QNX Inc. has unveiled a preview release of the QNX Developer Desktop graphical development environment, designed to operate on the QNX 8.0 operating system. This new environment aims to facilitate the development of applications for QNX without the need for cross-compilation. It is anticipated that the QNX Developer Desktop will streamline the process for new developers creating applications for QNX, as well as for those looking to port programs and libraries from Linux.
The user environment of the QNX Developer Desktop is centered around a customized Xfce desktop environment that utilizes the Wayland protocol. It encompasses a range of development tools such as clang, gcc, clang++, Python, make, cmake, git, amongst others. Additionally, it includes a web browser, a terminal emulator, various integrated development environments and code editors like Geany, Emacs, Neovim, and vim, the Thunar file manager, as well as code examples in C, C++, and Python.
The QNX Developer Desktop is delivered in a self-contained system image bundled with tools for building programs for QNX 8.0, along with a selection of ported open source packages. A system image optimized for Linux systems using QEMU is available for free download as “QNX SDP 8.0 Quick Start Target Image for QEMU” in the QNX Software Center.
Previously, QNX had developed its own desktop environment called Photon microGUI, which was replaced in QNX 7 by the graphics framework QNX Screen. This new framework emphasizes the creation of domain-specific interfaces and does not offer a standalone desktop environment.
