I would like to write code in C, on my computer. Compile it, and test in the emulator. Before transferring it to the phone. I know the programming part. I'm just curious how I can set this up. I would like to use an IDE, but would this IDE need to be installed inside of scratchbox? Like eclipse. Scratchbox is from what I've understood acting like a transparent cross-compiling layer where you don't have to think about compiling it for another cpu architecture. So if an IDE would benefit from scratchbox I assume it would have be installed inside it. I was recommended QT SDK, but I didn't get how that would cross-compile the code. Eclipse is what I would like to use. Just share you're experience on this, thanks.

The IDE itself would exist outside of Scratchbox, because SB is really just a system for cross-compiling and testing, not for actual coding. A lot of IDE's, like Eclipse or ESBox, have support for compiling things in the Scratchbox environment, but they themselves exist outside of SB itself.

To actually get it to work, I presume you have to get some sort of plugin to tell whatever IDE you're using to use Scratchbox instead of the toolchain that is natively resident on your system. But, I don't use anything like Eclipse, ESBox, or QtCreator, so I wouldn't know exactly how to set those up.

The Nokia QT SDK is many things bundled into one: An IDE (qtcreator), cross-compiling and packaging toolkit (madde), QT sources, headers and libraries for your dev machine as well as for Maemo (and Symbian, but only on Windows).
It also has a QT simulator.

Best of all it is free and works in Windows and Linux.

Fancy. That makes sense. Is the UI primarily based on GTK or QT? I'll test both ESbox and the QT sdk.

QTCreator is compiled using QT.

However if you're asking if the look and feel is GTK or QT, then that question is invalid: QT by default uses the underlying system's window manager. So if you're using gnome, it will look gnomish, on KDE, KDE-ish, on Window like a native windows app.

Madde is not included with QTcreator (at least last time I looked). You have to download the madde file and install it and setup QT to work with it. Not hard.

If you run OSX, use XCode and just drag the folder into a Linux VM.
On linux - There are so many IDE's for C/C++. Use QT. Works well.

The Fremantle UI is based on GTK. The MeeGo/Harmattan UI will be QT based. For now you can choose to write your program in either GTK or QT--use whatever you prefer. It seems most people are writing newer apps in QT to anticipate MeeGo, but if you would rather use C you're going to have to stick to GTK.

Its included in the Nokia QT SDK release candidate:
http://www.forum.nokia.com/info/sw.n...ia_Qt_SDK.html

The Nokia QT SDK includes all of the hildon libraries too.

I would also recommend the Nokia Qt SDK.
Noone forec you to use Qt though - if you want to program in C and using Gtk, Qt Creator can also handle that.