from PyQt4 import QtGui from PyQt4.QtCore import QThread, SIGNAL import sys import design import urllib2 import json import time class getPostsThread(QThread): def __init__(self, subreddits): """ Make a new thread instance with the specified subreddits as the first argument. The subreddits argument will be stored in an instance variable called subreddits which then can be accessed by all other class instance functions :param subreddits: A list of subreddit names :type subreddits: list """ QThread.__init__(self) self.subreddits = subreddits def __del__(self): self.wait() def _get_top_post(self, subreddit): """ Return a pre-formatted string with top post title, author, and subreddit name from the subreddit passed as the only required argument. :param subreddit: A valid subreddit name :type subreddit: str :return: A string with top post title, author, and subreddit name from that subreddit. :rtype: str """ url = "https://www.reddit.com/r/{}.json?limit=1".format(subreddit) headers = {'User-Agent': 'nikolak@outlook.com tutorial code'} request = urllib2.Request(url, headers=headers) response = urllib2.urlopen(request) data = json.load(response) top_post = data['data']['children'][0]['data'] return "'{title}' by {author} in {subreddit}".format(**top_post) def run(self): """ Go over every item in the self.subreddits list (which was supplied during __init__) and for every item assume it's a string with valid subreddit name and fetch the top post using the _get_top_post method from reddit. Store the result in a local variable named top_post and then emit a SIGNAL add_post(QString) where QString is equal to the top_post variable that was set by the _get_top_post function. """ for subreddit in self.subreddits: top_post = self._get_top_post(subreddit) self.emit(SIGNAL('add_post(QString)'), top_post) self.sleep(2) class ThreadingTutorial(QtGui.QMainWindow, design.Ui_MainWindow): """ How the basic structure of PyQt GUI code looks and behaves like is explained in this tutorial http://nikolak.com/pyqt-qt-designer-getting-started/ """ def __init__(self): super(self.__class__, self).__init__() self.setupUi(self) self.btn_start.clicked.connect(self.start_getting_top_posts) def start_getting_top_posts(self): # Get the subreddits user entered into an QLineEdit field # this will be equal to '' if there is no text entered subreddit_list = str(self.edit_subreddits.text()).split(',') if subreddit_list == ['']: # since ''.split(',') == [''] we use that to check # whether there is anything there to fetch from # and if not show a message and abort QtGui.QMessageBox.critical(self, "No subreddits", "You didn't enter any subreddits.", QtGui.QMessageBox.Ok) return # Set the maximum value of progress bar, can be any int and it will # be automatically converted to x/100% values # e.g. max_value = 3, current_value = 1, the progress bar will show 33% self.progress_bar.setMaximum(len(subreddit_list)) # Setting the value on every run to 0 self.progress_bar.setValue(0) # We have a list of subreddits which we use to create a new getPostsThread # instance and we pass that list to the thread self.get_thread = getPostsThread(subreddit_list) # Next we need to connect the events from that thread to functions we want # to be run when those signals get fired # Adding post will be handeled in the add_post method and the signal that # the thread will emit is SIGNAL("add_post(QString)") # the rest is same as we can use to connect any signal self.connect(self.get_thread, SIGNAL("add_post(QString)"), self.add_post) # This is pretty self explanatory # regardless of whether the thread finishes or the user terminates it # we want to show the notification to the user that adding is done # and regardless of whether it was terminated or finished by itself # the finished signal will go off. So we don't need to catch the # terminated one specifically, but we could if we wanted. self.connect(self.get_thread, SIGNAL("finished()"), self.done) # We have all the events we need connected we can start the thread self.get_thread.start() # At this point we want to allow user to stop/terminate the thread # so we enable that button self.btn_stop.setEnabled(True) # And we connect the click of that button to the built in # terminate method that all QThread instances have self.btn_stop.clicked.connect(self.get_thread.terminate) # We don't want to enable user to start another thread while this one is # running so we disable the start button. self.btn_start.setEnabled(False) def add_post(self, post_text): """ Add the text that's given to this function to the list_submissions QListWidget we have in our GUI and increase the current value of progress bar by 1 :param post_text: text of the item to add to the list :type post_text: str """ self.list_submissions.addItem(post_text) self.progress_bar.setValue(self.progress_bar.value()+1) def done(self): """ Show the message that fetching posts is done. Disable Stop button, enable the Start one and reset progress bar to 0 """ self.btn_stop.setEnabled(False) self.btn_start.setEnabled(True) self.progress_bar.setValue(0) QtGui.QMessageBox.information(self, "Done!", "Done fetching posts!") def main(): app = QtGui.QApplication(sys.argv) form = ThreadingTutorial() form.show() app.exec_() if __name__ == '__main__': main()