Qt and KDE developers have yet another great set of tools

Mar 30, 2016 23:00 GMT  ·  By

Today, March 30, 2016, KDE, through Thomas Pfeiffer, has proudly announced a new framework for developers who want to build cross-platform Qt-based applications.

The KDE project is well known for providing developers with UI (User Interface) components that are much more advanced than the ones offered in the cross-platform Qt GUI (Graphical User Interface) toolkit, such as the amazing collection of over 70 add-ons for Qt packed in the KDE Frameworks 5 suite.

Thanks to KDE Frameworks 5 and its active development cycle (a new release is pushed to the official channel on the second Saturday of every month), Qt and KDE developers alike benefited from all sorts of tools and libraries that aren't distributed as part of the normal KDE Stack.

"Now, with KDE's focus expanding beyond desktop and laptop computers into the mobile and embedded sector, our QWidgets-based components alone are not sufficient anymore," says Thomas Pfeiffer, Manager Human-Centered Design, Blue Systems. "In order to allow developers to easily create Qt-based applications that run on any major mobile or desktop operating system, we have created a framework that extends the touch-friendly Qt Quick Controls."

Kirigami UI is more than just a collection of Qt tools

According to KDE, their brand new Kirigami UI framework is more than just a collection of tools targeted at Qt developers who want to build cross-platform, Qt-based apps that run on all major desktop and mobile operating systems, including GNU/Linux, Microsoft Windows, Mac OS X, Android, and iOS. It's a philosophy to define precise user interface and user experience patterns, they say.

Kirigami UI promises to allow Qt developers to develop consistent and intuitive applications that offer a great user experience across all the major platforms mentioned above, as well as on KDE's very own Plasma Desktop and the upcoming Plasma Mobile user interface. Everything you need to know about Kirigami UI should be available in the official announcement. Kirigami UI will be released next month!