Python good for translating GUI built in Java?

[François Pinard]

ginsberg at once.cirl.uoregon.edu (Matthew L. Ginsberg) writes:

> I've got a GUI application currently written in Java; it's about 16000
> lines.

I do not speak Java, but I've read a few times that Python allows you to
write smaller programs for similar algorithms, a factor of 8 was mentioned.

> Any language I use should be supported in both Windows (where my
> customers are) and linux (where I am).  It needs to be reasonably fast,
> and reasonably good at all the usual windows things -- file selection
> dialogs, popup menus, image manipulation, etc etc.

For image manipulation and user interfaces, Python has a lot to offer,
to the point it might be a problem choosing what you would like to use.
Tkinter, for user interfaces, has the reputation of being solid on both
platforms, and has been for quite a while.  The PIL (Python Imaging Library)
has good reputation too, I do not remember if people said it run on Windows,
however; someone else might confirm.

In these days, I'm having fun with `pygtk', which is a Python interface to
the GTK library, which the GIMP program uses and made popular.  The GTK
has been ported to Windows, but is not stable yet.  So, even if fun,
it might not be what you want. :-)

Computational speed might be more of a concern, if Java was efficiently
compiled to native code.  It might not be a serious problem in practice,
given that Java code is often interpreted by a `Java machine', and Python
is also interpreted.  I presume you would have to tame yourself by running
some loops and comparing.  You might have to learn a few Python idioms to
give you more Python speed, maybe it is not worth: you will judge.

-- 
François Pinard   http://www.iro.umontreal.ca/~pinard