GUI Apps with Python and GTK – Text Editor Tutorial

In this tutorial, we will be creating a simple text editor using Python and GTK. GTK is a popular toolkit for creating graphical user interfaces in Linux and is widely used for developing desktop applications.

Setting Up

First, make sure you have Python and GTK installed on your system. You can install GTK using the following command:


$ sudo apt-get install python-gtk2


Creating the Text Editor

Now, let’s start by creating a new Python file for our text editor and import the necessary GTK modules:


```python
import gtk
import pygtk
pygtk.require('2.0')
```


Next, we will create a new window and add a text view widget to it:


```python
class TextEditor:
def __init__(self):
self.window = gtk.Window()
self.textview = gtk.TextView()
self.window.add(self.textview)
self.window.show_all()
```


Adding Functionality

Now that we have created the basic structure of our text editor, let’s add some functionality to it. We can create methods for opening, saving, and closing files:


```python
class TextEditor:
# previous code...

# other methods for saving and closing files...
```


Finally, we can create a main loop to run our text editor:


```python
if __name__ == "__main__":
editor = TextEditor()
gtk.main()
```


Conclusion

With just a few lines of code, we have created a simple text editor using Python and GTK. This is just a basic example, and there are many more features and functionalities that can be added to make it more robust and user-friendly.

Feel free to experiment with different GTK widgets and explore the documentation to create more complex GUI applications with Python.