Tkinter – Key binding

Bind a key (any key)

import tkinter as tk


keyspressed = 0
def key():
    global keyspressed
    print(f"Pressed a key: {keyspressed} times")
    keyspressed += 1

root = tk.Tk()
root.bind("<Key>", lambda x: key())
label = tk.Label(root, text="Press a key and look at the console")
label.pack()
root.mainloop()

Press a particular key

root.bind("<c>", lambda x: key())

Press ctrl + a key

root.bind("<Control-c>", lambda x: key())

Select an item in the listbox

def sel():
    print("An item has been selected")

listbox = tk.Listbox(root)
listbox.pack()
listbox.bind("<<ListboxSelect>>", lambda x: sel())

Double click on an item in a listbox

def double_clicked():
    print("An item has been double clicked")

listbox = tk.Listbox(root)
listbox.pack()
listbox.bind("<Double-Button>", lambda x: double_clicked())

 

Key binding with tkinter

In another post we’ve yet seen how to bind the click of a mouse(<Button-1>) to intercept the user action and make the computer do something. We also tryied to apply the code to an example of a little game.

Now we want to see another example, but with the use of Key (<Key>) binding.

A basic example of Key binding

This example show you how is the syntax to bind a key event and how we can grab the key pressed showing it to the console. In the next video we will add some code to make a more complex example of its possible use.

Video number 2

In this video we will see the char pressed in a label.

Video nr. 3

In the following video, pressing “a” the width of the frame will shrink.

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