View source for Differences Between PySide and PyQt


[[Category:LanguageBindings::PySide]]
'''English''' [[Differences Between PySide and PyQt SimplifiedChinese|简体中文]]



== API differences ==

=== Different import name (PySide instead of PyQt4) ===

PySide uses a different library name than PyQt. Instead of typing:

<code>
from PyQt4.QtCore import *
</code>

or

<code>
import PyQt4.QtCore
</code>

you have to do the following:

<code>
from PySide.QtCore import *
</code>
or
<code>
import PySide.QtCore
</code>
.

=== PySide only supports PyQt's "API 2" (PSEP 101) ===

PyQt provides [http://www.riverbankcomputing.co.uk/static/Docs/PyQt4/pyqt4ref.html#selecting-incompatible-apis two different APIs], the first of which provides <code>QStrings</code>, <code>QVariants</code>, etc as is in Python. The new API 2 provides automatic conversion between the Qt classes and respective native Python datatypes and is much more Pythonic in nature. PyQt on Python 2.x defaults to API 1, while PyQt on Python 3 defaults to API 2.

PySide only supports PyQt's API 2 (see [http://www.pyside.org/docs/pseps/psep-0101.html PSEP 101]) for details. Therefore Qt classes such as <code>QStrings</code>, <code>QStringLists</code>, and <code>QVariants</code> are not available on PySide. Instead, you should simply use native Python datatypes.

If you're porting code from PyQt, you might want to first modify the PyQt code to use API 2 (using a <code>sip.setapi(class,ver)</code> call before importing PyQt4), and only after getting that change working, change the imports to use PySide instead.

'''NB:''' Due to the API change, <code>QFileDialog.getOpenFileName</code> returns a tuple in PySide, which often is an issue when porting code from PyQt. See e.g. [http://bugs.openbossa.org/show_bug.cgi?id=343 bug 343].

=== New-style signals and slots use slightly different syntax (PSEP 100) ===

PyQt unfortunately uses an implementation-specific naming scheme for its new-style signal and slot classes:

<code>
# Define a new signal called 'trigger' that has no arguments.
trigger = QtCore.pyqtSignal()
</code>

As described in [http://www.pyside.org/docs/pseps/psep-0100.html PSEP 100], use <code>QtCore.Signal()</code> and <code>QtCore.Slot()</code> instead.

If you want to modify your PyQt code to use the PySide naming scheme, that can be done using a simple definition:

<code>
QtCore.Signal = QtCore.pyqtSignal
QtCore.Slot = QtCore.pyqtSlot
</code>
.

=== Declaring Qt Properties is done using a slightly different syntax (PSEP 103) ===

As with the signal/slot syntax change above, declaring Qt Properties is done using <code>QtCore</code>. Property instead of <code>QtCore.pyqtProperty</code> (see [http://www.pyside.org/docs/pseps/psep-0103.html PSEP 103]).

=== Tool names different ===

PySide uses different names for the tools scripts:

* pyuic4 -> pyside-uic
* pyrcc4-> pyside-rcc
* pylupdate4 -> pyside-lupdate

=== Property Names ===

PySide uses <code>connect</code> and <code>event</code> in the <code>QObject</code>. Do not use these for anything in your code, and when moving code from PyQt look for any that exist.

=== QThreads ===

In PySide you should <code>.wait()</code> on a thread after calling <code>.stop()</code> if you are quitting the application. Otherwise you may receive

<code>QThread: Destroyed while thread is still running
Segmentation fault</code>

== Differences in the functionality of the bindings ==

=== Bindings for functions deprecated before Qt 4.5 are not generated ===

Bindings for functions deprecated before Qt 4.5 are not generated in PySide.

If a function is not present in PySide, check the [http://doc.qt.io/ Qt Online Reference Documentation] and see whether the function has been deprecated and what to use instead.

Example bug: [http://bugs.openbossa.org/show_bug.cgi?id=359 bug 359]

For example, this affects functions such as <code>QColor.dark()</code> and <code>QColor.light()</code>, instead of which <code>QColor.darker()</code> and <code>QColor.lighter()</code> need to be used.

=== sender() method returns None when used within a partial or a lambda ===

If a lambda is used as a slot, <code>sender()</code> cannot be used to acquire the object that emitted the signal. This works in PyQt, but their implementation behaves incorrectly in certain situations. See [http://bugs.openbossa.org/show_bug.cgi?id=344 bug 344] for details.

=== When inheriting classes, parent class constructors need to be always called ===

PyQt in some cases allows code such as:

<code>
class Window(QtGui.QWidget):
 def ''init''(self, parent=None):
 super(QtGui.QWidget, self).''init''(parent)
 […]
</code>

in which the direct parent class constructor is not called. PySide expects you to do the right thing:

<code>
class Window(QtGui.QWidget):
 def ''init''(self, parent=None):
 super(Window, self).''init''(parent)
 […]
</code>

=== Old style signals need use of parentheses ===

PyQt allows the use of short-circuit signals without parentheses such as:

<code>
self.emit(SIGNAL ('text_changed_cb'), text)
</code>

Since this is an old and deprecated feature, and the effort to fix this is not worth it, we decided to not implement it. In PySide code you need to use something like:

<code>
self.emit(SIGNAL ('text_changed_cb(QString)'), text)
</code>

You can check the complete discussion on [http://bugs.pyside.org/show_bug.cgi?id=314 bug #314]

=== Only signals without arguments can be auto connected on constructor. ===

If you use:

<code>
action = QtGui.QAction(None, triggered=handler)
</code>

The triggered() signal will be connected to the slot handler instead of the triggered(bool) signal.

= Supporting Both APIs =

[https://github.com/epage/PythonUtils/blob/master/util/qt_compat.py qt_compat.py] is an example of centralizing the knowledge of PySide and PyQt without using monkey-patching. It serves both to point out what differences exist as well as keeping your code binding-agnostic. This is important for when needing to support both bindings, usually when transitioning from one to the other and needing to continue to support older distributions that do not yet come with PySide.

[https://github.com/ros-visualization/python_qt_binding python_qt_binding] is a Python package from the [http://www.ros.org ROS] middleware which gives a more extensive example of how to keep your code agnostic of the actual Python-Qt binding used. It offers a very transparent abstraction, allowing you to write standard import lines like <code>from python_qt_binding.QtCore import QObject</code> Furthermore it provides a substitute '''loadUi''' function for simple loading of ui files that work the same with both bindings. For usage examples see [https://github.com/ros-visualization/rqt rqt_gui]

= Converting PyQt4 code to PySide =