Serial port read/write using a multithreaded Qt app

[Aham]

The Qt application I am required to develop, needs to have 2 threads.

thread-1: read data from a serial port and pass it onto thread 2
thread-2: display the raw data it received (sent by thread-1)

From my very limited knowledge of Qt, I understand thread-1 is the worker thread and thread-2 is the main GUI thread.

What is the design approach for implementing this application?

[Lesiok]

The second thread (with serial port) is unnecessary. Just use signal readyRead to get data from serial port and display it.

[Aham]

Thanks, Lesiok.

What you are saying is correct and I understand that.

But, there is a requirement for 2 threads because more functionalities will be added in future that require 2nd thread.

Before we add many functionalities, I'm just trying to implement the basic framework with 2 threads.

[Lesiok]

This use a signals and slots mechanism for communicating between threads. And yes, thread 1 is worker and thread 2 is GUI (main) thread.

[Aham]

Ok, cool. I'm new to Qt and have been reading up some literature about it. So, do you think I should use a QueuedConnection to pass data from worker to main thread? Can you give me a basic structure of the code that I can start with for my application?

[Lesiok]

Yes, You should use a QueuedConnection. It is a default when sender and receiver are in two threads.

[Aham]

I've installed Qt 5.7 on Windows (8.1). I'm not getting QThread option (as a base class) while I try to add a new class to a project? What could be the reason?

[Lesiok]

Here (http://doc.qt.io/qt-5/qthread.html#details) You have an example how to deal with QThread. Note that in first example the Worker does not inherit the QThread. This method is better because you can easily use the Worker in any thread.

[Aham]

Ok, I will. Thanks, Lesiok.