Open Build Service vs qmake

Open Build Service (OBS) builds and distributes binary packages from source code in a consistent, reproducible way. Each package is built in a fresh jailed environment; when a build succeeds, OBS rebuilds packages that depend on it. The service can release packages, updates, add-ons, appliances, and complete distributions for different operating systems and hardware architectures. Documented package formats include RPM, DEB, and Arch, with recipes in formats such as spec, dsc, KIWI, and mkosi. Teams can use access controls, branches, merge requests, and submission reviews to coordinate work. GitHub.com and GitLab.com integrations are supported, as are self-hosted GitHub, GitLab, and Gitea instances when network connectivity works. The API gives clients and external services access to OBS resources, while the osc command-line client can edit sources and metadata, start builds, and gather results. OBS is GPL-licensed free software, available on a reference server for open-source developers or for installation on users’ own hardware or in a data center. The listed plan is free.

qmake manages builds for applications, libraries and other components by turning project files into Makefiles. Its `.pro` files can define source files, configuration, libraries and include paths. It supplies build rules for Qt's moc and uic tools, with templates for applications, libraries and plugins. Projects can specify third-party libraries, and qmake can use pkg-config for supported libraries such as D-Bus and ogg. It can generate Microsoft Visual Studio project files and, on macOS, Xcode project files. Platform notes cover iOS universal binaries, frameworks and bundles. In Qt 6, qmake remains supported for building Qt applications, but cannot compile custom Qt plugins or libraries that rely on Qt 5 build-system internals. Qt warns that building an untrusted project can execute code on the build machine. The Qt Community Edition is free under LGPL or GPL terms, with source-code obligations and limited access to some Qt capabilities.