Widgets in PyGTK
last modified October 18, 2023
In this part of the PyGTK programming tutorial, we introduce some PyGTK widgets.
Widgets are basic building blocks of a GUI application. Over the years, several widgets became a standard in all toolkits on all OS platforms. For example a button, a check box or a scroll bar. The PyGTK toolkit’s philosophy is to keep the number of widgets at a minimum level. More specialised widgets are created as custom PyGTK widgets.
Label
The Label widget displays a limited amount of read-only text.
label.py
#!/usr/bin/python
ZetCode PyGTK tutorial
This example demonstrates the Label widget
author: jan bodnar
website: zetcode.com
last edited: February 2009
import gtk
lyrics = “““Meet you downstairs in the bar and heard your rolled up sleeves and your skull t-shirt You say why did you do it with him today? and sniff me out like I was Tanqueray
cause you’re my fella, my guy hand me your stella and fly by the time I’m out the door you tear men down like Roger Moore
I cheated myself like I knew I would I told ya, I was trouble you know that I’m no good”””
class PyApp(gtk.Window): def init(self): super(PyApp, self).init()
self.set_position(gtk.WIN_POS_CENTER)
self.set_border_width(8)
self.connect("destroy", gtk.main_quit)
self.set_title("You know I'm no Good")
label = gtk.Label(lyrics)
self.add(label)
self.show_all()
PyApp() gtk.main()
The code example shows some lyrics on the window.
lyrics = “““Meet you downstairs in the bar and heard your rolled up sleeves and your skull t-shirt …”””
This is the text that we display.
self.set_border_width(8)
The Label is surrounded by some empty space.
label = gtk.Label(lyrics) self.add(label)
The Label widget is created and added to the window.
Figure: Label Widget
CheckButton
CheckButton is a widget that has two states: on and off. The n state is visualised by a check mark. It is used to denote some boolean property.
checkbutton.py
#!/usr/bin/python
ZetCode PyGTK tutorial
This example demonstrates the CheckButton widget
author: jan bodnar
website: zetcode.com
last edited: February 2009
import gtk
class PyApp(gtk.Window):
def __init__(self):
super(PyApp, self).__init__()
self.set_title("Check Button")
self.set_position(gtk.WIN_POS_CENTER)
self.set_default_size(250, 200)
fixed = gtk.Fixed()
button = gtk.CheckButton("Show title")
button.set_active(True)
button.unset_flags(gtk.CAN_FOCUS)
button.connect("clicked", self.on_clicked)
fixed.put(button, 50, 50)
self.connect("destroy", gtk.main_quit)
self.add(fixed)
self.show_all()
def on_clicked(self, widget):
if widget.get_active():
self.set_title("Check Button")
else:
self.set_title("")
PyApp() gtk.main()
We display a title in the titlebar of the window, depending on the state of the CheckButton.
button = gtk.CheckButton(“Show title”)
CheckButton widget is created.
button.set_active(True)
The title is visible by default, so we check the check button by default.
if widget.get_active(): self.set_title(“Check Button”) else: self.set_title("")
If the CheckButton is checked we show the title. Otherwise we put empty text in the titlebar.
Figure: CheckButton
ComboBox
ComboBox is a widget that allows the user to choose from a list of options.
combobox.py
#!/usr/bin/python
ZetCode PyGTK tutorial
This example demonstrates the ComboBox widget
author: jan bodnar
website: zetcode.com
last edited: February 2009
import gtk
class PyApp(gtk.Window): def init(self): super(PyApp, self).init()
self.set_title("ComboBox")
self.set_default_size(250, 200)
self.set_position(gtk.WIN_POS_CENTER)
cb = gtk.combo_box_new_text()
cb.connect("changed", self.on_changed)
cb.append_text('Ubuntu')
cb.append_text('Mandriva')
cb.append_text('Redhat')
cb.append_text('Gentoo')
cb.append_text('Mint')
fixed = gtk.Fixed()
fixed.put(cb, 50, 30)
self.label = gtk.Label("-")
fixed.put(self.label, 50, 140)
self.add(fixed)
self.connect("destroy", gtk.main_quit)
self.show_all()
def on_changed(self, widget):
self.label.set_label(widget.get_active_text())
PyApp() gtk.main()
The example shows a combo box and a label. The combo box has a list of six options. These are the names of Linux distros. The label widget shows the selected option from the combo box.
cb = gtk.combo_box_new_text()
The gtk.combo_box_new_text function is a convenience function that constructs a new text combo box. It is a ComboBox just displaying strings.
cb.append_text(‘Ubuntu’) cb.append_text(‘Mandriva’) cb.append_text(‘Redhat’) cb.append_text(‘Gentoo’) cb.append_text(‘Mint’)
The ComboBox is filled with textual data.
self.label.set_label(widget.get_active_text())
Inside the on_changed method, we get the selected text out of the combo box and set it to the label.
Figure: ComboBox
Image
The next example introduces the Image widget. This widget displays pictures.
image.py
#!/usr/bin/python
ZetCode PyGTK tutorial
This example demonstrates the Image widget
author: jan bodnar
website: zetcode.com
last edited: February 2009
import gtk
class PyApp(gtk.Window):
def __init__(self):
super(PyApp, self).__init__()
self.set_title("Red Rock")
self.set_position(gtk.WIN_POS_CENTER)
self.set_border_width(2)
image = gtk.Image()
image.set_from_file("redrock.png")
self.connect("destroy", gtk.main_quit)
self.add(image)
self.show_all()
PyApp() gtk.main()
We show the Red Rock castle in the window.
image = gtk.Image()
Image widget is created.
image.set_from_file(“redrock.png”)
We set a PNG image to the Image widget. The picture is loaded from the file on the disk.
Figure: Image
In this chapter, we showed the first pack of basic widgets of the PyGTK programming library.
