[Development] Qt and IoT infographic

[Jason H]

> Sent: Tuesday, August 29, 2017 at 5:07 PM
> From: "Thiago Macieira" <thiago.macieira at intel.com>
> To: development at qt-project.org
> Subject: Re: [Development] Qt and IoT infographic
...
> > Besides, this comes a bit as disdainful. I work in music research and
> > *everything* embedded uses Arduinos, Pi, Beaglebones or similar. If you
> > have seen interactive artistic installations in museums, outdoor
> > expositions, or contemporary concerts, there is a huge chance there's a Pi
> > or an Arduino running somewhere. Sure, there aren't "products" that end up
> > produced thousand times and sold on the counter or at Moser, but they are
> > shows, expositions, etc. which generate revenue all the same, for the
> > artists, museums, etc. and need programmers to get the stuff running and
> > banging sound.
> 
> I was talking about production runs, where you make thousands to millions of 
> exact copies. I guess I wasn't very clear about that.
> 
> For one-offs or maybe tens of copies, sure, there's a lot of Arduinos. And a 
> lot of Raspberry Pis too.
> 
> For production runs, that number goes very quickly to zero.

I guess this comes down to whom you are marketing. I can understand Intel and TrollTech (whatever you call current incarnation) wanting those high volume customers. But I think the innovation space is not those high volume customers. It's kickstarters, hobbyists, etc. The knowledge required to go from a Qt level knowledge to a dedicated MCU is as big a gulf - as big a difference as in the hardware specs. It's far easier to pick up Qt and spend a few more $ on your board than to learn about interrupts and all that stuff. The market play here is to use the OSS license, get them to develop their stack on Qt and have them pay for a license later. You'll get far more things for your showcase.

I don't know much about 3D but thanks to QtQuick and Qt3D, I can use 3D in my software. I'd like a similar experience for IoT people. I don't know much about video over USB but I don't need to, QML's Camera works with it. 

I was recently working on an embedded project where we had a couple options. One was essentially a Pi Zero, with reduced memory and storage, providing a REST interface to the data. Quantities in 10k increments, about 10k per year. Because that was judged to be too much work to get running, we ended up not using Qt on the device, but Qt to get the video frames on a connected computer.

These situations may be anecdotal, but I think they'll be more common and I'd like Qt to be ideally positioned for the next million innovators.