March 6th, 2009
Nokia puts out help wanted sign on Qt
Continuing its effort to get by with a little help from its friends, Nokia released a new version of its Qt user interface framework and Qt Creator, an integrated development environment (IDE).
The new software is offered under the Lesser GPL for the first time, as well as the main GPL and two commercial licenses dating back from Qt’s days as Trolltech.
The QTSoftware.com site has the code, and Nokia also promised a new community site soon, called QT Contribution.
Yes, it’s hard to make programming tools interesting, as our Dave Rosenberg says, but there are some important points to make here.
- Nokia is doubling-down on the open source development process.
- Nokia is betting heavily on the cross-platform aspects of Qt, the kind of “write once, run anywhere” mantra Java was first known for.
From the user point of view, you could technically have a Qt application that ran on your phone, on your Mac, on your Windows box, and under Linux. How far Nokia can get with that promise remains to be seen, but it’s nice to see it being made.
Oh, and don’t confuse this Qt with the gasoline retailer. Their QT is all-caps and red. This one has a small t and it’s green. Theirs sells donuts, while working with the Finnish one may make you hungry for donuts.
Dana Blankenhorn has been a business journalist for 30 years, a tech freelancer since 1983. You can follow Dana on Twitter. See his full profile and disclosure of his industry affiliations.
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