Exciting news for the Qt community today: this morning Nokia confirmed that Qt will be a core component in the Nokia strategy to bring apps to the next billion, reassuring developers that investments made in Qt today can live on in the future with Nokia.
This will mean mobile Qt developers can benefit from the strong momentum Qt apps have on the Ovi store (with over 100 million Nokia Qt-enabled Symbian devices around the world) as well as to continue to have a large addressable target audience in the future.
Other great news for Qt developers: The exciting new Qt-powered Nokia N9 device running Linux (MeeGo 1.2 Harmattan) was announced today, providing more opportunities for Qt app developers in 2011 – Experimental MeeGo Harmattan 1.2 target added to the Qt SDK.
Qt’s momentum has been growing dramatically over the past few months:
- In May we saw record number of Qt downloads! The use and interest of Qt has never been higher
- Major upgrade to the Qt documentation, making Qt easier to use. Public testing on-going at the Qt Developer Network
- Last weeks successful Qt contributor Summit and progress of the Qt 5 project
- Qt Developer Days pre-registration will open up for Munich and San Francisco – today. Qt Developer events are also scheduled for China, Taipei and Tokyo in December, stay tuned for more information.
- Cooperation with Digia is bearing fruit. Digia is going to make Qt 4.6.4 available also for open source developers in the coming weeks.
So by now having a clearer understanding of why Nokia continues to invest in Qt, the short- and long-term opportunities for developers using Qt increase. A big thank you to our Qt community including Digia for helping to ensure Qt becomes better and continues to grow!
Daniel Kihlberg, Director Qt Ecosystem
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Waiting, to have one
I am happy to see so much good things happening with Qt. N9 seems really beautiful device and Qt coming to S40 is really big backing from Nokia towards Qt.
So Qt goes to low-end and Windows Phone / Silverlight to high-end then?
“Digia is going to make Qt 4.6.4 available also for open source developers in the coming weeks.”
How does that fit with this quote
“The decision on whether the release is made available to Qt open-source users is a decision for Nokia, not Digia, and we will let them comment on their intentions here later.”
from the Digia announcement earlier today?
@Jeffery It’s good news all round today, including re Qt 4.6.4. That first quote is new. It is a response/update to the first quote.
More info –
As part of our relationship with Digia (and their genuine interest in everyone’s usage of Qt, not just Qt commercial licensees) we have agreed with Digia, that we will open up a Qt 4.6.4 branch in Gitorious, so Digia can contribute their code – and making 4.6.4 binary packages available for the entire community in the coming weeks.
Thank you Digia’s Qt developers, services team and technical support team for work you are doing for the entire community!
(taken from http://blog.qt.nokia.com/2011/06/15/digia-announces-qt-commercial-4-6-4-release/)
@David: That’s great to hear! I just wanted to verify it, given the temporal proximity (and phrasing) of the announcements.
Assuming you can speak to this, is this the intended way of things for the future with Digia, or will Digia-specific updates be provided on a case-by-case basis? I sincerely hope the former is the case.
@Jeffery
Since open governance was not in place when 4.6.4 commercial was launched, we needed to come to a special arrangement for this one.
When open governance is fully in place, we expect contributions of this nature to be an integrated part of the normal development process.
N9 rocks … but ….
I always don’t understand why developer should trust nokia :
- in one side : the N9, a promising Meego device using Qt… the “disruptive”, the road to billions apps for Symbian (dead in 2016) and Meego (not choose for smartphone nokia strategy)
- in other side : Windows Mobile + Richard Green go out + communication of Elop saying Meego is not good for smartphone ….
So I always don’t think N9 is here to ensure Qt futur … seems more a way to attract developer to build symbian apps, assuring a smooth transition before WP7 ….
@qtnext we think the N9 rocks too (I’ve used a prototype and it is really REALLY good), but the great story today is that Qt is at the core of Nokia’s strategy to bring apps that connect ‘the next billion’ people to the internet.
So yes, part of the announcement today is about Qt and the N9, but importantly, there is also a future beyond that.
Nokia will “make Qt core to bringing applications to the next billion,”
This is good news for Qt developers. However, most developers want to make apps for smartphones not low end S40 devices. Where does Qt fit in Nokia’s smartphone strategy?
P.S The N9 looks awesome!
Where do you guys read that Qt will be ported to S40? Can’t really find it anywhere in the linked pages.
Not necessarily S40..that was not the point I was trying to get across.
> Qt Developer Days pre-registration will open up for Munich
> and San Francisco – today.
Where? Where?
@Guido – Not quite yet. Give us a few hours
Fascinating, but what it actually means?
So Nokia will use Qt for its two platforms it declared dead already? I wonder how this is exciting news …
Why are you still called Nokia? Your name is Microsoft now.
I still am not ‘reassured.’ Qt is gone, WP7 and the BS with having to use .NET, VS, C# is in. Sucks but true.
Microsoft should add some easier way to put native code on that device for one thing, so we can get true Qt support in WP7.
But I guess once you sign a contract with the devil, it’s their way or the contract is invaildated immediately.
You have to have the FIRST billion to get the NEXT billion, right?
Digia has been sacking Qt developers all spring, so I wouldn’t get my hopes up on Qt future in Digia’s possession.
What exactly is the announcement? We already knew Qt was available for Symbian and Meego, both of which Nokia have forsaken.
Could somebody in clear words tell us what the hell is Nokia doing? MeeGo was supposed to be scrapped, wasn’t it? Now it isn’t?
What you really need to spell out to everyone is: Will Qt be the framework for the future of Nokia apps? Will investment in developing Qt apps pay of when Nokia becomes WiMo only?
Very confusing.
Windows or not Windows, Qt or not Qt? Perhaps Android then…
In my opinion, Qt developers dont have to worry about whether Nokia adopts WP7 or Meego. Don’t stop writing Qt apps, because Intel is there for Meego, Linux fans are there ready to use a good Meego (Linux) tablet or Smart Phone.
Nokia N900 users will be there. If they are going to opt for a 1Ghz Processor, its going to be N9.
If u are still unconvinced, Android has a Qt port supported by a community. So don’t stop creating Qt apps, atleast for desktops.
Can Qt really run in low end phones ? (its kind of “heavy”)
Still WinPho7 is the future strategy of Nokia and this release is like outlier. What will Nokia say about future devices based on Meego. Neither I see any enthusiasm in other OEMs to adopt Meego.
Nokia should just GPL all S60 code as many programmers will put it to better use.
Qt will be doing better on Android and desktop and the community just makes it happen.
@Heikki @Mads @V @Tim
I’ll try to provide some more clarity:
Nokia forward strategy has three parts.
1 Smartphones. Transition to Windows Phone in future – no plans exist to port Qt to Windows Phone
2 Future disruptive technologies.
3 Connecting the next billion. When speaking about this, Nokia is speaking about the mobile phone space, not the smartphone space.
When Nokia says ‘Qt is a core component in strategy for connecting the next billion’, it is not talking about smartphones, it is talking about taking Qt to the mobile phone space.
Important point – This is not an announcement about platform strategy for mobile phones. More will come on this in future. The key thing is that mobile Qt developers can have their investment live on in new places (in Nokia) in future.
Hope that helps
@DavidStone
How long would mobile phone market would be present? Android is already hitting low price barriers.
Good news i hope it brings apps like whatapp etc. to s40/maemo /meego
“Could somebody in clear words tell us what the hell is Nokia doing?”
Suicide
These kinds of unclear statements aren’t doing Nokia’s image any good. What about telling us exactly which Nokia platform with a billion devices Qt is going to run on.
- It cannot be Symbian as that is limited to 150 million before WinPhone takes over.
- It cannot be MeeGo, MeeGo isn’t going to sell a billion devices.
- It cannot be WinPhone because Qt is not going to be ported to WinPhone.
- It cannot be a competing platform as that would make that platform more popular, decreasing Nokia’s bottom line even more.
- It could be a new platform, but why would Nokia create a new platform?
- It could be S40, as S40 has been sold that much
- It could be a completely new class of mobile devices.
So, extrapolating common sense tells us S40 is the most likely candidate. A completely new class of devices is a possibility, but nobody in his right mind is going to invest in software for a new class of devices unless having at least some idea what they are going to be.
To develop for MeeGo or M$ looks like a siren’s song trap.
QT should continue to only target what it does well: multiplatform desktop/server development.
I would never develop for mobile devices with QT because it is not multiplatform for mobile devices. No Android or iOS? Forget!
Nokia lost the OS war. I have to please my customers, not Nokia or M$. Currently, customers use Android or iOS. I won’t spend my time with MeeGo or M$ mobile.
QT is a good product. A new business market for nokia. Only this.
Dear All,
Please note that Meego is the future of Nokia; and that’s why they have retained Meego OS development inhouse their co operation with Intel is less now but how does that matters its a community driven project. I ntel always had their agenda around midfield while Nokia’s maemo was technically superior and near complete. Stephen Elop has always said he is giving meego more time to mature to create an aura around it and exactly by chhosing windows phone 7 he has freed the internal developers the burden to save Nokia, they can keep innovating with wow and disruptive products. More over as Meego is a community project at Linux foundation and internally at Nokia; updates to Meego OS will keep coming along with new devices. I believe with meego devices Nokia will make a new marketing strategy that will see one or two device launches and significant updates creating a buzz around nokia, that will not only help meego thrive at the top end but help Nokia on its road map for devices beyond smartphones. That is what Nokia had always planned with Meego they have always said it is not for mass market flloding devices but elegant best of the best from Nokia.
Nokia N9 is class apart and miles ahead of competition and is an absolute beauty in terms of a cosmic fusion of elegant hardware and fluid and intuitive UI on an absolutely brilliant OS.
So first get the N9, wait for updates and then devices are coming in 2012 not 10 or 12 but 1 or 2 but classic devices that will create mass following Nokia seems to have taken up well from Apple marketing and device roadmap. Not bad…… Congrats Nokia gr8 device competitors might be having sleepless nights….
@Prasenjit, I don’t know where you got your ideas. We already know that Nokia Windows Phone 7 ‘Sea Ray’ is basically the N9 running WP7.5 (Mango)
@Prasenjit: According to my understanding N9 is the first and the last MeeGo based smartphone from Nokia. During this week Nokia announced remarkable layoffs which affect also on MeeGo division. Such layoffs would not make any sense if Nokia is going to deliver more MeeGo based devices in the future.
This week, Nokia unveiled the N9 smartphone, the company’s first smartphone to run the MeeGo OS. The Finnish Newspaper Helsingin Sanomat reports in an interview with Nokia’s CEO Stephen Elop that it will also be the company’s last. Nokia will be focusing all its efforts on the Windows Phone OS, no matter how successful the N9 might be.
Read more: http://www.electronista.com/articles/11/06/24/ceo.reemphasizes.windows.phone.focus/#ixzz1QDMipJJt
Very confusing, except it’s not.
I’m watching very carefully how many Trolls make it through this round of layoffs since the N9 will be Nokia’s *last* device to run MeeGo.
http://allthingsd.com/20110211/massive-layoffs-expected-at-nokia/
one reason to keep me developing with my favorite framework Qt after all the mess with Qt and Nokia’s future is http://labs.qt.nokia.com/2011/02/28/necessitas/
@RaedBenz, +1, totally agree.
It just means I can’t use my favorite framework on Nokia devices.
Can Nokia comment on the future of the Mac OSX port of Qt? I’m planning to start work on a major new app and I really want to use Qt. But there are many issues with Qt on Mac (most of which can be worked around) but if there’s a significant change in a new OSX (e.g. Lion), what guarantees can Nokia make that Qt will still be viable for that platform?
I don’t want to switch to Cocoa + .Net to continue doing what Qt gives me already but if a major OS upgrade breaks Qt (as Snow Leopard) did, then I’ll have no choice.
@Danny:
There is no need to switch. Lion will be supported in Qt 4.8 and we will bring Qt 5 to Mac OS X. We also hope for more community involvement through our Open Governance model and thus a better Qt for Mac OS X than what we had in Qt 4.
“Daniel Kihlberg, Director Qt Ecosystem”
Daniel, canyou kindly explain what qt ecosystem means in this scope? every set of something is labeled as “ecosystem”. Why? How much “eco” in qt?
“Nokia confirmed that Qt will be a core component in the Nokia strategy to bring apps to the next billion” – how many billions was before? is this “next billion” a big % of all symbian phones released before and planned to be released this&next year? In light of WP7 future of nokia maybe it is better to say “core component of dead platform”?
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