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There is an application I am working on using Python and Tkinter, and this application requires a variety of input forms. Each input form needs a scrollbar in case the form’s parent is too short to display everything, and so after some help from Google, this is what I currently have:
import tkinter as tk
def get_vertically_scrollable_frame(parent_frame: tk.Frame or tk.Tk) -> tk.Frame:
"""
:param parent_frame: The frame to place the canvas and scrollbar onto.
:return: A scrollable tk.Frame object nested within the parent_frame object.
"""
assert isinstance(parent_frame, tk.Frame) or isinstance(parent_frame, tk.Tk)
# Create the canvas and scrollbar.
canvas = tk.Canvas(master=parent_frame, bg="blue")
scrollbar = tk.Scrollbar(master=parent_frame, orient=tk.VERTICAL, command=canvas.yview)
# Let the canvas and scrollbar resize to fit the parent_frame object.
parent_frame.rowconfigure(0, weight=1)
parent_frame.columnconfigure(0, weight=1)
canvas.grid(row=0, column=0, sticky='news')
scrollbar.grid(row=0, column=1, sticky='nes')
# Link the canvas and scrollbar together.
canvas.configure(yscrollcommand=scrollbar.set)
canvas.bind('<Configure>', lambda x: canvas.configure(scrollregion=canvas.bbox("all")))
# Create the tk.Frame that is within the canvas.
canvas_frame = tk.Frame(master=canvas, bg="red")
canvas.create_window((0, 0), window=canvas_frame, anchor="nw")
# TODO: Let the canvas_frame object resize to fit the parent canvas.
canvas.columnconfigure(0, weight=1)
canvas.rowconfigure(0, weight=1)
# canvas_frame.grid(row=0, column=0, sticky="news") # Resizes the frame, but breaks the scrollbar.
return canvas_frame
if __name__ == "__main__":
window = tk.Tk()
window.rowconfigure(0, weight=1)
window.columnconfigure(0, weight=1)
parent_frame = tk.Frame(master=window)
parent_frame.grid(row=0, column=0, sticky="news")
scrollable_frame = get_vertically_scrollable_frame(parent_frame)
# Add the widgets to the new frame.
scrollable_frame.columnconfigure(0, weight=1) # Resize everything horizontally.
tk.Label(master=scrollable_frame, text="First name").grid(row=0, column=0, sticky="w")
tk.Entry(master=scrollable_frame).grid(row=1, column=0, sticky="ew")
tk.Label(master=scrollable_frame, text="").grid(row=2, column=0, sticky="w")
tk.Label(master=scrollable_frame, text="Last name").grid(row=3, column=0, sticky="w")
tk.Entry(master=scrollable_frame).grid(row=4, column=0, sticky="ew")
tk.Label(master=scrollable_frame, text="").grid(row=5, column=0, sticky="w")
tk.Label(master=scrollable_frame, text="Email").grid(row=6, column=0, sticky="w")
tk.Entry(master=scrollable_frame).grid(row=7, column=0, sticky="ew")
tk.Label(master=scrollable_frame, text="").grid(row=8, column=0, sticky="w")
tk.Label(master=scrollable_frame, text="Favorite color").grid(row=9, column=0, sticky="w")
tk.Entry(master=scrollable_frame).grid(row=10, column=0, sticky="ew")
tk.Label(master=scrollable_frame, text="").grid(row=11, column=0, sticky="w")
tk.Frame(master=scrollable_frame).grid(row=12, column=0, sticky="news")
scrollable_frame.rowconfigure(12, weight=1) # Vertically resize filler frame from last line.
tk.Button(master=scrollable_frame, text="Clear").grid(row=13, column=0, sticky="ews")
tk.Button(master=scrollable_frame, text="Submit").grid(row=14, column=0, sticky="ews")
window.mainloop()
This function takes an empty Tkinter frame, places a working canvas and scrollbar on that frame, places a new frame into the canvas, and then returns the frame inside the canvas.
While the scrollbar works fine with the above code, the returned nested Tkinter frame does not resize to fit the height and width of its parent canvas. If the parent canvas is too large, it looks like this:
(The blue area is the canvas, and red is the frame inside the canvas.)
In an attempt to fix this, I manually placed the nested frame on the canvas using grid (see the commented code just before the return statement). The frame inside the canvas started resizing itself, but the scrollbar stopped working.
Is there a simple way to allow the frame inside the canvas to resize itself without breaking the scrollbar?
Is there a simple way to allow the frame inside the canvas to resize itself without breaking the scrollbar?
Simple? I guess that depends on your definition of simplicity. It's possible, but it requires a few extra lines of code.
The scrollbars only work if you add the frame to the canvas with create_window and only when you let the frame be as big as it needs to be to hold all of its children and then set the canvas bbox accordingly. When the window resizes you need to force the frame to be bigger than it wants to be if it is smaller than the canvas, but you need to let the frame be its preferred size if the frame is bigger than the canvas.
The solution looks something like the following example, off the top of my head. Notice the use of a tag to make it easy to find the inner frame. You could just as easily store the id returned by create_window and use that instead. This also takes advantage of the fact that the event object has width and height attributes for the canvas.
def get_vertically_scrollable_frame(parent_frame: tk.Frame or tk.Tk) -> tk.Frame:
...
canvas.create_window((0, 0), window=canvas_frame, anchor="nw", tags=("canvas_frame",))
canvas.bind('<Configure>', handle_resize)
...
def handle_resize(event):
canvas = event.widget
canvas_frame = canvas.nametowidget(canvas.itemcget("canvas_frame", "window"))
min_width = canvas_frame.winfo_reqwidth()
min_height = canvas_frame.winfo_reqheight()
if min_width < event.width:
canvas.itemconfigure("canvas_frame", width=event.width)
if min_height < event.height:
canvas.itemconfigure("canvas_frame", height=event.height)
canvas.configure(scrollregion=canvas.bbox("all"))
I just got started using Tkinter and I'm facing a weird problem, basically, I want my app to look something like this
So in order to do that, I created two Frames, one for menu items and the other one to display the content. Strange thing, when I initialize the frames with the given width and height the program seems to work as expected, but when I put some widgets inside the window resizes, it looks like this
Could somebody please explain this weird behaviour to me? What am I missing? Also, I would like to mention that when I add the buttons to the menu frame the width changes to fit the button width, not vice versa as I would like
app = tk.Tk()
app.resizable(False, False)
menu_frame_users = tk.Frame(app, width=200, background='red')
content_frame = tk.Frame(app, height=600, width=600, background='blue')
hello_label = tk.Label(menu_frame_users, text='Hello, User').grid(column=0, row=0, sticky='we')
view_profile_button = tk.Button(menu_frame_users, text="View Profile").grid(column=0, row=1, sticky='we')
invoices_button = tk.Button(menu_frame_users, text="Invoices").grid(column=0, row=2, sticky='we')
bookings_button = tk.Button(menu_frame_users, text="View bookings").grid(column=0, row=3, sticky='we')
tools_button = tk.Button(menu_frame_users, text="Search tools").grid(column=0, row=4, sticky='we')
test_label = tk.Label(content_frame, text='View profile')
test_label.grid(column=0, row=0, sticky='we')
menu_frame_users.grid(column=0, row=0, sticky='nswe')
content_frame.grid(column=1, row=0, sticky='nswe')
The frames in tkinter will only be as big as the widgets contained within unless you add weight to row and columns to make them expand.
You can get the frame to expand by setting the size of the window and then adding weight to the appropriate row and column.
app.geometry('500x400')
app.grid_columnconfigure(1, weight=1)
app.grid_rowconfigure(0, weight=1)
You can play around with the size of the window and then resize and position your buttons until you get the layout you want.
You can also use:
app.grid_columnconfigure(1, minsize=300)
However this only applies when the column contains a widget.
I'm not sure if I fully understand the question, but maybe this will help. Note I removed the explicit frame dimensions for the sake of the example.
import tkinter as tk
app = tk.Tk()
app.resizable(False, False)
menu_frame_users = tk.Frame(app,background='red')
content_frame = tk.Frame(app, background='blue')
app.geometry("500x500")
app.rowconfigure(0, weight=1)
app.columnconfigure(0, weight=1)
menu_frame_users.columnconfigure(0, weight=1)
hello_label = tk.Label(menu_frame_users, text='Hello, User').grid(column=0, row=0, sticky='we')
view_profile_button = tk.Button(menu_frame_users, text="View Profile").grid(column=0, row=1, sticky='we')
invoices_button = tk.Button(menu_frame_users, text="Invoices").grid(column=0, row=2, sticky='we')
bookings_button = tk.Button(menu_frame_users, text="View bookings").grid(column=0, row=3, sticky='we')
tools_button = tk.Button(menu_frame_users, text="Search tools").grid(column=0, row=4, sticky='we')
test_label = tk.Label(content_frame, text='View profile')
test_label.grid(column=0, row=0, sticky='we', padx=20, pady=20)
menu_frame_users.grid(column=0, row=0, sticky='nswe')
content_frame.grid(column=1, row=0, sticky='nswe')
app.mainloop()
Documentation for tkinter is a bit limited but there's some great info regarding grid configuration on this page.
Generally speaking, the widgets in a given container are what give the container it's dimensions, unless explicitly coded otherwise. (In other words, the frame will grow as you add things into it, not the other way around)
In your example, I added an arbitrary window size (you can also specify an offset in that string argument). My guess is you're looking for rowconfigure() and columnconfigure(). Also, you can add some padding to space things out with .grid()
I almost exclusively use the grid geometry manager, but sometimes you might find it more pragmatic to use pack() or place(), just make sure you don't use both at the same time.
Cheers.
So i have some tkinter checkboxes in a frame widget, which should be aligned to each other. I thought with grid and then using sticky='w' should align them to most east as possible of the column. So to say, to have the checkbox-squares aligned. Instead this happens (the relief is just to see the boundaries of the checkbutton widgets):
Image of GUI
The documentation of the widget - in my opinion - does not provide a function to set this. With the sticky of grid i am not sure whether it should even be the function. Actually the relief shows its sticky in that column...
Here is my code example:
def init_checkboxes(self):
"""
Creates all checkboxes for this particular frame subclass.
"""
self.bvar_cbx_showplots = tk.BooleanVar(value=False)
self.cbx_showplots = tk.Checkbutton(self.lblframe, width=20,
text='Show Plots after run',
variable=self.bvar_cbx_showplots,
relief='groove')
self.cbx_showplots.grid(row=1, column=2, sticky='W')
self.bvar_cbx_saveres = tk.BooleanVar(value=True)
self.cbx_saveres = tk.Checkbutton(self.lblframe, width=20,
text='Save simulation results',
variable=self.bvar_cbx_saveres,
relief='groove')
self.cbx_saveres.grid(row=2, column=2, sticky='W')
edit: Second attempt from Reblochon
Use anchor.
anchor=
Controls where in the button the text (or image) should be located. Use one of N, NE, E, SE, S, SW, W, NW, or CENTER. Default is CENTER. If you change this, it is probably a good idea to add some padding as well, using the padx and/or pady options. (anchor/Anchor)
import tkinter as tk
root = tk.Tk()
bvar_cbx_showplots = tk.BooleanVar(value=False)
cbx_showplots = tk.Checkbutton(root, width=20,
text='Show Plots after run',
variable=bvar_cbx_showplots,
relief='groove', anchor='w')
cbx_showplots.grid(row=1, column=2, sticky='W')
bvar_cbx_saveres = tk.BooleanVar(value=True)
cbx_saveres = tk.Checkbutton(root, width=20,
text='Save simulation results',
variable=bvar_cbx_saveres,
relief='groove', anchor='w')
cbx_saveres.grid(row=2, column=2, sticky='W')
root.mainloop()
I have a Labelframe and inside that LabelFrame, I've placed a button. That button will always appear in the top-left corner of the LabelFrame, though I would like it to center itself within the LabelFrame. What property am I missing that will force this button to center itself inside of the LabelFrame?
self.f1_section_frame=LabelFrame(self.mass_window, text="LOCATIONS", width=300, height=998, padx=5, pady=5, bd=5)
self.f1_section_frame.grid(row=0, rowspan=6, column=1, sticky="nw", padx=(2,0))
self.f1_section_frame.grid_propagate(False)
self.button_frame1 = LabelFrame(self.f1_section_frame, width=275, height=50)
self.button_frame1.grid_propagate(False)
self.button_frame1.grid(row=1, column=0)
self.b1_scoring=Button(self.button_frame1, text="CONFIRM\nLOCATION(S)", height=2, width=10, command=self.initiate_site_scoring, justify="center")
self.b1_scoring.grid(row=0,column=0, pady=(1,0))
Thanks for the response #R4PH43L. I gave that a shot and it didn't seem to change. However, it got me thinking so I removed "grid_propagate" from the frame that encloses my buttons, which then wrapped the frame around the buttons without any space and centered the frame within the column in which IT was placed. Then I used padx=(x,0) on my leftmost button and padx=(0,x) on my rightmost button to add the space needed on the left and right side and it's working how I need it to now.
self.f1_section_frame=LabelFrame(self.mass_window, text="LOCATIONS", width=300,
height=998, padx=5, pady=5, bd=5)
self.f1_section_frame.grid(row=0, rowspan=6, column=1, sticky="nw", padx=(2,0))
self.f1_section_frame.grid_propagate(False)
self.button_frame1 = LabelFrame(self.f1_section_frame, width=275, height=50)
self.button_frame1.grid(row=1, column=0)
self.b1_scoring=Button(self.button_frame1, text="CONFIRM\nLOCATION(S)", height=2, width=10,
command=self.initiate_site_scoring, justify="center")
self.b1_scoring.grid(row=0,column=0, padx=(15,0))
self.b2_scoring=Button(self.button_frame1, text="CLEAR\nSELECTION(S)", height=2,
width=10, command=self.clear_selected_locations)
self.b2_scoring.grid(row=0,column=1)
self.b3_scoring=Button(self.button_frame1, text="UPDATE\nSELECTION(S)", height=2, width=10,
command=self.update_selected_location_details)
self.b3_scoring.grid(row=0,column=2, padx=(0,15))
If you uncomment the options_frame_title you will see that it does not behave properly. Am I missing something? That section was just copied and pasted from the preview_frame_title and that seems to have no issues.
from tkinter import *
blank_app = Tk()
blank_app.geometry('750x500+250+100')
blank_app.resizable(width=False, height=False)
main_frame = Frame(blank_app, width=750, height=500, bg='gray22')
main_frame.grid(row=0, column=0, sticky=NSEW)
main_title = Label(main_frame, text='App Builder', bg='gray', fg='red', font='Times 12 bold', relief=RIDGE)
main_title.grid(row=0, column=0, padx=2, pady=2, sticky=NSEW, columnspan=2)
preview_frame = Frame(main_frame, width=70, height=465, bg='red', highlightcolor='white', highlightthickness=2)
preview_frame.grid(row=1, column=0, padx=2, pady=2, sticky=NSEW)
preview_frame_title = Label(preview_frame, text='Preview Window', width=70, bg='gray', fg='blue', relief=RIDGE)
preview_frame_title.grid(row=0, column=0, sticky=NSEW)
options_frame = Frame(main_frame, width=240, height=465, bg='blue', highlightcolor='white', highlightthickness=2)
options_frame.grid(row=1, column=1, padx=2, pady=2, sticky=NSEW)
options_frame_title = Label(options_frame, text='Widget Options', width=20, bg='gray', fg='blue', anchor=CENTER, relief=RIDGE)
options_frame_title.grid(row=0, column=0, sticky=NSEW)
blank_app.mainloop()
I don't understand what you mean by "behaving properly". It seems to be behaving as it's designed to behave.
By default, tkinter frames are designed to shrink (or grow) to fit their child widgets. When you comment out options_frame_title.grid(...), the frame has no visible children so it says the fixed size that you gave it. When you uncomment that line, it causes a label to be placed in the widget which then causes the frame to shrink to fit.
To further complicate the matters for you, grid will by default give any extra space to rows and columns that have a non-zero weight. Since you haven't given any rows or columns any weight, they don't get any extra space.
Part of the problem is that you are trying to solve too many problems at once. When first starting out you need to be more methodical. Also, you should consider using pack when you're putting a single widget into another widget. It only takes one line of code to get it to fill its parent rather than three with grid.
pro-tip: it really helps if you separate widget creation from widget layout. Your code, even though it's only a couple dozen lines long, is really hard to read.
For example, the first thing you should do is start by creating your top-most frames, and get them to fill and expand/shrink properly before putting any widgets in them.
Starting from scratch
Step 0: don't remove the ability to resize the window
User's don't like having control taken away from them. Remove this line:
blank_app.resizable(width=False, height=False)
Your users will thank you, and during development it's much easier to play with the window to make sure everything is filling, growing, and shrinking as necessary.
Step 1: main_frame
Since it appears this is designed to contain everything, it makes sense to use pack since it is the only widget directly in blank_app.
main_frame = Frame(blank_app, width=750, height=500, bg='gray22')
main_frame.pack(fill="both", expand=True)
With just that (plus the first couple of lines where you create the root window, along with the final call to mainloop), notice how the window is the right size, and the main frame fills the window. You can resize the window all you want and the main frame will continue to fill the whole window.
Step 2: widgets inside main_frame
As I mentioned earlier, it's best to separate widget creation and widget layout. Also, when using grid a good rule of thumb is to always give at least one row and one column a weight. It appears you want the right frame to be about 3x as wide as the left frame. This is where you can use weights.
# widgets in the main frame
main_title = Label(main_frame, text='App Builder', bg='gray', fg='red', font='Times 12 bold', relief=RIDGE)
preview_frame = Frame(main_frame, width=70, height=465, bg='red', highlightcolor='white', highlightthickness=2)
options_frame = Frame(main_frame, width=240, height=465, bg='blue', highlightcolor='white', highlightthickness=2)
# laying out the main frame
main_frame.grid_rowconfigure(1, weight=1)
main_frame.grid_columnconfigure(0, weight=1)
main_frame.grid_columnconfigure(1, weight=3)
main_title.grid(row=0, column=0, padx=2, pady=2, sticky="nsew", columnspan=2)
preview_frame.grid(row=1, column=0, padx=2, pady=2, sticky="nsew")
options_frame.grid(row=1, column=1, padx=2, pady=2, sticky="nsew")
Once again, run the code and notice that as you resize the main window everything still continues to fill the window, and resize properly, and keep the proper proportions. If you don't like the proportions, just change the weights. They can be any number you want. For example, you could use 70 and 240 if you want.
Step 3: preview frame
The preview frame has a label, and I presume you will be putting other stuff under the label. We'll continue to use grid, and just give the row below the label a weight so that it gets all of the extra space. When you add more widgets, you might need to adjust accordingly.
# widgets in the preview frame
preview_frame_title = Label(preview_frame, text="Preview Window", bg='gray', fg='blue', relief=RIDGE)
# laying out the preview frame
preview_frame.grid_rowconfigure(1, weight=1)
preview_frame.grid_columnconfigure(0, weight=1)
preview_frame_title.grid(row=0, column=0, sticky="nsew")
Step 4: the options frame
This is just like the preview frame: a label at the top, and all of the extra space is given to the empty row number 1.
# widgets in the options frame
options_frame_title = Label(options_frame, text='Widget Options', bg='gray', fg='blue', anchor=CENTER, relief=RIDGE)
# laying out the options frame
options_frame.grid_rowconfigure(1, weight=1)
options_frame.grid_columnconfigure(0, weight=1)
options_frame_title.grid(row=0, column=0, sticky="new")
Final thoughs
Notice that you don't need to worry about propagation, which is somewhat of an advanced topic. You also don't have to worry about the size of frames since we're using column weights to give relative sizes, and you don't have to give sizes to their labels.
We have removed the propagation code, removed the non-resizable behavior, and removed some hard-coded widths, giving us less code but more functionality.
Ok after some digging I realized the problem was not with your options_frame_title but with your frames the Label was being placed in.
Of you un-comment options_frame_title and comment out preview_frame_title you will see the exact same problem. What is happening is the frame has a set size and the main window is conforming to that frame size. And when you decide to place a label into the frame then the frame will conform to the label size.
What you want to do to achieve the look you are going for is do something a little different with the .grid_propagate(0) than what you are currently doing.
We also need to add some weights to the correct frames so the widgets will fill properly.
Take a look at this code.
from tkinter import *
blank_app = Tk()
main_frame = Frame(blank_app,width=700, height=300, bg='gray22')
main_frame.grid(row=0, column=0, sticky=NSEW)
main_frame.grid_propagate(0) #the only place you need to use propagate(0) Thought there are better ways
main_frame.columnconfigure(0, weight = 1) #using weights to manage frames properly helps a lot here
main_frame.columnconfigure(1, weight = 1)
main_frame.rowconfigure(0, weight = 0)
main_frame.rowconfigure(1, weight = 1)
main_title = Label(main_frame, text='App Builder', bg='gray', fg='red', font='Times 12 bold', relief=RIDGE)
main_title.grid(row=0, column=0, columnspan=2, padx=2, pady=2, sticky=NSEW)
preview_frame = Frame(main_frame, bg='red', highlightcolor='white', highlightthickness=2)
preview_frame.grid(row=1, column=0, padx=2, pady=2, sticky=NSEW)
preview_frame.columnconfigure(0, weight = 1)# using weights to manage frames properly helps a lot here
preview_frame_title = Label(preview_frame, text='Preview Window', bg='gray', fg='blue', relief=RIDGE)
preview_frame_title.grid(row=0, column=0, sticky=NSEW)
options_frame = Frame(main_frame, bg='blue', highlightcolor='white', highlightthickness=2)
options_frame.grid(row=1, column=1, padx=2, pady=2, sticky=NSEW)
options_frame.columnconfigure(0, weight = 1) #using weights to manage frames properly helps a lot here
options_frame_title = Label(options_frame, text='Widget Options', bg='gray', fg='blue', anchor=CENTER, relief=RIDGE)
options_frame_title.grid(row=0, column=0, sticky=NSEW)
blank_app.mainloop()