Metadata-Version: 1.1
Name: browsergui
Version: 0.4
Summary: A GUI toolkit targeting browsers
Home-page: https://github.com/speezepearson/browsergui
Author: speezepearson
Author-email: speeze.pearson+1097@gmail.com
License: UNKNOWN
Description: What is this?
        -------------
        It's a GUI framework prioritizing portability, simplicity, and a Pythonic feel.
        
        If you want to build a simple GUI for a simple task, I recommend this package whole-heartedly. I don't think this is just pride in my own work -- I'm pretty sure that this package *actually is* very easy to learn, and very good for simple things.
        
        If you want to build a video game, or a nice, fluid 3D visualization, this is easily the worst GUI framework I have ever seen.
        
        - [Why is it good?](#why-is-it-good)
        - [Why is it bad?](#why-is-it-bad)
        - [What are the alternatives?](#what-are-the-alternatives)
        - [How do I install it?](#how-do-i-install-it)
        - [How do I learn to use it?](#how-do-i-learn-to-use-it)
        
        
        Why is it good?
        ---------------
        
        This package prioritizes ease of use, portability, and good documentation above all else. The following statements will remain true as long as I have breath left in my body:
        
        - **It feels like Python.** It uses HTML/CSS/JS under the hood, but that fact is carefully hidden under nice object-oriented abstractions. Contrast with [Tkinter][tkinter], which feels like Tk, because it is.
        - **It has a shallow learning curve.** "Hello World" is `GUI(Text("Hello world!")).run()`. Minesweeper, including the game logic, is [less than 100 lines of code][minesweeper-code] and [looks like this][minesweeper-screenshot].
        - **It's super-portable.** `pip install browsergui && python -m browsergui.examples` has worked, with no snags, on every system I've tried (OS X, Debian, and Ubuntu, with both Python 2.7 and a few Python 3.Xs). Seriously, you could run that right now and it would work, without a single abstruse error messages about your Qt/wx/PyObjC installation. At the risk of tooting my own horn, I've never seen another GUI library so easy to install.
        - **It's well-documented.** There's a [wiki][wiki] to teach you how to use it. There are [examples](#how-do-I-learn-to-use-it). There's a [reference manual][docs]. There's a [runnable demo for every predefined kind of element][tour-screenshot]. I've spent more time documenting than I've spent writing actual code.
        
        Why is it bad?
        --------------
        
        - **It's slow.** It does not even try to be high-performance. There's an HTTP request every time the user interacts with the GUI, and again every time the view is updated. Performance is off the table. (It's not *frustratingly* slow -- you can drag a slider and see the value update with no perceptible delay -- but it's not good for fancy stuff.)
        - **It's not super-easy to make super-pretty things.** I just haven't prioritized styling: any styling you want to do, you have to do through CSS. I'm not sure `element.css['color'] = 'red'` is so much worse than `widget.config(foreground="#f00")`, but it *does* feel like a thin wrapper over CSS (because it is), which is gross.
        
        How do I install it?
        --------------------
        
        If you use pip, `pip install browsergui`.
        
        If you use easy_install, `easy_install browsergui`.
        
        If you don't like package managers, just unzip [this][download-zip] and put the `browsergui` folder anywhere on your Python path.
        
        Once it's installed, I recommend running `python -m browsergui.examples` to see a catalog of all the kinds of building blocks available to you, or checking out [the wiki][wiki] for tutorial-type stuff.
        
        
        How do I learn to use it?
        -------------------------
        
        [The wiki][wiki] has several tutorial-type pages. Or you could just extrapolate from these examples:
        
        - Hello world:
        
                from browsergui import GUI, Text
                GUI(Text("Hello world!")).run()
        
        - A number that increments every time you press a button:
        
                from browsergui import GUI, Text, Button
        
                button = Button('0')
                @button.def_callback
                def increment():
                  button.text = str(int(button.text)+1)
        
                GUI(button).run()
        
        - A clock:
        
                import time
                import threading
                from browsergui import Text, GUI
        
                now = Text("")
        
                def update_now_forever():
                  while True:
                    now.text = time.strftime("%Y-%m-%d %H:%M:%S")
                    time.sleep(1)
        
                t = threading.Thread(target=update_now_forever)
                t.daemon = True
                t.start()
        
                GUI(Text("The time is: "), now).run()
        
        (You can close/reopen the browser window at any time; Ctrl-C will stop the server.)
        
        Each kind of element (`Text`, `Button`, `ColorField`, `Grid`...) also has a simple example showing you how to use it: `python -m browsergui.examples` will display all those examples to you.
        
        What are the alternatives?
        --------------------------
        
        I am aware of some GUI toolkits for Python that fill a similar niche. You should consider using these instead:
        
        - [tkinter][tkinter] (standard library)
        
          Advantages: it's in the standard library. It has always worked out of the box for me. If you want maximal portability, this is probably your best bet.
        
          Disadvantages: it feels like a wrapper around Tk, because it is. This gives good performance and detailed control, but writing it feels unintuitive (to me).
        
        - [pyJS][pyjs], another Python package for making GUIs targeting browsers. It works by compiling your Python code into a slug of JavaScript which runs in the browser.
        
          Advantages: pyJS applications are much faster and much easier to deploy (since it doesn't require the user to run Python).
        
          Disadvantages: I had trouble installing it. And like `tkinter`, it's a wrapper, with the same dis/advantages.
        
        There are, of course, many other GUI toolkits. [Here][official-alternatives] is a list of those popular enough to earn the notice of Official Python People. [Here][unofficial-alternatives] is a paralytically long listing of less-notable ones.
        
        [minesweeper-code]: https://github.com/speezepearson/browsergui/blob/master/browsergui/examples/minesweeper.py
        [minesweeper-screenshot]: http://i.imgur.com/8Ax04sZ.png
        [tour-screenshot]: http://i.imgur.com/AvVVVFd.png
        [download-zip]: https://github.com/speezepearson/browsergui/archive/master.zip
        [wiki]: https://github.com/speezepearson/browsergui/wiki
        [docs]: http://pythonhosted.org/browsergui
        [download-zip]: https://github.com/speezepearson/browsergui/archive/master.zip
        [tkinter]: https://docs.python.org/3/library/tkinter.html#module-tkinter
        [pyjs]: http://pyjs.org
        [official-alternatives]: http://docs.python.org/2/library/othergui.html
        [unofficial-alternatives]: http://wiki.python.org/moin/GuiProgramming
        
Keywords: browser gui
Platform: UNKNOWN
Classifier: Development Status :: 4 - Beta
Classifier: Intended Audience :: Developers
Classifier: Topic :: Software Development :: User Interfaces
Classifier: Programming Language :: Python :: 2.7
Classifier: Programming Language :: Python :: 3
Classifier: Programming Language :: Python :: 3.2
Classifier: Programming Language :: Python :: 3.3
Classifier: Programming Language :: Python :: 3.4
