Best GUI for small-scale accounting app?

[Steve Holden]

Paul Rubin wrote:

> Bulba! <bulba at bulba.com> writes:
> 
>>I'll soon start development of a specialized small app and need 
>>to choose GUI for it. 
>>
>>I have narrowed the choice to wxPython/PythonCard and QT/PyQT 
> 
> 
> What does the app need to do?  I'd try to make it web based unless
> there's a good reason not to.  That's even if it just runs on the
> user's desktop; run the http listener on the localhost and let the
> user connect to it with a browser.  
> 
I'm not sure I'd agree with this advice. It's easier than it used to be 
to put a good-looking web interface together, but considerably more 
difficult still than using either wxPython or PyQT. The web is still 
clunky for certain types of interaction, as you either have to 
completely redisplay after a server round-trip or closely co-ordinate 
client-side code to keep some interactions local to the client. This is 
a difficult compromise, and requires a lot of experience.

> However, between those two you mention, wxPython seems easier to use
> and runs on more platforms.  On the other hand, it may be less well
> maintained than QT.  For example, its current installation script
> seems to assume an older version of GTK is installed, and it fails
> with newer GTK versions.

Both packages are maintained be people who know what they are doing. 
wxPython has had its issues over the years, but many of those have (I 
believe) been due to the instability of the underlying wxWindows (no 
wxWidgets) package, which in turn has often been due to the introduction 
of serious chunks of new functionality.

Personally I think that the choice may well come down to which API is 
closest to what Bulba has used in the past.

Both kits are well capable of handling everything a serious programmer 
would want to do. I personally think that wxPython gets closest to the 
native look-and-feel of the windowing platform, but that may just be my 
limited experience speaking.

regards
  Steve
-- 
Steve Holden               http://www.holdenweb.com/
Python Web Programming  http://pydish.holdenweb.com/
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