How much cost Qt for Indie developers ?
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When the licences were still sold by Nokia, I believe that they cost something like EUR 1400 per developer for a single platform licence. You could also buy a 2 or 3 platform licence at a few hundred per additional platform. No idea if Digia is using a very different price model, but I doubt it.
If you need more exact data, you have to ask Digia, of course.
Note that you may also considder using the LGPL version of the toolkit. That would be a much cheaper option for an "indie", I think. The limitations are not such that it is impossible to develop commercial software that way.
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Just a note: I think that this post maybe moved somewhere else, i.e. The lounge subforum...
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Ooops... I was sure it was under Mobile and Embedded. Sure, it is a tipycal Independent Developer's argument :)
Sorry
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[quote author="williamsj" date="1321378286"]Prices I got from Digia are the same as Nokia was quoting:
Qt Desktop Single OS – 2.995,-
Qt Desktop Multi OS – 4.195,-
Qt Embedded Single - 4.795,-
Qt Embedded Multi – 5.595,-
Qt All OS – 6.395,-All prices are in Euro and per developer.[/quote]
Sorry for dumb question, but i cant find complete answer for this.
What can I get for this price?
And what difference between opensource version and version from Digia? -
If it's too expensive for your - nobody forces you to buy a license. Go with the LGPL version and be happy. There's nothing to flame about this. If you run a business making money out of the software you build on top of Qt, it's likely that the license fees are negligible compared to the other costs. And there's more you get for the money than only the license, e.g. dedicated support, bug fixes, etc.
Let's be happy that there are that much options and everyone can choose what fits ones needs.
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[quote author="Ryein" date="1345071590"]I'm happy about that, but I just don't know why it's so hard to figure out the prices. I got a credit card ready, but haven't heard back for about a week on the prices.[/quote]
I feel bad for the credit card, they're really big prices. In their site they tell you the benefits of a commercial license.
(I'd love to be able to statically build without having to purchase... But well) -
I’d love to be able to statically build without having to purchase…
Unfortunatelly in static linked Qt 5.0 not worked QML 2.0 feature, also you can't link static with ICU and Angle (used in Qt 5.0).
This way commercial license have no benefits except paid support. -
Qt would not stand where it stays today, if they would not have so many developers. And most contributions are not made from hobbyists, they are made by commercial programmers. If I
sell successfully a commercial application, I would be happy to buy a licence, because I make sure that my foundation will not break away. And that is quite a crucial benefit.... Just my two cents.Bests
Mike -
It is a pity Digia doesn't distinguish between rich corporations and poor independent developers. And I keep hearing stuff like "It is not expensive" mostly by people whose sight goes about as far as their noses, in complete ignorance of the fact many people in the world still have to survive and provide for families with monthly pay that is lower than a day's pay for others. That is right, the average monthly pay where I come from is less than a day's pay of an average C++ developer in western nations. But hey, since when do rich people give a damn about the poor?
Paid support I can live without. I never ever resorted to customer support with the exception of returning faulty hardware. It is a very ugly thing that Digia don't take into consideration the financial capabilities of developers, especially after they got Qt literally for peanuts. Maybe I'd understand if they (over)paid as much as Nokia, but getting it so cheap and milking it so hard draws a picture in a pretty greedy tone.
And while some people say "what do you care, just use LGPL and link dynamically" but many others seem to think that if you develop closed source applications you pretty much have to go commercial, the whole subject is very vague, everyone gives a vague answer, so the poor independent developer is faced with a dilemma - just as he can't afford to buy a commercial license he can't also afford to get sued.
So how does one start developing and selling his software so he can reach the point of being able to afford either the ridiculously high priced commercial license or the ridiculously high priced legal council?
And excuse me but those prices are not just high relative to the standards of people who live east of Germany, they are also quite high compared to other similar products:
C++ Bulder XE3 Starter - 236 euro
C++ Bulder XE3 Ultimate - 2676 euro
C++ Bulder XE3 Pro - 891 euro
C++ Bulder XE3 Enterprise - 1784 euro
Juce (single product) - 399 pounds
Juce (unlimited) - 699 pounds
Visual Studio 2012 Pro - 600 euro
Marmalade SDK Indie - 499$
Marmalade SDK Plus - 1499$
MoSync Basic Pro - 199 euro
MoSync Gold Pro - 2999 euro
MoSync (without support) - FREEAnd all those include multiple platform support, which for Qt comes at in excess of 6000 euro. And this only for the currently supported platforms, there is still the possibility to jack the price even further once iOS and Android are supported.
With all the ambiguity the only good LGPL serves is to attract more potential commercial customers, not to mention it can very well entrap naive people into legal troubles. Surely it must be safe to develop open source applications, but the question is who will pay for an open source application? Maybe a few people will pay for support, but that implies you already have a business with support staff, which is hardly the case of start-up indie developers.
A much better option for indie developers would be to get commercial license at the cost of 10% of your application sales. Whether you are entitled to support and how much would depend on the scale of your operation. When or if you get big enough - switch to the current fixed price licensing scheme. This approach would make it much easier for indie developers, but it will also increase Digia's profits, provided of course it is willing to collect amounts below 4 digit, and most importantly - it will provide the possibility to start up and grow big enough to be able to afford the full blown license.
Otherwise, it is just discriminatory towards people whose only fault is no one asked them about the geographic coordinates to be born at.
