We are planning to develop an application for monitoring and configuring our service (which is running on remote server). After long time of discussion, we decided for python as platform for our app, because we love and know python. But we don't know, what GUI toolkit preferred for our aims. We need fast (for development and running) app, whose users will be Admins, Maintainers and Account managers.
There are two GUI toolkit for python, which we know: wxPython and pyQT.
Anybody have arguments regarding pro and cons? And maybe someone knows any commercial applications, using these products (only python version of toolkits)? Links are desirable.
Thanks.
I choose wxPython after much research. The reasons were:
"wxPython in Action" book by Rappin & Dunn
The voluminous examples that come as part of the wxPython download
The number of projects that have used wxWidgets
The fact that wxPython code runs equally well on Linux, Mac OS/X and Win32
I did consider pyQT and other researchers are successfully using it. After writing many examples in all API's that I considered, I found wxPython ticked the most boxes for me.
As for Tkinter (TIX), I think it looks rather dated.
Unless you are using IronPython or Jython I would not consider using the associated native windowing APIs. For another project which is to be delivered exclusively on .Net, I plan to use WinForms after lots of great feedback from StackOverflow members.
Well, I am a fan of QT: it has a more modern look and feel. However - your choice should be based on your actual requirements. Simple trade studies are helpful for this. Make a list of what features your toolkit must have and what features would be nice to have and then weight each item appropriately. Then look at all your options (TKinter also) and then score them according to your feature list (using the weights you assigned to each feature requirement). At the end it should be evident which one is right for your project.
I've always liked Qt's "signals and slots" conceptual model, though I guess it may take a bit of learning for developers who are more used to other models of event propagation and handling. Personally, given a choice, I'd pick PyQt because of this programming aspect.
You wrote "There is two GUI toolkit for python, which we know: wxPython and pyQT." You are forgetting about the most obvious toolkit: tkinter. That's actually part of a core python distribution, no extra downloads required.
Some people don't like Tk but that's often due to ignorance. Tk is a fine choice for a cross platform toolkit. It uses native widgets on windows (and has for many years) and the latest versions of tk use themed widgets on all platforms.
i've been using wxpython for 3 years .. and now we had to switch into pyqt since qt is integrated in maya 2011 .. however , wxpython is more straight forward and you can easily start working on it and learn it from zero fast .it provides and awesome resources and decumentation . but QT provides more powerful features that you cant find in wxpython , for example ( the multi touch detection) , QT also provides good support for drawing devices like pc tablets and so on .
qt also provides a good designer that makes u create interfaces faster.
one of qt disadvantages is it's license since it's not free like wxpython
A Windows (and Mono) option for a GUI toolkit is provided by IronPython. It provides access to the Winforms and WPF libraries. For examples, see Developing with IronPython & Windows Forms, and many others.
If you want to expand the list of options, consider building a Web App instead of a (local) GUI app. You say your service runs on a remote server, so networking is part of your requirements.
Once you start down that road, Python provides a bewildering amount of options.
I want to point out two strengths that wxPython has compared to pyQt:
It uses native widgets on every supported platform. So the apps have a native look and feel. I'm aware that PyQt uses native styles, but the behavior ("the feel") is reported to be somewhat non-native especially on the Mac.
It provides a wider choice of widgets out of the box.
You should also check out PyGTK. It is similar to pyQT in programming model but does not have any licensing cost since it is LGPL. I always found it nice to work with as a developer. The main drawback over pyQT is that in some cases they take away functionality in things like file chooser dialogs in favour of simplicity for the user.
Related
Need advise from those who have minimum health experience to design GUI interfaces with Python.
When and what to choose depending of GUI complexity?
Which GUI builders can we use to have a better development quality?
This is my first GUI design, and I've did it without GUI builder, at the moment stacked because I've understood, that ObjectListView wrapper for wx.ListCtrl haven't natively to include easily progress bar or gauge elements. (see column "Upload status" from picture).
Note: ObjectListView has progress bar in .Net version, at the moment not in wx.Python.
P.S: I found this wonderful Python GTK+ Full Stack Tutorial
I'm not really sure what you're asking. wxPython and pyQt / pyside are probably the easiest to use on all platforms and will look right on most Operating systems. I know wxPython is specifically designed to wrap the native widgets so if you want your app to look native, I think wxPython is the way to go. If you want to be able to theme/skin your app, then PyQT or pyGTK may be better.
PyQt/PySide supports mobile to some degree, which I don't believe the other two do. If you plan to program for mobile, then you might want to go that route or look at Kivy.
PyQt/PySide have a pretty powerful WYSIWYG editor. wxPython has a couple, but I don't think any of them support all of wx's widgets and their support is spotty. That hasn't stopped me as I do all my coding by hand anyway.
As usual, you'll probably need to read lots of documentation and try each of them to see which one fits your brain and meets your needs best.
Don't use PyGTK if you want cross platform compatibility. GTK3 doesn't work on windows yet (last I checked) and GTK2 has an awful memory leak under windows which has been fixed in the latest source, but no new release has been compiled for windows.
I would put my vote with PySide (more flexible license for commercial options) over PyQt and PySide/PyQt over wxPython simply because I think the GUI designer tool are better! Being able to rapidly create and edit the GUI graphically (and independently of your applications code) is a huge time-saver.
Update: Actually, I'd recommend PyQt over PySide now for stability reasons and long term support. PySide development is lagging, there are very few people fixing bugs and no-one working on support for Qt 5.
PyQT in Windows
PyGTK
PyQT in KDE
PyQT in Windows
PyGTK+3
PyQT in KDE
So if you go with PyQT the design of your application will look different on the different operating systems and desktop environments. I don't have Macintosh so cannot provide a picture how will look my application in it. This is one of my applications written in PyQT and PyGTK+3. Keep in mind that the design will stay as is with PyGTK+3, so there won't be any differences as they are in PyQT. It's definitely the most easiest to learn, as there is a Glade program which will help you to build your design without spending even a minute coding it manually. But with PyQT you can fine tune the application design and it won't make you tear your hair from bugs.
I worked mainly in web development but occasionally do some C/C++ or Java programming. I am very curious how these frameworks actually produce the graphics used in their GUI. Were the GUI elements (title bar, window frame, status bar, buttons, etc...) designed by a designer in Photoshop then a developer adds that graphic to the framework? Or do the developers actually build the elements programatically with the direction of a designer?
If someone could give me an overview that would be awesome!
Great question, Lark ! Since we're in Qt Framework branch, I'll tell you how its done in Qt, but I'm sure you can apply to similar frameworks or libraries like GTK, etc.
So Qt started a framework that would provide one API for a variety of platforms making it very easy to port your applications from one platform to another while providing native look and feel on those platform. So for example on MacOSX a push button would have this blue Aqua style while on Windows XP it would look like a button on Windows platform. Trolltech put a lot of effort and did a great job on making the GUI look native. So how it works ? Well, all Qt widgets use QStyle and its derivatives to render themselves. Depending on the style, a widget would look differently. All the standard widgets follow the guides of those platforms they are designed for. There are probably some small graphics designer work behind that, but I believe its not that significant. The main source of the look and feel is the platform guides that describe how UI elements on those platforms should look like and their behavior.
But Qt has been developing very fast and the trolls came with a very promising technology called Qt Quick. Its an amazing technology which allows designers and developers tightly work together providing the best UI. Its highly oriented on using artwork made in Photoshop, GIMP or similar tools in the code. And its much easier to use mock ups from designers with Qt Quick than with C++/Qt cause Qt Quick is initially designed for that.
Hope that helps
The basic low level functionality of most GUI frameworks is quite old, the result of a great deal of very hard work by earlier developers working with primitives - literally drawing things on terminal screens, etc, at very low levels, using C or Assembler. Slowly, libraries for abstraction of these processes, and frameworks and class hierarchies for refining them and organizing come into being. All Linux GUI's (in fact, nearly all contemporary GUI frameworks) are based on XWindows, for example:
X originated at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in
1984. The protocol version has been X11 since September 1987....X primarily defines protocol and graphics primitives - it deliberately
contains no specification for application user-interface design, such
as button, menu, or window title-bar styles. Instead, application
software – such as window managers, GUI widget toolkits and desktop
environments, or application-specific graphical user interfaces –
define and provide such details. As a result, there is no typical X
interface and several different desktop environments have become
popular among users.
See more there, for some good information about this topic.
I am working on a new small utility desktop application but I am not really able to choose the GUI framework to use. I have worked on both JAVA,C# and C++, so language is not really a constraint. My criteria are:-
A very well designed architecture, something like QT. It's better if it follows typical C++ design methodologies.
Layout management should be easy, intuitive and not really cumbersome. I hate adjusting pixels on screen.
Its license should be open.
It should look good :)
Mentioned QT seems to comply to all your requirements. QT has "deploy everywhere" attribute, whilst Java needs no deploying at all (it depends on what is use of your utility).
Ad. 2 QT has really convenient GUI designer.
Ad. 3 LGPL. Usually it is enough.
Ad. 4 It is always matter of taste. IMO QT4 looks awesome under linux, but it's windows look'n'feel is correct at best. It's strong point is, that without additional tweaks it almost everywhere looks native.
I've been using Swing, and it works fine. NetBeans (a decent IDE by itself) even supports graphical GUI building.
It's well designed (basically
everything is done with listeners,
functions that are registered for a
certain event). It has bindings, so
you don't have to write code to set
up a value in a text field or read
it out
Layout is not perfect, but
acceptable within NetBeans. It's
WYSIWYG (almost). Look-and-feel can
be changed on the fly.
License is free. Source-code is not
available, I think.
Looks fine on Windows and Linux,
less so on OSX.
You could always try SWT. The advantages of Java with the standard L&F of supported operating systems.
Well designed. Lots of
documentation, and very easy to
develop with. (If you know Swing,
you can pick up SWT in no time.)
I believe layout managers do exist
that support SWT. I'm not positive
about this though, as I typically
don't use layout managers too much.
Uses the Eclipse Public
License. Should meet most of
your requirements.
From Wikipedia on SWT:
SWT is written in Java. To display GUI elements, the SWT implementation accesses the native GUI libraries of the operating system using JNI (Java Native Interface) in a manner that is similar to those programs written using operating system-specific APIs. Programs that call SWT are portable, but the implementation of the toolkit, despite the fact that it is written in Java, is unique for each platform.
Hope that helps you.
I'd suggest wxWidgets if you want to program in C++ or wxPython (the python language binding of wxWidgets if you know or don't mind learning Python.
Architecture is similar to QT I think.
Layout using sizers. Quite easy once you get the hang of it.
Liberal open source license.
Widgets are native on all platforms (Windows, Mac OS X, Linux).
I work in the embedded world, using mainly C and no GUI at all (because there is no display screen).
Moving over to the non-embedded world, in which I have nearly no experience, what is the best programming environment (langauge/IDE/etc) for me to build a simple window-form application that will run on all the common platforms: windows/linux/mac-os ?
I do not want to build a web-app.
I have my eye on Python and one of it's widget libraries, QT or WxWidgets. Is that a good option ?
I like GTK+ personally but that or any of the ones you mentioned should be OK. I don't know which is the best in terms of least RAM usage.
Both wx and QT have embedded/universal versions where the widgets are drawn directly.
They can both be called from python,but if you have a very small system python or py2exe might not be available.
Unless you want to embed HtmlWindow I'd go with wxWindows... works everywhere without problems so far for me.
I have both worked with PyQt and wxPython extensively.
PyQt is better designed and comes with very good UI designer so that you can quickly assemble your UI
wxPython has a very good demo and it can do pretty much anything which PyQT can do, I would anyday prefer PyQt but it may bot be free for commercial purpose but wxPython is free and is decent cross platform library.
Qt is a good choice to start with. In my opinion it has a best (easy to use, simple & informative) API Documentation. Package also includes many examples - from very basic to complex. And, yep, it`s truly crossplatform.
Check Qt Licensing page, the library is free only for GPL projects.
I`m using QDevelop as text editor, but there are many other alternatives - Eclipse, KDevelop, Code:Blocks, VS plugin & etc.
Why not use swing and java? It is quite cross platform, and looks reasonable for form apps. If you squint a bit and ignore the java, its quite pleasant - or alternatively, use one of them dynamic languages on the JVM (Groovy is my recommended one).
What kind of application is it going to be? Have you considered a web-based application instead? Web-based apps can be super flexible in that sense - you can run them on any platform that has a modern browser.
By far the simplest choice for creating native cross-platform applications is REALbasic. Give it a try and you'll have a working app for Mac OS X, Windows and Linux in minutes. No run-times or other stuff to worry about.
I think you should try Html Application.It is something like web page it contain DHTML,java script,ActiveX but it is execute like .exe .
Edit:
Sorry for advice you html application.I just know it can run on windows only.
Some of the requirements (restrictions) for such a ui framework/toolkit are:
No single vendor lock down
Ability for real time data visualization
Good initial widgets
Good dash boarding capabilities
cross platform
Good development/debug environment
No flash
It's a pity you can't/won't use Flash. Else I could really recommend Adobe AIR. It has a good editor (Flex Builder built on Eclipse), a good component framework with many out of the box components, charting components set, ability to communicate with many different protocols (and you could write your own protocol implementation), cross platform, runs in the AIR runtime and not in the browser, file IO, ...
I wouldn't pass over Flex/Air (Flash) without a closer consideration but here are a few others I have come across:
wxWidgets
GTK+
Qt
There is also a slashdot post with links to some tookits I haven't heard of. I'll add their recommendations here:
GLUI, an OpenGL-based GUI
Whisper, a Mac/Windows application framework
WxWindows, a framework which supports Windows 3.1/95/98/NT, and Unix with GTK/Motif/Lesstif, and MacOS
YAAF, Yet Another Application Framework, offering suport for Macintosh OS, Windows 95 and Windows NT, and X Windows
CPLAT, a framework for developing MacOS and Windows (Linux soon) applications
Ardi's Carbonless Copies technology, which is a portable rewrite of much of the MacOS API
For general information:
GUI Toolkit/Framework Page
PIGUI FAQ Page
C++ User's Journal PIGUI Page
I might suggest Mozilla XUL, but it has some drawbacks:
No really good development / debug environment (although there are tools and debuggers; they are variable)
You are locked into a vendor, but it is Mozilla.
It is very easy to use though and allows you to reuse your web Javascript skills for a rich-client app.
There's also Java of course. It satifies all your requirements AFAICS.
Plenty of custom charting controls, which are things you will struggle to find for GTK/WxWindows/$other_small_userbase_framework.
If you dont like Swing(its come a long way - Metal is dead, long live SystemDefault L&F!), there are options like SWT or even QT bindings for java(QTJambi).
For C or C++ go QT, its APIs are really nice.
For RCAs check out Eclipse RCP. For RIAs, you might be interested in OpenLaszlo. It's a rich internet platform that can compile both to Flash and DHTML.
http://www.gnustep.org/
"GNUstep is a cross-platform, object-oriented framework for desktop application development. Based on the OpenStep specification originally created by NeXT (now Apple), GNUstep enables developers to rapidly build sophisticated software by employing a large library of reusable software components."
Portable to: Windows, BSD-based systems, Linux-based systems, HP/UX, , Solaris, Sparc, GNUstep Solaris 10 U2 vmware appliance, OpenSolaris, others.
I recently made a pretty complete list here: http://commadot.com/ria-frameworks/
ExtJS is probably my favorite and we use that at work. I think it satisfies your list. Otherwise, there are a bunch of other possibilities on that page.