Creating a choicelist dialog box with tkinter

Question

I am trying to make using tkinter a function similar to buttonbox of easygui (http://easygui.sourceforge.net/tutorial.html#buttonbox) which I should be able to call from both console and gui applications:

from tkinter import *
def mychoicebox(choicelist): 
    def buttonfn(): 
        return var.get()
    choicewin = Tk()
    choicewin.resizable(False, False)
    choicewin.title("ChoiceBox")

    Label(choicewin, text="Select an item:").grid(row=0, column=0, sticky="W")

    var = StringVar(choicewin)
    var.set('No data') # default option
    popupMenu = OptionMenu(choicewin, var, *choicelist)
    popupMenu.grid(sticky=N+S+E+W, row =1, column = 0)

    Button(choicewin, text='Done', command=buttonfn).grid(row=2, column=0)
    choicewin.mainloop()

Testing:

reply = mychoicebox(['one','two','three'])
print("reply:", reply)

It creates a window with label, choicelist and buttons but it does not return the selected item when "Done" button is pressed. How can I make this work?

score 1 · Answer 1 · answered Oct 09 '22 at 19:09

Minor modifications will make it work like you want. The result was getting returned by the button function, but not by the outer function. By making it global within your function, the outer function is able to return it. Note: you must also break out of the mainloop for the outer function to complete:

from tkinter import *

def mychoicebox(choicelist):
    global result

    def buttonfn():
        global result
        result = var.get()
        choicewin.quit()

    choicewin = Tk()
    choicewin.resizable(False, False)
    choicewin.title("ChoiceBox")

    Label(choicewin, text="Select an item:").grid(row=0, column=0, sticky="W")

    var = StringVar(choicewin)
    var.set("No data")  # default option
    popupMenu = OptionMenu(choicewin, var, *choicelist)
    popupMenu.grid(sticky=N + S + E + W, row=1, column=0)

    Button(choicewin, text="Done", command=buttonfn).grid(row=2, column=0)
    choicewin.mainloop()
    return result

# Testing:

reply = mychoicebox(["one", "two", "three"])
print("reply:", reply)

Ron Norris · Accepted Answer · 2018-05-26T04:10:46.817

0

It's a bit rearranged into a class, but is this what you were wanting to do?

from tkinter import *

class Choices:

    def __init__(self, parent, choicelist):

        Label(choicewin, text="Select an item:").grid(row=0, column=0, sticky="W")

        self.var = StringVar()
        self.var.set('No data') # default option
        popupMenu = OptionMenu(choicewin, self.var, *choicelist)
        popupMenu.grid(sticky=N+S+E+W, row =1, column = 0)

        Button(choicewin, text='Done', command=self.buttonfn).grid(row=2, column=0)

    def buttonfn(self): 
        print(self.var.get())

if __name__ == '__main__':
    choicewin = Tk()
    choicewin.resizable(False, False)
    choicewin.title("ChoiceBox")
    app = Choices(choicewin, ['one','two','three'])
    choicewin.mainloop()

edited May 26 '18 at 04:10

answered May 26 '18 at 03:50

Ron Norris

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There should be indentation below `class choices:` – rnso May 26 '18 at 04:07
Good catch. fixed. Had some insert troubles initially and didn't catch the indentation mess up. – Ron Norris May 26 '18 at 04:11
This doesn't return a value, it only prints it. The question seems to be specifically about returning the value from a function call. – Bryan Oakley May 26 '18 at 05:36
Yes, I want to have a simple function that shows a choicebox and returns selected item. – rnso May 26 '18 at 06:19
@rnso Added an answer that only required minimal changes to your original attempt. – RufusVS Oct 10 '22 at 02:42
Very nice coding. – rnso Oct 10 '22 at 03:47

Creating a choicelist dialog box with tkinter

2 Answers2