QtCreator reports lots of headers as "not found"

cristian-adam

You should run the Visual Studio Installer and do any updates that it thinks it needs to be done.

By running cmd.exe and then:

call "C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft Visual Studio\2022\BuildTools\VC\Auxiliary\Build\vcvars64.bat"

(adjust to your local setup C:\Program Files (x86) -> C:\Program Files, and BuildTools -> Professional | Community | Enterprise)

You will then get the environment where you can run the Visual C++ compilers - cl.exe.

In my case it looks like:

**********************************************************************
** Visual Studio 2022 Developer Command Prompt v17.6.0
** Copyright (c) 2022 Microsoft Corporation
**********************************************************************
[vcvarsall.bat] Environment initialized for: 'x64'

With:

set | findstr /i ^^INCLUDE=

You can then see the paths that the compiler will look after files.

Qt Creator when it registers the Visual C++ compilers runs the same vcvars64.bat to collect the environment variables.

With Ctrl+Shift+F12 (Tools -> Debug Qt Creator -> Inspect C++ Code Model) you can have some information about what Qt Creator considers to be available.

I have math.h under:

"c:\Program Files (x86)\Windows Kits\10\Include\10.0.22000.0\ucrt\math.h"

and this path is part of the INCLUDE environment variable from above.

On Windows setting up a working Visual C++ compiler can be a bit complicated. More than just unpacking an archive.

JoeCFD

@bleriot13 Often magic happens when Windows is rebooted.

bleriot13

Hi once more.

I'm on the verge of desperation.

Following a mix of the advice given by all of you I have gone through the steps below:

Updated MSVC using the MSVC installer.
Uninstalled Qt completely.
Deleted the Qt settings in %appdata%\QtProject and %localappdata%\QtProject (not the contents of these folders but the folders themselves, so no trace of settings remained).
Removed all temporary files using Bleachbit.
Cleaned the registry using Glarysoft Registry Cleaner.
Restarted the computer.
Installed Qt from scratch.

The problem persists.

If I show the paths used by Qt using Tools -> Debug Qt Creator -> Inspect C++ Code Model I get the following:

The red rectangle points to the paths that seem to indicate include directories. There, there's no trace of the actual path where one of the missing header files (math.h, for instance) is located:

C:\Program Files (x86)\Windows Kits\10\Include\10.0.22000.0\ucrt

a folder which is the same as the one given by cristian-adam.

My last hope is to UNINSTALL everything (MSVC, Qt) and start again. This is what I'm going to do right now. If this doesn't work, I don't know what else can I do.

cristian-adam

Big uff @bleriot13 ! It shouldn't be that hard to get a working MSVC installation.

Alternatively you could try a different way of installing Visual Studio, via a package manager (Chocolatey):

$ choco install visualstudio2022buildtools
$ choco install windows-sdk-11-version-22H2-all

Then at the end I start the "Visual Studio Installer" from start menu and selected "Desktop Development with C++".

I only need Visual Studio BuildTools and not Community.

bleriot13

No joy.

This time I have uninstalled everything, cleaned preferences, registry and temporary files.

The result is exactly the same. However, there's something I have noticed that is related to the MSVC compiler.

If you open an "x64 Native Tools Command Prompt" using the MSVC 2022 entry in Windows Start menu, the vcvars64.bat batch file is automatically executed. Therefore, issuing the "SET" command lists the environment variables set in such a way that the compiler (cl.exe) may work properly.

Well, just after installing MSCV 2022 from scratch and before installing Qt, I opened the said command prompt and typed "set". The result is shown below:

ALLUSERSPROFILE=C:\ProgramData
APPDATA=C:\Users\cttc\AppData\Roaming
CommandPromptType=Native
CommonProgramFiles=C:\Program Files\Common Files
CommonProgramFiles(x86)=C:\Program Files (x86)\Common Files
CommonProgramW6432=C:\Program Files\Common Files
COMPUTERNAME=LTJANAVARRO
ComSpec=C:\WINDOWS\system32\cmd.exe
DevEnvDir=C:\Program Files\Microsoft Visual Studio\2022\Community\Common7\IDE\
DriverData=C:\Windows\System32\Drivers\DriverData
EFC_4820=1
ExtensionSdkDir=C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft SDKs\Windows Kits\10\ExtensionSDKs
EXTERNAL_INCLUDE=C:\Program Files\Microsoft Visual Studio\2022\Community\VC\Tools\MSVC\14.36.32532\include;C:\Program Files\Microsoft Visual Studio\2022\Community\VC\Tools\MSVC\14.36.32532\ATLMFC\include;C:\Program Files\Microsoft Visual Studio\2022\Community\VC\Auxiliary\VS\include
Framework40Version=v4.0
FrameworkDir=C:\Windows\Microsoft.NET\Framework64\
FrameworkDir64=C:\Windows\Microsoft.NET\Framework64\
FrameworkVersion=v4.0.30319
FrameworkVersion64=v4.0.30319
GDAL_DATA=C:\Program Files\PostgreSQL\13\gdal-data
GEOSERVER_DATA_DIR=C:\ProgramData\GeoServer
GEOSERVER_HOME=C:\Program Files\GeoServer
HOMEDRIVE=C:
HOMEPATH=\Users\cttc
INCLUDE=C:\Program Files\Microsoft Visual Studio\2022\Community\VC\Tools\MSVC\14.36.32532\include;C:\Program Files\Microsoft Visual Studio\2022\Community\VC\Tools\MSVC\14.36.32532\ATLMFC\include;C:\Program Files\Microsoft Visual Studio\2022\Community\VC\Auxiliary\VS\include
JAVA_HOME=C:\Program Files\Java\jdk-11
LIB=C:\Program Files\Microsoft Visual Studio\2022\Community\VC\Tools\MSVC\14.36.32532\ATLMFC\lib\x64;C:\Program Files\Microsoft Visual Studio\2022\Community\VC\Tools\MSVC\14.36.32532\lib\x64
LIBPATH=C:\Program Files\Microsoft Visual Studio\2022\Community\VC\Tools\MSVC\14.36.32532\ATLMFC\lib\x64;C:\Program Files\Microsoft Visual Studio\2022\Community\VC\Tools\MSVC\14.36.32532\lib\x64;C:\Program Files\Microsoft Visual Studio\2022\Community\VC\Tools\MSVC\14.36.32532\lib\x86\store\references;C:\Windows\Microsoft.NET\Framework64\v4.0.30319
LOCALAPPDATA=C:\Users\cttc\AppData\Local
LOGONSERVER=\\LTJANAVARRO
NUMBER_OF_PROCESSORS=8
OneDrive=C:\Users\cttc\OneDrive - Centre Tecnol•gic de Telecomunicacions de Catalunya
OneDriveCommercial=C:\Users\cttc\OneDrive - Centre Tecnol•gic de Telecomunicacions de Catalunya
OPENCV_DIR=C:\Users\cttc\ODjnavarro\jnavarro\Dev2\opensource_libraries\opencv3
OS=Windows_NT
Path=C:\Program Files\Microsoft Visual Studio\2022\Community\VC\Tools\MSVC\14.36.32532\bin\HostX64\x64;C:\Program Files\Microsoft Visual Studio\2022\Community\Common7\IDE\VC\VCPackages;C:\Program Files\Microsoft Visual Studio\2022\Community\Common7\IDE\CommonExtensions\Microsoft\TestWindow;C:\Program Files\Microsoft Visual Studio\2022\Community\Common7\IDE\CommonExtensions\Microsoft\TeamFoundation\Team Explorer;C:\Program Files\Microsoft Visual Studio\2022\Community\MSBuild\Current\bin\Roslyn;C:\Program Files\Microsoft Visual Studio\2022\Community\Team Tools\Performance Tools\x64;C:\Program Files\Microsoft Visual Studio\2022\Community\Team Tools\Performance Tools;C:\Program Files\Microsoft Visual Studio\2022\Community\\MSBuild\Current\Bin\amd64;C:\Windows\Microsoft.NET\Framework64\v4.0.30319;C:\Program Files\Microsoft Visual Studio\2022\Community\Common7\IDE\;C:\Program Files\Microsoft Visual Studio\2022\Community\Common7\Tools\;C:\Users\cttc\ODjnavarro\jnavarro\Dev2\ADAtools\installer\deployment\bin;C:\Program Files\Microsoft SQL Server\150\Tools\Binn\;C:\Program Files\dotnet\;C:\Users\cttc\AppData\Local\Microsoft\WindowsApps;C:\Users\cttc\AppData\Local\Programs\MiKTeX\miktex\bin\x64\;C:\Program Files\Microsoft Visual Studio\2022\Community\Common7\IDE\CommonExtensions\Microsoft\CMake\CMake\bin;C:\Program Files\Microsoft Visual Studio\2022\Community\Common7\IDE\CommonExtensions\Microsoft\CMake\Ninja;C:\Program Files\Microsoft Visual Studio\2022\Community\Common7\IDE\VC\Linux\bin\ConnectionManagerExe;C:\Program Files\Microsoft Visual Studio\2022\Community\VC\vcpkg
PATHEXT=.COM;.EXE;.BAT;.CMD;.VBS;.VBE;.JS;.JSE;.WSF;.WSH;.MSC
PGPASSFILE=%APPDATA%\postgresql\pgpass.conf
Platform=x64
POSTGIS_ENABLE_OUTDB_RASTERS=1
POSTGIS_GDAL_ENABLED_DRIVERS=GTiff PNG JPEG GIF XYZ DTED USGSDEM AAIGrid
PROCESSOR_ARCHITECTURE=AMD64
PROCESSOR_IDENTIFIER=Intel64 Family 6 Model 142 Stepping 12, GenuineIntel
PROCESSOR_LEVEL=6
PROCESSOR_REVISION=8e0c
ProgramData=C:\ProgramData
ProgramFiles=C:\Program Files
ProgramFiles(x86)=C:\Program Files (x86)
ProgramW6432=C:\Program Files
PROJ_LIB=C:\Program Files\PostgreSQL\13\share\contrib\postgis-3.1\proj
PROMPT=$P$G
PSModulePath=C:\Program Files\WindowsPowerShell\Modules;C:\WINDOWS\system32\WindowsPowerShell\v1.0\Modules
PUBLIC=C:\Users\Public
PYTHONPATH=C:\Users\cttc\jnavarro\Dev2\python
SESSIONNAME=Console
SystemDrive=C:
SystemRoot=C:\WINDOWS
TEMP=C:\Users\cttc\AppData\Local\Temp
TMP=C:\Users\cttc\AppData\Local\Temp
USERDOMAIN=LTJANAVARRO
USERDOMAIN_ROAMINGPROFILE=LTJANAVARRO
USERNAME=janavarro
USERPROFILE=C:\Users\cttc
VCIDEInstallDir=C:\Program Files\Microsoft Visual Studio\2022\Community\Common7\IDE\VC\
VCINSTALLDIR=C:\Program Files\Microsoft Visual Studio\2022\Community\VC\
VCPKG_ROOT=C:\Program Files\Microsoft Visual Studio\2022\Community\VC\vcpkg
VCToolsInstallDir=C:\Program Files\Microsoft Visual Studio\2022\Community\VC\Tools\MSVC\14.36.32532\
VCToolsRedistDir=C:\Program Files\Microsoft Visual Studio\2022\Community\VC\Redist\MSVC\14.36.32532\
VCToolsVersion=14.36.32532
VisualStudioVersion=17.0
VS140COMNTOOLS=C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft Visual Studio 14.0\Common7\Tools\
VS170COMNTOOLS=C:\Program Files\Microsoft Visual Studio\2022\Community\Common7\Tools\
VSCMD_ARG_app_plat=Desktop
VSCMD_ARG_HOST_ARCH=x64
VSCMD_ARG_TGT_ARCH=x64
VSCMD_VER=17.6.0
VSINSTALLDIR=C:\Program Files\Microsoft Visual Studio\2022\Community\
windir=C:\WINDOWS
WindowsLibPath=References\CommonConfiguration\Neutral
WindowsSDKLibVersion=winv6.3\
WindowsSDKVersion=\
ZES_ENABLE_SYSMAN=1
__DOTNET_ADD_64BIT=1
__DOTNET_PREFERRED_BITNESS=64
__VSCMD_PREINIT_PATH=C:\Users\cttc\ODjnavarro\jnavarro\Dev2\ADAtools\installer\deployment\bin;C:\Program Files\Microsoft SQL Server\150\Tools\Binn\;C:\Program Files\dotnet\;C:\Users\cttc\AppData\Local\Microsoft\WindowsApps;C:\Users\cttc\AppData\Local\Programs\MiKTeX\miktex\bin\x64\

If you take a look to the INCLUDE variable, you'll see that its contents is exactly the same that I presented in screenshot showing the "C++ Code Model Inspector - Qt Creator" a few posts before.

So, if MSCV 2022 does not include the complete list of include directories to look for when executing vcvars64.bat, Qt will never be able to learn where are they!!!

Obviously, after installing Qt I've got exactly the same results: the list of folders to look for headers is, once more, the one reported in the said image, so my code does not compile.

Curiously, compiling a simple C++ program using any of the offending headers (such as "math.h" or "string.h" using MSVC 2022 instead of Qt works without problems.

So, having arrived to this point, I'm afraid there is nothing else I can do to solve the problem. My only guess is that, maybe, it is possible, somehow, to add manually the missing paths to Qt creator, but a quick Google search seems to contradict me. The usual answer is "you can't add MSVC manually, it must be autodetected".

Any ideas from the experts?

Thanks.

bleriot13

Oh, my God.

I have installed MSVC 2022 in my wife's laptop, which has never seen a compiler in its life, and there the INCLUDE variable is perfect, listing all the necessary paths located in c:\Program Files (x86)\Windows Kits\10\Include\10.0.22000.0* (the ones my laptop does not have).

So, by some unknown reason, when I try to install MSVC 2022 in MY laptop, something goes wrong in spite of all the cleaning made.

I know that this goes beyond the scope of this forum but, any ideas about what to do so the MSVC 2022 installer thinks that it's working in a brand new computer, with no history behind that might lead to this undesirable problem???

Thanks.

cristian-adam

Maybe Repair Visual Studio helps somehow. 🤞

JonB

@bleriot13 said in QtCreator reports lots of headers as "not found":

any ideas about what to d

Yes: how about asking your wife to do the programming for you? ;-)
Sorry, couldn't help it.

Very difficult to help with this remotely. If necessary/just for testing, why don't you set your machine's INCLUDE or whatever to be the same as hers?

bleriot13

@JonB Unfortunately, none of your two suggestions will work. First, programming is not exactly the kind of activity my wife would choose to make a living :-) so I discarded this solution immediately.

Concerning the second one, the INCLUDE variable is set by a chain of batch files, since QtCreator uses these to retrieve the value of this and others environment vars. Changing these batch files is firstly difficult and secondly undesirable, since any update of the underlying MSVC 2022 compiler will restore these.

At any rate, thanks for trying. I know that helping remotely is complicated.

bleriot13

@cristian-adam This is what I'm doing right now, but I have no faith on this working at all. I'm starting to consider reinstalling Windows... :-(

JonB

@bleriot13
If you don't want to change the supplied MSVC batch files, you can always e.g. simply add an extra batch file which is invoked after them and alters/adds to INCLUDE variable. Just saying.

cristian-adam

Re-installing Windows from time to time is a good idea. Forces you to think about things, where to store information, how to backup etc.

You could try two things:

Open Qt Creator from a Visual Studio Command Prompt, where I assume that the INCLUDE, LIB and PATH environment variables contain the necessary paths needed to compile the project.
With set INCLUDE=%INCLUDE% paths could be prepended or appended.
If Qt Creator works fine, one could then add in the Qt Creator's Preferences -> Environment -> System -> Environment the INCLUDE, LIB, and PATH values.

They would be global, affect all kits, but hopefully work as expected.

PATH=${PATH};\some\extrapath is the format of Qt Creator's macro expansion.

bleriot13

@cristian-adam This is a very good suggestion. In fact, in one of my previous posts I was asking where these variables could be set.

At any rate, it is much more than just probable that I will reinstall Windows. If things start to fail like in this case, I think it's time to reset the system.

Thanks!

bleriot13

Well, reinstalling Windows did the trick. Now everything works as it always did.

A pity that posting in MS Visual Studio help forum takes about two weeks to get an answer. Or at least, this is what the bot that first answers you says.

Two weeks, yes.

Thanks to all of you.