QTrio - a library bringing Qt GUIs together with async and await via Trio

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Distribution	PyPI

Introduction

Note:

This library is in early development. It works. It has tests. It has documentation. Expect breaking changes as we explore a clean API. By paying this price you get the privilege to provide feedback via GitHub issues to help shape our future. :]

The QTrio project's goal is to bring the friendly concurrency of Trio using Python's async and await syntax together with the GUI features of Qt to enable more correct code and a more pleasant developer experience. QTrio is permissively licensed to avoid introducing restrictions beyond those of the underlying Python Qt library you choose. Both PySide2 and PyQt5 are supported.

By enabling use of async and await it is possible in some cases to write related code more concisely and clearly than you would get with the signal and slot mechanisms of Qt concurrency. In this set of small examples we will allow the user to input their name then use that input to generate an output message. The user will be able to cancel the input to terminate the program early. In the first example we will do it in the form of a classic "hello" console program. Well, classic plus a bit of boilerplate to allow explicit testing without using special external tooling. Then second, the form of a general Qt program implementing this same activity. And finally, the QTrio way.

# A complete runnable source file with imports and helpers is available in
# either the documentation readme examples or in the repository under
# qtrio/examples/readme/console.py.

def main(
    input_file: typing.TextIO = sys.stdin, output_file: typing.TextIO = sys.stdout
) -> None:
    try:
        output_file.write("What is your name? ")
        output_file.flush()
        name = input_file.readline()[:-1]
        output_file.write(f"Hi {name}, welcome to the team!\n")
    except KeyboardInterrupt:
        pass

Nice and concise, including the cancellation via ctrl+c. This is because we can stay in one scope thus using both local variables and a try/except block. This kind of explodes when you shift into a classic Qt GUI setup.

# A complete runnable source file with imports and helpers is available in
# either the documentation readme examples or in the repository under
# qtrio/examples/readme/qt.py.

class Main:
    def __init__(
        self,
        application: QtWidgets.QApplication,
        input_dialog: typing.Optional[QtWidgets.QInputDialog] = None,
        output_dialog: typing.Optional[QtWidgets.QMessageBox] = None,
    ):
        self.application = application

        if input_dialog is None:  # pragma: no cover
            input_dialog = create_input()

        if output_dialog is None:  # pragma: no cover
            output_dialog = create_output()

        self.input_dialog = input_dialog
        self.output_dialog = output_dialog

    def setup(self) -> None:
        self.input_dialog.accepted.connect(self.input_accepted)
        self.input_dialog.rejected.connect(self.input_rejected)

        self.input_dialog.show()

    def input_accepted(self) -> None:
        name = self.input_dialog.textValue()

        self.output_dialog.setText(f"Hi {name}, welcome to the team!")

        self.output_dialog.finished.connect(self.output_finished)
        self.output_dialog.show()

    def input_rejected(self) -> None:
        self.application.quit()

    def output_finished(self) -> None:
        self.application.quit()

The third example, below, shows how using async and await allows us to return to the more concise and clear description of the sequenced activity. Most of the code is just setup for testability with only the last four lines really containing the activity.

# A complete runnable source file with imports and helpers is available in
# either the documentation readme examples or in the repository under
# qtrio/examples/readme/qtrio_example.py.

async def main(
    *,
    task_status: trio_typing.TaskStatus[Dialogs] = trio.TASK_STATUS_IGNORED,
) -> None:
    dialogs = Dialogs()
    task_status.started(dialogs)

    with contextlib.suppress(qtrio.UserCancelledError):
        name = await dialogs.input.wait()
        dialogs.output.text = f"Hi {name}, welcome to the team!"
        await dialogs.output.wait()