Does QtRuby work with Qt 5?

Question

Everything I can find online about QtRuby uses Qt 4, but the current version of Qt is 5. Is this simply a matter of documentation not catching up with reality, where Qt 5 would work just fine with QtRuby?

If you assert that this is the case (that Qt5 is unsupported) then please backup your assertion with evidence.

Strobotron

The question is not clear. Please make sure you do not only ask for a definite answer - as I currently understand it -, but also proof for that, i.e. source code level most likely. – Ea

because the question is unclear. Once, you make it clearer, I will turn it back into +1. – Ea

@LaszloPapp: it is normal to give evidence for any assertions made. That is not a matter of question clarity. Especially since I pointed out that the evidence seems to point to Qt5 being unsupported, it's obvious that I'd need a firm reason to conclude that, and more than just someone's supposition or assertion. – Strobotron

Thanks for the edit, although I would define what "evidence" means for you. It is still unclear what you are looking for by evidence. Is my answer evident enough for you? Who knows except you ... – Ea

Answer 1

QtRuby

Qtruby and korundum are not maintained for years now. To get a maintained version of qtruby, install qtbindings as ruby gem.

Qtbindings home page: https://github.com/ryanmelt/qtbindings/

Also see https://github.com/ryanmelt/qtbindings/issues/131 for a discussion about supporting Qt5.

Ruby-QML

Ruby-qml is a QML / Qt Quick wrapper for Ruby. It provides bindings between QML and Ruby and enables you to use Qt5 Quick-based GUI from Ruby.

The bindings provided by Ruby-QML are much leaner in comparison to QtRuby. In particular there is no direct access to the Qt classes' methods. That might first seem to be a a disadvantage when coming from QtRuby.

When learning to use use Ruby-QML, it turns out quickly that the advantages outweigh the limitations:

• QML and JS greatly complement to describe and model the static and dynamic aspects of the UI
• The user community of QML/JS is huge. It is so much easier to find examples or help to solve QML/JS issues, than it was within the tiny QT/Ruby community.
• The examples on Ruby-qml are pretty much complete to demonstrate the constructs needed to get started.
• JS may be used as flexible 'glue logic' between Ruby and Qt.

Deon

Upvoted for useful information. Unfortunately I think that some of your comments will turn out to be not really viable for ruby users who want to use qt. You mention a lot of JS, but we use ruby - it feels as if we are pushed to become a second class citizen by qt and kde. Since they prioritize on Javascript - or python. That is not a viable model to pursue IMO. At this point I feel that ruby-gtk is in a much better shape than the ruby-qt ecosystem. I still remember rdale being active years ago for qtruby ... now qtruby does not even have the manpower left to transition from qt4 to qt5. – Capitate

Answer 2

QtRuby only supports Qt 4 for the time being. Hopefully, it will change soon, but this seems to be the reality at the time of writing this.

The last release happened two and half a years ago as the time of writing this. That can be seen here:

http://rubyforge.org/projects/korundum/

As you can see, that is also a Qt 4 release as its name says: qt4-qtruby-2.2.0.

That information is also getting from their outdated KDE Wiki in here:

http://techbase.kde.org/Development/Languages/Ruby

If this is still not enough proof, you can look into the code yourself to see it is not actually binding Qt 5 classes added in that major Qt variant.

Here is a quick ls after decompressing the latest tarball:

lpapp ~/Downloads/qt4-qtruby-2.2.0/qtruby/src/lib $ ls
CMakeLists.txt  Qt  Qt.rb  Qt3.rb  Qt4.rb

Meatman

You know this from experience? Or you found an authoritative source? Or you're just drawing the conclusion from the same evidence I mentioned? – Strobotron

I wasn't the downvoter BTW. I just haven't upvoted yet because I'm unsure if your answer is more conclusive than what I already put in the question. Can you link to something on the mailing list? Or a specific piece of code that specifies Qt4 only? Otherwise it seems like you have a tentative conclusion, which is more or less what I already had. – Strobotron

Yes, I realize you make a firm assertion (at least initially, but the word "seem" casts doubt on the initially implied certainty), but since you're not backing it up, I don't know whether it is trustworthy. If it is indeed a trustworthy answer and can be shown to be that, then I will appreciate it. But if you think I should just believe you because you say so, then I can't appreciate that attitude. – Strobotron

@iconoclast: OK, I updated for you, although I really should do my work :) – Ea