[maemo-developers] [maemo-developers] Nokia developer contact?

[From: Justin Bradford]

On 7/26/05, Mikael Hallendal <micke at imendio.com> wrote:

> The only ones who brought up a QT/Qtopia vs. GTK/Hildon flamewar here
> was the supporters of the latter.

You apparently haven't read any of Lorn Potter's emails to the list...

> 1) Has anyone looked in to the shortest-possible route of having a
>    QT-based application running on the 770.

There has been some productive discussion regarding the significant
development necessary to get QT based apps running "natively" on the
maemo platform. Basically, these issues are supporting gtk/hildon
widgets (or at least themes) and osso/dbus support.

> 2) If someone from Nokia could contact him for possible business to
>    business communication on how to make the Komanpanys applications to
>    run on the 770.

I think this is really the problem. In theory, this email list is
about the maemo platform, not various how to work around the the
non-proprietary architecture Nokia has chosen for the 770. Perhaps
those Nokia employees looking in might consider proferring a
commercial app email address to contact rather than everyone just
settling on the maemo dev lists.

> The Maemo platform is X/GTK+ based, I don't see that changing, why need to defend
> it when it's not even being attacked.

Perhaps because actual and potential maemo open source developers are
sick of hearing about how it should really be a QT/e based platform.
What exactly is better about that approach, besides, of course, that
Trolltech gets $$$ for any commercial developer that decides to
consider the platform. Why would Nokia choose a QT based system when
they actually want commercial developers?

And, as it it is a flamewar and all, perhaps the unpleasantness is
just the consequence of general nausea at the prospect of having to
pay some random company for the mere privilege of developing
commercial applications for a platform.

For what it's worth, this is the first Linux-based handheld/"embedded"
device I was interested in developing for, largely because it was the
first device that didn't use QT.

Sure a QT license is a trivial percentage of the cost of commercial
development, but I refuse to consider a platform that *requires* QT on
simple principle. And this is being written on a laptop running
Windows. And moreover, a laptop running Windows with well over $2000
of Windows development software on it. But if I wanted, developing
commercial apps for Windows or MacOS (which I do), could cost nothing
more than that needed for testing. But developing for KDE still
requires an unvoidable tithe to Trolltech. Any platform that has a
core, fundamental library under the GPL license should be shunned,
whether RMS is pleased or not.

And the sheer arrogance of Trolltech and their positioning of QT makes
me wish that that company (and their employees who decided on this
course of action) will rot in hell for eternity. There is no company
in the world I would rather see sink into bankruptcy and oblivion more
than Trolltech. They have done incalcuable damage to the state of the
Linux desktop.

If you want a QT or qtopia based application to run natively and
seamlessly on the 770, just port it to gtk/hildon/osso. An extra
upside: you can stop (or avoid) paying royalties to some
inconsequential company if you don't feel inclined to.

Justin