“Almost two months ago, TrollTech resolved one of the Linux
community’s more notable schisms with the release of their Qt/Unix
toolkit under the GNU General Public License. Today the Norwegian
company, citing enhanced revenues from that move as well as a
desire to promote open source programming communities, announced
they will do the same with their Qt/Embedded toolkit.”
“As with the release of Qt/Unix under the GPL, Qt/Embedded will
be placed under a dual-licensing scheme allowing developers to
either use the GPL or TrollTech’s standard commercial license. With
this arrangement, anyone who cares to develop proprietary or
closed-source software must first purchase a license from
Trolltech. In addition, developers purchasing a commercial license
will receive support and services unavailable to those utilizing
Qt/Embedded under the GPL.”
“…In an interview, TrollTech CEO Haavard Nord said his
company held off on releasing Qt/Embedded under the GPL while they
observed the effects the licensing change had on Qt/Unix. According
to Nord, the move encouraged commercial developers interested in
purchasing licenses, which “affected revenue in a positive way” as
several high-profile companies including Ericsson (makers of the
upcoming Linux-based ScreenPhone), Hewlett Packard, and IBM decided
to adopt Qt/Unix for projects.“