[PyKDE] PyKDE KDE Applets

[Jim Bublitz]

On Wednesday 09 November 2005 13:33, Rajeev Joseph Sebastian wrote:

> Is there some way to write KDE Applets in Python ?

Yes. There used to be a "PyKPanelApplet" included in PyKDE, and I have a 
"PyKPanelExtension" working also. They were complcating the build system at 
one time, some other changes messed up the applet testing/install utility, 
and there didn't seem to be a lot of demand for the feature, so I pulled it 
out of PyKDE. I wouldn't add them back into PyKDE, but I do have a separate 
package kind of half done (it has some other problems with a different 
extension).

The way it's set up, panel applets or extensions are written completely in 
Python, but installation is a little messy.

The basic method I used is to a) provide a simple interface to libpython; b) 
provide a single interface to the kicker panel applet loader code in an .so 
lib. The applet is written in Python, but to install it, you need to symlink 
to the lib from (b), plus create and install a .desktop file in the right 
place and install the Python code in the right place. There is a graphical 
installer that does all that, as well as validating the applet and allowing 
you to test it. It isn't necessary to create a new .so - just a symlink with 
the applet name to a common lib that takes care of loading the applet and 
providing the necessary linkages between C++ and Python.

The biggest problem is the old docs are out of date, and I haven't created new 
ones, but there is are working examples for applets and extensions. If you're 
interested, I can throw something together and send it to you, but it's quite 
a way from being something that could be distributed.

Jim