Introducing Qt Enterprise Embedded (aka Boot to Qt)

We have spent the past 11 months working on the Boot to Qt project, which started as an internal Digia Qt R&D labs investigation to address some of the challenges with software development for embedded devices.  Since then, the Boot to Qt Project has received a lot of positive feedback from our customers and evaluators, and we are currently at the stage where it’s time to turn it into a real product and integrate it fully into the Qt embedded offering.

We are happy to introduce Qt Enterprise Embedded (Qt EE), consisting of the “Boot to Qt” software stack (v 1.0) and the existing Qt embedded offering from Digia for embedded Linux and embedded Android development.

Embedded Development Made Easy

A key objective of the Boot to Qt project was to enable people to get started with embedded projects quickly by removing the tedious nature of developing for devices and focus on the ease of creating fluid and responsive applications & UIs for embedded systems. This objective lives on in Qt Enterprise Embedded. Here is a video showing how to get started with Qt Enterprise Embedded:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-Sz6UDUK68w

During our usability testing, we found that all our test subjects were able to install Qt Enterprise Embedded and deploy a Hello World application to a device in less than 3 hours.

The following were the types of developers who completed our usability testing:

1. Developers experienced with Qt and embedded
2. Web developers with no Qt or embedded experience
3. Developers experienced with embedded, but no Qt experience

To make sure we were developing a top offering, we experimented a bit ourselves with device creation. (It’s usually healthy to use your own product). Here is a video of how Andy Nichols (Digia, Qt Software Engineer) made a device to aid in learning to play the piano:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0EpNrFE2hmE

Reference Devices

We have set up Qt Enterprise Embedded to run out-of-the-box on a few reference devices (see list below). These are the devices we are using for internal development and testing. However, please note that Qt Enterprise Embedded is not limited to these devices and we can help you get up and running on most hardware targets.

Here is a video showing the different reference devices (and another device we have been playing with) in action.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oAVCtm1dGjE

What’s New in Qt Enterprise Embedded

We have made some significant improvements since the Boot to Qt Technology Preview 2, which have introduced into the final Qt Enterprise Embedded.

Qt Quick and Qt Widgets
With Qt Enterprise Embedded you can develop your applications both using Qt Quick and Qt Widgets.

Qt Multimedia
We have updated the Android version on the i.MX6 and the Nexus 7 to Android 4.2, which was helpful in making Qt Multimedia work on these devices.

Qt Sensors
The sensors API’s on Android seems to be pretty standardized, so we have made Qt Sensors work on Android (can be tested on the Nexus 7). On Linux the sensors API’s seems less standardized, so we don’t have an out of the box solution for sensors on Linux.

Input devices
Touch, mouse and keyboard handling has received fixes to the known issues, so these are fully supported.

New reference devices
In the Boot to Qt Technology Preview 2, some of the feedback was that people wanted the Raspberry Pi as a reference device. This has been done, so now you can use the Raspberry Pi (model B) out of the box with Qt EE. Also, we are now allowed to distribute software from Freescale, which allows us to present the i.MX 6 as a reference device also on Linux.

Supported modules

An overview of the supported modules can be found here.

Supported platforms in Qt

With the launch of Qt Enterprise Embedded Android is introduced as a fully supported embedded platform in Qt.

Documentation

The documentation for Qt Enterprise Embedded can be found here.

Versions

The “Boot to Qt” software stack (v 1.0) is based on Qt 5.1 and Qt Creator 2.8.

Qt Enterprise Embedded in Action

We are really happy to announce that one of the early adapters of the Boot to Qt Project is already in production. You can read more about their experiences on the product page

Getting Started

To get started with Qt Embedded Enterprise, you can request a free 30-day trial via the try now page.

Existing Qt Enterprise customers with an embedded Linux license can access the Qt Enterprise Embedded installer in Customer Portal download area.

We are looking forward to your feedback!