Get started with Python / GTK3 / PyGObject in Ubuntu

 I found myself needing to make a GUI tool for work using a recent version of Ubuntu. These are the steps I followed.

*Install Ubuntu packages needed

sudo apt install pkg-config libglib2.0-dev libgtk-3-dev libgirepository1.0-dev;

You should already have python3 by default.

Note, in Ubuntu 20 you may also need these packages as well for the pycairo/wheels dependency:

sudo apt install libcairo2-dev python3-dev;

*Create a virtual env and set permissions

(Note: You will need to install the package for pip3 for python 3 if it is not already installed)

Choose a location on your machine to hold your python virtualenv, e.g mine will be "/opt/python3".

Find your python 3 path, e.g.

which python3

- mine is /usr/bin/python3

pip3 install virtualenv;

sudo mkdir -p /opt/py3env;

sudo chown scott:scott -R /opt/py3env;

sudo chmod 777 -R /opt/py3env;

virtualenv -p /usr/bin/python3 /opt/py3env;

*Start using the new virtualenv

source /opt/py3env//bin/activate;

pip install --upgrade pip

*Install PyGObject in the virtualenv

pip install pygobject

See the output: 

Successfully installed pycairo-1.20.0 pygobject-3.38.0

*Try a "hello world" program

Save this code in an editor, e.g. as a file named "hello_world.py": 

#!/usr/bin/env python

import gi

gi.require_version("Gtk", "3.0")

from gi.repository import Gtk

window = Gtk.Window(title="Hello World")

window.show()

window.connect("destroy", Gtk.main_quit)

Gtk.main()

*Run the program on the command line:

python hello_world.py

You should see a small GUI window appear! (You might need to stretch it to see its title bar "Hello World")

OctoberCMS Get Up & Go Guide

OctoberCMS is a neat project for creating online content, written in PHP. I recently had to restart some projects I made with it on a new laptop, so I've made this post basically so I don't have to remember the steps all over again.

Below are some instructions (mainly just for myself) on getting up and running with OctoberCMS on a local machine. This assumes you are using a recent version of Ubuntu and have LAMP installed already.

Create an empty MySQL database

Enter these MySQL commands:
create database test_october1;
create user oct_user@localhost identified by 'enter_password_here';
use test_october1;
grant all on test_october1.* to oct_user@localhost;
flush privileges;

Install required PHP packages:

sudo apt-get update && sudo apt-get install php php-ctype php-curl php-xml php-fileinfo php-gd php-json php-mbstring php-mysql php-sqlite3

Download the OctoberCMS installer file

The local web directory I'm going to be using is just:
/home/scott/ws/php/october_projects/toct1

In a browser, go to octobercms.com/download
Unzip the install-master.zip file
Then copy its contents to your web directory, e.g.:
cp -r /home/scott/Downloads/octobercms/install-master/* .

Set directory permissions:
chown scott:www-data -R october_projects/;
chmod 770 -R october_projects

Set up a virtualhost for the OctoberCMS site using Apache

mkdir /etc/apache2/logging/;
chown -R www-data:www-data /etc/apache2/logging/;
chmod 770 -R /etc/apache2/logging/;

cd /etc/apache2/sites-available/;
nano testoct.localhost.conf

Type this:

<VirtualHost *:80>
 ServerAdmin username@abcs.co.nz
 DocumentRoot "/home/scott/ws/php/october_projects/toct1"
 ServerName testoct.localhost
 ServerAlias www.testoct.localhost
 <Directory "/home/scott/ws/php/october_projects/toct1">
 Options Indexes FollowSymLinks Includes ExecCGI
 AllowOverride All
 Require all granted
 </Directory>
 ErrorLog "logging/testoct-error.log"
 CustomLog "logging/testoct-access.log" common
</VirtualHost>

sudo a2ensite testoct.localhost;
sudo systemctl reload apache2;

sudo nano /etc/hosts

Enter this:
127.0.0.1       testoct.localhost

Run the Install wizard 

In a browser, test this by going to:
http://testoct.localhost/install.php

This will start an install wizard
- you will see a checks screen. If all is OK, push Continue

- Enter the database details and set up the administrator credentials. Continue 

 

- On the last step, click Start from scratch. This will create an empty installation with a simple demo theme.

 

You can see a demo page at:

http://testoct.localhost

Go to the admin section:
http://testoct.localhost/backend
-log in
-if you get an error trying to go to the admin page, you might need to enable mode_rewrite for Apache:
sudo a2enmod rewrite

 

 

Create content! 

I suggest you can then add some static pages. A good tutorial is here:
https://www.sitepoint.com/getting-started-with-october-cms-static-pages/

 

 Here's a screenshot of my first OctoberCMS page using my own partials showing up (oh the great CSS, haha):

Get Netbeans browser debugging going with PHP and Xdebug

This was done with Ubuntu v.19.10 and Netbeans v.11.
-got this going in both Firefox and Chromium browsers



Make sure xdebug is installed
sudo apt-get install php-xdebug
-check this works OK in some phpinfo output in a web page


-in your browser, install the XdebugHelper extension/add on
-make sure in the extension's Preferences/Options, set the session key to the preset for Netbeans




Firefox view

Chromium view

-add these lines in the PHP ini file for Xdebug, e.g.
in /etc/php/7.3/apache2/conf.d/20-xdebug.ini:
xdebug.remote_enable=on
xdebug.idekey = netbeans-xdebug
xdebug.remote_host = localhost
xdebug.remote_port = 9000
xdebug.remote_handler = dbgp

You may also want to check your Apache php.ini file for output_buffering=off.

Restart Apache:
systemctl restart apache2

You might have to restart the browser and Netbeans to get this all going
In Netbeans, make sure your project's Properties has the PHP version as the right one (e.g. 7.3). Also the run configuration should be "Local web site (running on local web server" 
Add a breakpoint in a margin
Go to Debug >Debug Project
In browser, go to a page. Click the little extension bug icon, choose Debug

Refresh the page in the browser.

Go back to Netbeans.
-the code execution in the IDE should stop at the line, and highlight the breakpoint line green (with dark theme)
Push F5 / F8 to carry on execution