Jack Jansen | a630813 | 1996-03-18 13:38:52 +0000 | [diff] [blame] | 1 | <HTML><HEAD><TITLE>Using python to create Macintosh applications, part two</TITLE></HEAD> |
| 2 | <BODY> |
| 3 | <H1>Using python to create Macintosh applications, part two</H1> |
| 4 | <HR> |
| 5 | |
| 6 | In this document we rewrite the application of the <A |
| 7 | HREF="example1.html">previous example</A> to use modeless dialogs. We |
| 8 | will use an application framework, and we will have a look at creating |
Jack Jansen | 2450a25 | 1999-12-03 15:15:28 +0000 | [diff] [blame] | 9 | applets, standalone applications written in Python. The <A |
| 10 | HREF="example2/dnslookup-2.py">source code</A> and |
| 11 | <A HREF="example2/dnslookup-2.rsrc">resource file</A> are available in the folder |
| 12 | <A HREF="example2">example2</A>. <p> |
Jack Jansen | a630813 | 1996-03-18 13:38:52 +0000 | [diff] [blame] | 13 | |
| 14 | Again, we start with ResEdit to create our dialogs. Not only do we |
Jack Jansen | 2450a25 | 1999-12-03 15:15:28 +0000 | [diff] [blame] | 15 | want a main dialog this time but also an "About" dialog. This example is less |
| 16 | than complete since we do not provide a <A NAME="bundle">BNDL resource</A> |
| 17 | and related stuff that an application cannot be without. We are able to do this |
| 18 | when building a python applet since BuildApplet will substitute default resources |
| 19 | for BNDL, etc. when none are supplied (<A HREF="#no-bundle">See below</A>.) |
| 20 | "Inside Mac" or various |
| 21 | books on Macintosh programming will help here. Also, you can refer to |
Jack Jansen | a630813 | 1996-03-18 13:38:52 +0000 | [diff] [blame] | 22 | the resource files provided in the Python source distribution for some |
| 23 | of the python-specific points of BNDL programming: the |
| 24 | "appletbundle.rsrc" file is what is used for creating applets if you |
| 25 | don't provide your own resource file. <p> |
| 26 | |
Jack Jansen | 2450a25 | 1999-12-03 15:15:28 +0000 | [diff] [blame] | 27 | When creating your own BNDL resouorces, keep in mind that the Finder gets |
| 28 | confused if you have more than one application with the same signature. This may be due |
| 29 | to some incorrectness on the side of "BuildApplet", I am not sure. There is one |
| 30 | case when you definitely need a unique signature: when you create an applet that |
| 31 | has its own data files and you want the user to be able to start your |
Jack Jansen | a630813 | 1996-03-18 13:38:52 +0000 | [diff] [blame] | 32 | applet by double-clicking one of the datafiles. <p> |
| 33 | |
Jack Jansen | 2450a25 | 1999-12-03 15:15:28 +0000 | [diff] [blame] | 34 | Let's have a look at dnslookup-2.rsrc, our resource file. Dialog 512 is the |
| 35 | main window which has one button (Lookup), two labels and |
Jack Jansen | dd20689 | 1999-12-03 16:00:20 +0000 | [diff] [blame] | 36 | two text entry areas, one of which is used for output only. The "Quit" |
Jack Jansen | 2450a25 | 1999-12-03 15:15:28 +0000 | [diff] [blame] | 37 | button has disappeared, because its function is handled by a menu choice. Here's |
| 38 | what it will look like at run time:<p> |
| 39 | <div align=center> |
| 40 | <img width=324 height=205 src="example2/dnslookup-2.gif" alt="dialog image"> |
| 41 | </div> |
| 42 | <p> |
Jack Jansen | a630813 | 1996-03-18 13:38:52 +0000 | [diff] [blame] | 43 | |
| 44 | <H2>A modeless dialog application using FrameWork</H2> |
| 45 | |
| 46 | On to the source code in <A |
Jack Jansen | 2450a25 | 1999-12-03 15:15:28 +0000 | [diff] [blame] | 47 | HREF="example2/dnslookup-2.py">dnslookup-2.py</A>. The |
Jack Jansen | a630813 | 1996-03-18 13:38:52 +0000 | [diff] [blame] | 48 | start is similar to our previous example program <A |
Jack Jansen | 2450a25 | 1999-12-03 15:15:28 +0000 | [diff] [blame] | 49 | HREF="example1/dnslookup-1.py">dnslookup-1.py</A>, with |
Jack Jansen | a630813 | 1996-03-18 13:38:52 +0000 | [diff] [blame] | 50 | one extra module being imported. To make life more simple we will use |
| 51 | the <CODE>FrameWork</CODE> module, a nifty piece of code that handles |
Jack Jansen | 2450a25 | 1999-12-03 15:15:28 +0000 | [diff] [blame] | 52 | all the gory Mac details of event loop programming, menubar |
| 53 | installation and all the other code that is the same for every Mac |
Jack Jansen | a630813 | 1996-03-18 13:38:52 +0000 | [diff] [blame] | 54 | program in the world. Like most standard modules, FrameWork will run |
| 55 | some sample test code when you invoke it as a main program, so try it |
| 56 | now. It will create a menu bar with an Apple menu with the about box |
| 57 | and a "File" menu with some pythonesque choices (which do nothing |
| 58 | interesting, by the way) and a "Quit" command that works. <p> |
| 59 | |
Jack Jansen | 0836542 | 1996-04-19 15:56:08 +0000 | [diff] [blame] | 60 | <BLOCKQUOTE> |
| 61 | If you have not used <code>FrameWork</code> before you may want to |
| 62 | first take a look at the <A HREF="textedit.html">Pathetic EDitor</A> |
| 63 | example, which builds a minimal text editor using FrameWork and TextEdit. |
| 64 | On the other hand: we don't use many features of FrameWork, so you could |
| 65 | also continue with this document. |
| 66 | </BLOCKQUOTE> |
Jack Jansen | a630813 | 1996-03-18 13:38:52 +0000 | [diff] [blame] | 67 | |
| 68 | After the imports we get the definitions of resource-IDs in our |
| 69 | resource file, slightly changed from the previous version of our |
Jack Jansen | 2450a25 | 1999-12-03 15:15:28 +0000 | [diff] [blame] | 70 | program. The main program is also |
Jack Jansen | a630813 | 1996-03-18 13:38:52 +0000 | [diff] [blame] | 71 | similar to our previous version, with one important exception: we |
| 72 | first check to see whether our resource is available before opening |
| 73 | the resource file. Why is this? Because later, when we will have |
| 74 | converted the script to an applet, our resources will be available in |
| 75 | the applet file and we don't need the separate resource file |
| 76 | anymore. <p> |
| 77 | |
| 78 | Next comes the definition of our main class, |
Jack Jansen | 2450a25 | 1999-12-03 15:15:28 +0000 | [diff] [blame] | 79 | <CODE>DNSLookup</CODE>, which inherits |
Jack Jansen | a630813 | 1996-03-18 13:38:52 +0000 | [diff] [blame] | 80 | <CODE>FrameWork.Application</CODE>. The Application class handles the |
| 81 | menu bar and the main event loop and event dispatching. In the |
| 82 | <CODE>__init__</CODE> routine we first let the base class initialize |
| 83 | itself, then we create our modeless dialog and finally we jump into |
Jack Jansen | ef5cd05 | 1996-09-17 12:39:12 +0000 | [diff] [blame] | 84 | the main loop. The main loop continues until we call <CODE>self._quit</CODE>, |
Jack Jansen | 2450a25 | 1999-12-03 15:15:28 +0000 | [diff] [blame] | 85 | which we will do when the user selects "Quit". When we create |
Jack Jansen | a630813 | 1996-03-18 13:38:52 +0000 | [diff] [blame] | 86 | the instance of <CODE>MyDialog</CODE> (which inherits |
| 87 | <CODE>DialogWindow</CODE>, which inherits <CODE>Window</CODE>) we pass |
| 88 | a reference to the application object, this reference is used to tell |
| 89 | Application about our new window. This enables the event loop to keep |
| 90 | track of all windows and dispatch things like update events and mouse |
| 91 | clicks. <p> |
| 92 | |
| 93 | The <CODE>makeusermenus()</CODE> method (which is called sometime |
| 94 | during the Application <CODE>__init__</CODE> routine) creates a File |
| 95 | menu with a Quit command (shortcut command-Q), which will callback to |
Jack Jansen | ef5cd05 | 1996-09-17 12:39:12 +0000 | [diff] [blame] | 96 | our quit() method. <CODE>Quit()</CODE>, in turn, calls <CODE>_quit</CODE> which |
| 97 | causes the mainloop to terminate at a convenient time. <p> |
Jack Jansen | a630813 | 1996-03-18 13:38:52 +0000 | [diff] [blame] | 98 | |
| 99 | Application provides a standard about box, but we override this by |
| 100 | providing our own <CODE>do_about()</CODE> method which shows an about |
| 101 | box from a resource as a modal dialog. This piece of code should look |
| 102 | familiar to you from the previous example program. That do_about is |
| 103 | called when the user selects About from the Apple menu is, again, |
| 104 | taken care of by the __init__ routine of Application. <p> |
| 105 | |
Jack Jansen | a630813 | 1996-03-18 13:38:52 +0000 | [diff] [blame] | 106 | The <CODE>MyDialog</CODE> class is the container for our main |
| 107 | window. Initialization is again done by first calling the base class |
Jack Jansen | 2450a25 | 1999-12-03 15:15:28 +0000 | [diff] [blame] | 108 | <CODE>__init__</CODE> function and finally setting the local variable |
| 109 | "parent." <p> |
Jack Jansen | a630813 | 1996-03-18 13:38:52 +0000 | [diff] [blame] | 110 | |
| 111 | <CODE>Do_itemhit()</CODE> is called when an item is selected in this |
| 112 | dialog by the user. We are passed the item number (and the original |
| 113 | event structure, which we normally ignore). The code is similar to the |
| 114 | main loop of our previous example program: a switch depending on the |
Jack Jansen | 2450a25 | 1999-12-03 15:15:28 +0000 | [diff] [blame] | 115 | item selected. <CODE>Dnslookup()</CODE> is quite similar to our previous |
| 116 | example. <p> |
Jack Jansen | a630813 | 1996-03-18 13:38:52 +0000 | [diff] [blame] | 117 | |
| 118 | <H2><IMG SRC="html.icons/mkapplet.gif"><A NAME="applets">Creating applets</A></H2> |
| 119 | |
Jack Jansen | 3412c5d | 1997-08-27 14:08:22 +0000 | [diff] [blame] | 120 | Now let us try to turn the python script into an applet, a standalone |
| 121 | application. This will <em>not</em> work if you have the "classic 68k" |
Jack Jansen | a2139fe | 1998-02-25 15:40:35 +0000 | [diff] [blame] | 122 | Python distribution, only if you have the cfm68k or PPC distribution. |
| 123 | |
| 124 | <blockquote> |
Jack Jansen | 3412c5d | 1997-08-27 14:08:22 +0000 | [diff] [blame] | 125 | Actually, "standalone" is probably not the correct term here, since an |
| 126 | applet does still depend on a lot of the python environment: the |
| 127 | PythonCore shared library, the Python Preferences file, the python Lib |
| 128 | folder and any other modules that the main module depends on. It is |
Jack Jansen | a2139fe | 1998-02-25 15:40:35 +0000 | [diff] [blame] | 129 | possible to get rid of all these dependencies and create true standalone |
Jack Jansen | dd20689 | 1999-12-03 16:00:20 +0000 | [diff] [blame] | 130 | applications in Python, but this is a bit difficult. See <a href="freezing.html"> |
Jack Jansen | a2139fe | 1998-02-25 15:40:35 +0000 | [diff] [blame] | 131 | Standalone Applications in Python</a> for details. For this |
| 132 | document, by standalone we mean here that |
Jack Jansen | 3412c5d | 1997-08-27 14:08:22 +0000 | [diff] [blame] | 133 | the script has the look-and-feel of an application, including the |
Jack Jansen | a2139fe | 1998-02-25 15:40:35 +0000 | [diff] [blame] | 134 | ability to have its own document types, be droppable, etc. |
| 135 | </blockquote> |
Jack Jansen | a630813 | 1996-03-18 13:38:52 +0000 | [diff] [blame] | 136 | |
| 137 | The easiest way to create an applet is to take your source file and |
Jack Jansen | 3412c5d | 1997-08-27 14:08:22 +0000 | [diff] [blame] | 138 | drop it onto "BuildApplet", located in the Python home |
| 139 | folder. This will create an applet with the same name as your python |
Jack Jansen | a630813 | 1996-03-18 13:38:52 +0000 | [diff] [blame] | 140 | source with the ".py" stripped. Also, if a resource file with the same |
| 141 | name as your source but with ".rsrc" extension is available the |
| 142 | resources from that file will be copied to your applet too. If there |
| 143 | is no resource file for your script a set of default resources will be |
Jack Jansen | 3412c5d | 1997-08-27 14:08:22 +0000 | [diff] [blame] | 144 | used, and the applet will have the default creator 'Pyt0'. The latter |
Jack Jansen | a630813 | 1996-03-18 13:38:52 +0000 | [diff] [blame] | 145 | also happens if you do have a resource file but without the BNDL |
Jack Jansen | 2450a25 | 1999-12-03 15:15:28 +0000 | [diff] [blame] | 146 | combo. <A NAME="no-bundle">Actually</A>, as in the present example. |
| 147 | <p> |
Jack Jansen | a630813 | 1996-03-18 13:38:52 +0000 | [diff] [blame] | 148 | |
Jack Jansen | 3412c5d | 1997-08-27 14:08:22 +0000 | [diff] [blame] | 149 | If you need slightly more control over the BuildApplet process you can |
| 150 | double-click it, and you will get dialogs for source and |
Jack Jansen | a630813 | 1996-03-18 13:38:52 +0000 | [diff] [blame] | 151 | destination of the applet. The rest of the process, including locating |
| 152 | the resource file, remains the same. <p> |
| 153 | |
| 154 | Note that though our example application completely bypasses the |
| 155 | normal python user interface this is by no means necessary. Any python |
| 156 | script can be turned into an applet, and all the usual features of the |
| 157 | interpreter still work. <p> |
| 158 | |
| 159 | That's all for this example, you may now return to the <A HREF="index.html"> |
| 160 | table of contents</A> to pick another topic. <p> |
Jack Jansen | 2450a25 | 1999-12-03 15:15:28 +0000 | [diff] [blame] | 161 | </BODY> |
| 162 | </HTML> |