Open or Save file dialogues?

[skix]

Hello,

I am fairly new to Python. I have only skimmed the surface in an introductory class I just finished in college.

As my first program in Python, I am attempting to make a text editor.

I am wondering if there is a universal command to bring up a Save or Open file dialogue? Or should I continue creating Toplevel windows for Save and Open files?

If I create my own Save and Open windows, how do I get the user's computer directory structure to show up in a Listbox? And the files in that directory to show up in a Listbox?

Anyone have any insight on this?

Thank you for your help. Have a good one. -Dave

[vegaseat]

I assume you are using the Tkinter GUI toolkit. Using the tkFileDialog will make your life much easier, and brings up a dialog familiar to most users. Here is a short example ...

# a very simple Tkinter editor to show file read/write dialog
 
from Tkinter import *
from tkFileDialog import *
 
class App(object):
    def __init__(self, master):
        frame = Frame(master)
        frame.pack()
        self.text = Text()
        self.text.pack()
 
        menu = Menu(master)
        root.config(menu=menu)
        # file menu
        filemenu = Menu(menu, tearoff=0)
        menu.add_cascade(label="File", menu=filemenu)
        filemenu.add_command(label="New")
        filemenu.add_command(label="Open", command=self.file_open)
        filemenu.add_command(label="Save", command=self.file_save)        
        filemenu.add_separator()
        filemenu.add_command(label="Exit", command=self.do_exit)
 
    def file_open(self):
        """open a file to read"""
        # optional initial directory (default is current directory)
        initial_dir = "C:\Temp"
        # the filetype mask (default is all files)
        mask = \
        [("Text and Python files","*.txt *.py *.pyw"), 
        ("HTML files","*.htm"), 
        ("All files","*.*")]        
        fin = askopenfile(initialdir=initial_dir, filetypes=mask, mode='r')
        text = fin.read()
        if text != None:
            self.text.delete(0.0, END)
            self.text.insert(END,text)
 
    def file_save(self):
        """get a filename and save the text in the editor widget"""
        # default extension is optional, here will add .txt if missing
        fout = asksaveasfile(mode='w', defaultextension=".txt")
        text2save = str(self.text.get(0.0,END))
        fout.write(text2save)
        fout.close()
 
    def do_exit(self):
        root.destroy()
 
root = Tk()
root.title("a very simple editor")
app = App(root)
root.mainloop()

[skix]

Wow, thank you vega!

That's exactly the code I was hoping to find!

[skix]

After the user opens or saves a file with tkFileDialog, how can I retrieve the filename they used?

[jrcagle]

Check the documentation for tkFileDialog with help(tkFileDialog) and help(tkFileDialog.askopenfile). That will tell you what the dialog accepts as parameters and returns as values.

Jeff

[vegaseat]

After the user opens or saves a file with tkFileDialog, how can I retrieve the filename they used?

If you are looking for a filename then you have to use another method ... filename = tkFileDialog.askopenfilename(filetypes=[("Text files","*.txt")])

[skix]

Great. Thanks again. tkFileDialog does exactly what I needed.

with the askopenfilename function, I ask the user for the file name, then I just use Python's open function to open the file and insert to the Text widget. worked out quite nicely.

Next, I am creating a Find feature on the text editor. So far I am using the Text widget's .search to go through and look for similarities in entry.get() with a for loop. When it finds similarities, I would like it to highlight the similarities (with events?) How can this be done? So far it only prints exact match of the word it finds. I just need to define an event to select at this starting index, and this ending index, but i dont know the syntax.

Thanks again for all your help. -Dave

here's my Find code so far:

from Tkinter import *

class Find(object):
    def __init__(self):
        global text1
        self.top1 = Toplevel()
        self.top1.title("Find Text")

        self.entry1 = Entry(self.top1)
        self.entry1.pack()

        self.button1 = Button(self.top1,
                              text = "Find",
                              command = self.find_text)
        self.button1.pack()
        self.button2 = Button(self.top1,
                              text = "Cancel",
                              command = self.exitp)
        self.button2.pack()
    def exitp(self):
        self.top1.destroy()
    def find_text(self):
        global text1
        new_word = ""
        word = self.entry1.get()
        text = text1.search(word, 0.0, stopindex = END)
        for text in word:
            new_word = new_word + text
        length = len(new_word)
        flength = length - length
        print new_word[flength:length]

root = Tk()
root.title("Find")

text1 = Text(root)
text1.pack(fill = BOTH,
           expand = 1)

button1 = Button(root,
                 text = "find",
                 command = Find)
button1.pack()

root.mainloop()

[jrcagle]

See if this works for you:

from Tkinter import *

class Find(object):
    def __init__(self):
        #global text1  << Not needed since you aren't assigning text1.
        self.top1 = Toplevel()
        self.top1.title("Find Text")

        self.entry1 = Entry(self.top1)
        self.entry1.pack()

        self.button1 = Button(self.top1,
                              text = "Find",
                              command = self.find_text)
        self.button1.pack()
        self.button2 = Button(self.top1,
                              text = "Cancel",
                              command = self.exitp)
        self.button2.pack()
        self.tags = []
    def exitp(self):
        self.top1.destroy()
    def find_text(self):
        #global text1
        new_word = ""
        for tag in self.tags:                         # undo last find
            text1.tag_config(tag,background='white')
        word = self.entry1.get()
        if not word:       ## Needed for error checking
            return

        lines = text1.get('0.0',END).split('\n')
        self.tags = []  # save tags for undo later
        for i in range(len(lines)):   # Normally, 'for line in lines' --
                                      # but we need the index!
            if lines[i].startswith(word):
                text1.tag_add('t%d'%i,'%d.0'%(i+1),'%d.%d'%(i+1,len(word)))
                text1.tag_config('t%d'%i,background='blue')
                self.tags.append('t%d'%i)
        print self.tags  # just to see what's going on. comment this out
        
            
root = Tk()
root.title("Find")

text1 = Text(root)
text1.pack(fill = BOTH,
           expand = 1)

button1 = Button(root,
                 text = "find",
                 command = Find)
button1.pack()

root.mainloop()

Jeff

[ChristianOncken]

i want to know how to get the tag´s in text editor to save in (.doc)

def file_save(self):
        """get a filename and <strong class="highlight">save</strong> the text in the editor widget"""
        # default extension is optional, here will add .txt if missing
        fout = asksaveasfile(mode='w', defaultextension=".txt")
        text2save = str(self.text.get(0.0,END))
        fout.write(text2save)
        fout.close()

because when i save the text in (.doc) format dont show tag´s

[Notouch]

I'm having trouble saving unicode characters to a .txt or a .doc file