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jsomers / websockets.md
Created September 27, 2018 12:50
Using websockets to easily build GUIs for Python programs

Using websockets to easily build GUIs for Python programs

I recently built a small agent-based model using Python and wanted to visualize the model in action. But as much as Python is an ideal tool for scientific computation (numpy, scipy, matplotlib), it's not as good for dynamic visualization (pygame?).

You know what's a very mature and flexible tool for drawing graphics? The DOM! For simple graphics you can use HTML and CSS; for more complicated stuff you can use Canvas, SVG, or WebGL. There are countless frameworks, libraries, and tutorials to help you draw exactly what you need. In my case, this was the animation I wanted:

high-priority

(Each row represents a "worker" in my model, and each rectangle represents a "task.")