Qt Project: Difference between revisions

Revision as of 12:10, 6 February 2019

Revision as of 12:11, 6 February 2019

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Controversy arose around 1998 when it became clear that [[KDE|KDE’s]] [[K Desktop Environment 1|K Desktop Environment]] was going to become one of the leading [[desktop environment]]s for [[Linux]]. As it was based on Qt, many people in the [[free software movement]] worried that an essential piece of one of their major operating systems would be proprietary.

With the release of versionQt 2.0, the license was changed to the [[Q Public License]] (QPL), a [[free software]] license but one regarded by the [[Free Software Foundation]] as incompatible with the GPL. A compromise was found between KDE and Trolltech whereby Qt would not be able to fall under a more restrictive license than the QPL, even if Trolltech was bought out or went bankrupt. This led to the creation of the KDE Free Qt Foundation which guarantees that Qt would fall under a [[BSD-style license]] should no free/open source version of Qt be released during a period of 12 months.<ref name="foundation">{{cite web|url=http://www.kde.org/community/whatiskde/kdefreeqtfoundation.php |title=Free Qt Foundation |publisher=KDE |date= |accessdate=2013-05-08}}</ref>

In 2000, Qt 2.2 was released under the GPL v2, ending all controversy regarding GPL compatibility.<ref name="Qt2.2-GPL">{{cite web|url=http://www.linuxplanet.com/linuxplanet/reports/2269/1/ |title=Trolltech to Release Qt Under GPL - Decision Alters Linux GUI Landscape - Reports |publisher=LinuxPlanet |date=2000-09-04 |accessdate=2013-05-08}}</ref>