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On Jan 20, 3:06*pm, Emile van Sebille <em...@fenx.com> wrote:

> You might find this interesting...
> http://mail.python.org/pipermail/pyt...000-November/0...
> Yes, it's old. *That's part of the reason you get no traction on this.

Thanks Emile. This read was both hair raising and informative.
Following is the relevant Tkinter parts posted verbatim with my
comments sprinkled throughout...


> However, this process is still in its infancy, and the announcement
> caused much worrying in the Tcl/Tk user community about the
> language's future and its continued maintenance. This affects
> Python because Tk, through the Tkinter module, is the most GUI most
> commonly used with Python. Tkinter is included in the source
> distribution, it's the most extensively documented, and it's the
> most portable, supported on the Big Three platforms, namely Windows,
> Unix, and MacOS.

It seems at the time (a decade ago) fantasies abounded about the
importance of Tkinter. I find it highly unlikely that Tkinter was OR
IS the "Most commonly used GUI with Python". Maybe the most commonly
used GUI library for utilities, but that's about it

> Fredrik Lundh first posted a note about the announcement, and Eric
> S. Raymond raised the question of what this meant for Tkinter: "This
> raises anew a question I've been meaning to bring up for the last
> week: is it finally time to move away from Python's dependence on
> Tcl/Tk for GUI support?"

Yes (even a decade later!).

> People were split on this question, though Guido was receptive to
> the idea ("Yes, it may be time to have this discussion again.") and
> pointed out some reasons to stick with Tkinter: "Tk has two very
> high quality widgets: the Canvas and Text widgets are unsurpassed in
> functionality and robustness by other widget sets.

Not anymore Guido!

> You can draw
> more lines or characters per second in most toolkits, but few
> toolkits offer the convenience of marks and tags, not having to deal
> with refresh events, being able to group objects, move them around,
> change attributes, etc., etc., etc."

Thats a very weak argument. While i'll agree that the tagging system
employed by the TK::Canvas widget is helpful, the same functionality
can be reproduced by the programmer very easily. And i always prefer
to work with objects as opposed to tags because of the obvious
limitations.

> Greg Wilson's reaction was "Yes please", and he went on to explain
> what factors kept him using Tkinter for a recent course:
http://www.python.org/pipermail/pyth...er/016757.html

Well that link is broken so we will never know what greg said?

> /F thought Tk was still a good choice, and said " ... and trust me,
> the Python 2.0/Tk8.4/Tkinter3000 combo will rock ". Tkinter3000
> is an improved Tk interface that /F has been working on, with more
> flexibility and better performance.
> http://tkinter.effbot.org

Yea Frederic maybe Tkinter < exaggeration >"rocked the casba"</
exaggeration > in 2000, however we are building with steel and glass
now, not rock and stone.

> /F also hoped that the Tcl Core Team would become more receptive to
> making it easier to use Tk from other languages without Tcl having
> to be in the middle, which would let the maintainers of Tkinter and
> the Perl/Tk interface participate more in Tk's development.

Why in the world do WE -- THE Python community-- give two figs as to
how useful TclTk is to OTHER communities?

> Eric S. Raymond speculated about the success of Tcl's new
> development model: "Good for Tcl: Osterhout's rather lame attempts
> to develop under a mixed model have almost certainly come to an end
> in favor of an Apache-like model funded by big Tcl users."
> http://www.python.org/pipermail/pyth...er/016763.html
>
> Greg Ewing wondered if stdwin should be revived. GvR and Raymond
> both thought that far too much work, and not productive of very good
> results. "And stdwin would really look pathetic in this time", GvR
> observed.

Well Guido, just imagine how bad Tkinter will look in 10 years

> Python isn't tied very tightly to Tk, of course; well-maintained and
> reasonably complete bindings exist for many different GUI toolkits,
> such as Qt, GTk+, wxWindows, Windows MFC, and a few more.
> http://www.thekompany.com/projects/pykde/
> http://www.daa.com.au/~james/pygtk/ http://wxpython.org/
> http://http://www.oreillynet.com/pub/a/217

Well i'd have to disagree being that Tkinter is IN the STDLIB!!!!

> wxWindows is probably the most obvious second candidate, since it
> actually supports all of the Big Three platforms, and no other
> toolkit does. Robin Dunn, author of the wxPython binding, posted to
> discuss the status of wxWindows on the Mac: "My understanding is
> that the version in CVS is nearly up to date with the features in
> the MSW and GTK versions, though I haven't had a chance to use it
> myself. ... The next step I guess is getting it wrapped up in
> wxPython..." http://www.python.org/pipermail/python-
> dev/2000-October/016764.html

Finally some sanity in this thread!

> There was no clear final decision, and my crystal ball didn't deign
> to give an answer. Given all the uncertainties, it's probably best
> to wait and see. If Tk's development continues to progress and
> becomes more open to languages other than Tcl, Tkinter will probably
> continue to be the most common Python GUI.

Thats ridiculous. Just because Tk becomes more open to other
developers (namely Perl, and Ruby) does not mean we should keep it
around for the same reason.

> If not, we can consider
> this question in another 6 months, which will give wxWindows and
> wxPython time to develop on the Mac platform. And who knows? Maybe
> something else will happen, such as Qt or GTk+ being ported to the
> Macintosh.

Yea, i'll bet the author did not expect what has happened.

* Very slow if any advancement of Tk.
* wxPython became rich GUI library.
* Tkinter used only for utility and toy apps.
* An apathy for Tkinter within the community.
* and more

On Thu, Jan 20, 2011 at 4:52 PM, rantingrick <> wrote:
>> Greg Wilson's reaction was "Yes please", and he went on to explain
>> what factors kept him using Tkinter for a recent course:
> Â* Â* Â* Â*http://www.python.org/pipermail/pyth...er/016757.html
>
> Well that link is broken so we will never know what greg said?

I think that's referring to this email:
http://mail.python.org/pipermail/pyt...er/010046.html

--
Jerry

On 20/01/2011 21:52, rantingrick wrote:
> On Jan 20, 3:06 pm, Emile van Sebille<em...@fenx.com> wrote:
>
[snip]
>> Greg Wilson's reaction was "Yes please", and he went on to explain
>> what factors kept him using Tkinter for a recent course:
> http://www.python.org/pipermail/pyth...er/016757.html
>
> Well that link is broken so we will never know what greg said?
>
[snip]
Yes:
http://mail.python.org/pipermail/pyt...00-October.txt

On Jan 20, 5:01*pm, Jerry Hill <malaclyp...@gmail.com> wrote:
> On Thu, Jan 20, 2011 at 4:52 PM, rantingrick <rantingr...@gmail.com> wrote:
> >> Greg Wilson's reaction was "Yes please", and he went on to explain
> >> what factors kept him using Tkinter for a recent course:
> > * * * *http://www.python.org/pipermail/pyth...er/016757.html
>
> > Well that link is broken so we will never know what greg said?
>
> I think that's referring to this email:http://mail.python.org/pipermail/pyt...er/010046.html
>
> --
> Jerry

Thanks Jerry this was the thread i was looking for. Two points for
you

On Jan 20, 5:08*pm, MRAB <pyt...@mrabarnett.plus.com> wrote:
> On 20/01/2011 21:52, rantingrick wrote:> On Jan 20, 3:06 pm, Emile van Sebille<em...@fenx.com> *wrote:
>
> [snip]
> >> Greg Wilson's reaction was "Yes please", and he went on to explain
> >> what factors kept him using Tkinter for a recent course:
> > * *http://www.python.org/pipermail/pyth...er/016757.html
>
> > Well that link is broken so we will never know what greg said?
>
> [snip]
> Yes:
> * * *http://mail.python.org/pipermail/pyt...00-October.txt

Sorry MRAB. I could not find Greg's reply in this mountain of Usenet
you posted a link to. You lose two points , oh wait, why should i be
unhappy

On Jan 20, 5:01*pm, Jerry Hill <malaclyp...@gmail.com> wrote:

> I think that's referring to this email:http://mail.python.org/pipermail/pyt...er/010046.html


---- Greg Wilson -----
I thought about using wxPython in the most recent run of my Python
course, but
decided to stick to Tkinter because:

- There isn't a wxWindows/wxPython book (matters a lot when
organizations are
trying to decide what to adopt for long-term use).
---- Greg Wilson -----

WxPython could use better docs even today (not sure of what books are
available) however when we decide to integrate wx into the stdlib that
would be the best time to write a comprihensive "python specific
tutorial/docs

---- Greg Wilson -----
- Tkinter came packaged with the 1.5.2 installer, wxPython didn't.
---- Greg Wilson -----

Duh! And if wxPython came prepackaged this post whould never have
existed eh?

---- Greg Wilson -----
- There aren't as many tools on top of wxPython as there are on top of
Tkinter.
In particular, I think that a vector drawing package on top of
wxPython that
did what Sketch does, but on Windows as well as Linux, would make a
great
subject for a book on Python, non-trivial OO, and HCI (hint,
hint...)
---- Greg Wilson -----

Oh come on, this is about as weak as Guido's "tag" rant. A vector
drawing app is not a tool it's an app! An besides more "tools" or apps
will be written in wx when we integrate it into the stdlib, no doubt.
These are really ridiculous reasons for not choosing wxPython and i
suspect that you are just another one of the mindless "Tkinter"
zombies who base their judgments on friendships and constituents.

On 20/01/2011 23:15, rantingrick wrote:
> On Jan 20, 5:08 pm, MRAB<pyt...@mrabarnett.plus.com> wrote:
>> On 20/01/2011 21:52, rantingrick wrote:> On Jan 20, 3:06 pm, Emile van Sebille<em...@fenx.com> wrote:
>>
>> [snip]
>>>> Greg Wilson's reaction was "Yes please", and he went on to explain
>>>> what factors kept him using Tkinter for a recent course:
>>> http://www.python.org/pipermail/pyth...er/016757.html
>>
>>> Well that link is broken so we will never know what greg said?
>>
>> [snip]
>> Yes:
>> http://mail.python.org/pipermail/pyt...00-October.txt
>
> Sorry MRAB. I could not find Greg's reply in this mountain of Usenet
> you posted a link to. You lose two points , oh wait, why should i be
> unhappy
>
Did you try searching for "yes please"? It takes just seconds...

Emile van Sebille:

> The problem with QT is the license.
>
> From http://qt.nokia.com/products/licensing/:
>
> Qt Commercial Developer License
> The Qt Commercial Developer License is the correct license to use for
> the development of proprietary and/or commercial software ...

The LGPL version is also useful for producing commercial software.
From the same web page:

"""
Qt GNU LGPL v. 2.1 Version
This version is available for development of proprietary and commercial
applications in accordance with the terms and conditions of the GNU
Lesser General Public License version 2.1.
"""

Developing a proprietary (closed source) application using LGPL
libraries is normally not a problem as the only pieces of code you have
to publish are changes to those LGPL libraries, not the application
code. Most applications do not change the libraries.

The "can't reuse LGPL code" clause is a restriction on what can be
done with the Qt Commercial Developer License not on what can be done
with the LGPL license.

GTK+ has always been LGPL and that license has not been an obstacle
to either open source or closed source projects.

Neil

> From: "Adam Skutt" <ask...@gmail.com>> Yet, for some unfathomable reason,
> you keep promoting
> I would be glad if you could tell me about a portable solution which is
> accessible with JAWS and Window Eyes, the most used screen readers under
> Windows (real glad).

I did, Qt. I'm not yournanny and I'm not going to go test it for
you. There are bugs in the Qt database relating to JAWS
functionality, so it others have plainly gotten it working to some
degree. But honestly, why should I waste my time replying to you when
you're too damn lazy to even use Google? I certainly won't be doing
so in the future. "Lead a ignorant, thirsty horse to water, watch it
die of thirst" and all that.


I have tried more QT-based apps and I couldn't find one to be accessible,
while most widgets offered by WxPython are accessible out of the box.

QT is really bad, but you hijacked the tread because as you can see even in
the subject, we are talking about Tkinter, not about QT.

If QT is not included by default in Python, it is not such a big problem
because only those who care more about the visual aspect than about the
accessibility use it, but Tkinter is bad because it is promoted and many
beginners will start using it witout knowing how bad it is and why.

You keep telling that you searched on the web for finding what the others
say about accessibility but this is a very wrong way. Don't say anything
about accessibility if you haven't tried personally.

Octavian

On Jan 20, 8:34*pm, Neil Hodgson <nhodg...@bigpond.net.au> wrote:


This is exactly what Aristotle meant when he said...


""" Tolerance and Apathy are the last virtues of a dying society! """

Specifically no one here has the nerve to question/argue Guido when he
offers such weak arguments like the "tag" argument. Can you really
base the worth of any library on such a limited argument. I would bet
that most people who use Tkinter ARE NOT using the canvas anyway. They
are not interested in drawing simple lines and rects and just looking
at them. No. They are intersted in creating GUIs with frames, buttons,
labels, radiobuttons, checkbuttons, listboxes, textboxes, notebooks,
comboboxes, and dialogs just to name a few.

However in light of such a weak argument presented TEN YEARS AGO not
one person dared to even question the BDFL. If i were Guido i would be
disappointed. The very community he has built has degenerated into
mindless goose stepping "yes" men. AND THAT WAS TEN YEARS AGO!

Congratulations "yes men" you are the genesis of this self
destruction. I think i should find a fiddle...