Digia finally acquires the Qt

Digia today announced that it has completed the acquisition of the Qt software technologies and Qt business it announced in August 2012. As Digia now becomes responsible for Qt activities including product development and commercial and open source licensing, the acquisition paves the way for Qt to become the world’s leading cross-platform application development framework across desktop, embedded and mobile platforms.

Used by over 450,000 developers worldwide, Qt is a full framework that enables the development of powerful, interactive and platform-independent applications. Qt is a proven and solid technology used across many different industries to provide extensive applications beyond what is possible with many other cross-platform technologies. Qt applications run native on the host system, delivering performance that is far superior to any other cross-platform application development framework. With Qt, developers can not only take full advantage of the multicore processors in desktops and high-end smartphones, but also deliver impressive graphical performance on low-end and low cost embedded hardware. Qt’s support for multiple platforms and operating systems allows developers to save significant time related to porting to other devices. Once developed on a Windows desktop PC, for example, an application’s code can be re-used on a smartphone, tablet computer or embedded device.

Qt comes with a built-in tool-chain, IDE and an extensive set of C++ frameworks. The Qt Quick technology allows for rapid and easy creation of dynamic and interactive user interfaces. Using Qt Quick’s declarative programming method, which couples QML and JavaScript with a powerful C++ engine, leads to optimally performing and visually stunning user interfaces. Qt's built-in features such as full support for HTML5 through the Qt WebKit module provide an easier and all-in-one solution for hybrid application development where pure web technologies fall short.

Qt already runs on leading desktop, embedded and real-time operating systems, as well as on a number of mobile platforms. Digia has initiated projects to deliver full support for Android and iOS mobile and tablet operating systems within Qt and will present the product roadmap and strategy later in the fall. Adding this support will extend one of the most popular and powerful development frameworks to cover the fastest growing and most popular smartphone and tablet operating systems.

Digia will continue the work with ecosystem members and the Qt community to secure a successful release of Qt5 and is committed to continuing the Qt Project in order to maintain Qt’s availability under both open source and commercial licences. Digia now has over 200 dedicated people working on Qt. The 89 Qt team members who have now joined Digia include many key players of the Qt community, of whom Lars Knoll, Chief Maintainer of the Qt Project, is one of the most experienced members of the Qt ecosystem.

Lars Knoll, Chief Maintainer of Qt Project, Digia commented: "I look forward to the exciting next chapter for Qt together with Digia. Qt 5 Beta was released during the acquisition process and we are working hard to reach a final release within the next months. Qt 5 is a huge step forward for Qt and, with technologies such as Qt Quick or the improved WebKit module, Qt is making many things trivial that are very hard to achieve with other technologies. Qt being developed as an open source project, with a vibrant and strong community behind it, greatly increases the strength of the technology. I am now very much looking forward to bringing the product to new platforms such as Android and iOS."

Tommi Laitinen, SVP, International Products, Digia, commented: "Qt has already proved to be exceptionally popular with developers because of its easy-to-use libraries and ability to generate efficient, high performance applications in minimal time. Our intention is to continue to work towards the goal set out by Trolltech, Qt’s originators, to develop a framework that enables users to ‘write code once and deploy everywhere’. Adding support for Android and iOS, together with the most widely used embedded operating systems, will give us the potential to target hundreds of millions of products and to help make Qt the dominant force in the software development world."

Brightcove Open Sources App Cloud, Bets Big On Dual-Screen Apps For Apple TV

It was just a year ago that video distribution specialist Brightcove announced it was entering a new market, with a cloud-based product for quickly building multiplatform mobile applications called App Cloud. Well at this year’s annual Play conference, Brightcove will make App Cloud available for free with an open source license. It’s also making a set of tools available that it hopes will push forward the dual-screen applications market.

Brightcove’s App Cloud is basically like a WYSIWYG editor for app development, designed to allow developers to roll out rich apps for both iOS and Android mobile phones and tablets with a minimum amount of actual programming required. App Cloud provides templates to get developers up and running quickly, but which can also be customized with native code. Once built, App Cloud also contains Brightcove’s Workshop debugging tool, so that users can test and preview apps natively on the device and make changes in real-time, before submitting to the App Store or Google Play.

The new free version of Brightcove’s App Cloud is being made available with an open source SDK, to enable developers to build, test, and debug an unlimited number of apps on their devices. They can compile them, and make them available for Apple iOS and Google Android devices.

It’s more or less a freemium model for app building. With App Cloud Core you can build and release as many apps as you want. But if you want features like real-time analytics, push notifications, and native ads, you can upgrade to App Cloud Pro for $99 a month. And for those who need an even more robust feature set, there’s an enterprise version for high-volume apps with custom pricing plans based upon usage.

In addition to open sourcing App Cloud, it’s also pushing one particular feature set, which could change the way we watch TV. Its App Cloud Dual-Screen Solution for Apple TV uses a set of APIs that will allow tablet and mobile users to have a truly integrated second screen experience. By leveraging Apple’s AirPlay technology, App Cloud users can create applications that use the mobile device as the search and navigation, while the Apple TV plays back video.

While developers today can already build robust dual-screen apps that connect the iPad or iPhone and Apple TV, few apps actually take advantage of the capability. Brightcove’s Dual-Screen solution simplifies the creation of these apps, enabling a whole new level of interactivity for app makers to unlock. It also has the potential to shift viewership habits. Today, most TV apps think of the mobile phone or tablet as the “second screen,” but with these dual-screen apps, Brightcove CMO Jeff Whatcott says it’s the mobile device which is the first screen, since it is being used to control the experience, and it is also where all the program information appears.