[IronPython] esecui - hosting a Python application with IronPython

[Steve Dower]

Hi everyone

I finally decided that it's time to share my work (towards a PhD in
intelligent systems) with the public, and since IronPython features
heavily I figured it was worth posting a short note to the list.

My main project is a Python framework called esec
(http://code.google.com/p/esec/) for evolutionary computation, which
is IronPython compatible but that's as far as it goes. (The purpose
and use of the framework should be interesting to anyone interested in
evolutionary computation, and completely irrelevant to most other
people :) )

The GUI for esec (http://code.google.com/p/esecui/) is written in C#
(WinForms) and uses IronPython to host and interact with esec while it
is running. Configuration settings are converted into dictionaries
(esec's requirement) and the listener object (Monitor) is implemented
in C# and passed directly to esec.

At the moment I am including a build of IronPython, rather than
demanding users find it themselves, which works very nicely in terms
of distribution. I decided against implementing the whole UI in
Python, partially because it's pretty complex but also because some of
the rendering actually requires (or will require... plans abound!)
closer to native performance.

Full source and a download-and-run preview distribution (ie. it has
bugs) are available from the Google Code page at
http://code.google.com/p/esecui/  Anyone is welcome to
freely/commercially use parts of my code relating to working with
IronPython.

Thanks for supporting and providing IronPython - it's an incredibly useful tool.

Cheers,

Steve