Qt Apps banned from Mac App Store?

[Oliver Knoll]

@wysota, could you please stop replying to my posts please, thank you! You have proven several times that you did not understand the issues/topics being discussed, what you write is often simply wrong or proves otherwise your ignorance and need of self-portraying here! Let me give you a few examples of what I mean:

They won't include it. It would break compatibility with existing apps.

That's absolutely not true and may be due to your lack of understanding what binary compatibility means! Adding methods never breaks binary compatibility! Why do you think that the currrent Qt 4.7 is still binary compatible with Qt 4.0? I mean, you did notice that methods have been added since then, now do you?

And just for you, clear-text: No one here was talking to include the patches as-is into the current Qt source code, neither did I suggest to apply those patches! Read again: I suggested to contact Nokia, as to make them aware of the current problematic, that Qt writes a configruation file of its own - and just for you again: ~/Library/Preferences/com.trolltech.plist - and that is a problem when it comes to acceptance testing by Apple! Believe it or not, that is a fact, as just shown to us by AronR. Yes, please, go and read the post again if necessary!

Since this is something the application developer is fully in control of there is no point in modifying Qt. You just have to go past the happy "hey, let's use the defaults" approach.

Wrong again! We are talking about the Qt configuration file which is generated by Qt, not by the application. Why can't you just read and understand what people write here in the forum? And please stop with your arrogant comments like "You just have to go past the happy ... approach", no one wants to read that! And it is simply embarassing, as you just have shown that you again did not understand what it was all about, by the following:

There is. Have a look at available constructors for QSettings.

See what I mean? We are not talking - I repeat extra for you - not talking about QSettings! We are talking about the ~/Library/Preferences/com.trolltech.plist. And the current Qt API does not provide a way to control the location, as just shown by AronR.

Okay, since this is my last reply for you anyway, let's have a look at a few other posts from you:

Question: "[List of restrictions given] Does this affect Qt (C++) software?"

You: "Yes it does"

Wow, how helpful was that! But at least the answer is not wrong at this point.

Question: "Does that mean Qt 'Apps' are completely out of the question?"

You: "Officially, yes."

How the heck would you know at that point (note: before the store actually opened or anyone submitted a Qt app)? By now reality has shown that you were simply plain wrong, since it seems that Qt apps per se are allowed (there are a few glitches with files, but nothing serious). But again: Qt per se is not restricted - at least as far as we know so far!

Statement: "It's probably more like: Apps that look like standard Mac applications & behave like standard Mac applications will be accepted. ..."

You: "Qt is an "optional library", if at all you can install it through App Store. I doubt they will accept any application that depends on a library you can't install through App Store."

Now this post clearly shows that you have apparently no clue about how applications on Mac are deployed, namely that they provide all Frameworks/libraries themselves in the so-called App Bundle. So your doubt is absolutely unjustified here, since it totally does not matter whether a user could download an "optional Qt library" or not. The app simply provides it, point!

Correction by serkol: "Do you really have to "install" Qt? It does not have to be "installed". Qt is just several files inside your application bundle."

Your reply: "So if you have 10 Qt-based applications you get those "several files" ten times each, right? I know disk space is cheap but is it really a good approach?"

Again that definitively shows that you have no clue about app deployment on a Mac! Yes, disk space is wasted! Yes, every Qt app would ship along their own set of Qt libraries (by the way, like this it is also made sure that an application does not accidentally overwrite a newer Qt library installation, see "DLL hell" on Windows).

By the way also on Windows you have the same situation. The only OS where this is different is Linux, since there you have a proper package manager which installs Qt as well as a depenedency.

But just for you: Mac apps ship all their dependencies which are not by default on a Mac OS installation in their bundle. That is the way it is, has been and will be! If you did not know that... now you know!

You can complain about wasted disk space with Apple, if you feel like.

You: "Yes, you can compile it statically which makes your application really huge."

Again simply wrong, given the alternative that the application ships the Qt libraries inside the bundle (dynamically linked). The static build will at max be as large as the dynamic build, but in practise much smaller, since only the *.o files which are really needed are linked into the static application! And that size is often < size(your app + all required shared libraries).

(You are right under the assumption however that there would be exactly one Qt installation in the OS - but we have already learnt above that in the case of Mac this is not the case. And this thread is about the Mac).

Statement: "I've came across 2 Qt/Mac bugs that bother me." + Qt issue tracker links given. One of the issue is about "sheets"

You: "And how is this related to the discussion in this thread?"

Well, somewhat justified question. Posting issue URLs and ask people to vote for them is maybe not appropriate in this forum. But given the fact that we talk about "Qt acceptance" and these issues are Mac related these issues do have some relevance here in this discussion.

Opinion to your statement: "It is related. [...] - is definitely one of those bugs that can be a reason for Apple to reject a Qt app."

Correction to one of your previous statements regarding "disk space": "This is the Mac way; applications are packaged in bundles..."

You: "I'm not sure you are right. There is also a concept of "frameworks" and as far as I understand it that's what Qt is."

At least here you show that you are actually quite uncertain what "a framework actually is". Well, that is not bad, you can always learn. I am not going to repeat what other people have told you so far. But it gets better:

Statement: "You dynamically link to the QT libs and include them in the bundle; GPL/LGPL satisfied."

You: "No, you are wrong. GPL will certainly not be satisfied with that."

Now you are actually wrong here (again)! Whether you link against the Framework under /Library/Frameworks/Qt... or place that Framwork inside your own App Bundle still makes your application link dynamically against Qt! But you have proven previously that you did not understand of app deployment on Macs, so you are somewhat excused here with your ignorance...

Me: "For instance, if Qt creates ~/Library/Preferences/com.trolltech.plist ..."

You: "You can place your settings wherever you want, nothing needs to be "fixed" for this."

Again you are wrong: We are not talking about application settings. We are talking about the file being created by Qt, so call it "Qt settings" if you wish. I am not saying that there is currently no way in the Qt API to control that place, but you did not give any URL to doc.trolltech.com, and I doubt there is any such API!

You: "Sheets are available in Qt for ages now so no fix needed here as well. People just need to use them."

Now this shows both your misunderstanding of the previous discussion - as already pointed out by me - and it proves again your arrogance ("People just need to use them."). Fact: "Sheets are somewhat broken", an URL to a Qt issue (!) had been provided. So how come you saying "no fix needed here"? But it seems you do not understand written text so well, since you argue "sheets are available in Qt for ages". So? How is that related to the fact that there is a bug in the implementation? Who are you to say "People just need to use them"?

This was the point where I really had to tell you "Hey, please read - and understand - what other people say before giving bold statements!"

The fact that later on you quoted me incompletely and the fact that you freak out because of a missing ("because there is a missing closing bracket in your post and the place where you put the bracket changes the meaning of your whole sentence completely") is simply ridiculous (by the way, just for you: the closing bracket was there - it just was part of a smiley which gets converted into a real smiley - that is the way I close brackets and a at the same time - sorry if that confused you so much.

Thank God that English language (just as any other language) is higly redundant and most people's brain has a very good error detection and correction mechanism. That works for 99.9999999437% of all people on this planet. Count yourself as part of the other group...


Thanks for understanding,

Oliver