KDDockWidgets

Our brand new manual is now the docs entry point for everything related to KDDockWidgets. This README only provides minimal information.

KDDockWidgets is a Qt dock widget library written by KDAB, suitable for replacing QDockWidget and implementing advanced functionalities missing in Qt.

Although KDDockWidgets is ready to be used out of the box, it can also be seen as a framework to allow building very tailored custom docking systems. It tries to expose every internal widget and every knob for the app developer to tune.

Features

• Provide advanced docking that QDockWidget doesn't support
  • Native window resize on Windows (allowing for Aero-snap even with custom title bar decorations)
  • Arrow drop indicators for great drop precision
  • Allow for totally different, user provided, drop indicator types
  • Nesting dock widgets in a floating window and docking that group back to main window
  • Docking to any main window, not only to the parent main window
  • Docking to center of main window, or simply removing the concept of "central widget"
  • Main window supporting detachable tabs in center widget
  • Detaching arbitrary tabs from a tab bar into a dock area
  • Supporting more than 1 main window
  • Support for affinities, making some dock widgets only dockable on certain main windows
  • Allow to hide TitleBar and just show tabs. Allows dragging via the tab bar.
  • Exposing inner helper widgets so the user can customize them or provide his own
    • Customize tab widgets
    • Customize title bars
    • Customize window frames
    • Custom widget separators
• Cross-platform (macOS, Linux, Windows, WebAssembly, Wayland, X11/XCB, EGLFS are working) See README-Wayland.md and README-WASM.md for platform specific information.
• Layouting engine honouring min/max size constraints and some size policies
• PySide2 bindings
• Clean codebase
  • Not mixing GUI with state with logic with animations
  • Great test coverage, even the GUI and DnD operations are tested. 200 tests currently.
  • Fuzzer for doing random testing and finding bugs
• Lazy separator resize
• Reordering tabs with mouse
• Partial layout save/restore, affecting only a chosen sub-set
• Double click on title bar to maximize
• Double click on separator to distribute equally
• Show close button on tabs
• Allow to make a dock widget non-closable and/or non-dockable
• Optional minimize and maximize button on the title bar
• FloatingWindows can be utility windows or full native

Screen capture

Licensing

KDDockWidgets is © Klarälvdalens Datakonsult AB (KDAB) and is licensed according to the terms of the GPL 2.0 or GPL 3.0.

Contact KDAB at [email protected] to inquire about commercial licensing.

About KDAB

KDDockWidgets is supported and maintained by Klarälvdalens Datakonsult AB (KDAB).

The KDAB Group is the global No.1 software consultancy for Qt, C++ and OpenGL applications across desktop, embedded and mobile platforms.

The KDAB Group provides consulting and mentoring for developing Qt applications from scratch and in porting from all popular and legacy frameworks to Qt. We continue to help develop parts of Qt and are one of the major contributors to the Qt Project. We can give advanced or standard trainings anywhere around the globe on Qt as well as C++, OpenGL, 3D and more.

Please visit https://www.kdab.com to meet the people who write code like this.

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