How to get started with QT
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I posted this on the C++ forum and they gave me a link to this site. I’m a system / batch / console app developer who modifies database engines and scrapes the Internet for published data. I have little to no experience in writing Windows Form applications, but I’d like to do one now using HTML as the human interface if that is possible. Can someone show me a path with tutorials and videos to get me started using QT within the Visual Studio environment, if that is even possible? OK, here is the original C++ post:
I’ve written a program as a C++ console application. It does stock market analysis and runs in two phases. The first phase creates a market snapshot on a historical date and will remain as a batch application. The second phase does the analysis of the market data and creates an intranet website on my local disk so I can examine the results. This is the phase I want to re-write as a window’s form application, but even though I have over 40 years of programming experience, almost none of it has been in the creation of form applications, just batch processing!
My idea is to create the requested HTML pages one at a time as requested and somehow display them in the window form without ever writing them to disk. I do not want to run web server software on my PC, but I do want to display the HTML, including the use of CSS and JavaScript, and have the ability to recognize and process requested URLs when the user clicks on a link. Of course, each requested URL will run my personal code to create the requested HTML page.
Is this even possible to do? If so, can you point me in the right direction, maybe to an on-line tutorial or two!
Thanks
PS: A quick overview of the application is available at www.papageek.com/Investing.pdf
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Hi and welcome to devnet,
You'll probably be interested in the QtWebEngine module for the work you'd like to do. You also have two options: either full C++ with the QtWidget module or maybe QML.
Are you planning on integrating your current code in your new application or call your command line tool from it ?
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I’m planning to split the code into two parts. There will be a console based “Shapshot” program that will take a snapshot of the market conditions on a certain date. The second program will be a standalone app that allows a user to navigate through the market data.
I have the C++ code for both parts currently in a single app which currently does all of the analysis for all available date at the same time and then creates the Intranet website on your disk. I can easily create each web page as requested and store it in a character stream which I can then feed to the web browser control. Since all of the navigation can be done within a fixed header, I can easily convert my current page header into a series of Buttons and Labels and keep them fixed above the HTML page. I’m currently using Jquery to create a fixed navigation header on my Intranet pages.
What advantages does Qt have over the WebBrowser control in Visual Studio?
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One thing is that you are not tied to Windows thus you can provide your application for other platforms and generating the HTML might also be easier with Qt's classes
