wxPython is a GUI toolkit for the Python programming language. It allows Python programmers to create programs with a robust, highly functional graphical user interface, simply and easily.
wxPython is a GUI toolkit for the Python programming language. It allows Python programmers to create programs with a robust, highly functional graphical user interface, simply and easily. It is implemented as a Python extension module (native code) that wraps the popular wxWidgets cross platform GUI library, which is written in C++.
Like Python and wxWidgets, wxPython is Open Source which means that it is free for anyone to use and the source code is available for anyone to look at and modify. Or anyone can contribute fixes or enhancements to the project.
wxPython is a cross-platform toolkit. This means that the same program will run on multiple platforms without modification. Currently supported platforms are 32-bit Microsoft Windows, most Unix or unix-like systems, and Macintosh OS X+, in most cases the native widgets are used on each platform.
Since the language is Python, wxPython programs are simple, easy to write and easy to understand.
As an example, this is a simple “Hello World” program with wxPython:
import wx
app = wx.App()
frame = wx.Frame(None, -1, "Hello World")
frame.Show()
app.MainLoop()
The GUI layouts you can build with wxPython are almost infinite: it has an extremely rich set of widgets (derived from wxWidgets) and greatly extended by a huge set of pure-Python controls written over the years.
Phoenix is the code name of a new implementation of wxPython. The name comes from the mythical bird that bursts into flames at the end of its life and from the ashes is reborn as a new, stronger, and better phoenix. Likewise the intent with the wxPython Phoenix project is throw almost everything from wxPython Classic into the fire to be built anew from the ashes of its former self, without all of the old crud that had built up over the long life of Classic.
Much of that crud were rather hacky things which had to be done to work around limitations of the technology available at the time. Those are easy to get rid of. Others are things that seemed good at the time, but in retrospect turned out to be bad ideas. Some of those are a little more tricky, but still a good idea to change. The end result will be a new wxPython that is better, stronger, and faster than he was before, and which is easier to maintain, extend and document.
Although there hasn’t been a formal release yet, Phoenix is already in a usable state with snapshot builds available after new commits are merged, and is in active use on a number of projects already. Progress is still being made and an official release is on the way. Stay tuned to the wxPython developer and user groups for more information and announcements.
Meanwhile, here are some important links:
- The MigrationGuide will help you understand the differences between wxPython Phoenix and Classic. In addition, classic_vs_phoenix documents some names that have been changed, or which haven’t yet been ported to Phoenix.
- The new wxPython API documentation is available here.
- The Project Phoenix section of the wxPython wiki has information about the background of, and reasons for this project, as well as information for developers who want to help out.
- Source code and issue tracking are available at the Phoenix GitHub repository. Be sure to read the README.rst file there to learn how to build wxWidgets and Phoenix for yourself.