from IPython.html import widgets # Widget definitions
from IPython.display import display # Used to display widgets in the notebook
CSS¶
When trying to design an attractive widget GUI, styling becomes important. Widget views are DOM (document object model) elements that can be controlled with CSS. There are two helper methods defined on widget that allow the manipulation of the widget's CSS. The first is the set_css method, whos doc string is displayed below. This method allows one or more CSS attributes to be set at once.
print(widgets.Widget.set_css.__doc__)
The second is get_css which allows CSS attributes that have been set to be read. Note that this method will only read CSS attributes that have been set using the set_css method. get_css's doc string is displayed below.
print(widgets.Widget.get_css.__doc__)
Below is an example that applies CSS attributes to a container to emphasize text.
container = widgets.ContainerWidget()
# set_css used to set a single CSS attribute.
container.set_css('border', '3px solid black') # Border the container
# set_css used to set multiple CSS attributes.
container.set_css({'padding': '6px', # Add padding to the container
'background': 'yellow'}) # Fill the container yellow
label = widgets.StringWidget(default_view_name="LabelView", parent=container)
label.value = "<strong>ALERT: </strong> Hello World!"
display(container)
DOM Classes¶
In some cases it's necessary to apply DOM classes to your widgets. DOM classes allow DOM elements to be indentified by Javascript and CSS. The notebook defines its own set of classes to stylize its elements. The add_class widget method allows you to add DOM classes to your widget's definition. The add_class method's doc string can be seen below.
print(widgets.Widget.add_class.__doc__)
Since add_class if a DOM operation, it will only affect widgets that have been displayed. add_class must be called after the widget has been displayed. Extending the example above, the corners of the container can be rounded by adding the corner-all notebook class to the container (as seen below).
container = widgets.ContainerWidget()
container.set_css({'border': '3px solid black',
'padding': '6px',
'background': 'yellow'})
label = widgets.StringWidget(default_view_name="LabelView", parent=container)
label.value = "<strong>ALERT: </strong> Hello World!"
display(container)
container.add_class('corner-all') # Must be called AFTER display
The IPython notebook uses bootstrap for styling. The example above can be simplified by using a bootstrap class (as seen below). Bootstrap documentation can be found at http://getbootstrap.com/%E2%80%8E .
label = widgets.StringWidget(value = "<strong>ALERT: </strong> Hello World!")
display(label, view_name="LabelView")
# Apply twitter bootstrap alert class to the label.
label.add_class("alert")
The example below shows how bootstrap classes can be used to change button apearance.
# List of the bootstrap button styles
button_classes = ['Default', 'btn-primary', 'btn-info', 'btn-success',
'btn-warning', 'btn-danger', 'btn-inverse', 'btn-link']
# Create each button and apply the style. Also add margin to the buttons so they space
# themselves nicely.
for i in range(8):
button = widgets.ButtonWidget(description=button_classes[i])
button.set_css("margin", "5px")
display(button)
if i > 0: # Don't add a class the first button.
button.add_class(button_classes[i])
It's also useful to be able to remove DOM classes from widgets. The remove_class widget method allows you to remove classes from widgets that have been displayed. Like add_widget, it must be called after the widget has been displayed. The doc string of remove_class can be seen below.
print(widgets.Widget.remove_class.__doc__)
The example below animates an alert using different bootstrap styles.
import time
label = widgets.StringWidget(value = "<strong>ALERT: </strong> Hello World!")
display(label, view_name="LabelView")
# Apply twitter bootstrap alert class to the label.
label.add_class("alert")
# Animate through additional bootstrap label styles 3 times
additional_alert_styles = ['alert-error', 'alert-info', 'alert-success']
for i in range(3 * len(additional_alert_styles)):
label.add_class(additional_alert_styles[i % 3])
label.remove_class(additional_alert_styles[(i-1) % 3])
time.sleep(1)