RE: Qt on OS X (was Xcode & Visual C++)
RE: Qt on OS X (was Xcode & Visual C++)
- Subject: RE: Qt on OS X (was Xcode & Visual C++)
- From: "Brant Sears" <email@hidden>
- Date: Thu, 5 Jan 2006 10:17:58 -0500
- Thread-topic: Qt on OS X (was Xcode & Visual C++)
Title: RE: Qt on OS X (was Xcode & Visual C++)
>> [referring to Qt and wxWidgets cross-platform libraries]
>> If you want to create a "real" Mac application, you will have to use
>> Cocoa or Carbon.
>> Only if your application is really unique you may get away with a
>> cross platform framework. Otherwise you will most likely lose out
>> against the (Cocoa or Carbon) competition.
>
> I'm not knowledgeable enough to argue a position on the Qt vs
> wxWidgets
> comparison (there's plenty of discussion elsewhere) but I will
> correct some
> inaccuracies implied in Andreas's post. wxWidgets/Mac is built on
> Carbon;
> there's a Cocoa version (wxCocoa) available, albeit still in
> development;
> and the wxWidgets apps I've seen (e.g., Audacity,
> http://audacity.sourceforge.net/) sure look like "real" Mac apps.
>
>
>The Qt framework on OS X is also built on top of the native OS X
>frameworks. Apps built with Qt are "real" Mac applications - at least
>they certainly look and feel like "real" Mac apps. And, if you need
>it, there are Qt interfaces that expose the underlying GUI objects
>and event system. Of course, this is somewhat moot if you don't care
>about cross-platform. I say somewhat because the signal/slot
>mechanism in Qt is so cool that it alone is enough reason to use Qt.
>Combined with the wealth of other Qt features (networking, XML,
>databases, QSA, etc.), I think Qt is an outstanding choice,
>regardless of platform. Having written lots of apps in X/Motif,
>native Win16 and Win32, MFC, and Java (AWT and Swing), switching to
>Qt almost 5 years ago was one of the biggest leaps in productivity
>I've ever had.
I like Qt. Everything you say about it is true. However, there are a few things you lose by writing a Qt app instead a Cocoa or Carbon app. Qt has a "skin" system that allows you to create an application with Qt "widgets" skinned to look like native widgets. They disable the aqua skin on any platform other than MacOS X so as not to anger Apple Legal. However, the controls that you see are not native controls. For instance, if you use the Accessibility Inspector on a Qt application, you will find that the disability system only sees the window - not any of the controls. Other systemwide facilities might not interact correctly with a Qt app (e.g. possibly AppleScript).
If I was trying to write a professional app for a wide audience (e.g. the Mac shrink wrap market), I might avoid Qt for this reason. However, I have used it on other kinds of projects and it is very nice.
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