fpm VS Eel

If you ever revisit that decision, check out FPM. It can shave off a few of the rough edges related to packaging: https://github.com/jordansissel/fpm

The easiest way is probably FPM: https://fpm.readthedocs.io/en/latest/

There is definitely a lot more to building a proper package for wider distribution, but there are some great tools out there for folks wanting to get into it that make it more approachable. I've done my fair share with fpm when learning how the proverbial sausage is made.

Check out https://github.com/jordansissel/fpm

I use RedHat based environments for work. I've had good success creating my own yum repo and building RPM packages with Effing package management. FPM can handle packages for most distros so if you want to publish a linux app it is an easy way to provide it in multiple formats.

I gave up a long time ago attempting to write GUIs in pure python. I've come back to them periodically to see if the landscape has changed, but I'm always disappointed.

My current go-to python GUI solution is to use the Eel library. It renders GUIs in a web-browser like window with HTMl/CSS/JS.It lets you expose your python functions to JavaScript, so data can be easily transferred back and forth between the python and the JavaScript. And since it's just web-dev, it's pretty easy to make things look and feel good enough. Any other web-dev libraries like bootstrap and jquery can be used. It works pretty well for writing GUIs that put data analysis tools in front of my colleagues.

https://github.com/python-eel/Eel

Eel was used to implement the app and communication with the web interface.

I am calling a function from Python using eel and taking the return value. Python functions are asynchronous with JavaScript by nature. This code is combined with other variables to determine if the form can continue. allFilled() is called everytime the form field changes.

In the past, I've used QT4 and QT Designer. It was okay. It was a small mountain to climb for myself then - but certainly doable. However, there was a lot of generated code that wasn't the most concise thing. Today, I discovered Eel. Since I used QT4 in the past, I've done some web dev. Certainly, not proficient there. But Eel wasn't as big of a hurdle. In fact, it took me a fraction of the time because it is much like creating a basic website. Where there's an abundance of tutorials and tips out there for everything imaginable. Instead of downloading and adding a font, clicking through a bunch of dialogs. I just linked a Google font and updated the CSS. Stuff like that.

If you don't want a web-app, you can still use JS for GUI, using something like python-eel https://github.com/python-eel/Eel