[Qt5-feedback] Qt5's qmake

[Doug Schaefer]

On Sat, May 14, 2011 at 10:14 AM, Peter Kümmel <syntheticpp at gmx.net> wrote:
> On 12.05.2011 22:21, Thiago Macieira wrote:
>> On Thursday, 12 de May de 2011 14:38:37 Ian Monroe wrote:
>>> On Thu, May 12, 2011 at 14:15, Doug Schaefer<cdtdoug at gmail.com>  wrote:
>>>> On Thu, May 12, 2011 at 12:09 PM, Ian Monroe<ian at monroe.nu>  wrote:
>>>>> So whatever qmake+1 is, it shouldn't let configuration be an
>>>>> afterthought. And I hope we just use cmake.
>>>>
>>>> +1 for cmake. It's out there, it's customizable, and if needed, we
>>>> should be able to get changes upstream. I don't think it's a good
>>>> thing people have to learn yet another build tool. I'd rather they
>>>> focus on making great apps with Qt.
>>>
>>> The fact that cmake is open to changes can't be emphasized too much.
>>
>> They are indeed open for changes. We discussed with them a replacement for
>> qmake about a year and a half ago, but it never went anywhere. Still, Kitware
>> was very responsive to most of our concerns, about the needs of the IDE to
>> control the project file, the device deployment and packaging, etc.
>>
>> I think there's a blog on Labs that listed what our requirements were.
>>
>> However, one thing they were not open for change is the language.
>>
>
> I would design the wished language on paper with all the needed features,
> and starting the implementation on base of a cmake-fork. Then you would have
> all the existing cmake features, which could step-by-step be migrated to
> your new build tool language. This way you get very fast a running system.
>
> Adding a new script language to cmake isn't that hard, I know about three
> experimental bindings, QtScript, Lua, and AngleScript. Writing a wrapper to
> get rid of the cmake function names is also simple.
>
> And assuming you have really man-power/budget available for this job
> (qmake is 'Done') it would take only some months to replace qmake.
>
> And maybe there is interest to bring the changes upstream.
>
> Peter

Since cmake already has Qt4 support built-in, I assume it'll be pretty
straightforward to add Qt5, no? I think a lot of Qt devs would be
happy enough with that.

Doug.