<br><br><div class="gmail_quote">On Mon, Aug 27, 2012 at 3:50 AM, BogDan Vatra <span dir="ltr"><<a href="mailto:taipanromania@gmail.com" target="_blank">taipanromania@gmail.com</a>></span> wrote:<br><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex;border-left:1px #ccc solid;padding-left:1ex">
Hello folks,<br>
<br>
Today I have the great honor to announce the alpha 4 release of<br>
Necessitas. Since Nokia’s radical change of direction, Qt has had a<br></blockquote><div><br></div><div>Very awesome to BogDan, Ray and entire team!!!</div><div><br></div><div>Congrats... </div><div><br></div><div>and thank you for your sweat and blood invested-- to all contributors... we are all indebted to you guys...</div>
<div><br></div><div>-Nalin</div><div> </div><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex;border-left:1px #ccc solid;padding-left:1ex">
very hard time and many asked themselves whether it was worth<br>
investing their time and money in it anymore. I’m not going to comment<br>
further on Nokia’s recent stupid decisions because I value too highly<br>
the contributions Nokia has made to Qt.<br>
Instead, I want to comment on the future of Qt and how to make sure<br>
it will survive no matter what. I didn't comment on this matter until<br>
now because I was too busy getting this release out, and how better to<br>
prove to you folks that we are committed to Qt than to continue our<br>
work with this new release? First and foremost Qt is free software,<br>
according to the KDE Free Qt Foundation[1] Nokia (and most probably<br>
also Digia) must release it under both the LGPL 2.1 and the GPL 3.<br>
Otherwise *"the Foundation has the right to release Qt under a<br>
BSD-style license or under other open source licenses. The agreement<br>
stays valid in case of a buy-out, a merger or bankruptcy."* So from<br>
this point of view you don't have anything to worry about! What about<br>
Qt's future development, who will continue to work on it now that<br>
Nokia have dropped it? While we all share great hopes that Digia will<br>
manage the Qt Project well, the beauty of free software if that it<br>
doesn't need any single company behind it, it also needs a committed<br>
community; KDE, Necessitas, ICS, KDAB etc, and most importantly *YOU*!<br>
Now more than ever it is very important for all of us to join together<br>
and for you to show your support and appreciation. You have to ask<br>
yourself which option is better for you:<br>
- to be selfless and to spend some of your time (or your money) to<br>
make the things you love better and to keep them free for everybody...<br>
- or to be selfish, forget about Qt and start learning some crappy<br>
closed source C# or iFramework instead which, some day (sooner or<br>
later), will die with the *ONLY* company behind it?<br>
<br>
We choose the first option. The Necessitas developers will do their<br>
best to succeed where Nokia has failed: to make Qt available on a huge<br>
number of (Android-powered) devices. Yes baby, the next billion is<br>
coming!<br>
This alpha 4 release is one of the final steps that we needed to do.<br>
It *should* be our last alpha release! If there are no show-stopping<br>
regressions reported, in one and a half months we'll ship the first<br>
beta release. Why one and a half months? From now on, to be sure that<br>
there are no regressions introduced, releases will be made in two<br>
steps:<br>
- The first step is to release the SDK, and to push the new Android<br>
libs to Ministro's testing repository. The new Android libs will stay<br>
in the testing repository for at least one month to give developers<br>
enough time to test their apps using them. They should use the<br>
Ministro configuration tool to switch to the testing repository.<br>
Additional updates will be released in the testing repository and this<br>
period may be extended if any regressions are reported. A new update<br>
must stay for at least two weeks in the testing repository; known<br>
issues are not considered regressions!<br>
- Once the new libs in the testing repository are determined to be<br>
regression-free, they will land in the stable repository and they will<br>
be available to all Android users.<br>
<br>
In other words developers should perform the following two steps:<br>
- Update the SDK, use the Ministro configuration tool to switch to<br>
the testing repository, update your apps, and report any regressions.<br>
*DO NOT* publish any apps on Google Play until the version from the<br>
testing repository reaches the stable repository, otherwise they will<br>
stop working!!!<br>
- *WAIT* for the alpha 4 release to land in the stable repository,<br>
then you can publish the updated apps on Google Play!<br>
Go back and carefully read these two statements one more time!<br>
<br>
The alpha 4 release will stay in the stable repository for another<br>
two weeks, then *if no regressions* are reported, it will be<br>
re-released as beta 1. Basically we'll simply re-label it as beta 1!<br>
>From that moment we'll guarantee that the ABI/API will remain stable<br>
and therefore you can safely deploy any apps you like on Google Play!<br>
<br>
The most important changes:<br>
Necessitas has a new home page: <a href="http://necessitas.kde.org" target="_blank">http://necessitas.kde.org</a><br>
Here you can find latest news and information on how to get involved<br>
(<a href="http://necessitas.kde.org/getinvolved.php" target="_blank">http://necessitas.kde.org/getinvolved.php</a>), how to help and to get<br>
help (<a href="http://necessitas.kde.org/gethelp.php" target="_blank">http://necessitas.kde.org/gethelp.php</a>) and much more.<br>
We've also moved the wiki and the bugs from <a href="http://sf.net" target="_blank">sf.net</a> to KDE's infrastructure.<br>
<br>
Qt framework:<br>
- Update to Qt 4.8.2<br>
- Native Android look&feel for classic widgets.<br>
- Native Android menus - known limitation: Android menus support only<br>
one submenu. We'll try to find a solutions for this problem in a<br>
future release (follow <a href="https://bugs.kde.org/show_bug.cgi?id=304240" target="_blank">https://bugs.kde.org/show_bug.cgi?id=304240</a> to<br>
check its progress).<br>
- Fixed user Java/C++ interaction.<br>
- New assets access scheme. Please add "assets:" prefix, check<br>
<a href="http://techbase.kde.org/Development/Tutorials/Necessitas" target="_blank">http://techbase.kde.org/Development/Tutorials/Necessitas</a> for more<br>
information.<br>
- SMP safe atomics.<br>
- Many bug fixes.<br>
Known issues/limitations:<br>
- As stated above, native Android menus support only one submenu.<br>
- While some demos and examples work fine, many will not, particularly<br>
on Windows.<br>
- No other new issues.<br>
<br>
Ministro:<br>
- Extracts Android native look&feel.<br>
- Secure config files downloading.<br>
- Bug fixes.<br>
Known issues/limitations:<br>
- None.<br>
<br>
Qt mobility:<br>
- Android Bluetooth implementation.<br>
- A few bug fixes.<br>
Known issues/limitations:<br>
- No new issues.<br>
<br>
QtCreator:<br>
- Updated to 2.6 (alpha).<br>
- Fixed bug in ma-make.exe where all rule commands were run through a<br>
batch file leading to each 8192nd character being dropped. Now<br>
CreateProcess is used for nearly all commands, and a work around for<br>
the (MS) batch file bug was also implemented.<br>
- A few other bug fixes.<br>
Known issues/limitations:<br>
- This release is based on an un-released QtCreator version, so some<br>
unexpected issues may occur.<br>
- When you install the qt src package, the source paths mapping is not<br>
set automatically anymore so to debug the qt libraries at the source<br>
level, you need to set it manually: put<br>
“/tmp/necessitas/unstable/Android/Qt/482” in the source path and<br>
“YOUR_INSTALLATION_FOLDER/Android/Qt/482” in the target path.<br>
- On Windows, adb loses track of the connected devices a lot and<br>
otherwise misbehaves (worse with emulators), causing QtCreator to<br>
hang. When this happens, to get it to respond again you can execute:<br>
android-sdk\platform-tools\adb.exe kill-server &<br>
android-sdk\platform-tools\adb start-server &<br>
android-sdk\platform-tools\adb devices (from cmd.exe in<br>
YOUR_INSTALLATION_FOLDER) or:<br>
taskkill /F /IM adb.exe /T (from cmd.exe in any directory)<br>
<br>
SDK Installer framework has been updated with upstream’s latest<br>
changes. One of the biggest improvements is the ability to add<br>
3rd-party repositories, so:<br>
- If you are a developer who has something interesting to share for<br>
Android (e.g. plugins, custom widgets, QML controls, etc.) please add<br>
your repository to<br>
<a href="http://community.kde.org/Necessitas/3rd_party_SDK_repositories" target="_blank">http://community.kde.org/Necessitas/3rd_party_SDK_repositories</a><br>
- If you are a developer looking for something which is not shipped<br>
with the Necessitas SDK, you can check the same page:<br>
<a href="http://community.kde.org/Necessitas/3rd_party_SDK_repositories" target="_blank">http://community.kde.org/Necessitas/3rd_party_SDK_repositories</a>.<br>
Known issues/limitations:<br>
- Due to some bugs, the old installer can’t be used update the SDK, so<br>
you need to reinstall the SDK using the new installers.<br>
<br>
Updated the Android NDK and Android SDK to latest versions. Please do<br>
not use the Official Google Android NDK, instead use our Necessitas<br>
Special version.<br>
The following people have made large contributions to this release<br>
(alphabetic ordering):<br>
- Marco Bernasocchi <<a href="mailto:marco@bernawebdesign.ch">marco@bernawebdesign.ch</a>> Moved all the bugs from<br>
<a href="http://sf.net" target="_blank">sf.net</a> to <a href="http://kde.org" target="_blank">kde.org</a>. He is also one of the Necessitas website & wiki<br>
maintainers.<br>
- Ray Donnelly <<a href="mailto:mingw.android@gmail.com">mingw.android@gmail.com</a>> as usual he had a decisive<br>
contribution to this project. He created a custom Android NDK (the<br>
official NDK-r8b was not able to build Necessitas), gdb with Python<br>
support, and most importantly, the Windows and Mac OS X SDKs.<br>
- Willy Gardiol <<a href="mailto:willy@gardiol.org">willy@gardiol.org</a>> reworked most of Necessitas<br>
website and wiki pages. He is also one of the Necessitas website &<br>
wiki maintainers.<br>
- Marijn Kruisselbrink <<a href="mailto:mkruisselbrink@kde.org">mkruisselbrink@kde.org</a>> and Chris Browet<br>
<<a href="mailto:cbro@semperpax.com">cbro@semperpax.com</a>> did most of the native Android menu integration.<br>
- Lauri Laanmets <<a href="mailto:lauri.laanmets@proekspert.ee">lauri.laanmets@proekspert.ee</a>> Android Bluetooth<br>
implementation.<br>
- Tyler Mandry <<a href="mailto:tmandry@gmail.com">tmandry@gmail.com</a>> reworked Java/C++ interaction,<br>
added support for Android QML debugging in QtCreator.<br>
- BogDan Vatra <<a href="mailto:bog_dan_ro@yahoo.com">bog_dan_ro@yahoo.com</a>> Most of the QtCreator Android<br>
Plugin, Ministro updates, SDK Installer updates, Android native<br>
look&feel (Qt and Ministro implementation), cleanup of native Android<br>
menus integration, new assets implementation, SMP safe atomics, most<br>
of the bug fixes.<br>
<br>
As usual, special thanks goes to KDE for their hosting and support!<br>
<br>
I'll also like to personally thank everyone who has summited bugs (and<br>
even better, patches for some of them!)<br>
<br>
You can check out Necessita's glory wall<br>
(<a href="http://necessitas.kde.org/people.php" target="_blank">http://necessitas.kde.org/people.php</a>) for a complete list of all<br>
contributors (who agreed to be listed).<br>
<br>
You can grab the new SDK installer for the following platforms:<br>
-GNU/Linux: <a href="http://files.kde.org/necessitas/installer/release/linux-online-necessitas-alpha4-sdk-installer" target="_blank">http://files.kde.org/necessitas/installer/release/linux-online-necessitas-alpha4-sdk-installer</a><br>
<br>
-Windows: <a href="http://files.kde.org/necessitas/installer/release/windows-online-necessitas-alpha4-sdk-installer.exe" target="_blank">http://files.kde.org/necessitas/installer/release/windows-online-necessitas-alpha4-sdk-installer.exe</a><br>
<br>
-Mac OS X: <a href="http://files.kde.org/necessitas/installer/release/mac_osx-online-necessitas-alpha4-sdk-installer.7z" target="_blank">http://files.kde.org/necessitas/installer/release/mac_osx-online-necessitas-alpha4-sdk-installer.7z</a><br>
<br>
Yours sincerely,<br>
BogDan.<br>
<br>
[1] <a href="http://kde.org/community/whatiskde/kdefreeqtfoundation.php" target="_blank">http://kde.org/community/whatiskde/kdefreeqtfoundation.php</a><br>
</blockquote></div><br>