qmake generates bogus Makefiles

[dave2]

Hi,

I use Qt 4.7.3 on Linux, and I am facing weird qmake behavior. I have tried to narrow the problem down to the following minimal example:

I have a directory, qmake_example, which contains two files:

$ cat qmake_example.pro 
CONFIG += debug_and_release
 
release: DESTDIR = release
debug:   DESTDIR = debug
 
SOURCES += main.cpp
 
$ cat main.cpp 
int main()
{
    return 0;
}

$ cat qmake_example.pro 
CONFIG += debug_and_release

release: DESTDIR = release
debug:   DESTDIR = debug

SOURCES += main.cpp

$ cat main.cpp 
int main()
{
    return 0;
}

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As you can see:
1. I want to be able to build the project in debug and/or release mode.
2. I want to keep the generated binaries in build subdirectories separate from the source directory.

First I run qmake, which generates the expected Makefiles and build subdirectories:

$ ls
main.cpp  qmake_example.pro
$ qmake
$ ls
debug     Makefile        Makefile.Release   release
main.cpp  Makefile.Debug  qmake_example.pro

$ ls
main.cpp  qmake_example.pro
$ qmake
$ ls
debug     Makefile        Makefile.Release   release
main.cpp  Makefile.Debug  qmake_example.pro

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Then I run make to generate both debug and release builds:

$ make debug release # I also tried the equivalent 'make all'
<g++'s output lines, no warnings, no errors>

$ make debug release # I also tried the equivalent 'make all'
<g++'s output lines, no warnings, no errors>

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But then, surprise: the binary is generated only for debug:

$ ls debug/
main.o  qmake_example
$ ls release/
main.o

$ ls debug/
main.o  qmake_example
$ ls release/
main.o

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The problem is in Makefile.Release, which contains (among other lines):

# Makefile for building: debug/qmake_example
[more lines]
DESTDIR       = debug/
TARGET        = debug/qmake_example
[more lines]
@$(CHK_DIR_EXISTS) debug/ || $(MKDIR) debug/ 
[more lines]

# Makefile for building: debug/qmake_example
[more lines]
DESTDIR       = debug/
TARGET        = debug/qmake_example
[more lines]
@$(CHK_DIR_EXISTS) debug/ || $(MKDIR) debug/ 
[more lines]

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What am I doing wrong? How should I write my .pro file / invke qmake in order to have Makefile.Release refer to directory release instead of debug?

[jefftee]

Here's what I use in my qmake pro files and works for me:

CONFIG(debug, debug|release) {
    DESTDIR = build/debug
} else {
    DESTDIR = build/release
}

CONFIG(debug, debug|release) {
    DESTDIR = build/debug
} else {
    DESTDIR = build/release
}

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