The Monday after
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Thanks for this words Alexandra, I believe in you and the Qt team, and if you continue improvement Qt, I will continue development for Symbian and in the future for MeeGo, the market share of Symbian is to big to be despised and as a Open Source activist, MeeGo is the only alternative that satisfies my needs currently.
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[quote author="benglenn" date="1297695037"]So in 5 years from now, all the applications written for Qt will have to be rewritten from scratch to run on Windows Phone 7? [/quote]
5 years?!? I don't even know if we still have apps on phones by then! Or WP7 or phones at all.
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The big issue is not "new answers to questions" or people using "marketing blah". The issue is that there is a huge issue of trust here. It was betrayed big time by this move. First Qt was to be the platform for all future Nokia devices and the company would be bet on it, now it is merely the platform for the soon-to-be-phased-out symbian line and a "research platform" called Meego.
You can not possibly hope that developers will still trust Nokians after this. Not after comments that Nokia will make huge cost reductions in software development. Not for a time to come. You have to understand that people have huge personal and/or business investments in Qt. Seeing Qt now all of a sudden in the hands of a company that from the outlook of it, does not have any strategic stake in it's continued development anymore, and a solid partnering with another company that most probably would like Qt to fail sooner rather than later, does not paint a picture of a solid future for the framework.
Personally, I hope with great hopes that Qt will make it out somehow. That it will continue to be a viable platform. I have a personal stake in that happening, and I think it would be terrible, terrible waste if the platform were die. Qt is awesome, and the Trolls have been and are doing a wonderful job. Sure, I have criticisms at times, but please understand that that is out of an honest concern, not out of malice.
The best thing anyone within Nokia could do to quiet down the Qt developer community, IMHO, is to sketch out a believable business case of why exactly Qt will continue to be an interesting, strategic investment for Nokia in the mid-term future, especially for the era after Symbian is gone.
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I think that we are focusing, in this (rather sad) conversation, on mobile development. Well, many developers are interested in desktop development, and maybe what we could have here is a chance for a shift towards desktop development.
Let me remind you something very optimistic in this direction: http://www.markshuttleworth.com/archives/568 [www.markshuttleworth.com]
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[quote author="Stavros" date="1297700752"]I think that we are focusing, in this (rather sad) conversation, on mobile development. Well, many developers are interested in desktop development, and maybe what we could have here is a chance for a shift towards desktop development.
Let me remind you something very optimistic in this direction: http://www.markshuttleworth.com/archives/568 [www.markshuttleworth.com]
[/quote]
No, that is not the point. The point is that Nokia was interested in Qt especially for the mobile development. With that gone, or soon to be gone for a major part, what interest in Qt is left at Nokia? Canonical has an interest, yes. That is good. Perhaps they could buy Qt? Their business case I would understand at least.Edit: note that I do not doubt the commitment of the Qt team within Nokia. I am sure they will do the best they can to continue to support Qt as good as they can for as long as they can.
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[quote author="Alexandra" date="1297697349"][quote author="benglenn" date="1297695037"]So in 5 years from now, all the applications written for Qt will have to be rewritten from scratch to run on Windows Phone 7? [/quote]
5 years?!? I don't even know if we still have apps on phones by then! Or WP7 or phones at all.[/quote]
Wow. What a professional reaction. Just wow.
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[quote author="Andre" date="1297702501"]
Edit: note that I do not doubt the commitment of the Qt team within Nokia. I am sure they will do the best they can to continue to support Qt as good as they can for as long as they can.
[/quote]
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No doubt about the Qt folk's efforts and commitment. But in big companies it's not possible to defend resources against main stream (read: not Qt) business needs. Nokia has not business case for Qt except the remaining Symbian devices, which are not app centric.
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[quote author="Aron Kozak" date="1297707456"]
I am currently on booth duty at Mobile World Congress but I managed to sneak off and respond to a couple points here. Will be back online a bit later.
to Andre: We are evaluating Qt for our Mobile Phone strategy (bringing the web to the next billion people). This means we need to ensure it is still alive and evolving.
to AlexTAI: I have not heard any plans to drop any of our non-mobile platforms (Windows, Linux, Mac, embedded Linux)
[/quote]
From "this blog":http://blog.qt.nokia.com/2011/02/14/update-on-qt/#commentsWe are evaluating Qt for our Mobile Phone strategy Really? this sounds different to all other statements up to now.... So what is now the strategy?
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[quote author="benglenn" date="1297706877"]
[quote author="Alexandra" date="1297697349"][quote author="benglenn" date="1297695037"]So in 5 years from now, all the applications written for Qt will have to be rewritten from scratch to run on Windows Phone 7? [/quote]5 years?!? I don't even know if we still have apps on phones by then! Or WP7 or phones at all.[/quote]
Wow. What a professional reaction. Just wow. [/quote]
Goodness me, did you just run out of things to say, or did you actually mean to try on the ad hominem thing?
Seriously, how would you expect anybody to be able to foresee the mobile landscape in five years? Five years ago, Nokia had the /only/ mobile ecosystem with downloadable apps. The iPhone was not even a glint in Stevie-boy's eyes. How could anybody be expected to guess what a world which moves that fast would look five years from now?
On that note, my personal prediction on that particular topic: Whatever happens to the base OS over the next five years, Qt will be there. This is not me speaking as a random (and obviously proud) fan of the whole Qt thing, this is me speaking as someone who sees what's going on out there - Qt is spreading. Qt Everywhere is still going on, and you might have seen Cute Hacks' blog entry earlier today about some... other platforms where Qt also runs on.
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Dear all,
the post at
Live from 'An Evening With Nokia' at MWC 2011
is interesting as well.http://www.engadget.com/2011/02/13/live-from-an-evening-with-nokia-at-mwc-2011/
regards
david -
Oh, a bit off, but check out the MeeGo advertisement on "Engadget's header":http://www.engadget.com/ ;)
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[quote author="CreMindES" date="1297715739"]Oh, a bit off, but check out the MeeGo advertisement on "Engadget's header":http://www.engadget.com/ ;)[/quote]
That's not off topic at all :) Because at Intel as well, developing apps for MeeGo is all about Qt :) So, yup, very on topic information :)
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Some analysis from outside the box:
http://blogs.forbes.com/parmyolson/2011/02/14/nokia-shares-extend-fall-on-jpmorgan-downgrade/
Microsoft is charging Nokia a royalty for using WM7, which surprised the analysts, and it’s still unclear how much the alliance will benefit Nokia: “The fact that MSFT is charging a royalty for its OS in the face of Android also shows, in our opinion, a failure to grasp the platform economics at work.”
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I think the problem is that people get overly emotional over a companies sudden change of direction.
I remember when Microsoft decided to scrap VB, and start down the .Net path. There was mass panic, chaos, wild speculation, and a huge outcry from the developers...until they started using the .Net framework...fast forward to today and all the windows developers joke about the old school way of doing things and loves .Net....
MFC...yuck...
VB6...never again!!!Was it scary, frustrating, stressful...you bet.
The same thing is happening now with Java and Oracle. The java forums are on fire with chaos, confusion, conspiracy theories and developer outcries. Oracle has too much invest in java, they need java...will java survive...yes...will it change....yes.
Today the cycle starts again with Nokia and Qt.
Change is hard, people hate it, but this move makes good business sense to the execs at nokia...they know apple, google, and microsoft...stakes are high and the competition is tough.
I am not an expert in Qt, but I have used many languages, libraries, and frameworks over the years, probably more then I care to admit, (anyone else miss pascal?) - I probably just dated myself, but the point I am making is this...
Tools come and go, the good tools stay for a long time. C++ has stood the test of time, and Qt is a damn good tool to work with a damn good language.
Qt was successful before before it was bought by Nokia and will continue to be a success no matter what Nokia does to it. Because we the developers will always use the right tool for the job.
