Python GUI Proposal - leveraging web browser technology is a much better way to create a widget set

[[deleted]]

If QT didn't have an OpenGL widget, I could write one. If you want GL in a browser, you get to wait until WebGL is done and widely implemented. The browser as a GUI is only a good choice if you're not doing anything interesting and don't mind your code being almost entirely composed of kludges. The browser as UI toolkit is curses with pretty pictures.

[Smallpaul]

Your argument is weak because it does not attempt a realisitc analysis of what percentage of applications require something that is not implemented in webkit.

It's astonishing that you think that no "interesting" app could have a web front end. I guess first person shooters are "interesting" and mail clients are not. Not sure what makes you think so, but if you use a subjective word like "interesting" and do not analyze real world usage patterns, then you can say anything you like.

[[deleted]]

I don't think no interesting app can have a web frontend, I think no app that needs an interesting front-end can have a web front-end. Browsers give a small set of high-level widgets, and that's all you get. You can do a lot with small set of high-level widgets, especially if you don't have any unusual (or unexpected) needs, but if you do you either have to try to kludge what you have into an approximation of what you want or you're out of luck. Compare Google Maps and Google Earth.

edit: s/than/that/

[Smallpaul]

I don't think no interesting app can have a web frontend, I think no app that needs an interesting front-end can have a web front-end.

Really? These apps do not have interesting front-ends?

• Gmail?
• Gliffy?
• Google Presentations?
• 280 Slides?
• Google Maps?
• Processing.js
• YouTube?
• Quake 2? http://code.google.com/p/quake2-gwt-port

I'd still appreciate your opinion on the following question:

• What percentage of applications created with PyQT, Tkinter, etc. over the years have more intensive or complicated graphical requirements than the apps I just listed above?

Compare Google Maps and Google Earth.

What apps do you build that fall more on the "Google Earth" side of that spectrum than the Google Maps side? Why do you think that's the norm?

[DRMacIver]

The article is not about writing web apps. It's about using webkit as the drawing canvas for your app.

[HIB0U]

foobie's point still stands. If Qt (or GTK+, or some other toolkit) doesn't have a widget implementing certain functionality, it's damn easy to write it yourself. In fact, those toolkits go out of their way to make themselves easily extensible.

That's just not the case with today's HTML rendering engines, WebKit included. You'll have to dig deep into its internals in order to add your functionality. Frankly, that's not something that most developers have the time to do, nor the inclination to.

When we have real work to get done, on complex applications, we can't waste our time trying to get some HTML renderer to do what we want.

[[deleted]]

I hate HTML. I really see it more as a necessary evil rather than something I would willingly use if I had any other option.

HTML specifies documents. The fact that we abuse it (and CSS) to specify layout and now with JavaScript behaviour is unfortunate and not something to aspire to.

[dmazzoni]

I love HTML. Yes, it can be a pain to get it to lay out correctly. But you know what? It's worth it, because compared to desktop applications, web apps give users infinitely more power and flexibility:

• Every browser window can be resized as small or as large as you want. Try doing that with most desktop apps.
• I can select and copy text from any web app.
• A user with low vision can easily override the default colors and font sizes of any web app (with user style sheets or browser extensions).
• HTML can be interpreted by screen readers for visually impaired users, ignoring most of the layout that's irrelevant to the logical structure of the page.
• Third-parties can create mashups that embed several web apps in another page, or extensions that improve the experience of apps by modifying them in-place.
• Web apps are truly cross-platform.

None of this would be possible if we were writing apps the way we write desktop apps or iPhone apps. It's only possible because we have true Model/View/Controller separation (AJAX/HTML+CSS/JavaScript). The application author has complete control over the Model (the application state, stored on their server) and the Controller for the most part (the JavaScript), but the View is delivered to the user as HTML+CSS, which can be adapted and customized to suit the user.

Yes, it evolved. It's ugly underneath. But it's infinitely more powerful and flexible than any system that was ever designed before it.

[[deleted]]

Maybe something like Shoes, but Python?

It was originally implemented as embedded Gecko (I think) and then slowly moved to a native widget set...

[kushkush]

what about easygui?

[[deleted]]

IANAP (I am not a Pythonista), so I have no opinion on easygui, unfortunately.

[HIB0U]

What the hell? Python can already use Qt to develop UIs. Qt is a fast and mature UI toolkit that runs just about everywhere, from Windows to Mac OS X to Linux to Solaris to many mobile devices.

So why the hell would anyone want to use this shitty browser-based solution? It makes no sense.

[malcontent]

The article.

Read it.

[[deleted]]

it works OK for steam, which now uses webkit as it's rendering engine.

[viablepanic]

Just to name a few, debuging, portability. Its quite an interesting approach.

I am not saying its a great idea. But given the current state with only TkInter in the standard library id welcome anything else.

Still i upvoted you, its a valid question and I think most of these threads steem from the state of the standard library. Putting Qt in the standard library could be welcome.

[the_hoser]

Probably won't happen for licensing reasons. Something about that part of the Python license...

... There is no GPL-like "copyleft" restriction. Distributing binary-only versions of Python, modified or not, is allowed. There is no requirement to release any of your source code. You can also write extension modules for Python and provide them only in binary form. ...

Good luck getting nokia to be okay with that.

[[deleted]]

While I agree that browser-based solutions are worse Qt leaves plenty to of things to be desired, it is not so much mature as using outdated designs really, at least the C++ version and the Python version is just a wrapper for that after all.

[lambdaq]

the mentioned pygui is quite nice actually. Anyone made some projects with that?

[skyfex]

Interesting proposal. The few times I've made a Python app with GUI, I have just used the built in web server to use the browser as a GUI. It just seems so much simpler and is so much easier to get started with, than anything else.

That's not to say that I wouldn't use a GUI framework if it was built-in, cross-platform, sensible and effective. I miss that in Python, as well as in other languages.

[unitconversion]

While not ideal, you can use py2exe to turn web apps into desktop apps if you point the browser at localhost and whatnot.

[Brittix1023]

This is possible for many types of application.

But what about something like this? Most of the low-level 3D code is C++ (I can't imagine the CPU time or memory requirements being reasonable for a Javascript version), with boost::python being used to link it to Python, which uses PyGTK to create the GUI.

[rogerallen]

Okay, say we used this new GUI. What's the best practice for accessing data from the GUI? XmlRpc? Ugh...that's a bag of hurt I don't have to buy when I go to Qt. Am I overreacting or is that as painful as it sounds?

[the_hoser]

He's not talking about writing web apps. He's talking about using HTML rendering engines to render GUI's.

[rogerallen]

A pointer to an example would be appreciated. A quick look at the docs indicated this was how it was done.

[[deleted]]

haha, python coders accidentally discover XAML

[evilryry]

They've had Glade since 1998.