Creating GUI using Tkinter

Question

I originally had my GUI set up using the .pack method but realized that there were going to be some instances where I needed to use .grid and using the two together in the way I was doing was causing my app to freeze so I decided to go about designing my GUI in a different way. I decided to divide all major components of my GUI into frames which I packed in (TOP, LEFT, RIGHT, BOTTOM). For my labels, and buttons, I'm trying to place them within these four frame using the .grid method. It's sort of working. Though I'm not sure if I'm going about it the right way. For instance, my status bar is at the bottom of the screen but it won't stretch the entire length of the screen like it had before (when I was using pack for everything). I've tried changing the columnspan and using sticky but nothing seems to work. I'm new at Python and at using Tkinter. What am I missing? Any help or guidance would be most appreciated. Here are bits of my code so you can see how I'm setting everything up/calling for it.

    # set up frame for editing fields
    self.editFrame = Frame(self.mainGui, width=325, bd=1, relief=RIDGE,     bg="#BFC0C2")
    self.albumFrame = Frame(self.editFrame, width=315, height=265, bd=1,  relief=RIDGE, bg="#5F817C")
    self.toolFrame = Frame(self.mainGui)
    self.statusFrame = Frame(self.mainGui)
    self.mainFrame = Frame(self.mainGui)

    # setup toolbar, status bar and important buttons
    self.toolbar = Frame(self.toolFrame)
    self.importTracks = Button(self.toolbar, text="Import Tracks", command=self.importTracks)
    self.autoFill = Button(self.toolbar, text="Auto-Fill Fields", command=self.autoFillFields)
    self.exportStationBuilder = Button(self.toolbar, text="Export - StationBuilder", command=self.openStationBuilder)
    self.status = Label(self.statusFrame, text="",    bd=1, relief=SUNKEN, anchor=W, bg="#BFC0C2", padx=5)

    # place frame for editing fields
    self.editFrame.pack(side=RIGHT, fill=BOTH)
    self.editFrame.update()
    self.toolFrame.pack(side=TOP, fill=X, padx=2, pady=2)
    self.statusFrame.pack(side=BOTTOM, anchor=S, fill=X, expand=YES)
    self.mainFrame.pack(side=LEFT, expand=YES)

    # place toolbar, status bar and important buttons
    self.importTracks.grid(row=0, column=0)
    self.autoFill.grid(row=0, column=1)
    self.exportStationBuilder.grid(row=0, column=2)
    self.toolbar.pack(side=TOP, fill=X)
    self.status.grid(row=0, columnspan=1000, sticky=S)

Jozef Méry · Accepted Answer · 2015-08-04 00:25:43Z

1

The columnspan = 1000 is not needed. The columnspan defines the width relative to other widgets. Let's say you have two widgets one in column 0, the other in column 1. If you put the next widget to a row below a set columnspan = 2, this widget will the combined width of the 2 above. To make it fill the entire column you need to use

sticky = W+E or "we" or WE

depending on python version, and how you imported tk. This is basically, stretching East and West aka. horizontally. Other than that you might need to use columnconfigure on the parent widget, most likely frame like this

framename.columnconfigure(0, weight = 1)

This tell the widget to use the extra space it gets.

PS. I don't like the grid too much and when I want widgets to fill the frame I just make one for them separately and use pack. Simple and no columnconfigure etc.

answered Aug 4, 2015 at 0:25

Jozef Méry

3575 silver badges15 bronze badges

Sign up to request clarification or add additional context in comments.

1 Comment

terratunaz Over a year ago

Thanks for responding. I ended up taking the status and toolbar out of the frames I created for them and just used pack for those two. Ended up making things come together nicely (so far at least). Yeah, grid is a pain to work with but pack is almost too easy. Especially since I'm thinking my GUI is going to be getting complex, I don't want to run into limitations by just using pack. I'm trying to learn both though so we'll see how that goes.

Collectives™ on Stack Overflow

Creating GUI using Tkinter

1 Answer 1

1 Comment

Your Answer

Hot Network Questions

Collectives™ on Stack Overflow

1 Answer 1

1 Comment

Your Answer

Sign up or log in

Post as a guest

Related