wxWidgets: Preprocessor Symbols

| Version: 3.1.5

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Preprocessor Symbols

These are preprocessor symbols used in the wxWidgets source, grouped by category (and sorted by alphabetical order inside each category).

All of these macros except for the `wxUSE_XXX` variety is defined if the corresponding condition is true and undefined if it isn't, so they should be always tested using #ifdef and not #if.

# GUI system

WXBASE | Only wxBase, no GUI features (same as `wxUSE_GUI` == 0)
WXDFB | wxUniversal using DirectFB
WXGTK | GTK+
WXGTK127 | GTK+ 1.2.7 or higher
WXGTK20 | GTK+ 2.0 (2.6) or higher
WXGTK210 | GTK+ 2.10 or higher
WXGTK218 | GTK+ 2.18 or higher
WXGTK220 | GTK+ 2.20 or higher
WXMAC | old define, same as WXOSX
WXMOTIF | Motif
WXMOTIF20 | Motif 2.0 or higher
WXMSW | GUI using Windows Controls. Notice that for compatibility reasons, this symbol is defined for console applications under Windows as well, but it should only be used in the GUI code while WINDOWS should be used for the platform tests.
WXOSX | OS X GUI using any Apple widget framework (AppKit or UIKit)
WXOSX_IPHONE | iPhone (UIKit)
WXOSX_COCOA | macOS using Cocoa (AppKit)
WXOSX_MAC | macOS (Cocoa)
WXPM | OS/2 native Presentation Manager (not used any longer).
WXSTUBS | Stubbed version ('template' wxWin implementation)
WXXT | Xt; mutually exclusive with WX_MOTIF, not implemented in wxWidgets 2.x
WXX11 | wxX11 (WXUNIVERSAL will be also defined)
WXWINE | WINE (i.e. WIN32 on Unix)
WXUNIVERSAL | wxUniversal port, always defined in addition to one of the symbols above so this should be tested first.
X | any X11-based GUI toolkit except GTK+

wxOSX is the successor of the venerable wxMac, it currently exists in two versions: Cocoa for the desktop and a very early iPhone port. To summarize:

- If you want to test for wxOSX on the desktop, use WXOSX_MAC.
- If you want to test for wxOSX on the iPhone, use WXOSX_IPHONE.
- If you want to test for any port under macOS, including, for example, wxGTK and also wxBase, use DARWIN (see below).

The convention is to use the __WX prefix for these symbols, although this has not always been followed.

# Operating Systems

APPLE | any Mac OS version
AIX | AIX
BSD | Any *BSD system
CYGWIN | Cygwin: Unix on Win32
DARWIN | OS X (with BSD C library), using any port (see also WXOSX)
DATA_GENERAL | DG-UX
FREEBSD | FreeBSD
HPUX | HP-UX (Unix)
GNU | GNU Hurd
LINUX | Linux
MACH | Mach-O Architecture (OS X only builds)
OSF | OSF/1
QNX | QNX Neutrino RTOS
SGI | IRIX
SOLARIS | Solaris
SUN | Any Sun
SUNOS | Sun OS
SVR4 | SystemV R4
SYSV | SystemV generic
ULTRIX | Ultrix
UNIX | any Unix
UNIX_LIKE | Unix, BeOS or VMS
VMS | VMS
WINDOWS | Any Windows platform, using any port (see also WXMSW)
WIN16 | Win16 API (not supported since wxWidgets 2.6)
WIN32 | Win32 API
WIN64 | Win64 (mostly same as Win32 but data type sizes are different)
WINE | Wine

# Hardware Architectures (CPU)

Note that not all of these symbols are always defined, it depends on the compiler used.

ALPHA | DEC Alpha architecture
INTEL | Intel i386 or compatible
IA64 | Intel 64 bit architecture
POWERPC | Motorola Power PC

# Compilers

BORLANDC | Borland C++. The value of the macro corresponds to the compiler version: 500 is 5.0 (not used any more).
DIGITALMARS | Digital Mars (not used any more).
GNUG | Gnu C++ on any platform, see also wxCHECK_GCC_VERSION
GNUWIN32 | Gnu-Win32 compiler, see also wxCHECK_W32API_VERSION
INTELC | Intel C++ compiler
MINGW32 | Either MinGW32 or MinGW-w64 in either 32 or 64 bits
__MINGW32_TOOLCHAIN | MinGW32 only (32 bits only right now)
MINGW64 | MinGW-w64 in 64 bit builds
MINGW64_TOOLCHAIN | MinGW-w64 in either 32 or 64 bit builds
SUNCC | Sun CC, see also wxCHECK_SUNCC_VERSION
SYMANTECC | Symantec C++ (not used any more).
VISAGECPP | IBM Visual Age (OS/2) (not used any more).
VISUALC | Microsoft Visual C++, see also wxCHECK_VISUALC_VERSION. The value of this macro corresponds to the compiler version: `1020` for `4.2` (the first supported version), `1100` for `5.0`, `1200` for `6.0` and so on. For convenience, the symbols VISUALCn are also defined for each major compiler version from 5 to 12, i.e. you can use tests such as #ifdef __VISUALC7__ to test for compiler version being precisely 7.
XLC | AIX compiler
WATCOMC | Watcom C++. The value of this macro corresponds to the compiler version, `1100` is `11.0` and `1200` is OpenWatcom (not used any more).

# Feature Tests

Some library features may not be always available even if they were selected by the user. To make it possible to check if this is the case, the library predefines the symbols in the form `wxHAS_FEATURE`. Unlike `wxUSE_FEATURE` symbols which are defined by the library user (directly in `setup.h` or by running configure script) and which must be always defined as either 0 or 1, the `wxHAS` symbols are only defined if the corresponding feature is available and not defined at all otherwise.

Currently the following symbols exist:

wxHAS_3STATE_CHECKBOX | Defined if wxCheckBox supports wxCHK_3STATE flag, i.e. is capable of showing three states and not only the usual two. Currently defined for almost all ports.
wxHAS_ATOMIC_OPS | Defined if wxAtomicInc() and wxAtomicDec() functions have an efficient (CPU-specific) implementation. Notice that the functions themselves are always available but can be prohibitively slow to use when implemented in a generic way, using a critical section.
wxHAS_BITMAPTOGGLEBUTTON | Defined in `wx/tglbtn.h` if wxBitmapToggleButton class is available in addition to wxToggleButton.
wxHAS_CONFIG_TEMPLATE_RW | Defined if the currently used compiler supports template Read() and Write() methods in wxConfig.
wxHAS_MEMBER_DEFAULT | Defined if the currently used compiler supports C++11 `=default`.
wxHAS_LARGE_FILES | Defined if wxFile supports files more than 4GB in size (notice that you must include `wx/filefn.h` before testing for this symbol).
wxHAS_LARGE_FFILES | Defined if wxFFile supports files more than 4GB in size (notice that you must include `wx/filefn.h` before testing for this symbol).
wxHAS_LONG_LONG_T_DIFFERENT_FROM_LONG | Defined if compiler supports a 64 bit integer type (available as `wxLongLong_t`) and this type is different from long. Notice that, provided wxUSE_LONGLONG is not turned off, some 64 bit type is always available to wxWidgets programs and this symbol only indicates a presence of such primitive type. It is useful to decide whether some function should be overloaded for both `long` and `long long` types.
wxHAS_MULTIPLE_FILEDLG_FILTERS | Defined if wxFileDialog supports multiple ('|'-separated) filters.
wxHAS_NATIVE_ANIMATIONCTRL | Defined if native wxAnimationCtrl class is being used (this symbol only exists in wxWidgets 3.1.4 and later).
wxHAS_NATIVE_DATAVIEWCTRL | Defined if native wxDataViewCtrl class is being used (this symbol only exists in wxWidgets 3.1.4 and later).
wxHAS_NATIVE_WINDOW | Defined if wxNativeWindow class is available.
wxHAS_NOEXCEPT | Defined if the currently used compiler supports C++11 `noexcept`. `wxNOEXCEPT` is defined as this keyword in this case, and as nothing otherwise.
wxHAS_NULLPTR_T | Defined if the currently used compiler supports C++11 `nullptr`.
wxHAS_IMAGES_IN_RESOURCES | Defined if Windows resource files or OS/2 resource files are available on the current platform.
wxHAS_POWER_EVENTS | Defined if wxPowerEvent are ever generated on the current platform.
wxHAS_RADIO_MENU_ITEMS | Defined if the current port supports radio menu items (see wxMenu::AppendRadioItem).
wxHAS_RAW_BITMAP | Defined if direct access to bitmap data using the classes in `wx/rawbmp.h` is supported.
wxHAS_RAW_KEY_CODES | Defined if raw key codes (see wxKeyEvent::GetRawKeyCode are supported.
wxHAS_REGEX_ADVANCED | Defined if advanced syntax is available in wxRegEx.
wxHAS_TASK_BAR_ICON | Defined if wxTaskBarIcon is available on the current platform.
wxHAS_WINDOW_LABEL_IN_STATIC_BOX | Defined if wxStaticBox::Create() overload taking `wxWindow*` instead of the text label is available on the current platform.
wxHAS_MODE_T | Defined when wxWidgets defines `mode_t` typedef for the compilers not providing it. If another library used in a wxWidgets application, such as ACE (http://www.cs.wustl.edu/~schmidt/ACE.html), also defines `mode_t`, this symbol can be predefined after including the other library header, such as `"ace/os_include/sys/os_types.h"` in ACE case, but before including any wxWidgets headers, to prevent a definition conflict.

# MSVC-specific Symbols

Microsoft Visual C++ users may use the special `wx/setup.h` file for this compiler in `include/msvc` subdirectory. This file implicitly links in all the wxWidgets libraries using MSVC-specific pragmas which usually is much more convenient than manually specifying the libraries list in all of the project configurations.

By default, the pragmas used in this file to actually link with wxWidgets libraries suppose that the libraries are located in `vc_lib` or `vc_dll` directory which is used by default. However when using multiple MSVC versions, or when using the official binaries, the libraries are in a directory containing the compiler version number, e.g. `vc140_dll`. To make linking work in this case, you must predefine `wxMSVC_VERSION` as `vc140` before include `wx/setup.h` file, i.e. typically in the MSVS project options. Alternatively, you can predefine `wxMSVC_VERSION_AUTO` symbol (without any value), which means that the appropriate compiler version should be used automatically, e.g. "vc100" for VC 10 (MSVS 2010), "vc140" for VC 14 (MSVS 2015) etc. Additionally, VC 14 is a special case as it has 3 minor versions: VC 14.0, 14.1 and 14.2, corresponding to MSVS 2015, 2017 and 2019; that are ABI-compatible with each other. Due to this, it can also be useful to reuse the single build of wxWidgets with all versions of the compiler and this is supported if `wxMSVC_VERSION_ABI_COMPAT` is defined: the compiler prefix "vc14x" is used in this case.

If the makefiles have been used to build the libraries from source and the `CFG` variable has been set to specify a different output path for that particular configuration of build then the `wxCFG` preprocessor symbol should be set in the project that uses wxWidgets to the same value as the `CFG` variable in order for the correct `wx/setup.h` file to automatically be included for that configuration.

## Library Selection for MSVC

As explained above, MSVC users don't need to explicitly specify wxWidgets libraries to link with, as this is done by `wx/setup.h`. However sometimes linking with all the libraries, as is done by default, is not desirable, for example because some of them were not built and this is where the symbols in this section can be helpful: defining them allows to not link with the corresponding library. The following symbols are honoured:

    - wxNO_AUI_LIB
    - wxNO_HTML_LIB
    - wxNO_MEDIA_LIB
    - wxNO_NET_LIB
    - wxNO_PROPGRID_LIB
    - wxNO_QA_LIB
    - wxNO_RICHTEXT_LIB
    - wxNO_WEBVIEW_LIB
    - wxNO_XML_LIB
    - wxNO_REGEX_LIB
    - wxNO_EXPAT_LIB
    - wxNO_JPEG_LIB
    - wxNO_PNG_LIB
    - wxNO_TIFF_LIB
    - wxNO_ZLIB_LIB

Notice that the base library is always included and the core is always included for the GUI applications (i.e. those which don't define `wxUSE_GUI` as 0).

# Compatibility Macros

wxWidgets always tries to preserve source backwards compatibility, however sometimes existing symbols may need to be removed. Except in exceedingly rare cases, this happens in several steps: first, the symbol is marked as deprecated, so that using it results in a warning when using the common compilers (e.g. any non-ancient version of MSVC, gcc or clang) in some wxWidgets release `x.y`. It can still be used, however the warnings indicate all the places in your code which will need to be updated in the future. If your code doesn't use any deprecated symbols or you have already fixed all their occurrences, you may change `WXWIN_COMPATIBILITY_x_y` to 0 to ensure they can't be used – however its default value is still 1 at this time.

At some point in the future, the next stable wxWidgets release `x.y+2` changes the default `WXWIN_COMPATIBILITY_x_y` value to 0, meaning that now the symbol becomes unavailable by default and if you still want to be able to compile the code using it, you need to explicitly change `WXWIN_COMPATIBILITY_x_y` to 1 when building the library.

And, finally, the symbol is completely removed from the library in the next stable version after this, i.e. `x.y+4`. `WXWIN_COMPATIBILITY_x_y` itself is removed as well at this time, as it is not useful any longer.

According to this general rule, currently, i.e. in wxWidgets 3.2, the following two symbols are defined: `WXWIN_COMPATIBILITY_2_8`, as 0, and `WXWIN_COMPATIBILITY_3_0`, as 1. Please see Backwards Compatibility for even more details.

WXWIN_COMPATIBILITY_2_8 | defined as 0 by default meaning that symbols existing in wxWidgets 2.8 but deprecated in 3.0 release are not available by default. It can be changed to 1 to make them available, but it is strongly recommended to update the code using them instead.
WXWIN_COMPATIBILITY_3_0 | defined as 1 by default meaning that symbols existing in wxWidgets 3.0 but deprecated since then are still available. It can be changed to 1 to ensure that no deprecated symbols are used accidentally.
wxDIALOG_UNIT_COMPATIBILITY | wxMSW-specific setting which can be set to 1 to make wxWindow::GetCharWidth() and wxWindow::GetCharHeight() more compatible with old wxWidgets versions. Changing it is not recommended.
wxUSE_UNSAFE_WXSTRING_CONV | this option determines if unsafe implicit conversions of wxString to `char*` or `std::string` (depending on whether `wxUSE_STL` is 0 or 1) are defined. It is set to 1 by default for compatibility reasons, however it is recommended to set it to 0 for the new projects. See also `wxNO_UNSAFE_WXSTRING_CONV` below for an alternative way of disabling these unsafe conversions not requiring rebuilding the library.

# Miscellaneous

WXWINDOWS | always defined in wxWidgets applications, see also wxCHECK_VERSION
wxDEBUG_LEVEL | defined as 1 by default, may be pre-defined as 0 before including wxWidgets headers to disable generation of any code at all for the assertion macros, see Debugging
WXDEBUG | defined if wxDEBUG_LEVEL is 1 or more, undefined otherwise
wxUSE_XXX | if defined as 1, feature XXX is active, see the wxUSE Preprocessor Symbols (the symbols of this form are always defined, use #if and not #ifdef to test for them)
WX_PRECOMP | is defined if precompiled headers (PCH) are in use. In this case, `wx/wxprec.h` includes `wx/wx.h` which, in turn, includes a number of wxWidgets headers thus making it unnecessary to include them explicitly. However if this is not defined, you do need to include them and so the usual idiom which allows to support both cases is to first include `wx/wxprec.h`

then, inside #ifndef WX_PRECOMP, individual headers you need.}

_UNICODE and UNICODE

both are defined if wxUSE_UNICODE is set to `1`

wxUSE_GUI

this particular feature test macro is defined to 1 when compiling or using the library with the GUI features activated, if it is defined as `0`, only wxBase is available.

wxUSE_BASE

only used by wxWidgets internally (defined as 1 when building wxBase code, either as a standalone library or as part of the monolithic wxWidgets library, defined as 0 when building GUI library only)

wxNO_RTTI

is defined if the compiler RTTI support has been switched off

wxNO_EXCEPTIONS

is defined if the compiler support for C++ exceptions has been switched off

wxNO_THREADS

if this macro is defined, the compilation options don't include compiler flags needed for multithreaded code generation. This implies that wxUSE_THREADS is 0 and also that other (non-wx-based) threading packages cannot be used neither.

wxNO_UNSAFE_WXSTRING_CONV

this symbol is not defined by wxWidgets itself, but can be defined by the applications using the library to disable unsafe implicit conversions in wxString class. This is especially useful when using standard build of the library, e.g. installed by the system package manager under Unix, which is compiled with `wxUSE_UNSAFE_WXSTRING_CONV` set to 1 for compatibility reasons as `-DwxNO_UNSAFE_WXSTRING_CONV` can be used only compiling the application code, without rebuilding the library. Support for this option appeared in wxWidgets 3.1.1.

wxNO_IMPLICIT_WXSTRING_ENCODING

this symbol is not defined by wxWidgets itself, but can be defined by the applications using the library to disable implicit conversions from and to const char* in wxString class. Support for this option appeared in wxWidgets 3.1.4.

WXMAKINGDLL_XXX

used internally and defined when building the library `XXX` as a DLL; when a monolithic wxWidgets build is used only a single `WXMAKINGDLL` symbol is defined

WXUSINGDLL

defined when compiling code which uses wxWidgets as a DLL/shared library

WXBUILDING

defined when building wxWidgets itself, whether as a static or shared library