[Tutor] Larger GUI design ?

[Alan Gauld]

> I am now on a more ambitious project. There will be a main app 
> screen, some
> dialogue screens for more info etc and a backend script analysing a 
> database
> which will take some time to run.
>
> How to fit the GUI around it ?
>
> If I have my dlg_app.py  inhereting frm_app.py all is well until I 
> need a
> poppup dialogue.

Its usually better to make popups inherit directly from TopLevel 
rather
than the parent form.

> Would I define another module say dlg_info.py with its frm_info.py

Its usually best to put each significant window/dialog in its own 
form.
It makes them easier to reuse in other projects for one thing!

> would import and call when needed generating its own QT
> object and window.

Not sure how QT works so can't comment on that.

> app = QApplication(sys.argv)

Are you sure there isn't a QDialog base class somewhere in QT?
Thats usually been the case in other GUI toolkits I've used.

> Secondly my backend will take a while to run & I would like to 
> display a
> status bar in the GUI. The only way i can see to do this is to 
> either

Sounds like a job for a thread...

> (2) pass info from the backend via a socket (yep know about them 
> now!) to a QT
> script running in timerEvent()

You can do this but threads are less resource greedy.

HTH,

Alan Gauld
Author of the Learn to Program web site
http://www.freenetpages.co.uk/hp/alan.gauld