Python tkinter - how to send StringVar() content to Scrolled Text box using grid() and using procedural code

Question

Aspects of this question have most certainly been asked before, but not altogether.

[using Python 3.7.1]

Most of it works fine, but the display of scrolling textboxes is just not working... they expand southwards, and the scrollbar sliders never appear.

Never mind that the boxes and labels are too spaced apart.

Whilst it would probably be better to start again, with classes and use pack(), for the sake of understanding better, I would like to see if there's a way to make this work with grid() in a procedural way.

I can't quite get it over the line...

rtmiss = StringVar()

...

# COMMENT: Scrolled Text boxes
scrolledtext1_box=ScrolledText(framemain,width=30,height=10)
scrolledtext1_box.grid(sticky='n',row=5,column=0,rowspan=1,columnspan=1)
ttk.Label(scrolledtext1_box, anchor='w', width=20, text='placeholder', style='TLabel').grid(column=1, row=0, padx=0, pady=0)
tdiff_label = ttk.Entry(scrolledtext1_box, width=20, textvariable=tdiff)
scrolledtext1_box.insert(1.0, chars="anything")
tdiff_label.grid(column=0, row=5, columnspan=1, padx=1, pady=1)

no idea why this is so difficult. It's not the same as just inserting some free text into a textbox and adding a scrollbar.

tdiff_labelframe = ttk.LabelFrame(framemain, text='Title')
tdiff_labelframe.grid(column=0, row=5, padx=8, pady=4)
scrol_w  = 30
scrol_h  =  3
scrolledtext1_box = scrolledtext.ScrolledText(tdiff_labelframe, width=scrol_w, height=scrol_h, wrap=tk.WORD)
scrolledtext1_box.grid(sticky='nw',row=5,column=0,rowspan=1,columnspan=1)
tdiff_labelframe = ttk.Entry(framemain, width=20, textvariable=tdiff)
tdiff_entry = ttk.Entry(scrolledtext1_box, width=12, textvariable=tdiff)
tdiff_entry.grid(column=0, row=5)

I looked inside the Class Entry(Widget, XView) stuff...

    def insert(self, index, string):
        """Insert STRING at INDEX."""

You can insert a string, as most examples will show you, as "my string", and I am able to get the contents of a StringVar into the text box, but only as a contiguous string, with no scrolling.

In the form in the codesnippet above...

tk.Tk()= myframe(root)
my_stringvar = stringvar()
my_labelframe = ttk.LabelFrame(my_frame, text='My Text')
my_labelframe = Entry(my_frame, textvariable = my_stringvar)

The scrolled stuff seems to be on a different "layer". The two blocks of code seem to be unconnected: apart from the scrolledtext function variable referring to the labelframe, which just sticks it onto that layer.

my_scrollheight = 20
my_scrollwidth = 10
my_scrolledtext = scrolledtext.ScrolledText(my_labelframe, width=my_scrollwidth, height=my_scrollheight, wrap=tk.WORD)
my_scrolledtext.grid(row=0,column=0,sticky='news')

So is the StringVar just being inserted into the Frame, above the LabelFrame layer, and thus not being "seen" by the scrolledtext part?

Answer 1

I have a partial answer to this, that I happened upon myself, but it creates a new problem. Before I could print the filepath, but not get the file contents to print and scroll; now it's the other way round.

I started off with this code: Button errors in Tkinter - Selecting files, adding their paths ...trimmed it down to bare bones and one of each thing; then added my own junk, and eventually I accidentally made it work.

The solution to getting the text into a scrolled text widget, as in the question "how to send StringVar() content to Scrolled Text box using grid() and using procedural code?" is this:

def forkscroll():
    mylabelframe = tk.LabelFrame(myframe, text='My Long Text:').pack()
    scroll_w = 30
    scroll_h = 10
    myscrolledtext = scrolledtext.ScrolledText(mylabelframe, width=scroll_w, height=scroll_h, wrap=tk.WORD)
    myscrolledtext.vbar.config(width=20)
    myscrolledtext.grid(sticky='news', row=6, column=0, rowspan=1, columnspan=1, padx=5, pady=5)

# Open a dialogue; select and load a text file; read the text file directly into the scrolledtext widget (box)
    fork = open(filedialog.askopenfilename(), 'r') # it's the same as "infile" above; but it's not a string
    myscrolledtext.insert(tk.END, fork.read()) ### This reads the content of "fork" into the scrolledtext widget

...mainly those bottom two lines.

I then go on to put the file path of the selected text file into an Entry widget, but I can't get it to work... the best I could do was to keep the browsefunc and open the file twice... once for the path, and once for the contents... which is obviously a rubbish bodge.

    forkit = StringVar()
    forkit.set(fork.get())
    mynormaltext = Text(mylabelframe, width = 10, height = 1, wrap=tk.WORD)
    mynormaltext.grid(sticky='news', row=5, column=0, rowspan=1, columnspan=1, padx=5, pady=5)
    mynormaltext.insert(tk.END, forkit.get())

# Even though it does the same thing in one line as it does in three, the outcome is not the same for scrolledtext
#    forkname = filedialog.askopenfilename()
#    forkfile = open(forkname, 'r')
#    fork = forkfile.read()

# above... "fork" is a textIO, but Text can read it...

The best I can do, is get the content of the text file to fill the scrolledtext widget, and to print "<_IO.TextWrapper", as in the attached image. That's a bit better than just printing "PYVAR4" or something. I have tried converting the "TextIO" or "PathLike" file into a string to inset it; I've tried doing set()/get(), and read() and lambda and tried putting things in different functions, and inputting and returning things, all sorts to try and get the filepath out again, but not really getting anywhere.

At least I've become more familiar with what some things do, and how, but I think I've hit a wall with the total solution, which is:

1. present 2 labels with 2 buttons each with a field: one as a text widget field; and scrolledtext widget field.
2. to click a button to browse to a text file, and read it into memory, and print its path into the text widget field
3. to click the other button, and print the contents of the same file into the scrolledtext field, and have it present within the frame, with a nice long scrollbar.