To show you how to install the whole thing I am going to use Qt 4.8 and MySQL Server 5.5. To test this method I am using a Windows 7 x64, but it should be the same in any kind of Windows, as I am going to install Qt and MySQL Server x86-x64 edition. In that way, applications developed with this installation will be x86-x64 apps.

Prerequisites: You must have installed Microsoft Visual Studio 2010 on your computer.*

Install Qt

Ok, to start, first download Qt: http://qt.nokia.com/downloads/sdk-windows-cpp

Then open the file downloaded, and install the Qt SDK msvs2010 version in C:\QtSDK. Be sure to check the option to install Qt sources too, which in this case are Qt Sources 4.8. When the installation have finished, add to your PATH environment variable the Qt path (that is, in our case, C:\QtSDK\Desktop\Qt\4.8.0\msvc2010\bin). Now you have installed in C:\QtSDK the Qt Libraries 4.8 x86-x64 to start developing any Qt app.

But, what about MySQL? To use the QMySQL driver first we will have to install MySQL Server, and compile the driver from the Qt source we installed before. Lets do it.

Install MySQL Server

Download MySQL Community Server 5.5, x86 32 bits edition. We will choose to download the Zip file instead of the MSI installer, to control the MySQL installation.
http://dev.mysql.com/downloads/mirror.php?id=406441
Finally extract it on C:\MySQL

Compile and install QMySQL driver

Ok, now we are ready to compile the driver. Open a Visual Studio command prompt and enter the following commands:

cd cd C:\QtSDK\QtSources\4.8.0\src\plugins\sqldrivers\mysql
qmake "INCLUDEPATH+=C:\MySQL\include" "LIBS+=C:\MySQL\lib\libmysql.lib" mysql.pro
nmake

Last, copy qsqlmysql4.dll, qsqlmysqld4.dll, qsqlmysql4.lib and qsqlmysqld4.lib to C:\QtSDK\Desktop\Qt\4.8.0\msvc2010\plugins\sqldrivers\.

To finish…

In order to run our Qt app with MySQL, we must copy the MySQL library C:\MySQL\lib\libmysql.lib inside the Debug and Release folders, otherwise qsqlmysql.dll will not work.

And that’s all!

*If you don’t have Visual Studio, you can always try to do the same process using MinGW Qt version instead. I have not checked it out, but I think it will work the same way (the only change would be using make command instead of nmake when compiling the MySQL driver)

In that way, to use ipod nano 5th generation on linux, we have to install on our system the latest libgpod version, this is, 0.8.2 instead of 0.8. Following are described the steps to do that on a Debian-based system, like Ubuntu, or for any Linux distribution.

Debian-based Systems:

If you are using Ubuntu or Linux Mint (probably it will work on any Debian-based distribution too) you can download libgpod4 and libgpod-common packages from here:

https://launchpad.net/ubuntu/precise/+package/libgpod4

https://launchpad.net/ubuntu/precise/+package/libgpod-common

Then we install the packages using dpkg (it will fail with GDebi as you have a previous version installed):

$ cd [folder where .deb files were download]
$ sudo dpkg -i libgpod-common_0.8.2-4_amd64.deb
$ sudo dpkg -i libgpod4_0.8.2-4_amd64.deb

Any Linux System:

If you can’t or you don’t want to use the .deb packages, you can always install libgpod from source. To do that, you must have git installed on your system. Then, we clone the libgpod git repository on a place of our choice (in my case, /home/javi/projects):

$ cd /home/javi/projects
$ git clone git://gtkpod.git.sourceforge.net/gitroot/gtkpod/libgpod

Then we will follow the steps on the INSTALL file:

$ cd libgpod
$ ./autoconf.sh
$ ./configure
$ make
# make install

If autoconf or configure commands give you an error message asking you for a certain package, you will have to install it and rerun autoconf or configure command in order to compile and install libgpod correctly. Last command has to be executed as root.

To finish:

In this point you should be able to add new music to your ipod from banshee, amarok, exaile, or any other music player that uses libgpod (including gtkpod),without having to use ITunes. Enjoy!