PyGUI as a standard GUI API for Python?

[Banibrata Dutta]

On Thu, Sep 4, 2008 at 3:45 PM, M.-A. Lemburg <mal at egenix.com> wrote:

> On 2008-09-04 11:14, Kay Schluehr wrote:
> > On 4 Sep., 10:31, "M.-A. Lemburg" <m... at egenix.com> wrote:
> >> On 2008-09-04 07:49, Kay Schluehr wrote:
> >>
> >>> 3) Following the public rumor mill and the latest hype RIA i.e. the
> >>> merge of web- and desktop applications with systems like Adobe AIR,
> >>> JavaFX, Google Gears and MS Silverlight is the future of frontend
> >>> development. With the exception of IronPython and Silverlight, Python
> >>> hasn't even entered this game and no one knows if it ever will.
> >> Actually, it has already and quite some time ago:
> >>
> >> http://www.artima.com/weblogs/viewpost.jsp?thread=208528
> >>
> >> The recipe is simple: use Python for the business logic, database
> >> interfacing, etc and have it talk to a Flex front-end via XML-RPC
> >> or REST.
> >
> > Python is still server-side in this scenario and plays no role in UI
> > definitions.
>
> That depends on how you design the application. It is well possible
> to have Python drive the GUI by sending the required details to
> the Flex front-end via XML (ie. data-driven GUIs).
>
> > So one doesn't get more than e.g. Django apps that
> > respond to HTTP requests triggered by JavaScript forms except that
> > JavaScript+HTML+Browser is replaced by Flex = AS3+MXML+FlashPlayer.
>
> You really can't compare the Flex stack to an AJAX stack. Flex
> has a lot more to offer for GUI programming than AJAX, it also
> doesn't suffer from the problems of AJAX having to support several
> different sets of browser or library bugs.
>
> We switched from an AJAX approach to a Flex-based approach last year
> and never even considered moving back again.


The approach does seem quite impressive, but isn't Flex's platform
neutrality quite over-rated ? I mean after-all, it assumes that Flex is
available for and available on the platform. Flex today is not yet so
ubiquitous as the JRE...

Are there some established best-practices on how to package such
applications -- s.a. shipping with its's own Flex runtime, offer-download if
missing etc. ? What happens if owner of target machine decides to upgrade
their version of Flex, will it impact the application package in anyway, and
render rest of it "non-upgradable" ?

>
>
> > The role of Python is somewhat arbitrary. This could change only if
> > Python becomes a client side language executed by AVM, V8 etc. like
> > IronPython in Silverlight.
> >
> > About separating UI from application logics by assigning functionality
> > to different general purpose languages I have to admit that I don't
> > think it is such a great idea ...
>
> In my experience, Flex + Python gives you the best of both worlds,
> the nice GUI features of Flex and the efficiency of Python for the
> business logic.
>
> A long time ago, there was a Python plugin for Netscape
> which allowed you to run Python straight in the browser. Perhaps
> it's time to revive such an idea... but then you're still missing
> out on the GUI part, since you're still stuck with what the
> browser has to offer in terms of widget support.
>
> --
> Marc-Andre Lemburg
> eGenix.com
>
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-- 
regards,
Banibrata
http://www.linkedin.com/in/bdutta
http://octapod.wordpress.com
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