Building user interfaces with QML

I don't know about you, but creating interfaces is not my most favorite part of development. I think that's because I'm not a designer or a UX expert. Recent advancements in developing intefaces make my life easier, for example Silverlight, Flex and my favorite QML.

In 10 mins I created a custom interface element, created a custom menu and was able to debug the app, all using QML. Granted I followed the tutorial here.

I was able to follow the tutorial using Vim and qmlviewer. I didn't have to compile anything and it just felt natural. I do web development every single day and the format is very similar to JSON, so I think that's why I felt that way.

The other awesome part of this is, I can build my interfaces using QML and everything else using C++. I find developing interfaces in C++ to be boring, cumbersome and really not that fun. With QML, I can rock the back end in C++ and the front end with QML. I'm looking forward to updating a couple projects I have using this approach. Another plus is, I can develop applications for Meego using QML :)

More to come later. Until then, check out the tutorial and if all else spend a couple mins following the tutorial.

Meego rocks!

Meego is a collaborative effort between several major technology players, to create one operating system for mobile devices. The effort brings together Maemo and Moblin and it was built using Nokia's Qt framework. I look forward to seeing devices in the US with Meego preinstalled. Even though it's only on version 1.1, they've accomplished a lot and there are plans to distribute it on mobile devices.

I used version 1.1 exclusively on my Asus Eeepc netbook for a couple months. It worked great, even used it for basic development.

For more information take a look at the Meego website.