| :tocdepth: 2 | |
| ========================== | |
| Graphic User Interface FAQ | |
| ========================== | |
| .. only:: html | |
| .. contents:: | |
| What platform-independent GUI toolkits exist for Python? | |
| ======================================================== | |
| Depending on what platform(s) you are aiming at, there are several. | |
| .. XXX check links | |
| Tkinter | |
| ------- | |
| Standard builds of Python include an object-oriented interface to the Tcl/Tk | |
| widget set, called Tkinter. This is probably the easiest to install and use. | |
| For more info about Tk, including pointers to the source, see the Tcl/Tk home | |
| page at https://www.tcl.tk. Tcl/Tk is fully portable to the Mac OS X, Windows, | |
| and Unix platforms. | |
| wxWidgets | |
| --------- | |
| wxWidgets (https://www.wxwidgets.org) is a free, portable GUI class | |
| library written in C++ that provides a native look and feel on a | |
| number of platforms, with Windows, Mac OS X, GTK, X11, all listed as | |
| current stable targets. Language bindings are available for a number | |
| of languages including Python, Perl, Ruby, etc. | |
| wxPython (http://www.wxpython.org) is the Python binding for | |
| wxwidgets. While it often lags slightly behind the official wxWidgets | |
| releases, it also offers a number of features via pure Python | |
| extensions that are not available in other language bindings. There | |
| is an active wxPython user and developer community. | |
| Both wxWidgets and wxPython are free, open source, software with | |
| permissive licences that allow their use in commercial products as | |
| well as in freeware or shareware. | |
| Qt | |
| --- | |
| There are bindings available for the Qt toolkit (using either `PyQt | |
| <https://riverbankcomputing.com/software/pyqt/intro>`_ or `PySide | |
| <https://wiki.qt.io/PySide>`_) and for KDE (`PyKDE4 <https://techbase.kde.org/Languages/Python/Using_PyKDE_4>`__). | |
| PyQt is currently more mature than PySide, but you must buy a PyQt license from | |
| `Riverbank Computing <https://www.riverbankcomputing.com/commercial/license-faq>`_ | |
| if you want to write proprietary applications. PySide is free for all applications. | |
| Qt 4.5 upwards is licensed under the LGPL license; also, commercial licenses | |
| are available from `The Qt Company <https://www.qt.io/licensing/>`_. | |
| Gtk+ | |
| ---- | |
| PyGtk bindings for the `Gtk+ toolkit <http://www.gtk.org>`_ have been | |
| implemented by James Henstridge; see <http://www.pygtk.org>. | |
| FLTK | |
| ---- | |
| Python bindings for `the FLTK toolkit <http://www.fltk.org>`_, a simple yet | |
| powerful and mature cross-platform windowing system, are available from `the | |
| PyFLTK project <http://pyfltk.sourceforge.net>`_. | |
| FOX | |
| ---- | |
| A wrapper for `the FOX toolkit <http://www.fox-toolkit.org/>`_ called `FXpy | |
| <http://fxpy.sourceforge.net/>`_ is available. FOX supports both Unix variants | |
| and Windows. | |
| OpenGL | |
| ------ | |
| For OpenGL bindings, see `PyOpenGL <http://pyopengl.sourceforge.net>`_. | |
| What platform-specific GUI toolkits exist for Python? | |
| ======================================================== | |
| By installing the `PyObjc Objective-C bridge | |
| <https://pythonhosted.org/pyobjc/>`_, Python programs can use Mac OS X's | |
| Cocoa libraries. | |
| :ref:`Pythonwin <windows-faq>` by Mark Hammond includes an interface to the | |
| Microsoft Foundation Classes and a Python programming environment | |
| that's written mostly in Python using the MFC classes. | |
| Tkinter questions | |
| ================= | |
| How do I freeze Tkinter applications? | |
| ------------------------------------- | |
| Freeze is a tool to create stand-alone applications. When freezing Tkinter | |
| applications, the applications will not be truly stand-alone, as the application | |
| will still need the Tcl and Tk libraries. | |
| One solution is to ship the application with the Tcl and Tk libraries, and point | |
| to them at run-time using the :envvar:`TCL_LIBRARY` and :envvar:`TK_LIBRARY` | |
| environment variables. | |
| To get truly stand-alone applications, the Tcl scripts that form the library | |
| have to be integrated into the application as well. One tool supporting that is | |
| SAM (stand-alone modules), which is part of the Tix distribution | |
| (http://tix.sourceforge.net/). | |
| Build Tix with SAM enabled, perform the appropriate call to | |
| :c:func:`Tclsam_init`, etc. inside Python's | |
| :file:`Modules/tkappinit.c`, and link with libtclsam and libtksam (you | |
| might include the Tix libraries as well). | |
| Can I have Tk events handled while waiting for I/O? | |
| --------------------------------------------------- | |
| On platforms other than Windows, yes, and you don't even | |
| need threads! But you'll have to restructure your I/O | |
| code a bit. Tk has the equivalent of Xt's :c:func:`XtAddInput()` call, which allows you | |
| to register a callback function which will be called from the Tk mainloop when | |
| I/O is possible on a file descriptor. See :ref:`tkinter-file-handlers`. | |
| I can't get key bindings to work in Tkinter: why? | |
| ------------------------------------------------- | |
| An often-heard complaint is that event handlers bound to events with the | |
| :meth:`bind` method don't get handled even when the appropriate key is pressed. | |
| The most common cause is that the widget to which the binding applies doesn't | |
| have "keyboard focus". Check out the Tk documentation for the focus command. | |
| Usually a widget is given the keyboard focus by clicking in it (but not for | |
| labels; see the takefocus option). | |