Digia has upgraded its bootable, Linux and Android ready Qt Enterprise Embedded GUI with Qt 5.3, Qt Cloud support, Qt WebEngine, and Qt Quick Compiler.



Digia announced its commercial embedded version of Qt — Qt Enterprise Embedded — last October. The company updated it in early March with optimized Yocto recipes, a faster emulator, and a virtual keyboard.

As before, the commercial Qt Enterprise Embedded supports Android and Linux. The platform combines Qt’s drag-and-drop GUI builder with an IDE based on Qt Creator and Ubuntu 12.04 LTS, as well as a Boot to Qt embedded stack for Android and Linux targets.

Whereas the last version moved up to Qt 5.2 libraries, the new release taps the newly released, open source Qt 5.3. Version 5.3 of the cross-platform development framework is primarily a performance and maintenance release, but also adds an installer wizard for Android, QNX Neutrino 6.6 support, and a beta version of the Qt for Windows Runtime. There’s also new a QQuickWidget class, a Qt WebSockets API, and the new Qt Quick Compiler, among other features.







Qt Enterprise Embedded architecture

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The new Qt Enterprise Embedded version, meanwhile, debuts Qt WebEngine , which combines Qt Quick for fast native app development, HTML5 for dynamic web content, and WebGL support for “extra 3D elegance,” says Digia. Qt WebEngine is said to be well suited for embedded devices that need to provide on-demand web access, as well as to regularly update the stack with “the ability to develop hybrid UIs and functionality.”

Qt Enterprise Embedded also supports the new Qt Quick Compiler, which allows for the compilation of QML files into an application. The compiler “ensures IP protection of the QML source and improves load time and performance by pre-parsing the QML files,” says Digia. Compiled programs are said to start up as much as 90 percent faster.

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Digia has also launched a new incremental deployment option. Earlier versions depended on USB-based connections to devices in order to deploy, run, and debug, but you can now choose to connect to devices over a LAN using standard IP protocols. This is said to simplify the sharing of devices in a team setting, and more easily set up devices for automated testing.

Other new features include full integration with Qt Cloud Services and Enginio Data Storage to enable users to create a cloud backend for embedded, mobile, and desktop Qt clients via a Qt API. “Together with the newly added Bluetooth support (using BlueZ) and the existing Wi-Fi and wired network support, the platform provides everything needed for implementing, monitoring and updating internet-of-things devices from within a single technology,” says Digia.



Further information

More information on the new Qt Enterprise Embedded may be found at Digia’s Qt Enterprise Embedded product page.

