The K-Zone: My first Qtopia application -- how to get started with Qtopia development -- part 6

Summary

Here is a summary of the entire process described in the preceding five sections, for creating an installable application.

Create at least one user interface element (FrmMain.cpp in the example)
Create the main() method to instantiate the user interface element and the application
Run the MOC on all the header files that define user interface elements
Compile all the C++ files
Link with the Qtopia and Qt-embedded libraries, and their dependencies
Strip the executable to reduce its size
Create a .desktop file to control the Qtopia launcher
Create and compress a control file
Create an icon
Create a debian-binary file
Put the .desktop file, icon, and stripped executable into a directory structure that reflects the locations of these files on the target device. Compress this directory into data.tar.gz
Compress the debian-binary file, compressed control file, and data.tar.gz into a single package file

Comments

If you're new to Qtopia development, this probably all seems very complicated for a `Hello, World!' application. However, it is important to realize that this complexity -- the complexity of compiling and packaging the application -- never gets any worse than this. Or, at least, it doesn't get any worse until you start dealing with multi-platform distribution, which is a whole new ballgame.
What's more, all the preceding steps can be put into a shell script or Makefile, and executed with a single command. Note also that all the tools we've used in this exercise are available free-of-charge, and most are open source. It is possible to buy smart graphical tools for building Qtopia applications (from Metrowerks, for example), but I hope it should be obvious that these tools are a luxury -- you can build perfectly useable applications without them.

Where to go from here

Here are some suggestions for learning more about Qtopia and Qt-embedded.

There is lots of general information about Qtopia and Qt-embedded on Trolltech's FAQ pages
If you have installed the Qtopia libraries, you'll find very comprehensive documentation in HTML format. Point your browser at /opt/Qtopia/doc/index.html
Have a look at the source code for Qtopia, especially the built-in applications like the addressbook. More-or-less the whole of the Qt/Qtopia class library is demonstrated there.