Tkinter: The good, the bad, and the ugly!

[Corey Richardson]

On 01/18/2011 08:41 PM, rantingrick wrote:
> On Jan 18, 7:19 pm, Corey Richardson <kb1... at aim.com> wrote:
> 
>> I for one am quite pleased with Tkinter up to this point. It allowed me
>> to come in with extremely minimal GUI experience, and make something
>> that worked with minimal effort. It was simple to understand, no
>> concepts of slots and signals to learn.
> 
> I agree. I have written tons of code with Tkinter and i love both the
> simplistic API and the geometry managers to name a few pros.
> 
> 
>> If something else were to take it's place (Tkinter) I would hope that it
>> is as easy to learn/use as Tkinter is.
> 
> I completely agree! And we should expect it to be even better!

What out there is there that meets those requirements?
> 
> 
>> But I think this whole thread has gotten off topic. Why should Tkinter
>> be replaced?
> 
> Well there are many good reasons and most are not apparent to those
> with minimal to average Tkinter experience. My main beef with Tkinter
> is that it is limited --both widget wise and extensible wise-- and
> that we must recognize that web and mobile platforms are getting
> bigger every day. We cannot ignore this fact. The GUI landscape is
> changing fast and whilst desktop support will be needed for many years
> to come, mobile and web must be addressed and addressed quickly!

Mobile and web certainly have their place, but it Python the place for
it? Sure, Python can be used as the back-end of web sites, but not up
front like Java or Flash (aside from Jython). Especially mobile. Python
was not intended for a mobile platform not should it be made to fit that
niche. Python has its place, but your cell phone is not it.
> 
>  [snip]
>> What should
>> replace it, and why?
> 
> Well that seems to be the burning question. Now, after considering all
> the options i can't see anything that truly moves us forward to were
> we "should" be. I do think wx would be a move "forward" however only a
> very *small* move in the larger scope of things. We need to think
> bigger, we need to think of mobile and web interfaces if we want
> Python to compete in the next 10 years. So when considering anything
> we must consider all three.
> 

>From that, it appears we need to:
1. Replace Tkinter with something more modern and feature-complete, but
just as easy to use.
2. Add a web framework/web-GUI

As a web interface are you thinking something like Java's Swing or
something like Django?

Given the above, what do you guys (python-list, not just rantingrick)
think fills the spot the best?

Would these items inclusion in the stdlib entail unnecessary cruft added
on to the size of the stdlib, are they completely cross-platform (as far
as Python itself is)?

Let's try not to get off track like this thing has been since it was
started. Either get things done or shut up ;-). I think this is almost
ready to split into a "real" thread, not just a giant cyclic argument
that this thread has been.

~Corey