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11 <div class="document" id="wxpython-2-5-migration-guide">
12 <h1 class="title">wxPython 2.5 Migration Guide</h1>
13 <p>This document will help explain some of the major changes in wxPython
14 2.5 since the 2.4 series and let you know what you need to do to adapt
15 your programs to those changes. Be sure to also check in the <a class="reference" href="CHANGES.html">CHANGES</a>
16 file like usual to see info about the not so major changes and other
17 things that have been added to wxPython.</p>
18 <div class="section" id="wxname-change">
19 <h1><a name="wxname-change">wxName Change</a></h1>
20 <p>The <strong>wxWindows</strong> project and library is now known as
21 <strong>wxWidgets</strong>. Please see <a class="reference" href="http://www.wxwidgets.org/name.htm">here</a> for more details.</p>
22 <p>This won't really affect wxPython all that much, other than the fact
23 that the wxwindows.org domain name has changed to wxwidgets.org,
24 so mail list, CVS, and etc. addresses have also changed. We're going
25 to try and smooth the transition as much as possible, but I wanted you
26 all to be aware of this change if you run into any issues.</p>
27 </div>
28 <div class="section" id="module-initialization">
29 <h1><a name="module-initialization">Module Initialization</a></h1>
30 <p>The import-startup-bootstrap process employed by wxPython was changed
31 such that wxWidgets and the underlying gui toolkit are <strong>not</strong>
32 initialized until the wx.App object is created (but before wx.App.OnInit
33 is called.) This was required because of some changes that were made
34 to the C++ wxApp class.</p>
35 <p>There are both benefits and potential problems with this change. The
36 benefits are that you can import wxPython without requiring access to
37 a GUI (for checking version numbers, etc.) and that in a
38 multi-threaded environment the thread that creates the app object will
39 now be the GUI thread instead of the one that imports wxPython. Some
40 potential problems are that the C++ side of the &quot;stock-objects&quot;
41 (wx.BLUE_PEN, wx.TheColourDatabase, etc.) are not initialized until
42 the wx.App object is created, so you should not use them until after
43 you have created your wx.App object. If you do then an exception will
44 be raised telling you that the C++ object has not been initialized
45 yet.</p>
46 <p>Also, you will probably not be able to do any kind of GUI or bitmap
47 operation unless you first have created an app object, (even on
48 Windows where most anything was possible before.)</p>
49 <p><strong>[Changed in 2.5.2.x]</strong> All the Window and GDI (pen, bitmap, etc.)
50 class constructors and also many toplevel functions and static methods
51 will now check that a wx.App object has already been created and will
52 raise a wx.PyNoAppError exception if not.</p>
53 </div>
54 <div class="section" id="swig-1-3">
55 <h1><a name="swig-1-3">SWIG 1.3</a></h1>
56 <p>wxPython is now using SWIG 1.3.x from CVS (with several of my own
57 customizations added that I hope to get folded back into the main SWIG
58 distribution.) This has some far reaching ramifications:</p>
59 <blockquote>
60 <p>All classes derive from object and so all are now &quot;new-style
61 classes.&quot; This also allows you to use mixin classes that are
62 new-style and to use properties, staticmethod, etc.</p>
63 <p>Public data members of the C++ classes are wrapped as Python
64 properties using property() instead of using
65 __getattr__/__setattr__ hacks like before. Normally you shouldn't
66 notice any difference, but if you were previously doing something
67 with __getattr__/__setattr__ in derived classes then you may have
68 to adjust things.</p>
69 <p>Static C++ methods are wrapped using the staticmethod() feature of
70 Python and so are accessible as ClassName.MethodName as expected.
71 They are still also available as top level functions named like
72 ClassName_MethodName as before.</p>
73 <p>The relationship between the wxFoo and wxFooPtr classes have
74 changed for the better. Specifically, all instances that you see
75 will be wx.Foo even if they are created internally using wx.FooPtr,
76 because wx.FooPtr.__init__ will change the instance's __class__ as
77 part of the initialization. If you have any code that checks
78 class type using something like isinstance(obj, wx.FooPtr) you will
79 need to change it to isinstance(obj, wx.Foo).</p>
80 </blockquote>
81 </div>
82 <div class="section" id="binding-events">
83 <h1><a name="binding-events">Binding Events</a></h1>
84 <p>All of the EVT_* functions are now instances of the wx.PyEventBinder
85 class. They have a __call__ method so they can still be used as
86 functions like before, but making them instances adds some
87 flexibility that I expect to take advantave of in the future.</p>
88 <p>wx.EvtHandler (the base class for wx.Window) now has a Bind method that
89 makes binding events to windows a little easier. Here is its
90 definition and docstring:</p>
91 <pre class="literal-block">
92 def Bind(self, event, handler, source=None, id=wxID_ANY, id2=wxID_ANY):
93 &quot;&quot;&quot;
94 Bind an event to an event handler.
95
96 event One of the EVT_* objects that specifies the
97 type of event to bind.
98
99 handler A callable object to be invoked when the event
100 is delivered to self. Pass None to disconnect an
101 event handler.
102
103 source Sometimes the event originates from a different window
104 than self, but you still want to catch it in self. (For
105 example, a button event delivered to a frame.) By
106 passing the source of the event, the event handling
107 system is able to differentiate between the same event
108 type from different controls.
109
110 id,id2 Used for menu IDs or for event types that require a
111 range of IDs
112
113 &quot;&quot;&quot;
114 </pre>
115 <p>Some examples of its use:</p>
116 <pre class="literal-block">
117 self.Bind(wx.EVT_SIZE, self.OnSize)
118 self.Bind(wx.EVT_BUTTON, self.OnButtonClick, theButton)
119 self.Bind(wx.EVT_MENU, self.OnExit, id=wx.ID_EXIT)
120 </pre>
121 <p>The wx.Menu methods that add items to a wx.Menu have been modified
122 such that they return a reference to the wx.MenuItem that was created.
123 Additionally menu items and toolbar items have been modified to
124 automatically generate a new ID if -1 is given, similar to using -1
125 with window classess. This means that you can create menu or toolbar
126 items and event bindings without having to predefine a unique menu ID,
127 although you still can use IDs just like before if you want. For
128 example, these are all equivallent other than their specific ID
129 values:</p>
130 <pre class="literal-block">
131 1.
132 item = menu.Append(-1, &quot;E&amp;xit&quot;, &quot;Terminate the App&quot;)
133 self.Bind(wx.EVT_MENU, self.OnExit, item)
134
135 2.
136 item = menu.Append(wx.ID_EXIT, &quot;E&amp;xit&quot;, &quot;Terminate the App&quot;)
137 self.Bind(wx.EVT_MENU, self.OnExit, item)
138
139 3.
140 menu.Append(wx.ID_EXIT, &quot;E&amp;xit&quot;, &quot;Terminate the App&quot;)
141 self.Bind(wx.EVT_MENU, self.OnExit, id=wx.ID_EXIT)
142 </pre>
143 <p>If you create your own custom event types and EVT_* functions, and you
144 want to be able to use them with the Bind method above then you should
145 change your EVT_* to be an instance of wx.PyEventBinder instead of a
146 function. For example, if you used to have something like this:</p>
147 <pre class="literal-block">
148 myCustomEventType = wxNewEventType()
149 def EVT_MY_CUSTOM_EVENT(win, id, func):
150 win.Connect(id, -1, myCustomEventType, func)
151 </pre>
152 <p>Change it like so:</p>
153 <pre class="literal-block">
154 myCustomEventType = wx.NewEventType()
155 EVT_MY_CUSTOM_EVENT = wx.PyEventBinder(myCustomEventType, 1)
156 </pre>
157 <p>The second parameter is an integer in [0, 1, 2] that specifies the
158 number of IDs that are needed to be passed to Connect.</p>
159 <p><strong>[Changed in 2.5.2.x]</strong> There is also an Unbind method added to
160 wx.EvtHandler that can be used to disconenct event handlers. It looks
161 like this:</p>
162 <pre class="literal-block">
163 def Unbind(self, event, source=None, id=wx.ID_ANY, id2=wx.ID_ANY):
164 &quot;&quot;&quot;
165 Disconencts the event handler binding for event from self.
166 Returns True if successful.
167 &quot;&quot;&quot;
168 </pre>
169 </div>
170 <div class="section" id="the-wx-namespace">
171 <h1><a name="the-wx-namespace">The wx Namespace</a></h1>
172 <p>The second phase of the wx Namespace Transition has begun. That means
173 that the real names of the classes and other symbols do not have the
174 'wx' prefix and the modules are located in a Python package named
175 wx. There is still a Python package named wxPython with modules
176 that have the names with the wx prefix for backwards compatibility.
177 Instead of dynamically changing the names at module load time like in
178 2.4, the compatibility modules are generated at build time and contain
179 assignment statements like this:</p>
180 <pre class="literal-block">
181 wxWindow = wx._core.Window
182 </pre>
183 <p>Don't let the &quot;_core&quot; in the name bother you. That and some other
184 modules are implementation details, and everything that was in the
185 wxPython.wx module before will still be in the wx package namespace
186 after this change. So from your code you would use it as wx.Window or
187 wxWindow if you import from the wxPython.wx module.</p>
188 <p>A few notes about how all of this was accomplished might be
189 interesting... SWIG is now run twice for each module that it is
190 generating code for. The first time it outputs an XML representaion
191 of the parse tree, which can be up to 20MB and 300K lines in size!
192 That XML is then run through a little Python script that creates a
193 file full of SWIG %rename directives that take the wx off of the
194 names, and also generates the Python compatibility file described
195 above that puts the wx back on the names. SWIG is then run a second
196 time to generate the C++ code to implement the extension module, and
197 uses the %rename directives that were generated in the first step.</p>
198 <p>Not every name is handled correctly (but the bulk of them are) and so
199 some work has to be done by hand, especially for the reverse-renamers.
200 So expect a few flaws here and there until everything gets sorted out.</p>
201 <p>In summary, the wx package and names without the &quot;wx&quot; prefix are now
202 the official form of the wxPython classes. For example:</p>
203 <pre class="literal-block">
204 import wx
205
206 class MyFrame(wx.Frame):
207 def __init__(self, parent, title):
208 wx.Frame.__init__(self, parent, -1, title)
209 p = wx.Panel(self, -1)
210 b = wx.Button(p, -1, &quot;Do It&quot;, (10,10))
211 self.Bind(wx.EVT_BUTTON, self.JustDoIt, b)
212
213 def JustDoIt(self, evt):
214 print &quot;It's done!&quot;
215
216 app = wx.PySimpleApp()
217 f = MyFrame(None, &quot;What's up?&quot;)
218 f.Show()
219 app.MainLoop()
220 </pre>
221 <p>You shouldn't need to migrate all your modules over to use the new
222 package and names right away as there are modules in place that try to
223 provide as much backwards compatibility of the names as possible. If
224 you rewrote the above sample using &quot;from wxPython.wx import * &quot;, the
225 old wxNames, and the old style of event binding it will still work
226 just fine.</p>
227 </div>
228 <div class="section" id="new-wx-dc-methods">
229 <h1><a name="new-wx-dc-methods">New wx.DC Methods</a></h1>
230 <p><strong>[Changed in 2.5.2.x]</strong> In wxPython 2.5.1.5 there was a new
231 implementation of the wx.DC Draw and other methods that broke
232 backwards compatibility in the name of consistency. That change has
233 been reverted and the wx.DC Draw methods with 2.4 compatible
234 signatures have been restored. In addition a new set of methods have
235 been added that take wx.Point and/or wx.Size parameters instead of
236 separate integer parameters. The Draw and etc. methods now available
237 in the wx.DC class are:</p>
238 <pre class="literal-block">
239 FloodFill(self, x, y, colour, style = wx.FLOOD_SURFACE)
240 FoodFillPoint(self, pt, colour, style = wx.FLOOD_SURFACE)
241
242 GetPixel(self, x,y)
243 GetPixelPoint(self, pt)
244
245 DrawLine(self, x1, y1, x2, y2)
246 DrawLinePoint(self, pt1, pt2)
247
248 CrossHair(self, x, y)
249 CrossHairPoint(self, pt)
250
251 DrawArc(self, x1, y1, x2, y2, xc, yc)
252 DrawArcPoint(self, pt1, pt2, centre)
253
254 DrawCheckMark(self, x, y, width, height)
255 DrawCheckMarkRect(self, rect)
256
257 DrawEllipticArc(self, x, y, w, h, sa, ea)
258 DrawEllipticArcPointSize(self, pt, sz, sa, ea)
259
260 DrawPoint(self, x, y)
261 DrawPointPoint(self, pt)
262
263 DrawRectangle(self, x, y, width, height)
264 DrawRectangleRect(self, rect)
265 DrawRectanglePointSize(self, pt, sz)
266
267 DrawRoundedRectangle(self, x, y, width, height, radius)
268 DrawRoundedRectangleRect(self, r, radius)
269 DrawRoundedRectanglePointSize(self, pt, sz, radius)
270
271 DrawCircle(self, x, y, radius)
272 DrawCirclePoint(self, pt, radius)
273
274 DrawEllipse(self, x, y, width, height)
275 DrawEllipseRect(self, rect)
276 DrawEllipsePointSize(self, pt, sz)
277
278 DrawIcon(self, icon, x, y)
279 DrawIconPoint(self, icon, pt)
280
281 DrawBitmap(self, bmp, x, y, useMask = False)
282 DrawBitmapPoint(self, bmp, pt, useMask = False)
283
284 DrawText(self, text, x, y)
285 DrawTextPoint(self, text, pt)
286
287 DrawRotatedText(self, text, x, y, angle)
288 DrawRotatedTextPoint(self, text, pt, angle)
289
290 bool Blit(self, xdest, ydest, width, height, sourceDC, xsrc, ysrc,
291 rop = wx.COPY, useMask = False, xsrcMask = -1, ysrcMask = -1)
292 BlitPointSize(self, destPt, sz, sourceDC, srcPt, rop = wx.COPY,
293 useMask = False, srcPtMask = wxDefaultPosition)
294
295
296 SetClippingRegion(self, x, y, width, height)
297 SetClippingRegionPointSize(self, pt, sz)
298 SetClippingRegionAsRegion(self, region)
299 SetClippingRect(self, rect)
300 </pre>
301 </div>
302 <div class="section" id="building-extending-and-embedding-wxpython">
303 <h1><a name="building-extending-and-embedding-wxpython">Building, Extending and Embedding wxPython</a></h1>
304 <p>wxPython's setup.py script now expects to use existing libraries for
305 the contribs (gizmos, stc, xrc, etc.) rather than building local
306 copies of them. If you build your own copies of wxPython please be
307 aware that you now need to also build the ogl, stc, xrc, and gizmos
308 libraries in addition to the main wx lib.</p>
309 <p>The wxPython.h and other header files are now in
310 .../wxPython/include/wx/wxPython instead of in wxPython/src. You
311 should include it via the &quot;wx/wxPython/wxPython.h&quot; path and add
312 .../wxPython/include to your list of include paths. On OSX and
313 unix-like systems the wxPython headers are installed to the same place
314 that the wxWidgets headers are installed, so if you are building
315 wxPython compatible extensions on those platforms then your include
316 path should already be set properly.</p>
317 <p>If you are also using SWIG for your extension then you'll need to
318 adapt how the wxPython .i files are imported into your .i files. See
319 the wxPython sources for examples. Your modules will need to at least
320 <tt class="literal"><span class="pre">%import</span> <span class="pre">core.i</span></tt>, and possibly others if you need the definition of
321 other classes. Since you will need them to build your modules using
322 SWIG, the main wxPython .i files are also installed with the wxPython
323 headers in an i_files sibdirectory. It should be enough to pass a
324 -I/pathname on the command line for SWIG to find the files.</p>
325 <p>The bulk of wxPython's setup.py has been moved to another module,
326 wx/build/config.py. This module will be installed as part of wxPython
327 so 3rd party modules that wish to use the same setup/configuration
328 code can do so simply by importing this module from their own setup.py
329 scripts using <tt class="literal"><span class="pre">import</span> <span class="pre">wx.build.config</span></tt>.</p>
330 <p>You no longer need to call wxClassInfo::CleanUpClasses() and
331 wxClassInfo::InitializeClasses() in your extensions or when embedding
332 wxPython.</p>
333 <p>The usage of wxPyBeginAllowThreads and wxPyEndAllowThreads has changed
334 slightly. wxPyBeginAllowThreads now returns a boolean value that must
335 be passed to the coresponding wxPyEndAllowThreads function call. This
336 is to help do the RightThing when calls to these two functions are
337 nested, or if calls to external code in other extension modules that
338 are wrapped in the standard Py_(BEGIN|END)_ALLOW_THERADS may result in
339 wx event handlers being called (such as during the call to
340 os.startfile.)</p>
341 </div>
342 <div class="section" id="two-or-three-phase-create">
343 <h1><a name="two-or-three-phase-create">Two (or Three!) Phase Create</a></h1>
344 <p>If you use the Precreate/Create method of instantiating a window, (for
345 example, to set an extended style flag, or for XRC handlers) then
346 there is now a new method named PostCreate to help with transplanting
347 the brain of the prewindow instance into the derived window instance.
348 For example:</p>
349 <pre class="literal-block">
350 class MyDialog(wx.Dialog):
351 def __init__(self, parent, ID, title, pos, size, style):
352 pre = wx.PreDialog()
353 pre.SetExtraStyle(wx.DIALOG_EX_CONTEXTHELP)
354 pre.Create(parent, ID, title, pos, size, style)
355 self.PostCreate(pre)
356 </pre>
357 </div>
358 <div class="section" id="sizers">
359 <h1><a name="sizers">Sizers</a></h1>
360 <p>The hack allowing the old &quot;option&quot; keyword parameter has been removed.
361 If you use keyword args with w.xSizer Add, Insert, or Prepend methods
362 then you will need to use the <tt class="literal"><span class="pre">proportion</span></tt> name instead of
363 <tt class="literal"><span class="pre">option</span></tt>. (The <tt class="literal"><span class="pre">proportion</span></tt> keyword was also allowed in 2.4.2.4.)</p>
364 <p>When adding a spacer to a sizer you now need to use a wx.Size or a
365 2-integer sequence instead of separate width and height parameters.
366 This was optionally allowed in 2.4, but now it is required. This
367 allows for more consistency in how you add the various types of items
368 to a sizer. The first parameter defines the item (instead of the
369 possibily first two, depending on if you are doing a spacer or not,)
370 and that item can either be a window, a sizer or a spacer (which can
371 be a sequence or a wx.Size.) Removing the option for separate width
372 and height parameters greatly simplified the wrapper code.</p>
373 <p>The wx.GridBagSizer class (very similar to the RowColSizer in the
374 library) has been added to C++ and wrapped for wxPython. It can also
375 be used from XRC.</p>
376 <p>You should not use AddWindow, AddSizer, AddSpacer (and similar for
377 Insert, Prepend, and etc.) methods any longer. Just use Add and the
378 wrappers will figure out what to do. <strong>[Changed in 2.5.2.x]</strong>
379 AddWindow, AddSize, AddSpacer and etc. will now issue a
380 DeprecationWarning.</p>
381 <p><strong>[Changed in 2.5.2.x]</strong> wx.ADJUST_MINSIZE is now the default
382 behaviour for window items in sizers. This means that the item's
383 GetMinSize and/or GetBestSize will be called when calculating layout
384 and the return value from that will be used for the minimum size used
385 by the sizer. The wx.FIXED_MINSIZE flag was added that will cause the
386 sizer to use the old behaviour in that it will <em>not</em> call the window's
387 methods to determine the new best size, instead the minsize that the
388 window had when added to the sizer (or the size the window was created
389 with) will always be used.</p>
390 <p>Related to the above, when controls and some other window types are
391 created either the size passed to the constructor, or their &quot;best
392 size&quot; if an explicit size was not passed in, is set as the window's
393 minimal size. For non top-level windows that hasn't meant much in the
394 past, but now the sizers are sensitive to the window's minimal size.
395 The key point to understand here is that it is no longer the window's
396 size it has when added to the sizer that matters, but its minimal
397 size. So you might have some issues to iron out if you create a
398 control without a size and then set its size to something before
399 adding it to the sizer. Since it's minimal size is probably not the
400 size you set then the sizer will appear to be misbehaving. The fix is
401 to either set the size when calling the window's constructor, or to
402 reset the min size by calling SetSizeHints. You can call SetSizeHints
403 at anytime to change the minsize of a window, just call the sizer's
404 Layout method to redistribute the controls as needed.</p>
405 </div>
406 <div class="section" id="platforminfo">
407 <h1><a name="platforminfo">PlatformInfo</a></h1>
408 <p>Added wx.PlatformInfo which is a tuple containing strings that
409 describe the platform and build options of wxPython. This lets you
410 know more about the build than just the __WXPORT__ value that
411 wx.Platform contains, such as if it is a GTK2 build. For example,
412 instead of:</p>
413 <pre class="literal-block">
414 if wx.Platform == &quot;__WXGTK__&quot;:
415 ...
416 </pre>
417 <p>you should do this:</p>
418 <pre class="literal-block">
419 if &quot;__WXGTK__&quot; in wx.PlatformInfo:
420 ...
421 </pre>
422 <p>and you can specifically check for a wxGTK2 build by looking for
423 &quot;gtk2&quot; in wx.PlatformInfo. Unicode builds are also detectable this
424 way. If there are any other platform/toolkit/build flags that make
425 sense to add to this tuple please let me know.</p>
426 <p>BTW, wx.Platform will probably be deprecated in the future.</p>
427 </div>
428 <div class="section" id="activex">
429 <h1><a name="activex">ActiveX</a></h1>
430 <p>Lindsay Mathieson's newest <a class="reference" href="http://members.optusnet.com.au/~blackpaw1/wxactivex.html">wxActiveX</a> class has been wrapped into a new
431 extension module called wx.activex. It is very generic and dynamic
432 and should allow hosting of arbitray ActiveX controls within your
433 wxPython apps. So far I've tested it with IE, PDF, and Flash
434 controls, (and there are new samples in the demo and also library
435 modules supporting these.)</p>
436 <p>The new wx.activex module contains a bunch of code, but the most
437 important things to look at are ActiveXWindow and ActiveXEvent.
438 ActiveXWindow derives from wxWindow and the constructor accepts a
439 CLSID for the ActiveX Control that should be created. (There is also
440 a CLSID class that can convert from a progID or a CLSID String.) The
441 ActiveXWindow class simply adds methods that allow you to query some
442 of the TypeInfo exposed by the ActiveX object, and also to get/set
443 properties or call methods by name. The Python implementation
444 automatically handles converting parameters and return values to/from
445 the types expected by the ActiveX code as specified by the TypeInfo,
446 (just bool, integers, floating point, strings and None/Empty so far,
447 but more can be handled later.)</p>
448 <p>That's pretty much all there is to the class, as I mentioned before it
449 is very generic and dynamic. Very little is hard-coded and everything
450 that is done with the actual ActiveX control is done at runtime and
451 referenced by property or method name. Since Python is such a dynamic
452 language this is a very good match. I thought for a while about doing
453 some Python black-magic and making the specific methods/properties of
454 the actual ActiveX control &quot;appear&quot; at runtime, but then decided that
455 it would be better and more understandable to do it via subclassing.
456 So there is a utility class in wx.activex that given an existing
457 ActiveXWindow instance can generate a .py module containing a derived
458 class with real methods and properties that do the Right Thing to
459 reflect those calls to the real ActiveX control. There is also a
460 script/tool module named genaxmodule that given a CLSID or progID and
461 a class name, will generate the module for you. There are a few
462 examples of the output of this tool in the wx.lib package, see
463 iewin.py, pdfwin.py and flashwin.py.</p>
464 <p>Currently the genaxmodule tool will tweak some of the names it
465 generates, but this can be controled if you would like to do it
466 differently by deriving your own class from GernerateAXModule,
467 overriding some methods and then using this class from a tool like
468 genaxmodule. [TODO: make specifying a new class on genaxmodule's
469 command-line possible.] The current default behavior is that any
470 event names that start with &quot;On&quot; will have the &quot;On&quot; dropped, property
471 names are converted to all lower case, and if any name is a Python
472 keyword it will have an underscore appended to it. GernerateAXModule
473 does it's best when generating the code in the new module, but it can
474 only be as good as the TypeInfo data available from the ActiveX
475 control so sometimes some tweaking will be needed. For example, the
476 IE web browser control defines the Flags parameter of the Navigate2
477 method as required, but MSDN says it is optional.</p>
478 <p>It is intended that this new wx.activex module will replace both the
479 older version of Lindsay's code available in iewin.IEHtmlWindow, and
480 also the wx.lib.activexwraper module. Probably the biggest
481 differences you'll ecounter in migrating activexwrapper-based code
482 (besides events working better without causing deadlocks) is that
483 events are no longer caught by overriding methods in your derived
484 class. Instead ActiveXWindow uses the wx event system and you bind
485 handlers for the ActiveX events exactly the same way you do for any wx
486 event. There is just one extra step needed and that is creating an
487 event ID from the ActiveX event name, and if you use the genaxmodule
488 tool then this extra step will be handled for you there. For example,
489 for the StatusTextChange event in the IE web browser control, this
490 code is generated for you:</p>
491 <pre class="literal-block">
492 wxEVT_StatusTextChange = wx.activex.RegisterActiveXEvent('StatusTextChange')
493 EVT_StatusTextChange = wx.PyEventBinder(wxEVT_StatusTextChange, 1)
494 </pre>
495 <p>and you would use it in your code like this:</p>
496 <pre class="literal-block">
497 self.Bind(iewin.EVT_StatusTextChange, self.UpdateStatusText, self.ie)
498 </pre>
499 <p>When the event happens and your event handler function is called the
500 event properties from the ActiveX control (if any) are converted to
501 attributes of the event object passed to the handler. (Can you say
502 'event' any more times in a single sentence? ;-) ) For example the
503 StatusTextChange event will also send the text that should be put into
504 the status line as an event parameter named &quot;Text&quot; and you can access
505 it your handlers as an attribute of the event object like this:</p>
506 <pre class="literal-block">
507 def UpdateStatusText(self, evt):
508 self.SetStatusText(evt.Text)
509 </pre>
510 <p>Usually these event object attributes should be considered read-only,
511 but some will be defined by the TypeInfo as output parameters. In
512 those cases if you modify the event object's attribute then that value
513 will be returned to the ActiveX control. For example, to prevent a
514 new window from being opened by the IE web browser control you can do
515 this in the handler for the iewin.EVT_NewWindow2 event:</p>
516 <pre class="literal-block">
517 def OnNewWindow2(self, evt):
518 evt.Cancel = True
519 </pre>
520 <p>So how do you know what methods, events and properties that an ActiveX
521 control supports? There is a funciton in wx.activex named GetAXInfo
522 that returns a printable summary of the TypeInfo from the ActiveX
523 instance passed in. You can use this as an example of how to browse
524 the TypeInfo provided, and there is also a copy of this function's
525 output appended as a comment to the modules produced by the
526 genaxmodule tool. Beyond that you'll need to consult the docs
527 provided by the makers of the ActiveX control that you are using.</p>
528 </div>
529 <div class="section" id="png-images">
530 <h1><a name="png-images">PNG Images</a></h1>
531 <p>Prior to 2.5 the PNG image handler would convert all alpha channel
532 information to a mask when the image was loaded. Pixels that were
533 more than halfway transparent would be made fully transparent by the
534 mask and the rest would be made fully opaque.</p>
535 <p>In 2.5 the image handler has been updated to preserve the alpha
536 channel and will now only create a mask when all the pixels in the
537 image are either fully transparent or fully opaque. In addition, the
538 wx.DC.DrawBitmap and wx.DC.Blit methods are able to correctly blend
539 the pixels in the image with partially transparent alpha values.
540 (Currently only on MSW and Mac, if anybody knows how to do it for GTK
541 then please submit a patch!)</p>
542 <p>If you are using a PNG with an alpha channel but you need to have a
543 wx.Mask like you automatically got in 2.4 then you can do one of the
544 following:</p>
545 <blockquote>
546 <ul class="simple">
547 <li>Edit the image and make all the partially transparent pixels be
548 fully transparent.</li>
549 <li>Use a different image type.</li>
550 <li>Set a mask based on colour after you load the image.</li>
551 </ul>
552 </blockquote>
553 </div>
554 <div class="section" id="ogl-is-dead-long-live-ogl">
555 <h1><a name="ogl-is-dead-long-live-ogl">OGL is dead! LONG LIVE OGL!</a></h1>
556 <p><strong>[Changed in 2.5.2.x]</strong></p>
557 <p>The wx.ogl module has been deprecated in favor of the new Python port
558 of the OGL library located at wx.lib.ogl contributed by Pierre Hjälm.
559 This will hopefully greatly extend the life of OGL within wxPython by
560 making it more easily maintainable and less prone to getting rusty as
561 there seems to be less and less interest in maintaining the C++
562 version.</p>
563 <p>There are only a few known compatibility issues at this time. First
564 is the location of OGL. The deprecated version is located in the
565 wx.ogl module, and the new version is in the wx.lib.ogl package. So
566 this just means that to start using the new version you need to adjust
567 your imports. So if your code currently has something like this:</p>
568 <pre class="literal-block">
569 import wx
570 import wx.ogl as ogl
571 </pre>
572 <p>Then just change it to this:</p>
573 <pre class="literal-block">
574 import wx
575 import wx.lib.ogl as ogl
576 </pre>
577 <p>The other compatibility issue deals with removing a wart in the
578 original API that was necessary in order to allow overloaded methods
579 in derived classes to call the same method in the base class when
580 using the old SWIG. Instead dedaling with the wart you can now just
581 call the base class method like you woudl for any other Python class.
582 For example, if you had to do something like this previously:</p>
583 <pre class="literal-block">
584 class MyDividedShape(ogl.DividedShape):
585 ...
586 def OnSizingEndDragLeft(self, pt, x, y, keys, attch):
587 self.base_OnSizingEndDragLeft(pt, x, y, keys, attch)
588 ...
589 </pre>
590 <p>You will need to change it to be like this:</p>
591 <pre class="literal-block">
592 class MyDividedShape(ogl.DividedShape):
593 ...
594 def OnSizingEndDragLeft(self, pt, x, y, keys, attch):
595 ogl.DividedShape.OnSizingEndDragLeft(self, pt, x, y, keys, attch)
596 ...
597 </pre>
598 </div>
599 <div class="section" id="obsolete-modules">
600 <h1><a name="obsolete-modules">Obsolete Modules</a></h1>
601 <p>Instead of over a dozen separate extension modules linked together
602 into a single extension module, the &quot;core&quot; module is now just a few
603 extensions that are linked independently, and then merged together
604 later into the main namespace via Python code.</p>
605 <p>Because of the above and also because of the way the new SWIG works,
606 the &quot;internal&quot; module names have changed, but you shouldn't have been
607 using them anyway so it shouldn't bother you. ;-) In case you were
608 erroneously using them in 2.4, here are the internal extension modules
609 no longer exist:</p>
610 <blockquote>
611 <ul class="simple">
612 <li>clip_dnd</li>
613 <li>cmndlgs</li>
614 <li>controls</li>
615 <li>controls2</li>
616 <li>events</li>
617 <li>filesys</li>
618 <li>fonts</li>
619 <li>frames</li>
620 <li>gdi</li>
621 <li>image</li>
622 <li>mdi</li>
623 <li>misc</li>
624 <li>misc2</li>
625 <li>printfw</li>
626 <li>sizers</li>
627 <li>stattool</li>
628 <li>streams</li>
629 <li>utils</li>
630 <li>windows</li>
631 <li>windows2</li>
632 <li>windows3</li>
633 </ul>
634 </blockquote>
635 <p>They have been replaced by the following, but please remember that
636 these are just &quot;implementation details&quot; and you should really be using
637 the objects in these modules only via the wx or wxPython.wx packages:</p>
638 <blockquote>
639 <ul class="simple">
640 <li>_core</li>
641 <li>_gdi</li>
642 <li>_windows</li>
643 <li>_controls</li>
644 <li>_misc</li>
645 </ul>
646 </blockquote>
647 <p>The help module no longer exists and the classes therein are now part
648 of the core module imported with wxPython.wx or the wx package.</p>
649 </div>
650 <div class="section" id="other-stuff">
651 <h1><a name="other-stuff">Other Stuff</a></h1>
652 <p>wxPyDefaultPosition and wxPyDefaultSize are gone. Use the
653 wxDefaultPosition and wxDefaultSize objects instead.</p>
654 <p>Similarly, the wxSystemSettings backwards compatibiility aliases for
655 GetSystemColour, GetSystemFont and GetSystemMetric have also gone into
656 the bit-bucket. Use GetColour, GetFont and GetMetric instead.</p>
657 <p>Use the Python True/False constants instead of the true, TRUE, false,
658 FALSE that used to be provided with wxPython.</p>
659 <p>Use None instead of the ancient and should have been removed a long
660 time ago wx.NULL alias.</p>
661 <p>wx.TreeCtrl.GetFirstChild no longer needs to be passed the cookie
662 variable as the 2nd parameter. It still returns it though, for use
663 with GetNextChild.</p>
664 <p>The wx.NO_FULL_REPAINT_ON_RESIZE style is now the default style for
665 all windows. The name still exists for compatibility, but it is set
666 to zero. If you want to disable the setting (so it matches the old
667 default) then you need to use the new wx.FULL_REPAINT_ON_RESIZE style
668 flag otherwise only the freshly exposed areas of the window will be
669 refreshed.</p>
670 <p>wxPyTypeCast has been removed. Since we've had the OOR (Original
671 Object Return) for a couple years now there should be no need to use
672 wxPyTypeCast at all.</p>
673 <p>If you use the old wxPython package and wxPython.wx namespace then
674 there are compatibility aliases for much of the above items.</p>
675 <p>The wxWave class has been renamed to wxSound, and now has a slightly
676 different API.</p>
677 <p>wx.TaskbarIcon works on wxGTK-based platforms (for some window
678 managers,) however you have to manage it a little bit more than you
679 did before. Basically, the app will treat it like a top-level frame
680 in that if the wx.TaskBarIcon still exists when all the frames are
681 closed then the app will still not exit. You need to ensure that the
682 wx.TaskBarIcon is destroyed when your last Frame is closed. For
683 wxPython apps it is usually enough if your main frame object holds the
684 only reference to the wx.TaskBarIcon, then when the frame is closed
685 Python reference counting takes care of the rest.</p>
686 <p>Before Python 2.3 it was possible to pass a floating point object as a
687 parameter to a function that expected an integer, and the
688 PyArg_ParseTuple family of functions would automatically convert to
689 integer by truncating the fractional portion of the number. With
690 Python 2.3 that behavior was deprecated and a deprecation warning is
691 raised when you pass a floating point value, (for example, calling
692 wx.DC.DrawLine with floats for the position and size,) and lots of
693 developers using wxPython had to scramble to change their code to call
694 int() before calling wxPython methods. Recent changes in SWIG have
695 moved the conversion out of PyArg_ParseTuple to custom code that SWIG
696 generates. Since the default conversion fragment was a little too
697 strict and didn't generate a very meaningful exception when it failed,
698 I decided to use a custom fragment instead, and it turned out that
699 it's very easy to allow floats to be converted again just like they
700 used to be. So, in a nutshell, any numeric type that can be
701 converted to an integer is now legal to be passed to SWIG wrapped
702 functions in wxPython for parameters that are expecting an integer.
703 If the object is not already an integer then it will be asked to
704 convert itself to one. A similar conversion fragment is in place for
705 parameters that expect floating point values.</p>
706 <p><strong>[Changed in 2.5.2.x]</strong> The MaskedEditCtrl modules have been moved
707 to their own sub-package, wx.lib.masked. See the docstrings and demo
708 for changes in capabilities, usage, etc.</p>
709 <p><strong>[Changed in 2.5.2.x]</strong> wx.MaskColour constructor has been deprecated
710 and will raise a DeprecationWarning if used. The main wx.Mask
711 constructor has been modified to be compatible with wx.MaskColour so
712 you should use it instead.</p>
713 </div>
714 </div>
715 </body>
716 </html>