| <HTML><HEAD><TITLE>Using python to create Macintosh applications, part two</TITLE></HEAD> |
| <BODY> |
| <H1>Using python to create Macintosh applications, part two</H1> |
| <HR> |
| |
| In this document we rewrite the application of the <A |
| HREF="example1.html">previous example</A> to use modeless dialogs. We |
| will use an application framework, and we will have a look at creating |
| applets, standalone applications written in Python. The <A |
| HREF="example2/dnslookup-2.py">source code</A> and |
| <A HREF="example2/dnslookup-2.rsrc">resource file</A> are available in the folder |
| <A HREF="example2">example2</A>. <p> |
| |
| Again, we start with ResEdit to create our dialogs. Not only do we |
| want a main dialog this time but also an "About" dialog. This example is less |
| than complete since we do not provide a <A NAME="bundle">BNDL resource</A> |
| and related stuff that an application cannot be without. We are able to do this |
| when building a python applet since BuildApplet will substitute default resources |
| for BNDL, etc. when none are supplied (<A HREF="#no-bundle">See below</A>.) |
| "Inside Mac" or various |
| books on Macintosh programming will help here. Also, you can refer to |
| the resource files provided in the Python source distribution for some |
| of the python-specific points of BNDL programming: the |
| "appletbundle.rsrc" file is what is used for creating applets if you |
| don't provide your own resource file. <p> |
| |
| When creating your own BNDL resouorces, keep in mind that the Finder gets |
| confused if you have more than one application with the same signature. This may be due |
| to some incorrectness on the side of "BuildApplet", I am not sure. There is one |
| case when you definitely need a unique signature: when you create an applet that |
| has its own data files and you want the user to be able to start your |
| applet by double-clicking one of the datafiles. <p> |
| |
| Let's have a look at dnslookup-2.rsrc, our resource file. Dialog 512 is the |
| main window which has one button (Lookup), two labels and |
| two text entry areas, one of which is used for output only. The "Quit" |
| button has disappeared, because its function is handled by a menu choice. Here's |
| what it will look like at run time:<p> |
| <div align=center> |
| <img width=324 height=205 src="example2/dnslookup-2.gif" alt="dialog image"> |
| </div> |
| <p> |
| |
| <H2>A modeless dialog application using FrameWork</H2> |
| |
| On to the source code in <A |
| HREF="example2/dnslookup-2.py">dnslookup-2.py</A>. The |
| start is similar to our previous example program <A |
| HREF="example1/dnslookup-1.py">dnslookup-1.py</A>, with |
| one extra module being imported. To make life more simple we will use |
| the <CODE>FrameWork</CODE> module, a nifty piece of code that handles |
| all the gory Mac details of event loop programming, menubar |
| installation and all the other code that is the same for every Mac |
| program in the world. Like most standard modules, FrameWork will run |
| some sample test code when you invoke it as a main program, so try it |
| now. It will create a menu bar with an Apple menu with the about box |
| and a "File" menu with some pythonesque choices (which do nothing |
| interesting, by the way) and a "Quit" command that works. <p> |
| |
| <BLOCKQUOTE> |
| If you have not used <code>FrameWork</code> before you may want to |
| first take a look at the <A HREF="textedit.html">Pathetic EDitor</A> |
| example, which builds a minimal text editor using FrameWork and TextEdit. |
| On the other hand: we don't use many features of FrameWork, so you could |
| also continue with this document. |
| </BLOCKQUOTE> |
| |
| After the imports we get the definitions of resource-IDs in our |
| resource file, slightly changed from the previous version of our |
| program. The main program is also |
| similar to our previous version, with one important exception: we |
| first check to see whether our resource is available before opening |
| the resource file. Why is this? Because later, when we will have |
| converted the script to an applet, our resources will be available in |
| the applet file and we don't need the separate resource file |
| anymore. <p> |
| |
| Next comes the definition of our main class, |
| <CODE>DNSLookup</CODE>, which inherits |
| <CODE>FrameWork.Application</CODE>. The Application class handles the |
| menu bar and the main event loop and event dispatching. In the |
| <CODE>__init__</CODE> routine we first let the base class initialize |
| itself, then we create our modeless dialog and finally we jump into |
| the main loop. The main loop continues until we call <CODE>self._quit</CODE>, |
| which we will do when the user selects "Quit". When we create |
| the instance of <CODE>MyDialog</CODE> (which inherits |
| <CODE>DialogWindow</CODE>, which inherits <CODE>Window</CODE>) we pass |
| a reference to the application object, this reference is used to tell |
| Application about our new window. This enables the event loop to keep |
| track of all windows and dispatch things like update events and mouse |
| clicks. <p> |
| |
| The <CODE>makeusermenus()</CODE> method (which is called sometime |
| during the Application <CODE>__init__</CODE> routine) creates a File |
| menu with a Quit command (shortcut command-Q), which will callback to |
| our quit() method. <CODE>Quit()</CODE>, in turn, calls <CODE>_quit</CODE> which |
| causes the mainloop to terminate at a convenient time. <p> |
| |
| Application provides a standard about box, but we override this by |
| providing our own <CODE>do_about()</CODE> method which shows an about |
| box from a resource as a modal dialog. This piece of code should look |
| familiar to you from the previous example program. That do_about is |
| called when the user selects About from the Apple menu is, again, |
| taken care of by the __init__ routine of Application. <p> |
| |
| The <CODE>MyDialog</CODE> class is the container for our main |
| window. Initialization is again done by first calling the base class |
| <CODE>__init__</CODE> function and finally setting the local variable |
| "parent." <p> |
| |
| <CODE>Do_itemhit()</CODE> is called when an item is selected in this |
| dialog by the user. We are passed the item number (and the original |
| event structure, which we normally ignore). The code is similar to the |
| main loop of our previous example program: a switch depending on the |
| item selected. <CODE>Dnslookup()</CODE> is quite similar to our previous |
| example. <p> |
| |
| <H2><IMG SRC="html.icons/mkapplet.gif"><A NAME="applets">Creating applets</A></H2> |
| |
| Now let us try to turn the python script into an applet, a standalone |
| application. This will <em>not</em> work if you have the "classic 68k" |
| Python distribution, only if you have the cfm68k or PPC distribution. |
| |
| <blockquote> |
| Actually, "standalone" is probably not the correct term here, since an |
| applet does still depend on a lot of the python environment: the |
| PythonCore shared library, the Python Preferences file, the python Lib |
| folder and any other modules that the main module depends on. It is |
| possible to get rid of all these dependencies and create true standalone |
| applications in Python, but this is a bit difficult. See <a href="freezing.html"> |
| Standalone Applications in Python</a> for details. For this |
| document, by standalone we mean here that |
| the script has the look-and-feel of an application, including the |
| ability to have its own document types, be droppable, etc. |
| </blockquote> |
| |
| The easiest way to create an applet is to take your source file and |
| drop it onto "BuildApplet", located in the Python home |
| folder. This will create an applet with the same name as your python |
| source with the ".py" stripped. Also, if a resource file with the same |
| name as your source but with ".rsrc" extension is available the |
| resources from that file will be copied to your applet too. If there |
| is no resource file for your script a set of default resources will be |
| used, and the applet will have the default creator 'Pyt0'. The latter |
| also happens if you do have a resource file but without the BNDL |
| combo. <A NAME="no-bundle">Actually</A>, as in the present example. |
| <p> |
| |
| If you need slightly more control over the BuildApplet process you can |
| double-click it, and you will get dialogs for source and |
| destination of the applet. The rest of the process, including locating |
| the resource file, remains the same. <p> |
| |
| Note that though our example application completely bypasses the |
| normal python user interface this is by no means necessary. Any python |
| script can be turned into an applet, and all the usual features of the |
| interpreter still work. <p> |
| |
| That's all for this example, you may now return to the <A HREF="index.html"> |
| table of contents</A> to pick another topic. <p> |
| </BODY> |
| </HTML> |