QT may go commercial,will this affect KDE

Discussion of software apps
Post Reply
User avatar
crosscourt
Posts: 11102
Joined: Sun Jan 14, 2018 5:38 pm
Location: Wash DC
Contact:

QT may go commercial,will this affect KDE

Post by crosscourt »

Its been going on for quite awhile,
https://lwn.net/Articles/817129/
Site Moderator
wove
Posts: 1189
Joined: Mon May 04, 2020 4:47 pm

Re: QT may go commercial,will this affect KDE

Post by wove »

Qt has always been commercial, Troll Tech, which was a division of Nokia, at least a while back were the developers. Back when KDE was at KDE 1, there was a lot of flack because Qt was still closed source. I remember when Qt did create an open source variant of Qt, which seem to tame down the talk of KDE being built with a closed source tool kit. I have no idea what arrangements KDE made or currently have with the makers of Qt to use it. Overall it seems to be a symbiotic relationship.

A neighbor down the street develops financial software for companies using the Qt tool kit, and when we talk about software, he grumbles that KDE software uses Qt for free while he pays a fortune in license fees to use Qt. Qt of course is very popular it is used for a lot of Haiku software, and Deepin states very clearly that their desktop, and home built apps are all built using Qt. Much of Ubuntu's software (at least for Unity) was built with Qt. I know that Qt is popular for both Android and iOS application development and of course it can create both Mac and Windows software as well. I gather that most of its popularity comes from the idea of develop once and deploy everywhere.

I am a firm believer in open source, yet it also occurs to me that to be sustainable the model needs to include a way for the workers to make a living from their efforts.

bill
User avatar
crosscourt
Posts: 11102
Joined: Sun Jan 14, 2018 5:38 pm
Location: Wash DC
Contact:

Re: QT may go commercial,will this affect KDE

Post by crosscourt »

Of course, already aware of that but many are using free versions and given the issues with the pandemic and the economy QT will end up trying to commercialize everything they do and offer. Thus all versions for at least the first 12 months will be offered only to license holders.
I dont blame them for reacting to the position they are in, as long as it doesnt end up rippling through the various companies and causing unforeseen issues. KDE and QT as the article notes have been in talks since 1/27/20 but the first announcement came out in April 2020.
Site Moderator
Post Reply