August 25, 2017 –The Qt Company introduced the Qt for Automation offering, a set of libraries and development tools for the building, services and industrial automation sectors. Built on Qt for Device Creation and Qt for Application Development, Qt for Automation is designed to enhance the performance and capabilities of edge devices for the Internet of Things (IoT). With Qt for Automation’s modular, scalable and secure libraries and interoperability capabilities, organizations in the automation industry can potentially improve the efficiency of business processes.
With Gartner, Inc. forecasting earlier this year that 8.4 billion connected things will be in use worldwide in 2017, and with 5.5 million new devices being connected every day, the IoT is one of the most opportunity-rich areas across today’s global technology landscape.
Furthermore, McKinsey & Company found that the potential value that could be unlocked with IoT applications in factory settings – which represent a significant portion of the Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT) – could be as much as $3.7 trillion in 2025, which is approximately one-third of all potential economic value of the IoT estimated by McKinsey. Consequently, organizations in the automation industry are increasingly looking for ways to pursue the market opportunities created by both the IoT and the IIoT.
Qt for Automation extends Qt’s comprehensive portfolio of application development and device creation tools. The primary features of Qt for Automation include:
- QtKNX: QtKNX is the smart home library that translates user requests into KNX protocol.
- Qt MQTT: Qt MQTT is a client implementation that can be used for creating devices to send data, but also monitoring solutions designed to manage telemetry information.
As such, QtKNX is the first major step to bringing home automation to Qt developers.
QtKNX now makes it possible to write software for the smart home, which sets the stage to add new technology offerings such as voice control and innovative cloud services.
Qt MQTT is fully compliant with the standard, including features for encryption and authentication, QoS, Wildcard support, Last Will.
In addition, protocol level 3.1 and 3.1.1 are available to developers.