GUI programs

[Guest]

Just curious if anyone would be willing to share their thoughts
about different Python GUI programming modules. I've been
doing a bit of research and am trying to find something that:

1. Is portable. Would like to be able to send the module along
with the main python file that would be able to run a GUI
window. Would be sending this to multiple machines.
Currently I'd like it to work on OS X machines, but it'd be nice
if it worked on Windows machines, etc. Probably be using
Python 2.5 or 2.6.

2. Can show an image (that is zoomable) as well as add GUI
controls like text fields, popup menues, etc. as well as send
information back to the program from the text fields, etc.
For now, I'm really looking for something that can display
EPS (postscript) and PDF images.

In my research, here's some GUI modules/programs I've been
looking at. I haven't gone real in-depth with these, but did
just a little testing:

1. wxPython - This looks very good, although I'm not sure
how to set up portability with this. Other machines that would
run the Python code probably wouldn't have the Developer
Tools or wxPython installed. I think I could use Py2App for
OS X to create a Package App but I'm not real familiar with
how that would all work.

2. Pyglet - This is a pretty cool program. I was able to display
a window with an image… but I don't think it has GUI controls
like text fields, drop down menues, etc.

3. ImageMagick - This one looks cool but I can't figure out how
to install it correctly on OS X (Snow Leopard). Not sure if it would
give me the GUI tools either.

4. PyGui - This one looks very interesting. Just found it last night
so haven't looked at it too closely. Looks like it needs PyObjC on
the machine for OS X. I'm assuming that comes pre-installed on
Snow Leopard machines, but not sure about Leopard or Tiger
machines. Anyone have more info about this?

5. NodeBox - This is an incredible application! Don't think I can
use it's libraries for what I'm wanting to do, but what a cool
program! I will definitely spend some time working with this!

6. TkInter - Does this module come standard on all machines
that have Python? Haven't worked with this one much, but if I
send Python code to other machines would TkInter work?

Would love to hear anyones thoughts about GUI programming
and what they use. Would also like to hear pros/cons with the
different modules/apps.

Thanks for looking at my questions.

Jay

 

[Detlev Offenbach]

I would recommend PyQt. I've done a lot of programming with it
(http://eric-ide.python-projects.org) and am amazed about the platform
neutrality it offers.

Regards,
Detlev

 

[Grant Edwards]

1. wxPython - This looks very good, although I'm not sure
how to set up portability with this.

I'm not sure what you mean by "set up portability". If you follow the
wxPython API documentation, then wxPython code is fairly portable.

Other machines that would run the Python code probably wouldn't have
the Developer Tools or wxPython installed. I think I could use
Py2App for OS X to create a Package App but I'm not real familiar
with how that would all work.

I've used py2exe with success. It's fairly simple to use for simple
programs, but can require some configuration tweaking if you use a log
of libraries (wxPython numeric Python, scientific Python, etc.).

6. TkInter - Does this module come standard on all machines
that have Python?

Not all, but it's a lot more common than wxPython.

Haven't worked with this one much, but if I send Python code to other
machines would TkInter work?

Generally yes, if the machines have TkInter installed.

Would love to hear anyones thoughts about GUI programming and what
they use. Would also like to hear pros/cons with the different
modules/apps.

This question comes up about once a week, so Google should be able
to find plenty of recent threads.

 

[Alf P. Steinbach]

* (e-mail address removed), on 30.05.2010 03:13:

Just curious if anyone would be willing to share their thoughts
about different Python GUI programming modules. I've been
doing a bit of research and am trying to find something that:

1. Is portable. Would like to be able to send the module along
with the main python file that would be able to run a GUI
window. Would be sending this to multiple machines.
Currently I'd like it to work on OS X machines, but it'd be nice
if it worked on Windows machines, etc. Probably be using
Python 2.5 or 2.6.

2. Can show an image (that is zoomable) as well as add GUI
controls like text fields, popup menues, etc. as well as send
information back to the program from the text fields, etc.
For now, I'm really looking for something that can display
EPS (postscript) and PDF images.

A GUI library may contain such functionality, but it's more properly the domain
of a special purpose library.

The question then boils down to which GUI libraries your image/rich text library
is compatible with.

Perhaps if someone else has handled that combination they'll chime in.


Cheers & hth.,

- Alf

PS: Tkinter on its own does not provide image resizing and does not on its own
support common image formats like JPEG or PNG (it does support GIF). For Tkinter
I think you can do that by adding the PIL library, if I remember the name
correctly. But as far as I know PIL doesn't yet support Python 3.x, and doesn't
support EPS or PDF, which are not image formats but rich text formats.

 

[eb303]

PS: Tkinter on its own does not provide image resizing and does not on its own
support common image formats like JPEG or PNG (it does support GIF).

"Native" PNG support in tcl/tk and hence Tkinter is planned for the
next release (8.6), which is in beta stage, so should be official
soon.