Dabo Runtime Engine

The Dabo Runtime Engine is a single executable file that is packaged with all the supporting libraries it needs to run Dabo applications. Now you don't have to install Python/wxPython/MySQLdb/etc. in order to run Dabo; simply install the engine, and you will be able to run complete Dabo apps.

As of November 2006, this is only available on Windows. We're working on other platforms, too!

Windows Instructions

• The Windows version comes in the form of an Installer. Run the installer, place the files wherever you like (personally, I hate using Program Files).
• In the directory you've chosen will be a file named daborun.exe - this is the main application for the engine. There will also be several folders: one named dabo, which contains the framework code; demo, which contains several demonstration programs we've put together; ide, which contains the visual tools used to create and modify Dabo applications; and Common, which contains several double-clickable shortcuts to the main programs you would use with Dabo.
• To run a file, you can either open a DOS session and type: '[path]/daborun.exe myPythonScript.py' (if you want to run the main function of the script), or '[path]/daborun.exe myPythonScript.py method' if you want to launch a particular method in that file. Or, if you have an aversion to the command-line way of doing things, just drop the file onto the desktop icon for the Dabo Runtime Engine. Or right-click on the file you want to run, and select Open With... from the menu. If "Dabo Runtime Engine" isn't one of your choices, select Choose Program..., and then select daborun.exe from the Other... button.
• Things should just work. If they don't, please retrace your steps, write down just what happened, and send your observations to the dabo-users list. This is still very much a development effort, and we welcome the chance to make this work better!
• One more cool thing: when you have your app running, you can press Ctrl-D to open up a Command Window, which allows you to interact with a running app; if you're familiar with VisualFoxPro, you'll recognize this concept right away. It's the best way to interact with a running app. It features Intellisense, code completion, call tips, and lots of other cool stuff.

And since Dabo is very much a work-in-progress, there will be frequent updates. There is no need to wait for the next release of the complete runtime engine; instead, grab one of the source code updates, and unzip it over the dabo directory in your runtime folder to get the latest version of the framework. You can update the demo and ide directories the same way.

Here is a modified version of the setup.py used to build the Runtime Engine. Normally we exclude all Dabo files from the engine itself, so that you can update them as new releases come out, but you probably won't want to do that with your app, so I've removed the options to exclude Dabo. This can be an excellent starting point for use with your own project.

from distutils.core import setup
import glob
import py2exe


setup(
        # The first three parameters are not required, if at least a
        # 'version' is given, then a versioninfo resource is built from
        # them and added to the executables.
        version = "0.7",
        description = "Dabo Runtime Engine",
        name = "daborun",
        # targets to build
#        console = ["daborun.py"],
       windows = ["daborun.py"],
        #exclude the actual framework
        options = { "py2exe": 
                        {"includes" : ["ConfigParser", "threading", "mx.DateTime", "platform", 
                                "winpdb", "pydoc", "PIL"],
                        "excludes" : ["Tkconstants", "Tkinter", "tcl", "_imagingtk", "PIL._imagingtk", 
                                "ImageTk", "PIL.ImageTk", "FixTk"],
                        "packages" : ["MySQLdb", "encodings", "kinterbasdb", "pysqlite2",
                                "psycopg2", "wx.gizmos", "wx.lib.calendar", "wx.lib.foldpanelbar", 
                                "wx.lib.hyperlink", "wx.lib.masked", "wx.lib.buttons", 
                                "reportlab"]} },
        )

# To build, run:
#
# python setup.py py2exe --bundle 1