Jython

About the Tutorial

Jython is the JVM implementation of the Python programming language. It is designed to
run on the Java platform. Jython was created in 1997 by Jim Hugunin. It closely follows
the standard Python implementation called CPython. Jython 2.7.0 was released in May
2015, which corresponds to CPython 2.7.

This is an introductory tutorial, which covers the basics of Jython and explains how to
handle its various modules and sub-modules.

Audience
This tutorial will be helpful for Java programmers who want to utilize important features
of Python i.e. Simple Syntax, Rich Data Types and Rapid Application Development in Java
code. This will also be useful for Pythonistas to import feature Java class library into the
Python Environment.

This tutorial is made to make the programmers comfortable in getting started with Jython
and its various functions.

Prerequisites
Since Jython helps in integrating two very popular programming technologies namely Java
and Python, a reasonable knowledge of both languages is required.

Copyright and Disclaimer

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in this tutorial, please notify us at [email protected]

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Table of Contents
About the Tutorial ............................................................................................................................................ i
Audience ........................................................................................................................................................... i
Prerequisites ..................................................................................................................................................... i
Copyright and Disclaimer ................................................................................................................................. i
Table of Contents ............................................................................................................................................ ii

1. Jython – Overview .................................................................................................................................... 1

2. Jython ─ Installation .................................................................................................................................. 2

3. Jython – Importing Java Libraries .............................................................................................................. 6

4. Jython – Variables and Data Types ............................................................................................................ 8

Jython Numbers .............................................................................................................................................. 8
Jython Strings .................................................................................................................................................. 9
Jython Lists ...................................................................................................................................................... 9
Jython Tuples ................................................................................................................................................. 10
Jython Dictionary ........................................................................................................................................... 10

5. Jython – Using Java Collection Types ...................................................................................................... 12

Jarray Class .................................................................................................................................................... 12

6. Jython – Decision Control ....................................................................................................................... 14

7. Jython – Loops ........................................................................................................................................ 16

The WHILE Loop ............................................................................................................................................ 16
The FOR Loop ................................................................................................................................................ 17

8. Jython – Functions .................................................................................................................................. 19

9. Jython ─ Modules.................................................................................................................................... 21

10. Jython ─ Package .................................................................................................................................... 22

11. Jython – Java Application ........................................................................................................................ 24

12. Jython – Eclipse Plugin ............................................................................................................................ 26

13. Jython – A Project in Eclipse .................................................................................................................... 29

14. Jython – NetBeans Plugin & Project ........................................................................................................ 31

Jython Project in NetBeans ........................................................................................................................... 34

15. Jython – Servlets ..................................................................................................................................... 38

16. Jython – JDBC.......................................................................................................................................... 41

17. Jython – Using the Swing GUI library ...................................................................................................... 43

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18. Jython – Layout Management ................................................................................................................. 46

Absolute Layout ............................................................................................................................................. 46
Jython FlowLayout ......................................................................................................................................... 48
Jython GridLayout.......................................................................................................................................... 50
Jython BorderLayout ..................................................................................................................................... 52
Jython BoxLayout .......................................................................................................................................... 52
Jython GroupLayout ...................................................................................................................................... 55

19. Jython – Event Handling .......................................................................................................................... 58

Jython JRadioButton Event ............................................................................................................................ 62
Jython JCheckBox Event ................................................................................................................................ 64
Jython JList Event........................................................................................................................................... 65

20. Jython – Menus....................................................................................................................................... 68

21. Jython – Dialogs ...................................................................................................................................... 71

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1. JYTHON – OVERVIEW

Jython is the JVM implementation of the Python programming language. It is designed to run
on the Java platform. A Jython program can import and use any Java class. Just as Java,
Jython program compiles to bytecode. One of the main advantages is that a user interface
designed in Python can use GUI elements of AWT, Swing or SWT Package.

Jython, which started as JPython and was later renamed, follows closely the standard Python
implementation called CPython as created by Guido Van Rossum. Jython was created in
1997 by Jim Hugunin. Jython 2.0 was released in 1999. Since then, Jython 2.x releases
correspond to equivalent CPython releases. Jython 2.7.0 released in May 2015, corresponds
to CPython 2.7. Development of Jython 3.x is under progress.

Difference between Python and Java

Following are the differences between Python and Java:

 Python is a dynamically typed language. Hence, the type declaration of variable is not
needed. Java on the other hand is a statically typed language, which means that the
type declaration of variable is mandatory and cannot be changed.

 Python has only unchecked exceptions, whereas Java has both checked and unchecked
exceptions.

 Python uses indents for scoping, while Java uses matching curly brackets.

 Since Python is an interpreter-based language, it has no separate compilation steps.

A Java program however needs to be compiled to bytecode and is in turn executed by
a JVM.

 Python supports multiple inheritance, but in Java, multiple inheritance is not possible.
It however has implementation of an interface.

 Compared to Java, Python has a richer built-in data structures (lists, dicts, tuples,
everything is an object).

Difference between Python and Jython

Following are the differences between Python and Jython:

 Reference implementation of Python, called CPython, is written in C language. Jython

on the other hand is completely written in Java and is a JVM implementation.

 Standard Python is available on multiple platforms. Jython is available for any platform
with a JVM installed on it.

 Standard Python code compiles to a .pyc file, while Jython program compiles to a
.class file.
 Python extensions can be written in C language. Extensions for Jython are written in Java.

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 Jython is truly multi-threaded in nature. Python however uses the Global Interpreter
Lock (GIL) mechanism for the purpose.

 Both implementations have different garbage collection mechanisms.

In the next chapter, we will learn how to import the Java libraries in Jython.

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2. JYTHON ─ INSTALLATION

Before installation of Jython 2.7, ensure that the system has JDK 7 or more installed. Jython
is available in the form of an executable jar file. Download it from –
http://www.jython.org/downloads.html and either double click on its icon or run the following
command:

java -jar jython_installer-2.7.0.jar

An installation wizard will commence with which installation options have to be given. Here is
the systematic installation procedure.

The first step in the wizard asks you to select the language.

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The second step prompts you to accept the licence agreement.

In the next step, choose the installation type. It is recommended to choose the Standard installation.

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The next screen asks your confirmation about your options and proceeds to complete the
installation.

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The installation procedure might take some time to complete.

After the installation is complete, invoke jython.exe from the bin directory inside the
destination directory. Assuming that Jython is installed in C:\jython27, execute the following
from the command line.

C:\jython27\bin\jython

A Python prompt (>>>) will appear, in front of which any Python statement or Python script
can be executed.

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3. JYTHON – IMPORTING JAVA LIBRARIES

One of the most important features of Jython is its ability to import Java classes in a Python
program. We can import any java package or class in Jython, just as we do in a Java program.
The following example shows how the java.util packages are imported in Python (Jython)
script to declare an object of the Date class.

from java.util import Date

d = Date()
print d

Save and run the above code as UtilDate.py from the command line. Instance of the current
date and time will be displayed.

C:\jython27\bin>jython UtilDate.py
Sun Jul 09 00:05:43 IST 2017

The following packages from the Java library are more often imported in a Jython program
mainly because standard Python library either does not have their equivalents or are not as
good.

 Servlets

 JMS

 J2EE

 Javadoc

 Swing is considered superior to other GUI toolkits

Any Java package for that matter can be imported in a Jython script. Here, the following java
program is stored and compiled in a package called foo.

package foo;
public class HelloWorld {
public void hello() {
System.out.println("Hello World!");
}

public void hello(String name) {

System.out.printf("Hello %s!", name);
}

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This HelloWorld.class is imported in the following Jython Script. Methods in this class can
be called from the Jython script importex.py.

from foo import HelloWorld

h = HelloWorld()
h.hello()
h.hello("TutorialsPoint")

Save and execute the above script from the command line to get following output.

C:\jython27\bin>jython importex.py
Hello World!
Hello TutorialsPoint!

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4. JYTHON – VARIABLES AND DATA TYPES

Variables are named locations in computer’s memory. Each variable can hold one piece of
data in it. Unlike Java, Python is a dynamically typed language. Hence while using Jython
also; prior declaration of data type of variable is not done. Rather than the type of variable
deciding which data can be stored in it, the data decides the type of variable.

In the following example, a variable is assigned an integer value. Using the type() built-in
function, we can verify that the type of variable is an integer. But, if the same variable is
assigned a string, the type() function will string as the type of same variable.

> x=10
>>> type(x)
<class 'int'>

>>> x="hello"
>>> type(x)
<class 'str'>

This explains why Python is called a dynamically typed language.

The following Python built-in data types can also be used in Jython:

 Number

 String

 List

 Tuple

 Dictionary

Python recognizes numeric data as a number, which may be an integer, a real number with
floating point or a complex number. String, List and Tuple data types are called sequences.

Jython Numbers
In Python, any signed integer is said to be of type ‘int’. To express a long integer, letter ‘L’ is
attached to it. A number with a decimal point separating the integer part from a fractional
component is called ‘float’. The fractional part may contain an exponent expressed in the
scientific notation using ‘E’ or ‘e’.
A Complex number is also defined as numeric data type in Python. A complex number contains a
real part (a floating-point number) and an imaginary part having ‘j’ attached to it.

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In order to express a number in the Octal or the Hexadecimal representation, 0O or 0X is

prefixed to it. The following code block gives examples of different representations of numbers
in Python.

int -> 10, 100, -786, 80

long -> 51924361L, -0112L, 47329487234L
float -> 15.2, -21.9, 32.3+e18, -3.25E+101
complex -> 3.14j, 45.j, 3e+26J, 9.322e-36j

Jython Strings
A string is any sequence of characters enclosed in single (e.g. ‘hello’), double (e.g. “hello”) or
triple (e.g. ‘“hello’” o “““hello”””) quotation marks. Triple quotes are especially useful if content
of the string spans over multiple lines.

The Escape sequence characters can be included verbatim in triple quoted string. The
following examples show different ways to declare a string in Python.

str=’hello how are you?’

str=”Hello how are you?”
str="""this is a long string that is made up of
several lines and non-printable characters such as
TAB ( \t ) and they will show up that way when displayed.
NEWLINEs within the string, whether explicitly given like
this within the brackets [ \n ], or just a NEWLINE within
the variable assignment will also show up.
"""

The third string when printed, will give the following output.

this is a long string that is made up of

several lines and non-printable characters such as
TAB ( ) and they will show up that way when displayed.
NEWLINEs within the string, whether explicitly given like
this within the brackets [
], or just a NEWLINE within
the variable assignment will also show up.

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Jython Lists
A List is a sequence data type. It is a collection of comma-separated items, not necessarily of
the same type, stored in square brackets. Individual item from the List can be accessed using
the zero based index.

The following code block summarizes the usage of a List in Python.

list1 = ['physics', 'chemistry', 1997, 2000];

list2 = [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7 ];
print "list1[0]: ", list1[0]
print "list2[1:5]: ", list2[1:5]

The following table describes some of the most common Jython Expressions related to Jython
Lists.

Jython Expression Description

len(List) Length

List[2]=10 Updation

Del List[1] Deletion

List.append(20) Append

List.insert(1,15) Insertion

List.sort() Sorting

Jython Tuples
A tuple is an immutable collection of comma-separated data items stored in parentheses. It
is not possible to delete or modify an element in tuple, nor is it possible to add an element to
the tuple collection. The following code block shows Tuple operations.

tup1=('physics','chemistry‘,1997,2000);
tup2=(1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7 );
print "tup1[0]: ", tup1[0]
print "tup2[1:5]: ", tup2[1:5]

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Jython Dictionary
The Jython Dictionary is similar to Map class in Java Collection framework. It is a collection of
key-value pairs. Pairs separated by comma are enclosed in curly brackets. A Dictionary object
does not follow zero based index to retrieve element inside it as they are stored by hashing
technique.

The same key cannot appear more than once in a dictionary object. However, more than one
key can have same associated values. Different functions available with Dictionary object are
explained below:

dict={'011':'New Delhi','022':'Mumbai','033':'Kolkata'}
print "dict[‘011’]: ",dict['011']
print "dict['Age']: ", dict['Age']

The following table describes some of the most common Jython Expressions related to
Dictionary.

Jython Expression Description

dict.get(‘011’) Search

len(dict) Length

dict[‘044’]=‘Chennai’ Append

del dict[‘022’] Delete

dict.keys() list of keys

dict.values() List of values

dict.clear() Removes all elements

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