Get current working directory in a Qt application

I'm writing a program in C++ using the Qt library. There is a symbolic link in my home bin directory to the executable. I would like the current working directory of my program to be the directory in which I am with my terminal (ie. the result of the pwd command). I saw the QDir::currentPath() function, but it gives back the directory where the binary is.

How can I find my current working directory?

Just tested and QDir::currentPath() does return the path from which I called my executable.

And a symlink does not "exist". If you are executing an exe from that path you are effectively executing it from the path the symlink points to.

Have you tried QCoreApplication::applicationDirPath()

qDebug() << "App path : " << qApp->applicationDirPath();

To add on to KaZ answer, Whenever I am making a QML application I tend to add this to the main c++

#include <QGuiApplication>
#include <QQmlApplicationEngine>
#include <QStandardPaths>

int main(int argc, char *argv[])
{
QGuiApplication app(argc, argv);
QQmlApplicationEngine engine;

// get the applications dir path and expose it to QML 

QUrl appPath(QString("%1").arg(app.applicationDirPath()));
engine.rootContext()->setContextProperty("appPath", appPath);


// Get the QStandardPaths home location and expose it to QML 
QUrl userPath;
   const QStringList usersLocation = QStandardPaths::standardLocations(QStandardPaths::HomeLocation);
   if (usersLocation.isEmpty())
       userPath = appPath.resolved(QUrl("/home/"));
   else
      userPath = QString("%1").arg(usersLocation.first());
   engine.rootContext()->setContextProperty("userPath", userPath);

   QUrl imagePath;
      const QStringList picturesLocation = QStandardPaths::standardLocations(QStandardPaths::PicturesLocation);
      if (picturesLocation.isEmpty())
          imagePath = appPath.resolved(QUrl("images"));
      else
          imagePath = QString("%1").arg(picturesLocation.first());
      engine.rootContext()->setContextProperty("imagePath", imagePath);

      QUrl videoPath;
      const QStringList moviesLocation = QStandardPaths::standardLocations(QStandardPaths::MoviesLocation);
      if (moviesLocation.isEmpty())
          videoPath = appPath.resolved(QUrl("./"));
      else
          videoPath = QString("%1").arg(moviesLocation.first());
      engine.rootContext()->setContextProperty("videoPath", videoPath);

      QUrl homePath;
      const QStringList homesLocation = QStandardPaths::standardLocations(QStandardPaths::HomeLocation);
      if (homesLocation.isEmpty())
          homePath = appPath.resolved(QUrl("/"));
      else
          homePath = QString("%1").arg(homesLocation.first());
      engine.rootContext()->setContextProperty("homePath", homePath);

      QUrl desktopPath;
      const QStringList desktopsLocation = QStandardPaths::standardLocations(QStandardPaths::DesktopLocation);
      if (desktopsLocation.isEmpty())
          desktopPath = appPath.resolved(QUrl("/"));
      else
          desktopPath = QString("%1").arg(desktopsLocation.first());
      engine.rootContext()->setContextProperty("desktopPath", desktopPath);

      QUrl docPath;
      const QStringList docsLocation = QStandardPaths::standardLocations(QStandardPaths::DocumentsLocation);
      if (docsLocation.isEmpty())
          docPath = appPath.resolved(QUrl("/"));
      else
          docPath = QString("%1").arg(docsLocation.first());
      engine.rootContext()->setContextProperty("docPath", docPath);


      QUrl tempPath;
      const QStringList tempsLocation = QStandardPaths::standardLocations(QStandardPaths::TempLocation);
      if (tempsLocation.isEmpty())
          tempPath = appPath.resolved(QUrl("/"));
      else
          tempPath = QString("%1").arg(tempsLocation.first());
      engine.rootContext()->setContextProperty("tempPath", tempPath);
engine.load(QUrl(QStringLiteral("qrc:/main.qml")));
return app.exec();
}

Using it in QML

....
........
............
Text{
text:"This is the applications path: " + appPath
+ "\nThis is the users home directory: " + homePath
+ "\nThis is the Desktop path: " desktopPath;
}

Thank you RedX and Kaz for your answers. I don't get why by me it gives the path of the exe. I found an other way to do it :

QString pwd("");
char * PWD;
PWD = getenv ("PWD");
pwd.append(PWD);
cout << "Working directory : " << pwd << flush;

It is less elegant than a single line... but it works for me.

I'm running Qt 5.5 under Windows and the default constructor of QDir appears to pick up the current working directory, not the application directory.

I'm not sure if the getenv PWD will work cross-platform and I think it is set to the current working directory when the shell launched the application and doesn't include any working directory changes done by the app itself (which might be why the OP is seeing this behavior).

So I thought I'd add some other ways that should give you the current working directory (not the application's binary location):

// using where a relative filename will end up
QFileInfo fi("temp");
cout << fi.absolutePath() << endl;

// explicitly using the relative name of the current working directory
QDir dir(".");
cout << dir.absolutePath() << endl;