Cross-Platform Python Notification Library

Question

I'm making a python script that should run in the background and notify a user of changes, and I'd quite like it to work cross-platform. Main problem is, I don't have access to a mac at all, so coding specifically for it could be very difficult. wxPython seems like massive overkill for simple popups, so is there anything with a lighter footprint?

Answer 1

Does Python on Windows and Mac also ship with Tk wrappers? If so, you might be able to roll your own notification box. I do not think they have a dead-simple notification API (ie you pass it a string and a cute box pops up for 5 seconds) however at least you will only have one codebase to maintain.

I am thinking about other cross-platform apps such as Skype, Dropbox, and Thunderbird. Skype and Thunderbird seem to have rolled their own, and Dropbox went the platform-specific route.

Answer 2

Adobe Wave is a cross-platform notification framework however I have not used it and I do not believe it is a desktop-oriented deal, but rather something for rich Internet Apps and plugging into web sites. Still, it's some sort of cross-platform notification so possibly worth a look-see.

That reminds me, you may be able to find an AIR notification system out there that you could somehow trigger from Python. Mono with GTK# comes to mind as it supports the three major desktop platforms. See this GtkSharpNotification example perhaps.

Finally, for my third strike, maybe a cross-platform GUI toolkit like wxWidgets has the widget you need.

Answer 3

Seems like one way to go would be something like Growl/GNTP. Have you looked at python's gntp library ?