pyvfx-boilerplate

A boilerplate for creating PyQt4/PySide and PyQt5/PySide2 applications running in Maya, Nuke or completely standalone.

Documentation

Version 2.x

Changes from 1.0

Complete rewrite of the boilerplate.
Requires (and bundles) the Qt.py
Tested with Python 2.7.11 and 3.5.1.
Uses PySide.QUiTools instead of pysideuic, which was used in v1.0.
No longer uses the complex "wrap instance" approach in favor for simpler code. Because of this, UIs are no longer loaded into self.
Maya palette styling in standalone mode.
Git repo name change: all lowercase.
Pretty much PEP8 compliant.
Properly parented window in Maya
Writing of .pyc (bytecode) files disabled to prevent issues between Python 2 and 3.
Can be run in multiple ways (see examples).

Noteworthy known issues

Does not work with Nuke 10.0v1 on OS X: #7
Maya palette glitchy in standalone mode with PySide/PyQt4 on OS X (disabled by default): #9
Window will not stay on top of Nuke (OS X) without Qt.Tool or Qt.WindowStaysOnTopHint: #12

Installation

Clone the git repository:

git clone https://github.com/fredrikaverpil/pyvfx-boilerplate.git

Edit boilerplate.py to make the REPO_PATH point to the location where you cloned the repository.

Example usage

Run as standalone:

python boilerplate.py

Run in script editor of Maya or Nuke:

import sys
sys.path.append('/path/to/pyvfx-boilerplate')
import boilerplate

boilerplate.run_maya()  # or boilerplate.run_nuke()

You can also copy-paste the boilerplate.py contents into the script editor of Maya or Nuke and just execute it. Make sure you set the paths first in the boilerplate.py config.

Modifying the boilerplate

Open up boilerplate.py and scroll down to the # Configuration section and review the settings.
Rename every occurance of boil in the code to reflect a unique name for your application.
Change the class Boilerplate to your heart's content!

Development guidelines

Since the boilerplate relies on Qt.py, you should design your application as if you were designing it for PyQt5/PySide2. This means creating widgets using QtWidgets rather than QtGui. The Qt.py module takes care of the remapping and makes for compatibility with PyQt4/PySide. Read more over at the Qt.py repository.

Tip: when you cannot rely on Qt.py, create an issue (probably over at Qt.py) and/or detect which binding is being used and write some custom code:

from Qt import QtCompat

if QtCompat.__binding__ in ('PyQt4', 'PySide'):
    # Do something if PyQt4 or PySide is used

if QtCompat__binding.startswith('PySide'):
    # Do something if PySide or PySide2 is used

if QtCompat__binding == 'PySide2':
    # Do something if PySide2 is used

Issues

Something wrong, have a question or wish to file a feature request?

Open up an issue here!

Contribute

If you wish to contribute, pull requests are more than welcome!

juggernate/pyvfx-boilerplate