Qt controls and indicators

gRicky · wrote on 12 Feb 2013, 14:31

Hi to All,

Before starting to develop my own controls and indicators I'd like to know if there is something which is already developed and which is shared and free. There might already be what I'm looking for, therefore I can avoid to develop my custom controls and indicators. Is there a repository for controls and indicators where anybody can download for free?

Thank you in advance...

andre · wrote on 12 Feb 2013, 14:35

There are many. It depends what you are looking for exactly. Some available 3rd party components are listed on the "wiki":/wiki/Category:Add-ons page, but there are even more.

gRicky · wrote on 12 Feb 2013, 15:09

First of all I'd like to say thank you to you.

I'm looking for new boolean indicators and other controls with new graphics which I would like to use on my user interface. On wiki page I just see many libraries but not new controls and indicators... where exactly do I have to look at?

andre · wrote on 12 Feb 2013, 15:13

These libraries contain many widgets, and these widgets could be what you are looking for.

What is a "boolean indicator"? If you want completely custom looking UI, you could also consider using QML.

gRicky · wrote on 12 Feb 2013, 16:31

[quote author="Andre" date="1360682006"]
What is a "boolean indicator"? [/quote]

A boolean indicator (in my mind) is a LED lamp which is on when the boolean data is true and is off when the boolean data is False.

I think it's better to start to look at QML as you suggested doing!
Thanks for your support.

JKSH · wrote on 13 Feb 2013, 05:45

[quote author="gRicky" date="1360686677"][quote author="Andre" date="1360682006"]What is a "boolean indicator"? [/quote]A boolean indicator (in my mind) is a LED lamp which is on when the boolean data is true and is off when the boolean data is False.[/quote]Your terminology reminds me of LabVIEW. Do you have LabVIEW experience?

In Qt, the closest things to controllers/indicators are "Widgets":http://qt-project.org/doc/qt-5.0/qtwidgets/widget-classes.html , and they're programmable in C++. "Qt Quick":http://qt-project.org/doc/qt-5.0/qtquick/qtquick-index.html is quite different -- it lets you create more fluid user interfaces, and it's programmable in QML, which is like CSS + JavaScript.

One thing to remember: Unlike LabVIEW, buttons in Qt are NOT boolean controls; they are high-level "event triggers"

JKSH · wrote on 13 Feb 2013, 06:23

For scientific widgets, see http://qwt.sourceforge.net/

gRicky · wrote on 13 Feb 2013, 07:47

[quote author="JKSH" date="1360734331"]Your terminology reminds me of LabVIEW. Do you have LabVIEW experience?

[...]

One thing to remember: Unlike LabVIEW, buttons in Qt are NOT boolean controls; they are high-level "event triggers"[/quote]

Even though I'm a Labview developer expert, I know that terminology on Qt are quite different. Such as in Labview world I supposed that there was a place in this web-site where developer can share new graphic widgets which others can use in theirs user interface. I'm a fan of sharing code.
Any way, thank you for your clarification.

Therefore I have to start developing custom widget using QML. Do you have any advices to suggest to me to start programming widgets using QML, following the right way?

andre · wrote on 13 Feb 2013, 09:48

Well, I already gave you one link. You can also check www.qt-apps.org, and look in the widgets category. It even contains a couple of led widget implementations.

JKSH · wrote on 13 Feb 2013, 14:25

What would you like your widget(s) to do?

gRicky · wrote on 14 Feb 2013, 08:27

[quote author="Andre" date="1360748932"]Well, I already gave you one link. You can also check www.qt-apps.org, and look in the widgets category. It even contains a couple of led widget implementations.[/quote]

Andre, it is exactly what I was looking for! Thank you very much!

[quote author="JKSH" date="1360765502"]What would you like your widget(s) to do?[/quote]

I'd like to represent every bit of a byte. When the bit value is 0 the led has to be OFF otherwise the led has to be ON. I just thought a led would has been a nice representation.

gRicky · wrote on 14 Feb 2013, 08:33

I have downloaded some widgets from the place Andre had suggested downloading, now: what I have to do to install them properly and have them ready on QtDesigner?

Note: I'm working on ubuntu os.

andre · wrote on 14 Feb 2013, 08:37

That really depends. I guess most can't easily be added to QtDesigner at all, as they probably don't have a plugin for it. The documentation contains information on the ways you can use non-qt provided widgets in designer. Or, you just add them in code.