Quote Originally Posted by wysota View Post
openssl-linked means OpenSSL libraries are linked to QtNetwork library meaning that each application using QtNetwork needs OpenSSL regardless whether it is actually using it or not. Without openssl-linked openssl dependency is resolved at runtime when SSL functionality is required. This has nothing to do with having OpenSSL linked statically or not - in both cases a dynamic OpenSSL library is used. If you want everything in one binary, you need to have all your application's dependencies (like Qt) and all those dependencies dependencies (like OpenSSL) and their depenencies built statically. Only then you will get "one huge binary to rule them"
Interesting, so under what circumstances would openssl-linked be advantageous?

I'm really confused now. My copy of OpenSSL seems like it must be compiled statically, because I've wiped out everything in the OpenSSL directory except for the .a static libraries, and the /include/.h header include files. Nevertheless, when my application compiles, it's still demanding the OpenSSL dlls (and no other DLLs, as everything else from QT to other 3rd party libraries has been compiled in statically).