pythoncard-users

[Pythoncard-users] Sizers and Layout

[Peter C. <pe...@pe...>]

At 06:38 PM 9/2/2001 -0700, pyt...@li... 
wrote:
>After we are happy with our Font implementation I will be getting more into
>sizers. I already have an idea how we might implement them so that their
>description would be relatively easy to grasp.

I just checked out the sizers demo that came with wxWindows and I'm very 
impressed - I wish I had that kind of control in the HTML world.  I can see 
they would be a huge asset to PythonCard - if they could be made 
understandable and approachable.  Seems to me an interactive, drag-and-drop 
sizer editor would make all the difference in the world.  I'll probably get 
some ideas for an editor once my own stacks come far enough along to need 
sizers.

>There is actually quite a lot of work going into the wxHTML control for
>wxWindows and even in the upcoming wxWindows/wxPython 2.3.2 it will be much
>more capable than the one available today. We won't be able to do a GUI
>layout editor that uses HTML, that is simply too complicated, but we will
>probably be able to support the use of HTML with embedded widgets for
>layouts sometime in the future if somebody wants to go that route.

That's fantastic - I have been thinking all along that HTML would be a nice 
way to Python output, simply because it's familiar and has so many tools 
these days.  But I assumed I would have to build it to emulate a web server 
(Ugh) and couple it to Internet Explorer (Double-Ugh).  A wxHTML control 
with embedded widgets would be perfect, especially for generating dynamic 
interface elements at run-time.  Perhaps it could use Action Sheets (as 
described in W3C NOTE-AS-19980619) as way to associate the 
handlers.   <http://www.w3.org/TR/NOTE-AS>  That would be a nice tidy 
package if you ask me.

RE: [Pythoncard-users] Sizers and Layout

[Kevin A. <al...@se...>]

> From: Peter Cleaveland
>
> >After we are happy with our Font implementation I will be
> getting more into
> >sizers. I already have an idea how we might implement them so that their
> >description would be relatively easy to grasp.
>
> I just checked out the sizers demo that came with wxWindows and I'm very
> impressed - I wish I had that kind of control in the HTML world.
> I can see
> they would be a huge asset to PythonCard - if they could be made
> understandable and approachable.  Seems to me an interactive,
> drag-and-drop
> sizer editor would make all the difference in the world.  I'll
> probably get
> some ideas for an editor once my own stacks come far enough along to need
> sizers.

wxDesigner http://www.roebling.de/ is supposed to use sizers for layout, but
I have only looked at it briefly, so I don't know whether the interface is
intuitive or not. From what I've read so far, I'm sure I want to support the
full range of sizer controls in wxWindows, it just seems too complicated,
but I need to get a straw man implementation done and play with it before I
can say more.

> >There is actually quite a lot of work going into the wxHTML control for
> >wxWindows and even in the upcoming wxWindows/wxPython 2.3.2 it
> will be much
> >more capable than the one available today. We won't be able to do a GUI
> >layout editor that uses HTML, that is simply too complicated, but we will
> >probably be able to support the use of HTML with embedded widgets for
> >layouts sometime in the future if somebody wants to go that route.

Neil actually did a demo that uses the .rsrc.py files to make a web page
suitable for use in a browser, so the layout of PythonCard background can
sort of be used as HTML. I thought Neil was going to check the files into
cvs at:
http://cvs.sourceforge.net/cgi-bin/viewcvs.cgi/pythoncard/proto/samples/

but I don't see the files (Neil can you check them in?). The original
message is:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/pythoncard/message/397

You'll either need to check out the 'proto' cvs tree or I'll need to make
release 0.2.1 available for download again, since it is currently hidden to
avoid people downloading old versions. If you decide to check out from cvs,
0.2.1 is not a package and is significantly different from the current
release, so don't mix the two.

Perhaps it might be best for Neil to go into this subject more when he gets
time or the framework stabilizes to the point that someone can experiment
with this without having to update the files with every API change.

ka

Re: [Pythoncard-users] Sizers and Layout

[Neil H. <ne...@sc...>]

Kevin Altis:

> Neil actually did a demo that uses the .rsrc.py files to make a web page
> suitable for use in a browser, so the layout of PythonCard background can
> sort of be used as HTML. I thought Neil was going to check the files into
> cvs at:
> http://cvs.sourceforge.net/cgi-bin/viewcvs.cgi/pythoncard/proto/samples/
>
> but I don't see the files (Neil can you check them in?). The original
> message is:
> http://groups.yahoo.com/group/pythoncard/message/397

   OK, Pyker.hta and PykerLaunch.hta are now in CVS. These are HyperText
Applications and work only on Windows with a recent version of Internet
Explorer. Similar work could be done in Mozilla with the Python interpreter
embedded although not too many people have this set up.
   Pyker.hta displays the PythonCard resource file given as a command line
argument.
   PykerLaunch.hta displays a list of resource files in subdirectories and
clicking on one displays it using Pyker.hta.

   While I don't intent to takes these any further, they are reasonable
demonstrations of the ability of browsers to produce diverse user
interfaces. It may be possible to turn this code into a PythonCard player
that hosts PythonCard applications inside browsers in a similar manner to
the current wxPython based host.

> Perhaps it might be best for Neil to go into this subject more when he
gets
> time or the framework stabilizes to the point that someone can experiment
> with this without having to update the files with every API change.

   The API resource file hasn't changed since Pyker was first written so
still works.

   Neil

Re: [Pythoncard-users] Sizers and Layout

[Neil H. <ne...@sc...>]

Kevin Altis:

> Neil actually did a demo that uses the .rsrc.py files to make a web page
> suitable for use in a browser, so the layout of PythonCard background can
> sort of be used as HTML. I thought Neil was going to check the files into
> cvs at:
> http://cvs.sourceforge.net/cgi-bin/viewcvs.cgi/pythoncard/proto/samples/
>
> but I don't see the files (Neil can you check them in?). The original
> message is:
> http://groups.yahoo.com/group/pythoncard/message/397

   OK, Pyker.hta and PykerLaunch.hta are now in CVS. These are HyperText
Applications and work only on Windows with a recent version of Internet
Explorer. Similar work could be done in Mozilla with the Python interpreter
embedded although not too many people have this set up.
   Pyker.hta displays the PythonCard resource file given as a command line
argument.
   PykerLaunch.hta displays a list of resource files in subdirectories and
clicking on one displays it using Pyker.hta.

   While I don't intent to takes these any further, they are reasonable
demonstrations of the ability of browsers to produce diverse user
interfaces. It may be possible to turn this code into a PythonCard player
that hosts PythonCard applications inside browsers in a similar manner to
the current wxPython based host.

> Perhaps it might be best for Neil to go into this subject more when he
gets
> time or the framework stabilizes to the point that someone can experiment
> with this without having to update the files with every API change.

   The API resource file hasn't changed since Pyker was first written so
still works.

   Neil