[Tutor] web applications?? (original) (raw)

Magnus Lyckå magnus at thinkware.se
Fri Jul 16 13:43:32 CEST 2004

At 14:09 2004-07-15 -0700, Jeff Peery wrote:

hello, I would like to put my wxpython application up on the web for our customers to use. I don't want them to download it because it's sort of a one time use application. they just need it to calculate a number they need to use our products.

If we're talking vanilla MS Windows, wxPython applications can only run locally. There are certainly ways to run such applications remotely (e.g. Citrix or VNC), but in Windows that will require other installation efforts, lead to more security issues to consider, and possibly require expansive licenses.

In Unix it's much simpler (using X), but there are still serious security issues here.

Is it possible to just execute my wxpython application from our server? or do I need to write the application in some sort of web-python variation.

Not if you are talking about WWW.

One option which might be viable (but I haven't really done that) is to use Jython and Java's Swing for the user interface. Then you might be able to make your program into a Java applet.

For a more traditional web solution, you might want to look at Quixote http://www.mems-exchange.org/software/quixote/ etc.

A solution which only assumes a vanilla web browser on the client side is certainly a good thing, unless you know for sure what platforms your users use when they want to run this thingie...

If customers can simply execute the application from the web, how do I learn about how to set this up - is it as simple as uploading the executable and creating a link?

The simplest way out might be to use something like cx_Freeze or py2exe to make your application into a single executable (and possibly a few dlls). That way it's a small effort do download, install and run the program. You certainly don't want to force them to download and install first Python and then wxPython before they get to your app...

If there is data on a central server, you can certainly write your wxPython application so that it accesses data from your server across the web.

But if all they need to do is to calculate a number, I guess they don't need a full featured GUI.

-- Magnus Lycka (It's really Lyckå), magnus at thinkware.se Thinkware AB, Sweden, www.thinkware.se I code Python ~ The Agile Programming Language

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