Python Short Course

Lecture 6: Tk Graphics

Richard P. Muller
Materials and Process Simulation Center
June 22, 2000
 Tk Overview
• Set of widgets designed by John K. Ousterhout, 1987
• Based on Apple Hypercard idea of putting together
graphics program
• Tk == Tool Kit
• Mean to be driven by Tcl (Toolkit Control Language)
– Many people find Tcl limited
– Can also drive Tk with Perl, Python
• Tkinter is the Python Tk Interface
– Very easy to use

© 2000 Richard P. Muller 2

Hello, World

from Tkinter import *

w=Label(text="Hello, World!")
w.pack()
w.mainloop()
• Label() defines a label to be displayed
– text= specifies a parameter to be passed in
• pack() resizes the window to the proper size
• mainloop() enters the event loop, and the program idles until a
button is pushed, a menu is pulled, etc. It has to idle until the
program is killed, since we didn't define any events.

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Events (Hello, Goodbye)

from Tkinter import *

w=Label(text="Hello, World).pack()
b=Button(text="Goodbye",command='exit').pack()
mainloop()
• Button label defined by text parameter
• Button defines a callback function, something to run
when it is pushed.
• Now mainloop() has an event to catch, so when we push
the button, mainloop() executes the exit command.

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Creating a Molecular Editor

Menu bar
Label

Text area (for geometry input)

Text entry

Radio buttons
Checkbox

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 Molecular Editor Overview
• We're going to whiz through this fairly quickly
– Example is online for those who want more
– Just a survey of some different widgets
– How you can build a professional looking interface

© 2000 Richard P. Muller 6

Widgets Creation Routine
def makeWidgets(self):
frame = Frame(self)
self.makeMenuBar(frame)
self.makeLogo(frame)
self.makeMolEdit(frame)
self.makeNameEntry(frame)
self.makeSelectQM(frame)
frame.pack()
self.pack()
return

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 Frames & Containers
frame = Frame(self)
• Frame() is a general command to create a container for other
widgets
• It doesn't do much other than hold other things.
• Takes as an argument the parent (here self)
• Returns the frame object (here frame)
• We can then pass the frame object to other widgets as their
parent
self.makeMenuBar(frame)
• Frame is also useful for doing sophisticated layouts
– Tk doesn't give much control over precise layout
– Often have to pack frames within frames within frames

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Menubars and Menus

Menu bar

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 Menubars
• A menubar is just a frame that holds menus:
menubar =
Frame(frame,relief=RAISED,borderwidth=1)
menubar.pack(side=TOP)
– We've specified a raised relief, and a slight border
– We've also specified where to pack the widget (TOP)
– We will then pass menubar to all of the subsequent menus we'll define
(File, Edit, Help, etc.) as the parent function.

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 Menus
• A menu in Tk is a combination of a Menubutton (the title of
the menu) and the Menu (what drops down when the
Menubutton is pressed
mb_file = Menubutton(menubar, text='File')
mb_file.pack(side=LEFT)
mb_file.menu = Menu(mb_file)
• Once we've specified the menubutton and the menu, we can
add different commands to the menu
mb_file.menu.add_command(
label='New...',
command = self.new_mol)
– Here we've defined a new type of callback, one that points to one of
our functions (self.new_mol) rather than a predefined function

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Text Widgets

Label

Text area (for geometry input)

Text entry

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 Text Areas
• Text areas contain room for multiple lines of text
– Define a new frame and put a text area in it
textfr = Frame(frame)
self.text = Text(textfr,height=10,width=50)
– Put a scrollbar in this frame
scroll = Scrollbar(textfr,command =
self.text.yview)
self.text.configure(yscrollcommand=scroll.s
et)
– Pack everything
self.text.pack(side=LEFT)
scroll.pack(side=RIGHT,fill=Y)
textfr.pack(side=TOP)

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 Text Entries
• Text entries contain single lines of text
– Create a new frame for the entry, and put a label on it
entry_frame = Frame(frame)
Label(entry_frame,text = 'Name')
.pack(side=LEFT)
– Define the entry, connect it to a variable, and put the current value
of the variable in the entry
entry = Entry(f1,width=40,
textvariable = self.mol_name)
entry.insert(0,self.mol_name)
– Pack everything
entry.pack(side=LEFT)
entry_frame.pack(side=TOP,fill=Y)

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Radiobuttons and Checkboxes

Radio buttons
Checkbox

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 Radiobuttons
• Radiobuttons signify a choice between exclusive options
– Create a frame and label
rbfr = Frame(f)
Label(rbfr,text='Basis').pack(side=LEFT)
– Add the buttons. Note that the variable connected to all buttons is self.basis
r321 = Radiobutton(rbfr,text='3-21G',
value = '3-21G',variable=self.basis)
r321.pack(side=LEFT)
r631 = Radiobutton(rbfr,text='6-31G**',
value = '6-31G**', variable=self.basis)
r631.pack(side=LEFT)
– Set the default and pack
r631.select()
rbfr.pack(side=TOP,fill=X)

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 Checkboxes
• Check boxes represent boolean choices (T or F)
cbfr = Frame(f)
– Add the buttons. Note that the variables are different.
cbgeo = Checkbutton(cbfr,
text='Optimize Geometry?',
state=NORMAL,
variable=self.geo_opt).pack(side=LEFT)
cbsolv = Checkbutton(cbfr,
text='Solvate?',
state=NORMAL,
variable=self.solvated).pack(side=LEFT)
cbfr.pack(side=TOP)

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 Notes
• This interface doesn't do anything; to make it work
– Add Run command to File menu?
– Put Submit button at the bottom?
– Tie these commands to function calls
• Synergy between objects and widgets
– Variables are passed automatically within class; you can refer
to them as self.whatever and not have to worry about passing
variables
– Callback functions are similarly easy to handle; this is a
particularly good deal because often programmers jump
through hoops to define callbacks on the fly (lambda functions).
IMHO this is a source of confusion and should be avoided.

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 Dialog boxes

• Convenient way to get feedback from a user

– Confirm quit
– Inputs data directly into program
– Here 0 is returned for Yes, and 1 is returned for No

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Simple Dialog Box Example
import sys
from Tkinter import *
from Dialog import *

def confirm_quit():
d = Dialog(None, title="Goodbye?",
text="Really Leave?", default=0,
bitmap=DIALOG_ICON, strings=("Yes","No"))
if d.num ==0:sys.exit()
return

l = Label(text="Hello, World!").pack()
b = Button(text="Goodbye",
command=confirm_quit).pack()
mainloop()

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File Browser Dialog

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File Dialog Example Code
from Tkinter import *
from FileDialog import *

root = Tk()
– Set up the dialog box
filename=LoadFileDialog(root)
– Run it. Optionally you can give it a default directory and file
filter, as shown here:
filename.go("~/gallery","*.xyz")
print filename

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 Python Mega Widgets
• Very extensive set of sophisticated widgets
– counters, panes, dialogs, fields already having scrollbars,
groups of widgets, etc.
• Built from basic Tk widgets
– People are adding new ones all the time
• On MSC machines at /source/python/Pmw
– Not currently installed
– I'll be glad to install if anyone wants them
• Available on the web at http://www.dscpl.com.au/pmw

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 wxPython
• Python bindings for wxWindows widget set
• Very professionally done
• wxWindows is available on all platforms
• Many notables in the Python community (Eric Raymond)
are calling for wxPython to become the standard
• Not currently installed at MSC
– I'll be glad to do so if there is desire
– Still much more acceptance and much more use for Tkinter
• Available on the web at http://wxpython.org

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 References
• Web Pages
– Tkinter: http://www.python.org/topics/tkinter/doc.html
– Python megawidgets: http://www.dscpl.com.au/pmw
– wxPython: http://wxpython.org
• Books
– Programming Python, Mark Lutz, ORA
– Python and Tkinter Programming, John E. Grayson, Manning
Press
– Tcl and the Tk Toolkit, John K. Ousterhout, Addison-Wesley
Professional Computing Series

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