Qt Architect is a versitile screen architect for the Qt widget set.

Changes in Version 2.1

XML File Formats

XML is used for all file formats. The previous file format is still able to be loaded. However, only XML is saved. The previous format may be dropped in a later release.

Code Generation

The following code generation changes were made:

• Special character values, like new lines and tabs, are escaped in the generated code.

Widgets

The following widgets were added:

• QHGroupBox
• QIconView
• QVGroupBox

As usual, the properties for all the widgets were updated. Properties which were marked as obsolete were removed. In a future release, qtarch will support compiling with the QT_NO_COMPAT flag.

Features

• Multiple dialogs can be open at the same time. Each dialog has its own file. Projects allow multiple dialogs to be grouped together.

• Widgets are easily created, positioned, and resized on the dialog. An optional grid allows for easy alignment. Multiple widgets can be selected, repositioned and aligned.

• Widget attributes are easily modified by the use of property dialogs. Virtually every possible attribute of a widget is configured with a few clicks of the mouse.

• Widgets can be mapped to member variables easily. Just click the checkbox in the property dialog, type in the variable name, and press OK. Also, signals emitted by the widgets can be easily mapped to slots. These slots can then be defined in the dialog class and used to perform an action in response to the signal.

• Layouts can be graphically added and manipulated on a dialog. Box and Grid layouts are supported. Widgets which are added to layouts can themselves contain layouts. This allows, for example, a QButtonGroup to arrange its QRadioButtons in a grid layout.

• Widget Modules can now be created and added to QtArch to support third party widgets, including KDE. See the Module HOWTO for more about modules.

• Actual C++ files are generated to construct and initialize all the widgets on the dialog. File generation has two parts:

  1. Creation of the dialog class is done by default the first time the files are generated. A skeleton class is created which is derived from the dialog data base class.
  2. Creation of the dialog data class is done by default every time the files are generated. This class is derived from QDialog, QTabDialog, QWidget, or QFrame, as specified in the dialog properties. This class constructs and initializes all the widgets on the dialog. It also connects any signals and slots and contains default slots for any signals that were connected. The methods are empty and can be overridden in the dialog class since the slots are declared virtual.
  
  

• A pixmap editor is included for the creation of images for use within Qt. A pixmap file is created. Also, the pixmap can be generated. A header file with the definition of the pixmap variable as well as the source file with the actual definition of the pixmap is generated.

Screen Shots

• Main dialog editor
• Layout dialog for the previous screen
• Property page for a QMultiLineEdit
• Property page for a QIconView in the Platinum style

Releases

The source for Qt Architect is available under the GPL. The source builds on Linux, other Unices, and even Windows. It is developed on a standard RedHat 6.2 Linux box with egcs 2.91.66, flex 2.5.4, and GNU make. The README, TODO list, and documentation (QtArch.ps.gz) are available for viewing.

Qt Architect Users

Project Information

• Project page on SourceForge
• CVS Repository