just fine?

[SGaist]

Having a per library global header with the export macros even if it seems redundant is cleaner.

[Defohin]

@SGaist Thank you, I'll keep the original structure then.

[Oliver Broad]

This seems to be the top search result for this warning so I'd like to add a note relating to a case I've found.

I've cloned and built the open-source project "qModMaster", and this warning comes up a lot.

What appears to have happened is that the library "libmodbus" is statically linked into qModMaster, but the libmodbus source assumes it will be implemented as a DLL, so the warnings come up every time it attempts to import/export a function. I believe the inconsistency is that it has both a definition for the function and a directive to import the function.

. #if defined(_MSC_VER)
. # if defined(DLLBUILD)
. /* define DLLBUILD when building the DLL */
. # define MODBUS_API __declspec(dllexport)
. # else
. # define MODBUS_API __declspec(dllimport)
. # endif

In this case the library has been modified after adding it to the project, it isn't a clone so in the short term it is easiest to just define MODBUS_API as nothing.

[SGaist]

@Oliver-Broad said in Inconsistent dll linkage:

qModMaster

Hi and welcome to devnet,

Which version of qModMaster are you talking about ?

From a quick search, the only thing I have found is that libmodbus is a C library so it is not concerned by these export/import considerations and qModMaster does not use it as a library but compiles the sources it uses directly into the executable.