Make external libraries part of the default build. They are currently built before the rest, as qmake will recurse into each subdirectory in order. --- meshlab_full.pro.bak 2015-11-21 16:25:23.812658000 +0100 +++ meshlab_full.pro 2015-11-21 16:25:32.892417000 +0100 @@ -1,7 +1,7 @@ #config += debug_and_release TEMPLATE = subdirs CONFIG += ordered -SUBDIRS = common \ +SUBDIRS = external common \ meshlab \ meshlabserver \ # IO plugins