Poll: what add-on libraries do you use ?

[marcvanriet]

Hi,

Just wondering what the most-used open-source libraries are that everyone is using with Qt.

I just discovered Qxt and had a feeling of "wow, wish I had known of this much sooner". There are probably several more stable and well maintained libraries that one just doesn't know as a new Qt user.

For now this is my shortlist :
- libQxt (http://libqxt.bitbucket.org/doc/tip/)
- wwWidgets (http://www.wysota.eu.org/wwwidgets/)
- QExtSerialPort (http://qextserialport.sourceforge.net/) and QSerialDevice (http://qt-apps.org/content/show.php?content=112039)
- Qwt (http://qwt.sourceforge.net/)
- AnalogWidgets (http://qt-apps.org/content/show.php/AnalogWidgets?content=87780)

Best regards,
Marc

P.S. Of course there are many single-widget or single-function addons on Qt-Apps (http://qt-apps.org/), but these are not really 'libraries'.

[nroberts]

boost. Anyone doing C++ should be using boost.

[high_flyer]

and STL (http://www.sgi.com/tech/stl/) of course.

[wysota]

and STL (http://www.sgi.com/tech/stl/) of course.

Since I started using Qt there is little STL was able to offer me. I used some things from <algorithm> a couple of times but that's practically it. For instance knowing what QString can do, using std::string is a pain in the neck. Fortunately I don't remember when I had to use pure C++ the last time for anything serious.

As for the libraries mentioned I have been using QExtSerialPort and obviously wwWidgets. Apart from that I used libQGLViewer once and recently I've been taking a closer look at Qt3D and QtOpenCL. I'm also maintaining (so far privately but the code is intended to go public) a Qt wrapper over C++ API for ActiveMQ's JMS implementation.

Oh, and I was never a big fan of boost. Probably because I don't feel very comfortable with C++ templates. The syntax is too scary ;)

[high_flyer]

It is true, that in Qt applications, I too, don't have much use for stl since Qt has its own implementation for most classes I use, but in any non Qt project, I use STL heavily, boost too by the way (depending on what I do), since I always strive to be as portable as I can.
And I agree, boost syntax can be a bitch!

[marcvanriet]

Hi,

@nroberts & high_flyer : there is a lot of overlapping functionality in boost and Qt (like the signal/slot mechanism and threading, to name 2 obvious ones). Do you use the Qt ones where available or not ? It seems that the things that boost has more than Qt are rather 'complicated stuff' like MPI and complex algorithms and mathematical functions. Not something that one would need for 'ordinary' desktop applications.

Regards,
Marc

[high_flyer]

Not something that one would need for 'ordinary' desktop applications.
As I said, in Qt apps I hardly need standard functionality from outside Qt.
Its more for non Qt apps.
And what is 'ordinary'?
Since at work we develop client specific applications (which in our case is usually quite complex applications that bind special hardware as well), many hardware handling libs do not use Qt for that functionality, rather usually only for GUI.
So for my work it is very 'ordinary' to use boost/stl for the non Qt/GUI parts.

[finetjul]

The Common Toolkit ( CTK ):
www.commontk.org