pyqtdeploy - A Tool for Deploying PyQt4 and PyQt5 Applications
==============================================================

What is pyqtdeploy?
-------------------

pyqtdeploy is a tool that, in conjunction with other tools provided with Qt,
enables the deployment of PyQt applications written with either Python v2.7 or
Python v3.3 or later.  It supports deployment to desktop platforms (Linux,
Windows and macOS) and to mobile platforms (iOS and Android).

pyqtdeploy itself requires PyQt5 and Python v3.3 or later.

pyqtdeploy works by taking the individual modules of a PyQt application,
freezing them, and then placing them in a Qt resource file that is converted to
C++ code by Qt's ``rcc`` tool.  Python's standard library is handled in the
same way.

pyqtdeploy generates a simple C++ wrapper around the Python interpreter library
that uses the Python import mechanism to enable access to the embedded frozen
modules in a similar way that Python supports the packaging of modules in zip
files.

Finally pyqtdeploy generates a Qt ``.pro`` file that describes all the
generated C++ code.  From this Qt's ``qmake`` tool is used to generate a
platform-specific ``Makefile`` which will then generate a single executable.
Further Qt and/or platform specific tools can then be used to convert the
executable to a platform specific deployable package.

When run pyqtdeploy presents a GUI that allows the modules that make up the
application to be specified, along with the PyQt components that the
application requires and the parts of the Python standard library that should
also be included.  This information is stored in a pyqtdeploy project file.
pyqtdeploy can also be run as a command line tool to generate the C++ code from
a project file.


Author
------

pyqtdeploy is copyright (c) Riverbank Computing Limited.  Its homepage is
https://www.riverbankcomputing.com/software/pyqtdeploy/.

Support may be obtained from the PyQt mailing list at
https://www.riverbankcomputing.com/mailman/listinfo/pyqt


License
-------

pyqtdeploy is released under the BSD license.


Installation
------------

pyqtdeploy can be dowloaded an installed from PyPI::

    pip3 install pyqtdeploy

pyqtdeploy requires PyQt5 to be installed.  This is not installed
automatically.


Documentation
-------------

The documentation for the latest release can be found
`here <http://pyqt.sourceforge.net/Docs/pyqtdeploy/>`__.
